I again ordered from this awesome company, and really, I can’t get over how great they are.  I placed on order on Tuesday afternoon to get thank you cards for Will’s birthday (I know, a tad late, but better late than never).  First, there was so much to pick from it was hard to decide. Once I picked a card, I was even able to pick how many photos I wanted in there and what way they were facing (landscape or portrait). I only wanted three photos, and I even had a couple of choices from there. Now, if i was in the pictures, I would have wanted to take a little Orovo detox first. However, it was just him, so it turned out super cute. Including shipping, I paid less than $20 for custom thank you cards. How can you go wrong with that?  It took me about 15 minutes to design my cards, and they were ready for pickup at my local CVS Thursday afternoon.  A Tuesday to Thursday turnaround in awesome!

I would highly recommend Kodak Gallery to anyone looking to make some custom cards.  They even have custom gifts that you can do too!  The prices are right, the quality is excellent, and the turnaround can’t be beat.  Here’s a sneak peak at the card we did:

Pretty awesome is all I have to say.

Charlie the Can-do Choo-choo! is one of those books that you have to buy for all the little boys that you know.  Will got it for his birthday, and it is one of the coolest books I have seen for a long time.  Charlie the Can-do Choo-choo! is about having optimism and knowing that you can do whatever you set your mind too.  The part that impressed me was that this book is not like a normal book.  The book opens up like a train on the tracks. On one side, you have the story;  on the other side, you have pictures and lights.  When you press the train’s nose, the train lights up throughout the book.  Both  my 4 year old and my 1 year love to play with this book.  I have never seen two kids have so much fun with a book before!

Did you know that the stamp rate increased today? I had to mail the invitations for Will’s birthday party out, and I didn’t have any forever stamps. Instead, I had a bunch of 41 cent stamps. Nowadays though, I think the Forever Stamp is really your best buy. Why? Once you buy a Forever Stamp, you can always use it even if the rates go up.  I didn’t buy these the last time I needed stamps, so I got to spend my afternoon with two kids in the post office buying penny stamps.  What a waste of time!  Needless to say, I bought 100 Forever Stamps!

Bill and I caught 28 Weeks Later last night. This is definitely not a movie to watch when your kids are up. I have to admit that this was one of the better horror flicks I have ever seen. Being a horror flick, you do have to give up some of the logic of the real world. This is the sequel to the movie 28 Days. The plot is pretty limited, but the gore is definitely intense. The basic plotline is that zombies (which are humans infected with a virus that makes them go insane and violent and want to eat other humans’ flesh) are basically going around infecting everyone. You know how you sometimes see people go a little crazy when they are in drug rehabilitation and their bodies are going through withdrawal? This is ten times worse. The story is about the children of a couple who are trying to get out of the infected zone before the military kills them (the military is trying to stop the spread of the disease by methods of extermination). It is a gory movie. All in all, even though the plot is very thin (but aren’t most horror films?), it is a great movie. The ending sucked though. If you have seen this, let me know, because Bill and I disagree on the significance of the ending. Without stating too much and giving it away, I think they ended it the way they did, so they can have another sequel. However, I personally like my story to have an happily ever after ending whenever possible, and you really don’t know if that’s what happened here.

Since Will’s first birthday is coming up soon (June 7th to be exact), I am already on the lookout for birthday party invitations. I don’t have the creativity I once had and have been on the lookout for cute things I can do. Izzyprints your one stop shop for both birthday invitations and birth announcements.  This site has so many cute invitations it is super hard to decide which one I should go for.  The site is super easy to navigate and you can easily find what you are looking for.  They also have holiday and thank you cards if you are looking for those.  Their prices are in line with other sites.  Processing takes 2-3 days and you get to choose your shipping method.  I love that you can preview the changes you make anytime you want too.  They also let you order a couple extra envelopes in case you mess up!  You are able to order invitations in lots of 25.  If you are in need of invitations, check out Izzyprints.com.

Another toy that you must get if you have kids is the Laugh & Learn: Learning Home. This came out several years ago, but is a huge hit at my house. There is just so much to play on with this! The door open and shuts and allows your children to crawl through it. The light turns on and off. There is a mail box slot and the flower spins. The window opens and closes. Up on top, you can turn the thing with the moon on it, so it shows the sun. Of course, there is a corresponding noise with all these actions. On the other side (which this picture doesn’t show), there is a little mini radio for the kids to play with. It has 4 stations and the kids can hit that and hear just music or it singing the ABCs to them. I don’t know how this all works (maybe HDMI switches?) However, the kids love it, so it doesn’t matter. At this point at ten months, Will is really not sure what to do with this. He does play with it a little. Madison, however, is in seventh heaven. I don’t think she remembers playing with it, and she played with it a lot. At 4, she is enjoying this.

This is one of the more pricier toys to get your kids. However, it is another toy that is worth every cent, because they will play with it for years!

I was always a person who did not think there was a real difference between HDTV and regular TV. I figured the store just had a way to make it look better in the store, but it really wasn’t so. However, I will admit I was wrong. When we were in Arizona, our room had a Plasma TV with HD, and I could immediately tell the difference. When we came home, I realized how small and outdated our TV really was.

That being said, there are many sites out there that will help you navigate through the maze of all the HD products out there. Now, that we are coming up on March Madness, you need to look at site like Retrevo to help you decide which product will help you not miss a thing with these sports broadcasts. It starts with basketball, and then there will be baseball, and then football.