Back to (pre) school must haves

1 - A back to school tutorial.
Starting school can be a little nerve wracking for kids. What are they going to do all day? What are they supposed to know? And what do they do if they need to pee? LeapFrog to the rescue on this one. They've created a delightful little DVD all about starting school. In Let's Go To School Tad and Lilly get to know all the characters that populate a child's first day of school; taking all the scary out of the big event. On the way they practice counting and the alphabet as well as a few other key pre-school notions.
Even younger siblings will get a kick out of this video, and maybe a few early pointers!

2 - Good hand sanitizer.
This is the season of the swine flu. And even if it weren't? It would be the season of some other dread contagious something or other. Hand sanitizer is key for a kid's health and a mom's sanity. Only, I don't know about you, but I'm not a huge fan of the alcohol based stuff.
This year I'm packing some Aloe Up. Alcohol free. Foam. Clean smelling. Not sticky. And pretty darn effective. Not the easiest stuff to find, but you can buy it online here. And if you have any questions about it, follow them on Twitter!

3 - Magnetic letters for your fridge!
If your preschooler is anything like mine, everything is about words these days. Words and letters! We have these fabulous letters on our fridge and both girls love to play with them to create words. (They don't all make sense, but at least they know their alphabet!)
You're in luck, because these letters are on their once annual buy-one-get-one-free sale. Click here for the lower case letters and here for the upper case letters. Don't wait, the sale ends at the end of the week!

4 - Healthy eats!
Growing kids need good wholesome food. Even more so when they've been working hard at school. Warner Bros. and Safeway have teamed up to create a great line of food to help you feed your children well. The more than 60 items (that cross 18 categories!) were formulated to standards based on the most recent dietary recommendations and regulations from several federal and state agencies.
The Eating Right Kids line covers pretty much everything from fun shaped pasta (bugs!) to chicken nuggets, juice, snack bars, carrots and ranch, fruit in a cup, and even chocolate pudding. They'll help you make wholesome meals at home and pack great snacks and lunches for school.
Look for the cheery green logo and fun Warner Bros. characters on the packages while you shop at your local Safeway.

5 - Great organization for the whole family.
Are you always scrambling to remember what you have planned on any given day? Does your spouse's eyes roll in response to the 15th reminder about back-to-school night? Do you wish you had one central place to keep your shopping lists, menu plans, family photos, calendar, reminders, and every other little thing that you need to keep your family on track?
Meet Cozi. It's free. It's awesome. It's easy to set up. It even comes with a killer screen-saver for your computer. But most importantly, it'll change your life this year. Trust me. Check it out. Sign up. And enjoy the freedom that organization brings.

It might take more than videos, clean hands, letters, great food, and good organization to survive the school year, but it's as good a start as any. What are your back to (pre)school must haves?

Eager Mind Letter Magnets - Review & Giveaway

"Mommy? What does M T L say?"

The question is the same she has uttered a million times already, the combination of letters always different. Once in a while she inadvertently spells a real word (or its homonym) and her delight is palpable.

C knows her letters, all the capitals and most of the lower case ones. She knows that they come together to create words. She just doesn't quite yet know how to string them together to get to those words, but she can't wait to learn.

Here to help her in her endeavors are the adorable letter magnets created by Eager Mind. These cool little rectangular magnets feature a letter and a picture with a word that starts with the letter. What sets them out from the magnetic letter pack is that each contains images that represent both the short and the long vowel sounds - A is for anchor and A is for alien. To make the sets even more entertaining, no images are repeated, so kids learn that there are lots of different ways each letter can be used.

The instant we tore into the lowercase and the uppercase packages both girls had a blast sticking the letters on our refrigerator and stainless steel oven. They assembled plenty of nonsense words and tolerated my attempts at getting them to read simple two or three letter words. Weeks later we're still playing with the letters regularly.

Eager Mind Magnetic Letter Pros:

- The quality of these letters is quite impressive. The ones that have found their way into Little L's mouth have survived nicely. They're thick enough for little fingers to grasp.
- Each set comes with the regular 26 letters plus an extra four consonants and the 5 long vowel sounds. Combine the lower case set with the upper case set and you have plenty of letters to create many fun words.
- The pictures are cute and funny, but easily identifiable.
- Very affordable! Each set retails for $8.95. At that price if your child feels limited by the number of letters you could easily expand each set.

Eager Mind Magnetic Letter Cons:

- For most kids there's a gap between knowing letters and being able to combine them into words. This set doesn't really address that gap meaning that once the child has mastered letter recognition he might lose interest in the letters until he becomes interested in stringing words together.

Eager Mind Magnetic Letter Giveaway:

I have not one, not two, but THREE sets of letters to giveaway to you my faithful readers!

To enter:
1) Leave a comment telling me which child in your life would most enjoy these letters.
2) Visit the Eager Mind website's cool letter writing practice worksheet page and let me know if you download any.
3) Subscribe to this blog's feed. Leave a comment telling me you subscribed.
4) Subscribe to my other blog's feed. Leave a comment telling me you subscribed.
5) Tweet, email, blog about this giveaway.

