kids – Page 5 – Luv Saving Money

Zubels Petit Pomme Dress Review

I received the below mentioned dress at no cost in order to complete an honest review. Any opinions expressed are my own.

I love dressing my little ones. Babies and toddlers, they really don’t care what they wear as long as their comfortable. As a mom though, I want my little ones to be comfortable and look cute in their little outfits. Ok so babies and toddlers are cute no matter what but don’t you just love seeing the little outfits that you buy on them. You don’t even need to spend a lot of money.

I LOVE the smock style clothes So many cute colors, styles, and possibilities. Zubels has their own line of cute smock style clothing called Petit Pomme. I was pouring over all the super cute styles for the little ones. I was thinking, “oh I’d love to get my daughter this one and that one…” I had an opportunity to review a dress for my daughter called the Three Bunny Blue Dress.

The material of the dress is 60% cotton and 40% polyester. It felt soft and was a billowy dress. I had bought a size bigger. My daughter is currently in 24 months but some 2T clothing so I went ahead and requested the dress in size 2T. It was a bit long but that’s ok. I’m one that would rather clothes be a little too big than too small to ensure my children will get some wear out of it. I couldn’t wait to put this dress on her.

Normally my daughter is quite the little ham bone when I take the camera out but this time she wasn’t feeling the pictures. But I still got some pretty cute shots of her in the dress considering.

She looked so cute in her Petit Pomme dress. I followed my daughter around the house like the momarazzi trying to get pics of her. She was not having it. I got one more shot of her settled into my husband’s recliner. I totally missed a super cute picture of her coming down the stairs holding a teddy bear.

This will be the perfect dress for spring Easter egg hunts, visits with the Easter bunny, or anything spring really. Check out Petit Pomme for the super cute clothes for both boys and girls – infant to toddler size 4. My only cons for this dress is that the first day she wore it one of the buttons on the back fell off but buttons are easy to fix so I did. Also the dress is made in the Philippines, for me I like buying American made when possible. The rest of the stitching seemed to be done well, the embroidery on the dress was cute.

You can find Zubels on the following social sites:

Twitter: @Zubelskids

Facebook: facebook.com/Zubels

Instagram: @zubels

Pinterest: pinterest.com/Zubelkids

Real Bug Dig Kit Review

I received the below mentioned product at no cost in order to complete an honest review. Any opinions expressed are my own.

This time of year in Pennsylvania, it’s cold. When I say cold I mean last night windchill factors were -21 in my area. Not really weather you want to encourage your kids to go out in play in. As you might expect, they can get bored. 3 boys and a toddler in the house. I try to have things on hand to keep their attention without using electronics. I had a great experience with Dr. Cool’s science kits in the past so when I was asked to review their Insect Excavation kit, I couldn’t pass it up.

I love the Discover with Dr Cool kits because they come with just about everything you need, not too many parts, and have much to offer for many ages. The Real Bug Dig Kit includes a digging tool, brush, magnifying glass, an insect guide booklet full of interesting bug info, an activity booklets, and a big plaster beetle that your kids will chip into to find 3 real bugs encased in acrylic. My boys bugged me for a few days after we received the kit. They couldn’t wait to try it out. My kids are aged 12, 11, 5, and 2 years.

We cleared a spot on our island. They recommend laying down newspaper which is a good idea. There will be chips and some plaster dust all over your work surface but it’s an easy clean up if you use newspaper. The kids each took turns chipping away at the plaster beetle. They had so much fun with it.

They were so excited to when they started uncovering a bug. I didn’t tell them what bugs were included in the kit so there was an element of surprise when they pulled them out to see what they were. We looked them up in the bug guide pamphlet. The boys were genuinely interested in the information on each bug that was included. There is even additional bug info on bugs not in the kit that my boys wanted to read about.

My youngest child is 2. She stood by watching on a step stool and wanted to be included. I gave her the brush that came with the kit and let her help my cleaning off the bugs we found. She was happy to do it.

