Well, this isn’t a review for you.  Instead, I have some great promo links.  I have started my Christmas shopping here already, and I want to pass on some of the great deals I have found around the web!

KBtoys.com: FREE Standard Shipping on Orders of $68 or More - Limited Time Offer (see details)

KBtoys.com: FREE Standard Shipping on Select Batman Movie Toys (ends 8.04)

KBtoys.com: Up to 50% off Select Plug & Play TV Games (ends 8.04)

KBtoys.com: Summer Sale! Up to 40% off Select Items (ends 8.04)

KBtoys.com: WWE Elimination Chamber Value Pack (see details, while supplies last)

Challenges of Life is a blog that has a little bit of everything.  I read posts about how to get your kids to eat vegetables and tips to applying makeup.  As you can tell, she covers all aross the board.  Normally, orange is not a color I like especially on a theme.  However, Challenges of Life pulls it off with style.  This blog has an awesome design.  You don’t have 40 million widgets blinking at you.  Everything just compliments each other.  Her blog theme is very pleasing to the eye, and her sidebars definitely do not take away from the post content.  Like I stated in my last review, the only thing I would change is that she needs an about page.  I like to read about the author of the blog.  It gives one a better understanding of why they write about what they do and gives another glimpse into their life.

Back in April, I wrote a review on the That Baby CD and DVD.  They both are still a huge hit in my house.  The part I love most about the songs that are on there is that they aren’t kid songs.  You won’t find yourself climbing the walls with some sing songy tunes.  These are covers written by some of the best artists of our time:  Fleetwood Mac, Paul Simon, Joni Mitchell, Natalie Merchant, The Beatles, and The Pretenders.  You will find yourself singing along with a lot of these songs.  This CD is played every time Will goes to bed (naptime or nighttime).  That is how great I think this is!

Now, they are sure you are going to love this DVD and CD.  If you don’t, they have a money back guarantee.  They also offer free replacement of scratched or damaged discs too.  (This is worth its weight in gold!).  For those of us who want to be enviromentally friendly, they are made in the US with recyclable materials.  If you do purchase them, free shipping and handling in the US (you all know how much I adore free shipping!)  Also, if you need it quickly for a baby shower or birthday that you forgot about, call them.  They will figure something out to get it to you in time!  How awesome is that customer service?

Now, I have kept in touch with the awesome company who makes these unique baby gifts, and the owner agreed to give away a copy of the That Baby DVD and CD away to one of my lucky readers!!!  This contest will be open to all my readers.  To quote the owner:  “Kids around the world need to rock, so we’re open to all of them!”  I am going to run it until the end of the month (July 31st) till 8 PM CST.  So what do you need to do to enter?

Each one of these give you one entry:

1. Leave a comment on this post. I want to know which song you think you’ll like the best.  You are able to actually listen snippets of each song right on That Baby DVD’s site (I’ve linked the page, so you can easily find it), so that should help you make your decision.  One comment only please and let me know everything you did for your entries in that comment.  If you do not leave which song in your comment, your entry will not count.
2. Stumble this post. If you don’t know what Stumble Upon is, please read Lori’s post at Blogging Cents. She explains it extremely well.
3. Vote for this post on other social media sites. One extra entry for each social media site you vote for this on.
3. Subscribe to this blog using either my email or RSS feed.

For 5 additional entries, blog about this on your blog or add it to any forums you belong too. Please give me the URL, so I can verify.

Good luck to all!

UPDATE:  The winner has been chosen for this giveaway.  However, if you use the coupon code LISASENTME, you can get 20% off your own copies!

Bill and I had went a saw Hellboy II:  The Golden Army on Friday night.  My goal is not to give out any spoilers with this review.  If you saw Hellboy and like it, you will love Hellboy II.  However, if you thought the first one was cheesy, you’ll think this one is too.  The story is that the the mythical world starts a rebellion against humanity in order to rule the Earth.  Hellboy and his team must stop them to save us. Obviously, some of these characters are going to have wanted to buy some term insurance on their lives, since they don’t make it out alive (don’t worry, I won’t tell you who!)  The plot was good.  However, it was pretty predictible.  I had guessed the ending half way through the movie (and yes, I had guessed it right).  There were a few twists and turns that I didn’t see coming.  The special effects were awesome.  The humor was great too.  After seeing this movie though, you’ll never think of the tooth fairy the same again (okay, one little sort of spoiler).  Personally, I would have waited to see this on video. However, my husband was glad we saw it in the theater.

If you are in need of web hosting, you definitely need to check out Web Hosting Geeks. They have the ten best hosting sites on the web on their site, and why they think they are the best. You are able to view monthly prices and any bonus features that the host offers. This site makes it extremely easy to compare apples to apples. I’m glad to see my host, Bluehost, tops their list off. I have to agree with their five star rating. I can only stress how much I love their support staff. The other thing I like is that you can also see customer reviews and you can even put your own review on here! I should put my own review on there. If you look along their sidebar, you are able to sort the hosts out by hosting awards and reviews too. I looked at the last ten reviews and found one on IPowerWeb, that made me giggle. To quote, “Nowadays, though, the new servers are SSLLOOWW… it’s as though they’re channeling Twitter or something.” Now, that makes me really not want to use their service, and that’s the beauty of this site — you are getting real people reviews.

If you need hosting, you should definitely check out Web Hosting Geeks before you decide.

As you all know, I love reviewing kids books and kids toys on here.  With having a 4 year old and a 1 year old, I have great product testers, and I really get to see how products hold up.  That being said, at my house, we have been playing with the Nana Star books and plushies, and we have a winner at my house.