That's a grand total of 7 ways you can enter! Please remember to leave me a way to contact you. And please, please, please, leave a separate comment for each of your entries. I can't credit you for each of them if you don't.

Giveaway ends Friday, July 3, 2009 at 10pm PST.

I received an set of Eager Mind magnetic letters for review, but I was in other no way compensated for this giveaway. All opinions included in this post are mine and mine alone.

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Great Crayola Spring Giveaway Winner!

Drum roll please....

The winner of the Great Crayola Spring Giveaway Winner is...... which translates to Summer!

Congratulations Summer! I hope you have a blast with all the Crayola goodness!

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Spud Bunny - Review and Giveaway

Once there was a potato Bunny. He had big floppy ears and adorable bunny slipper shoes, but he was a lonely bunny. All his other spud friends sported simple round ears and big toothy smiles. He always felt out of place around them.

Then, one day, much to his utter delight, he met another Spud bunny. A girl Spud Bunny. She had big floppy ears, two perfect front teeth, and even better, she had the same bunny slippers as him.

It was love at first sight.

They lived happily ever after.

And even had a little spud, who, for some odd reason
didn't share his parents endearing characteristics,
but he was cute enough. So it was all OK.

Spud Bunny Pros:
- Spud Bunny is part of the Mr Potato Head family, he's just got slightly longer ears and teeth than his regular spud buddies. What that means is that all his parts are interchangeable with all your other Mr Potato Head parts, which can lead to some pretty fun characters!

Spud Bunny Cons:
- Just like the Easter Bunny, Spud Bunny only comes once a year, so snap him up quick or you'll have to wait another year.

Spud Bunny Giveaway:
I have one adorable Spud Bunny to give away to a lucky Lemonade Stand reader!

To enter:
1) Visit the Hasbro Mr. Potato Head page. Tell me which is your favorite Spud.
2) Leave a comment letting me know about your own or your child's Mr. Potato Head memories.
3) Check out the fun Hasbro games and let me know which one you might try with your child.
4) Subscribe to this blog's feed. Leave a comment telling me you subscribed.
5) Subscribe to my other blog's feed. Leave a comment telling me you subscribed.
6) Tweet, email, blog about this giveaway.

That's a grand total of 8 ways you can enter! Please remember to leave me a way to contact you. And please, please, please, leave a separate comment for each of your entries. I can't credit you for each of them if you don't.

Giveaway ends Tuesday, April 14, 2009 at 10pm PST. This giveaway is officially closed! Thank you for stopping by. Make sure to check out all my other great giveaways!

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Higher Higher & Happy Baby Sad Baby - Reviews of the Leslie Patricelli books

You all know how much we love books around here, so you won't be surprised to learn that we've found more books that we love. Until I received two Leslie Patricelli books I can't say I'd ever noticed her books on shelves before, now I'm resisting the urge to go out and buy the whole collection.

Baby Happy Baby Sad is a simple board book showing the roller-coaster of emotions that babies confront every day. Happy to have ice cream! Sad when you drop it! Sad when you slip! Happy again when mommy picks you up!

Little L is just learning to pick up on emotional cues and she loves to flip through the pages pointing out the sad babies. She always asks "Why cwayin?" Then we talk about why the baby is sad and what makes him happy again. Suggested price $6.99.

Higher! Higher! is just as simple, but with paper pages instead. Gorgeous pictures show the simple tale of a quasi-magical ride through the air on the upswing of a slide. C loves to pretend that she's the little girl flying so high, and Little L just gets a kick out of reading the story to herself and noticing all the little details on the page - the cat in the window of the skyscraper, the doggy at the window of the plane. Suggested price $15.99, but on "just released" sale at Amazon right now.

Baby Happy Baby Sad & Higher! Higher! pros:
- Gorgeous images that look like they've been painted on canvas before being turned into whimsical books.
- Sweet characters that any child could easily relate to.
- Very simple and effective story lines that babies and young children never tire of hearing over and over again.

Baby Happy Baby Sad & Higher! Higher! cons:
- Well, the only con here, and I'd like to point out that M is the only one with this issue, the stories are very repetitive and simple. He gets tired of repeating the same words over and over again. I disagree. I think the simplicity of the words is what makes these books so much fun!

Clearly C and Little L agree with me!

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Amazing Baby Books - Review & Giveaway

It's no secret that around here we love books. Especially adorable little board books with fun cutouts. The Silver Dolphin Amazing Baby books are no exception.

I was fortunate enough to be asked to review Five Little Ducks!
and Rainbow Fun! Both of which have become instant favorites in our home.

Five Little Ducks! is a cute little story that every mom can relate to on some level. A mama calls and her little ducks don't always come back. Each page one more duck goes missing. Of course at the end they all come back, safe and sound, much to everyone's delight.
This book is great for budding little counters. Each page represents a number and multiple opportunities to count it - flowers, ducks, cutouts! The last page features all the little ducklings and a fuzzy worried mama that toddlers can pat for comfort.
Budding readers will appreciate the simple text and the fact that the relevant numbers are bolded for easy spotting.

