Even wonder what life is like on other planets?  Planet 51 answers that question for us!  American astronaut Chuck Baker (Dwayne Johnson) lands on a planet that is suppose to be lifeless.  Instead, Planet 51 is home to aliens (which oddly enough looks like 1950s America).  To make matters worse, the aliens think he is an alien and that there is going to be invasion.  Lem (Justin Long) is the only one who believes Chuck comes in peace and helps him get back to his ship.

Since I know my readers love a great kids movie, I have arranged to give away one copy of Planet 51.  Here’s what you need to leave a comment telling me:

What is your favorite kids movie and why?

Each of these gives you one additional entry:
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Win a copy of Planet 51 from @blm03 http://su.pr/25157y

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If this isn’t working, please let me know. For some reason, Wordpress seems to be eating the code up when I post.

Each of these will give you 10 additional entries:

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This contest will end March 25th at noon CST! Good Luck!

How many times do you walk around your cluttered house and want to scream “It’s all too much!”? Be honest, we’ve all been there.  Have no fear though — Peter Walsh is to the rescue.  It’s All Too Much! is a full length DVD with more than an hour of tips, techniques and encouragement that will help you declutter every room of your home once and for all.  One of my personal goals this year to be more uncluttered, and Peter Walsh definitely has a lot of great ideas to make that happen.  I’ve actually incorporated a lot of his ideas already.  One of his tips that I have to do a better job with is making sure that all flat surfaces should remain empty and clutter free.  If I could stick to that, my kitchen would always be clean!  Peter, you need to see my lack of kitchen counter space and cupboards and help me!  In the meantime, I’m just going to try and keep them clean.  We recently bought a 4 drawer file cabinet, and that seems to be helping a lot.  We reorganized my closet and Madison’s closet too by adding shelves which has helped a lot too.

If you need to unclutter your house and your life, you need to watch this DVD.  Not only does Peter have great ideas and tips, he even has a way to include your whole family in decluttering your life!

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/2

Extraordinary Measures releases in the theaters on January 22nd. Bill and I were lucky enough to be invited to a special viewing last night.  I’m going to start off this review by stating that there may be spoilers in this review!

I researched this movie before we went, because I didn’t want to go to a movie where two kids die.  I’m glad to say that they don’t (and in real life, they are actually still alive).  The synopsis of the movie is this:

“Extraordinary Measures” is inspired by the true story of John Crowley, a man who defied conventional wisdom and great odds, and risked his family’s future to pursue a cure for his children’s life threatening disease. From his working class roots, John Crowley (Brendan Fraser) has finally begun to taste success in corporate America. Supported by his beautiful wife Aileen (Keri Russell) and their three children, John is on the fast track. But just as his career is taking off, Crowley walks away from it all when his two youngest children, Megan and Patrick, are diagnosed with a fatal disease. With Aileen by his side, harnessing all of his skill and determination, Crowley teams up with a brilliant, but unappreciated and unconventional scientist, Dr. Robert Stonehill. (Harrison Ford) Together they form a bio-tech company focused on developing a life-saving drug. One driven to prove himself and his theories, the other by a chance to save his children, this unlikely alliance eventually develops into mutual respect as they battle the medical and business establishments in a fight against the system – and time.

What did I walk away with from this movie? That one person can change the world. If Crowley didn’t fight the world for his children, this drug that saved his childrens’ lives would not be around for them or others with Pompe Disease.  Even knowing how the movie would eventually end, I still was riveted by what I was seeing on the screen.  Extraordinary Measures is one of the best movies I have seen in a long time.

The kids were 6 and 8 in the movie.  My kids are 2 and 6, so Bill and I definitely drew some parallels in our life.  We know what it is like to deal with doctors who don’t know how to treat your children to make them better (Madison has a genetic condition that makes her extremely ill when she’s got the flu).  The other reason I think the movie really touched us is that the little girl, Megan, reminded us soo much of Madison.  Her fiesty determination is Madison to a tee.  Bill thought she kinda looked like her too.  Without making the movie too sad or sappy, they were able to tell the story.  I can’t tell you how many times during the movie I felt my heart breaking in my chest.  Bill agreed it was a tearjerker and that even he teared up a few times.  Seriously, the movie is that good.

Extraordinary Measures is the first movie I’ve went to that people started clapping before the end of the movie.  As soon as we realized that the drug Dr. Stonehill was working, the audience erupted with applause that continued till the end of the movie.  That is how moving this film is.

It’s amazing what a parent will do for their children.  I know I’d move heaven and earth and that is exactly what Crowley did.  He beat the odds and played the drug companies games.  It’s amazing the hoops he had to jump through to make this happen.  It truly makes you realize you can change the world.  Though a tear jerker, it’s ended as a very uplifting movie.

Few movies are worth movie admission nowadays (its $10 a person here), but I’d gladly pay more than that to see this movie again.

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/2

When Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs came out in the theaters, Madison’s aunt had taken her to the movies to see it.  She loved it!  This is one of the few movies she’s actually been able to tell us everything that happened.  I was disappointed that this movie wasn’t out for Christmas, but ecstatic when I found out this would be released January 5th!  (This is 2 days before her birthday).  Haven’t heard of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs yet?  You can see the movie trailer here.

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs is about a boy wants to live his dream to be an inventor.  When this boy’s (now a man), latest contraption accidentally destroys the town square and rockets up into the clouds, he thinks his inventing career is over.  Then something amazing happens to Flint Lockwood (Bill Hader) as delicious cheeseburgers start raining from the sky. His machine actually works! However, everybody starts getting more and more greedy, it causes the food machine to go crazy.  Spaghetti tornadoes and giant meatballs threaten the world!  Now, if you want to know how it ends, you’ll have to watch the movie. 

We were able to watch a copy of this DVD, and I have to admit that I think I like Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs just as much as Madison.  It has a catchy story and nobody breaks out in song.  It has some great lessons in it — the best of which has to be “be true to yourself”.  I gladly sat through watching it a second time in a row, because my kids wanted too.  (On a funny side note, Will loved naming off all the food he saw that he knows the words for.  For a kid in speech therapy, it was kinda cool to watch).

With Madison in school now, I like being able to give her the tools to succeed.  That is why I like to see video’s like Munchkin Math’s telling time.  Now, the ages on this is 2 – 9.  However, my two year old ran in and out of the room while we watched it.  However, Madison (who is five) was memorized by it.  She got up and sang the songs with the movie and did the hand movements with the video.  I even found her learning to tell time with the video.  She did pretty well with the hour times, but was a little confused when it wasn’t exactly on the hour.  However, a few more views of the video should solve that problem!

I would definitely invest in Munchkin Math’s other DVD titles like Counting Money.  Madison really like this video, and I liked to see her learning.

I wrote this review while participating in a blog campaign by Mom Central on behalf of Munchkin Math and received a sample DVD to facilitate my candid review. Mom Central sent me a gift card to thank me for taking the time to participate.