At the Fence

Hi Neighbors! Here is a great gift idea from HABA for that little sweetheart in your life.  The Pure Nature Doll Leafy Girl is designed for ages 6 months and up and the suggested retail is $17.99.  At 8 inches long she is a perfect size for little one's hands.  The little leaves gives them something to pull, lift, and play with. The HABA Pure Nature Organic toys make a very sensible choice for gift giving.  You only want to give that little one the best choice available, by going with a soft, all natural toy.  These toys are produced in accordance with GOTS (Global Organic Textile Standards).  The GOTS are for the child's safety and for the environment. HABA toys can be found at over 1,000 US specialty retail stores, specialty catalogs and of course online!  They have been recognized with both German and American rewards.  Be sure to visit their website for more information. HABA and How They Started: It was a risk to start a company in an empty factory buildi

Hey Neighbors! We are going to add a really nice cookbook from the Gooseberry Patch to our Gift Guide.  This book, The Harvest Table is filled with recipes for fall and winter.  We tried a few recipes out of the book.  One was the Cowpoke Cornbread!  We have really been in a baking mood since the weather has turned a little bit chilly.  Of course they have some great sounding soups and stews too!  The cornbread was GREAT We also made the Frosted Pumpkin Cookies.  These were a hit!  We had a hard time saving any for the next day!  My children ate these up, literally!  Perfect for the holidays! All of the recipes are easy to follow.  These are not recipes that sound so exotic that you will never use them.  These are everyday, great tasting recipes, you will want to use over again and again. You can purchase the Gooseberry Patch Recipe books on the Gooseberry Patch website for $16.95.  They have many other cookbooks you might be interested in.  Start thinki

Hi Neighbors! Anyone finding their eyes itching lately?  I have and so have some of my children.  Fall and spring really hit me.  Anyway, when OcuFresh offered to allow me to try some of their products, it was perfect timing.  Not to mention, I have been doing some fall cleaning and stirring up dust. I received a tote bag with $50 worth of OcuFresh products inside.  The MiniDrops are going to be my favorite.  They are a Lubricant Eye Drop.  All of the drops I received are preservative free.  The MiniDrops come in small one use tubes.  I really like this feature.  This way you know you are using a sterile eye drop in your eye. There was also the Eye-Cept Rewetting Drops.  These are also one use tubes for soft contact lens.  Now, no one in my family has contact lens, but these would be great when you experience dry eyes. OcuFresh Eye Wash is for cleaning your eye of pollen, chlorine and other eye irritants.  You can use the provided cup or you can just use the tube and

Hey neighbors! Here is one you will like if you have little boys!  This one will be part of our Gift Guide.  This is a Mining Theme playset from Toy State .  With a CAT dump truck and sound effects your little builder will have hours of pleasure playing with the truck and working rock crusher.  This set is designed for ages 3 and up. I have a little boy in mind who I think will love this set.  Not sure if mom will enjoy the noise or not! :)  We will see!I am sure his eyes will light up when he sees the CAT dump truck.  The truck can drive in and out under the hill and then up and down the ramp.  The 3 buttons will allow construction sounds, worker's voices and real mining site sounds. The set does require 2-AAA batteries that are not included.  All the other pieces easily snap together for assembly. Toy State has several other toys I am sure you will want to check out.  Take a few minutes to browse their website!  You can purchase the CAT Mining Set for $9

Hi neighbors! As you all know we recently returned from our very long trip to Texas and New Mexico.  I have to share with you one little item that really helped my daughters handle the long hours in the vehicle.  It is the Sugar Creek Gang Vol. 1 on CDs from Beloved Books .  Not only did it help traveling, but they wanted to listen to them while going to sleep!  The set arrived right before we left on our trip. Now, my older girls grew up listening to Sugar Creek stories on the radio, and of course they read all the books they could get their hands on.  Somehow though we just sort of lost track of the Sugar Creek Gang, except for a few books, until just recently when we were offered the opportunity to review them through the TOS Crew program.  I have to say I jumped at the chance to get these in my daughters' hands.  They were excited too! Volume one contains six stories.  They do inform you, that these are not in the same order as the cassettes, so be sure you chec

Hey neighbors! If you have ever been in Dallas and have not visited their zoo, you are really missing out on a spectacular time.  We were able to visit the zoo while we were there and we truly enjoyed ourselves.  Some good advice here though, try to go on a weekday.  We went on a Monday and although other people were there we had no problems wandering the zoo and seeing the animals.  I spoke with a gentleman there and he said the weekend was packed.  I personally do not enjoy crowds, so I am glad we made the decision to go on Monday.  This is one large zoo!  Get prepared to go on a mini tour! We started out by heading towards the wilds of Africa.  Before I begin with what I saw though I want to tell you that I was impressed by the cleanliness of the park and by the friendliness of the employees.  Yes, I know they are there to help, but I had at least two of them come over when they saw us and ask us some questions and share information with us.  One of them offered us a be