Rainbow Fun! focuses on teaching children the colors of the rainbow. (OK, if we're going to be picky, the book explores primary and secondary colors rather than the actual colors of the rainbow since it uses the words blue and purple instead of indigo and violet, but whatever.) Each page features a different color and sweet little characters that will keep your child entertained. The last page rewards you with a sparkling rainbow and all the friends that you've made along the way.
Once again, budding readers will be able to easily spot the bolded names of the colors.

Amazing Baby Books Pros:
- Bright, colorful, chunky little board books that are sure to find a welcome home on your shelf.
- At $5.95 per book these are more affordable than many board books on the market.
- Educational books that will grow with your child and entertain toddlers and preschoolers both.

Amazing Baby Books Cons:
-Five Little Ducks! brought out the panicky mommy in me. Why are these duckies disappearing without anyone going out after them? In the end everything is fine, but it does make you wonder who cared for them while they were gone. (I might need to get out more. That's entirely possible.)
-Rainbow Fun! doesn't have a running story, each page can stand alone, so it's not a given that your child will sit through the whole book. But, then again, what ever guarantees that a toddler will listen to the end of a story?

In conclusion, next time you're looking for a sweet little board book as a gift or for your own little one you should definitely snap these guys up!

Amazing Baby Books Giveaway:
Thanks to the generosity of Silver Dolphin Books, one lucky The Lemonade Stand reader will win both of these books!

To win:
- Visit the Silver Dolphin Book site and browse around. Come back and leave a comment letting us know which book caught your eye.

- OR leave a comment telling us which is your child's favorite book this week.

- For extra entries Tweet, blog, or email your friends about this giveaway. Then come back and leave a comment telling us what you did.

- Sign up for this blog's feed or It's my life...'s blog feed. Then come back and leave a comment telling us what you did.

Don't forget to make sure to leave an email or a way for me to contact you!

Contest will run until Wednesday, March 4 at 10pm PST. Winner will be announced on Thursday, March 5. This contest is now closed. Stay tuned for more great opportunities!

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Didi & Ditto Preschool - Mother Nature's Visit - Computer Game Review

In a house where laptops and computers abound, it wasn't shocking that C would one day beg to play computer games. It started as a plea to play online Disney and Sesame Street games and it escalated to the games she saw advertised in the Christmas catalogs.

Luckily for me, just as I was about to lose the fight, the wonderful people at Kutoka Interactive emailed me and asked me if we'd be willing to test their new preschool game. I jumped at the chance.

Of course then we got bronchitis, and the flu, and every other ailment under the sun, so it was a while before we broke out the box and popped in the CD. Then I kicked myself that we hadn't done it sooner because it would have a been a great distraction while we were all so sick. But you know, hindsight 20/20 and all that.

Didi & Ditto Preschool - Mother Nature's Visit is a hit as far as computer games go. The graphics are awesome, the characters are endearing, and the learning is top notch. C is obsessed and M, the designated grown-up player, swears that the game isn't annoying for adults. In fact, this afternoon C was playing nicely by herself and he couldn't stay away.

Didi & Ditto Preschool Pros:
- The game has amazing graphics and animation as well as adorable cartoon characters.
- The games and puzzles start out easy and gradually get harder as the child learns and progresses. Each activity builds on the previous ones, creating learning in a way that mimics preschool classroom learning.
- Cute music and catchy victory tune. C loves reaching the victory tune stage, she sings along every time!
- Great learning! Provides a place to work on problem solving skills, letter recognition, and puzzle solving.
- Boys and girls can choose to play as either Didi, the girl, or Ditto, the boy, great for preschoolers who are all about gender differences!

Didi & Ditto Preschool Cons:
- M has found that after a while the memory games become a bit repetitive and predictable. C doesn't agree.
- Like many games, the CD has to be in the computer to play the game. There's no way to download the entire game to the computer.

In conclusion, Didi & Ditto Preschool is an amazing game and at $19.99 on the Kutoka site or $25.99 on Amazon it's a great deal!

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Kid Kleen Bath Blizzard Review

My kids love bubbles. I mean, duh, right, what kid doesn't? So a while back when we discovered a bubble blower specifically designed for the tub we got very excited. It was terrible. Stopped working after two days.

So when we got the Kid Kleen Bath Blizzard we were a bit skeptical. What were the odds that this bath bubble blower would be any better? I pulled it out of the box and I put in batteries and dumped a ton of bubble solution into it, which gave us so so results. Then I read the instructions and I took out all the bubble solution, rinsed out the machine, followed the instructions, and presto! an avalanche of bubbles, just like the box promised!

Bath Blizzard Pros
- It was actually pretty cool. The bubbles poured out and filled the tub with a rich lather.
- The girls thought the avalanche was pretty.
- The bubble solution, when diluted properly, lasts a really long time.
- It's pretty quiet.
- And miracles of all miracles, after multiple uses the bubble blower is still going strong.

Bath Blizzard Cons
- This is my fault because I didn't read the box closely enough, but I was hoping for more bubbles flying through the air rather than cascading down into the tub.
- It is not the most exciting toy in the world and I can see how my kids would quickly lose their awe.

All in all a pretty neat toy that I would especially recommend for the younger set while they're still easily mesmerized by bubbles of any kind.