This kit took some time to do. It’s not something that they’ll be done with in 5 minutes. Even with all the kids taking turns it took us about 45 minutes to complete the kit. My youngest son was enjoying chipping away at the plaster digging beetle even after all the bugs were discovered. This was a great kit. Would make a fantastic gift too. I know my kids have been engaged with both Dr Cool kits we’ve tried and I know they’d love to try even more.

You can also go check out my, Discover with Dr Cool Pan for Gold Kit review here.

You can see all the Discover with Dr Cool Science kits available on their website: discoverwithdrcool.com

You can find Discover with Dr Cool on the following social media sites:

Twitter: @DiscoverDrCool

Facebook: facebook.com/pages/Discover-with-Dr-Cool/224760197591551

Need Local Family Friendly Ideas? Check Out Yuggler

This post is sponsored by Yuggler. Any opinions expressed are my own.

Are your kids on a winter break? My kids have 12 days off for holiday break. Sure they’ll be entertained with their new toys and things for most of the break, undoubtedly I’m going to hear “mom I’m bored there’s nothing to do” Trying to think of ideas in the winter time is hard for me. I’m not a big fan of the cold. Things like tubing is nice except my daughter is too young too do that yet. Plus, it cost money to do that so it’s really a once in a while thing.

Need local family friendly ideas? Check out Yuggler. Yuggler is a cool free app for iPhone and iPad. You can find kids activities near you with the “Near Me” option. Find specific activities like “pumpkin patch” for instance to search for specific activities. There’s in a “Top Rated’ option so you can see the activities that are popular in your area.

Know of a cool place or activity that’s family friendly but is not on the map yet? You can add places to Yuggler so other families can find and enjoy. If someone else adds a new activity in your area you’ll get a notification about the new area. This could be a great way to discover things you didn’t even know existed in your area! I personally added a recreation park, my public library, our local mall, a kids’ fitness center, and a public playground near me but I can think of sooo many more I need to add. You even have the option to add “one time” activities like a local festival or circus comes to town, for instance.

Right now the app is for Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. Yuggler is Free to download on itunes. Just click any link in this post and it will take you right to the itunes download listing. You can also read more about the Yuggler app on their website Yuggler.com

You can also find Yuggler on the following social media sites:

Twitter: @YugglerFamily

Facebook: facebook.com/yuggler

Pinterest: pinterest.com/yuggler

Make Car Trips Learning Experiences

If you’re kids are like mine the last thing they want to hear is the words “educational” or “learning” when we’re going on a day trip or vacation. So it’s up to mom and dad to keep their minds going. It does have to be boring. We love making up games on the way. The added bonus, it’s keeps the kids engaged and you hear less of “I’m bored” and “are we there yet?”.

For the little ones:

1. We like to play the color game. Especially with my 4 yr old son. Since he does well with recognizing colors, this is a fun game for him. You can do this a few different ways.

–Playing an I Spy type of game. Ask your child “I see something red, do you see something red?” They might say “that sign” or “that light” or “on that McDonald’s”

–Color search – You can say “find something blue” they might see a blue car, a blue sign, water, etc. Once everyone in the car found the current color, you can move onto another one. Let each person take a turn suggesting a color. Just a suggestion to stick with colors you might easily find to avoid frustration. Saying “find lime green” might be a lot harder than just finding “green”

2. Letter recognition. The alphabet game. My kids love this one. We make it through the alphabet and they want to start all over again. Start with the letter “A” and everyone in the car has to find the letter “A”. We set rules that you can’t use the same word in a sign. If it take more than 10 or 15 min you move onto the next letter to keep them engaged and cut down on frustration. Little ones might say “there’s an A in that sign” Where readers can say “there’s an “O” in Johnstown”

Johnstown sign — picture by Jeffrey Vos @ flickr.com

3. Number recognition — Works the same way as the alphabet game but with numbers. Best to stick with 1 through 10. You could use commonly found numbers on the road like 25, 35, 55, 65 (in speed limit signs) or you can try to beat each other with who can find the biggest number along the way. 65 or 75 might seem big at first with speed limits but maybe you run across a mega millions sign with 40 million on it or one of those billboards that say things like “we’ve helped over 10,000 people” etc.

