I love what they do for me.

Once upon a time, a dad bought his 17-year-old daughter a car.  More specifically, my dad bought me a 1987 Toyota Camry station wagon. At the time it was only 8 years old, but had been kind of abused by it’s previous owner so it was in rough shape.  My dad nursed it back to health, and I named it Desmond.  Oh, how I loved him!

Desmond. Oh how I miss him!

He wasn’t the coolest looking car in the school parking lot, but he and I were total buddies. He got me through the rest of high school, all of college, and the early years of my marriage.  Many, many memories were made in Desmond.  Like when I was a freshman at Asbury College and wasn’t really supposed to have a car on campus and did and my friends talked me into sneaking out to town to Fazoli’s so we could all get 99 cent salads and all the breadsticks we could eat and avoid the college cafeteria for once!  Or when Bobby and I and my friend Lori drove him to the Cornerstone music festival SO packed full of a camping gear you had to use both feet on the brakes to stop him! Oh, those were the days!  When Desmond finally breathed his last in 2003, he had about 304,000 miles on him.  Bobby and I were actually pretty emotional about “putting him out to pasture” so to speak.

So we bought this:
the wagon

Our current Camry wagon, a 1992 (fully-loaded with SUNROOF thankyouverymuch! AND power windows, ahem, Emily)  that even has the third pop-up seat in the back.  That’s right, it seats SEVEN baby, SEVEN!  It’s great for trips and for hauling Bobby’s sailboats in the summer.  It’s really Bobby’s car so it doesn’t have a name (only chicks name their cars, right?) but we love this car to pieces.  It has been SO dependable and gets us and all the crap we can pack in it everywhere we need to go.  And? It’s got 257,650 miles on it!  It’s finally to the point where it’s needed some major repairs, but that’s where having a mechanic for a husband comes in handy.  We bought it for a very small sum back in 2003 and it has paid for itself many times over!

So, you heard Em’s Toyota story, and now you’ve heard mine – if you didn’t already share yours with us (or if any of my friends have any particular stories you want to share about MY Desmond!) please share today!

I LOVE my Toyotas!  To see what other bloggers love, check out Things I Love Thursday at the Diaper Diaries.

*******

This post was written as part of the “Every Toyota has a Story” campaign. To share your story, visit Toyota’s Facebook page – although there is no way your story is going to be as good as mine. 🙂

Post to Twitter

Things I Love Thursday: A Modern Eden

I like A Modern Eden
Moi with my A Modern Eden Winston the Owl shirt, which I purchased with my ooooowwwwn mooooney!

This is a review and giveaway (Stay tuned to win!!) that I’m thrilled to do because I LOVE the product and I KNOW the people behind it! The creators of A Modern Eden are the great guys at FORGE, hosts and sponsors of both our May Mom’s party and this upcoming Ultimate Mom’s Night Out July 29th. These are great people making cool stuff!  And it’s (well, I don’t know if they want me to say pretty so I’ll say) aesthetically pleasing as well!   A Modern Eden is a brand alive with cool, beautiful animal characters like Presley the Peacock, seen here in this gee-orgeous poster they sent me for review:

If Presley is a little feminine for you, perhaps you might prefer Webster the Frog:

Or Henry the Lion:

I love the Presley the Peacock poster. This is a great quality poster.  It’s not like the paper-thin glossy ones of Debbie Gibson and New Kids on the Block I had hanging in my bedroom in the 6th grade *ahem*.  The colors are vibrant and all these designs will really turn your kids’ rooms into the most whimsical zoo around.

The next genius thing A Modern Eden has in it’s bag of wares is an APP!  Yes, there’s an app for A Modern Eden!  They offered it free me to review but I ALREADY HAD IT because it’s so cool and it’s only 99 cents!  It’s called “Speak, Piggy” and it’s a great tool to entertain your kiddos and help them learn animal names and sounds at the same time.

Lastly, I did get one other cool thing to review from these guys: A Modern Eden reusable TOTE! I love reusable totes for all my drugstore shopping and this one is a lot cuter and more durable than the ones I get at the grocery. It’s also just the right size for toting around Sophie’s favorite books everywhere we go!  I chose this tree design but they have a really cool apple design here too.

They also have some super-cute animal flashcards featuring all their many animal characters which I will have to get for baby #3 for SURE! Just cause I like to look at them.

These are just the DEBUT products from A Modern Eden! I can’t wait to see what else they’re going to create for this gorgeous line.  How about some rugs and wall decals for baby’s nursery, guys?  🙂

Now the really fun part: one lucky reader will win a poster and tote of their choice from A Modern Eden!  Wheeeee!  Here’s how to enter:

1) Go to A Modern Eden and look around their site.  Leave a comment on this post telling us your fave product.

2) Follow @amoderneden on twitter and @them to say hi!  Then leave us a separate comment letting us know you did.

3) “Like” A Modern Eden’s facebook page and then leave a separate comment letting us know you do.

One winner will be chosen via random.org on Monday, July19th at 5 pm.  Good luck!

So, A Modern Eden is what I LOVE today. To see what other bloggers are diggin’ check out Things I Love Thursday at the Diaper Diaries!

Post to Twitter

A Favorite Things Giveaway

It’s Things I love Thursday!  Sooo we are excited to bring you a giveaway from one of our favorite companies whose brands we love – P&G.  P&G is a good old OHIO company that has been in business making great products for approximately FOREVER.  Last night as I was laying in bed not sleeping (you know you’re pregnant, you wake up to pee, end up having to puke, and then it’s just all downhill from there. But anyhoo.) and since I was not sleeping I thought I’d try and see how many P&G brands I could think of off the top of my head that we have in our house and use regularly.  I came up with THIRTEEN.  Thirteen!!! That’s a lot!  Especially since my thinking cap wasn’t exactly fittin’ right!  These brands include Tide, Bounce, Pampers, Secret, Gillette, Cascade, and Swiffer – just to name a few.   (Speaking of Swiffer, the winner of our Swiffer Sweeper Vac giveaway is Jen – lucky girl! Congrats!)

P&G asked Emily and I to host a great giveaway for you all to spread the word about their new eStore.  Now you have a one-stop P&G shop online!  You can get all your favorite P&G brands there and even apply available COUPONS (me likey!) with the click of your mouse.  Plus, shipping is super-fast, and a reasonable $5 flat-rate, even if you buy a giant, heavy jug of Tide or 10 jumbo packs of Pampers!  The store is very user-friendly.  I know because P&G gave me a $20 + free shipping code to try it out.

And of course, P&G also gave us fifteen $20 & free shipping codes to give away to YOU dear readers! (And also generously provided 10 for us to give away to friends and family!)  So 15 of you are gonna win the chance to experience some of your favorite P&G loot shipped to your door for free!  Here’s how to enter:

1) Leave us a comment on this post telling us your favorite P&G product.  Be specific! We wanna know!

2) For an extra entry, tweet about this giveaway on Twitter and use the hashtag #eStore in your tweet.  Then leave a separate comment with your tweet URL.

3) For another extra entry, share about this giveaway on your Facebook page, and leave a separate comment letting us know you did so.

Random.org will pick 15 winners and the contest will close Monday May 31 at 5 pm.  Good luck!

Visit the P&G eStore here.  And for more Things I Love Thursday favorites, head on over to the Diaper Diaries!

Post to Twitter