Before I go to far into the books, I need to give you a little background on how Nana Star came about (and I got a little teary-eyed myself when I found this all out).  The authors of this series of books are Elizabeth Sills and Elena Patrice.  The illustrator is Linda Saker.  The original creator of Nana Star is Elizabeth Owens (Elizabeth and Elena’s grandmother and Linda’s mother).  She had a grandson named Vance  that she made up Moonman and Nana Star for.  When he moved away, she often sent him hand made cards with her characters, so he always knew she was with him.  Unfortunately, Vance now “dances with the stars“, but she has allowed us into her fantasy world, so our children can have that sense of belonging too.

The first thing I have to do is warn you. You need to read the Nana Star book first. Trust me, it all makes more sense if you do (**blush** won’t tell you how I figured that out). This is a truly entertaining book. Not only can I read it to my kids, there is a CD that comes with it.  When you listen to the CD, make sure you get comfortable.  They have really awesome background music behind the narrator.  There is also an additional song on there.  Madison was singing along after the first time listening to the songs.

The other really cool thing that they do with these books is that they have a Nana Star’s Little Twinkles Club.  On purpose, they have a spellling mistake in the book.  You are able to write them and tell them what the mistake was, and you can then join the Twinkles Club!  This is such a cute idea to engage their little readers.

The second book we read and listened to was Nana Star and the Moonman. Now, in the first book, we learned that a little star fell out of the sky was looking for her Nana. Now, the second book is the start of the journey the little girl (Nana Star) takes to help the little star get home. I truly can see this being an awesome series of books. As an adult, I’m wondering what happens next.  The other nice thing is that the CDs that come with the books are held by a pocket that is attached to the book.  You don’t have to worry about losing the CDs.

Now, I highly recommend these books.  Madison was engaged with them.  The thing I noticed and loved about the books themselves (besides the CD pocket) was that the paper is a thicker paper.  It does not rip easily which is a huge problem normally in my house.  You also get a bookmark with each book.  Amazingly, we don’t actually own any bookmarks, so it is a welcome addition in our house.  I also like that I am not the only one who thinks these products are great.  They have gotten numerous awards including Mr. Dad Seal of Approval and Great Dad Recommends Awards, Nominated by Mom’s Choice Award® for Most Inspirational Story, and iParenting Media Award for Excellent Products of 2007.

Not only did we try out the books, we even had some fun with the plushies that they offer.  Now, I’ll be honest, I didn’t quite know what to expect.  I really am not good with measurements and figuring out how big things really are.  However, this Moonman was quite a bit larger than I expected!

Now, if you push on Moonman’s belly, his head lights up and it plays a lullaby (which you can kinda tell with my picture of Will and Moonman).  Will likes walking around with him (and let me add that is kissing him not biting him in the second picture!).

Now, this Nana Star plushy is a huge hit with both kids.  Its cute, easy to carry, and even has bloomers on under the skirt (yes, I checked).  Madison immediately made the connection between the doll and the books.  She talks about Nana Star quite often now.  You can also tell that this is not a small doll either.

If you need a great children’s gift, this is the way to go.  The books are for 3-7 years olds and they have such a postivie message.  In some of the books to come, they will learn about good manners and courtesy, friendship and fun, and giving and sharing just to name a few.  Now, if you’d like to win a copy of these books and plushies for yourself, they are running an awesome contest.  All you need to do is comment on their Got Lemons post and tell a story about how you turned lemons into lemonade.  The best story they get by July 7th will win you a copy of the books and they will also donate a copy of the books to your favorite school, childcare center, library, children’s hospital, or doctor’s office.  How awesome is that?

I recently purchased the Web2Submitter to help me submit posts to social media sites. Not only do I submit posts for my work, I do many for my own sites and posts. I was finding that I was spending hours on this tedious task and absolutely hating it. Someone recommended that I check out the Web2Submitter, so I did.

One of the things that I liked best about this was that they don’t promise the world to you (you know that they aren’t full of it then!). This isn’t black hat at all. You aren’t going to be spamming sites. For me, this kind of stuff was my main concern. I looked at a lot of submitters that were a lot more money. However, they were involved in the type of SEO I am not interested it. I personally bill my time out at a minimum of $15 an hour or more. At $47, the Web2Submitter pays for itself after a couple of uses. I seriously cut my submission time down by more than half.

Now, I personally needed something easy. I don’t want to have to read a manual to figure out how to use something. Now, Web2Submitter does all the hard work for you. Here’s what the interface looks like:

It literally requires you to fill in the blanks and that is it. It does not get any easier than this. You are able to set it up so that all of your passwords are saved. You use the software to log into each site. You also fill in the blanks for the title, URL, tags, description, etc. When you go to submit to each site, it will automatically fill those in for you. Now, my only complaint with this software is that it doesn’t submit to enough sites. There are a couple I would love to see added on like Mixx and Thoof. However, I also love that I can use the URL bar up on top and go to the additional sites that I want to submit to. Instead of searching for the URL, description, title, etc. again, it is all listed to my left.

Now, I have contacted their support for some issues I was having (it ended up being an issue on my end not theirs). I figured they wouldn’t get back to me ever, and I had a response in less than 24 hours! Also, this is software for life — there is no monthly fees that you have to worry about or anything like that. There is also a 60 day money back guarantee. If this doesn’t live up to your standards, you can get your money back!

Honestly, I have saved countless hours using this. If you do any sort of submitting to social media sites, you need to get this and save yourself time and headaches.