For the Older ones:

Honestly my boys love the alphabet game I mentioned above but to give a little more challenge.

1. Observation skills — Ask them things like “We just passed a sign for Baltimore, how many miles did it say until we reach Baltimore?” or “We just passed an airport, did you see what the name of the airport was?” Whoever gets it right can ask the next question.

2. Plan ahead and you can have a really educational ride. Plan your route and take note of some of the towns and areas you’ll be driving through. You could type up a little quiz along the way. With questions like “What is the first town we drive through once we hit the Maryland border?” or “We’ll be driving past the state capital of Pennsylvania, what is the state capital?” or “What fruit is Georgia known for?” You can give them hints like “I think #7 on the list will be coming up soon”

3. License plate game – If your traveling state to state, there’s a good chance you’ll see license plates from a number of different states. You can have the kids write down the states they see or you can make a check off list ahead of time. As they find them you can add to it by quizzing them about the state capital, what the state is known for, or whatever might be relevant to the state.

4. If your kids have smartphones or tablets and are glued to them constantly you can quiz them on areas of your destination. Ask them “Name a museum in Philadelphia” They can use their smartphones or tablets to look them up. You can ask them harder things since they’ll have access to answers by searching. “What year was the state of Kentucky established?” “What is the name of the college in Columbia, SC?” etc.

I’d love to hear what fun and educational games you’ve come up with!

NFL logo bandz giveaway!–CLOSED

I don’t know if your kids are into the “shaped bands” collecting like mine are. The last couple weeks of school my two older boys came home talking about so and so had these bands and “look at the band so and so gave me” They look at them every time we go to the store. There have also been recent news articles about them possibly being banned in some schools because they were so distracting. One article about shaped band bans

Personally I don’t understand the big craze but, kids are still collecting these bands. Whether your’re a collector of these bands, your kids are collectors, or your a Steeler fan, this giveaway is for you. Today I happened into a local shop. I found “NFL Logo Bandz 20-packs” They had 3 Steelers packs left. I bought all three. I gave one to my 8 year old and 1 to my 6 years old. The baby is only a year old so too little for NFL Steeler Logo Bandz. So what should I do with the other pack? Oh I know…give my readers a chance to win it! You can buy them at www.nflshop.com but they are $9.99/pk plus shipping and Pittsburgh Steelers bandz are not available in the NFLshop online at this time.

The pack includes 20 bandz. 4 team logos, 4 wordmarks (it spells Steelers), 4 footballs, 4 helmets, and 4-6x (for the 6 super bowl wins)

I took some out of one of the boys packs to show you what they look like:

To enter to win

Mandatory entry: Follow my blog publicly and post a comment about who your favorite NFL team is. This must be completed before bonus entries are considered.

Bonus entries:

1. “Like” Free Stuff, Fun Sites, Contests and More on facebook using my facebook gadget in the right hand column. (+1)

2. Follow me on twitter (+1) : @LuvSavingMoney

3. Tweet this giveaway and leave a direct link to your tweet: ” I’m entering to win Steelers NFL Logo Bandz @LuvSavingMoney http://bit.ly/NFLSteelband Please RT” (+1) Can tweet twice a day.

4. Subscribe to my blog via RSS feed using Gadget in the right column. (+2)

5. Subscribe to Free Stuff, Fun Sites, Contests, and More via email in right hand column (+2)

This is not one of the upcoming giveaways I was talking about in a previous post. This is one I decided to do to thank my loyal readers. This giveaway was paid for by me. I was not contacted by this company, I was not given this product for free and I was not paid to do this post.

***Winner will be chosen from qualified entries using random.org on June 30 at 10pm EST ***