Walgreens: FREE 8x10 collage print now thru 3/20!!

I have gotten this freebie more times than I can count and I LOVE it when it comes up! There are no strings attached and you don't even have to give a credit card number! I just made one up for myself with all of my nieces and nephews to hang up in our living room!! These make awesome gifts to give to any family member!!

Head over to Walgreen's Photo Center website and you can score a free 8x10 photo collage!! Just center coupon code COLLAGE4FREE when you go to check out. Choose pick up at store and pay at store and that's it! Offer expires 3/20/13.

Valentine Idea: Have a colorful Valentine's Day!

I totally forgot to post the Valentine's Day gift I made up for Leah to hand out to her class! I got LOADS of free crayons this year at Walmart with overage I had gotten from other coupons during back to school season at Walmart!!

When I saw this super cute idea on Pinterest, I knew I just had to make them for Leah's class!!

You can read about my awesome shopping trip, it was featured on my favorite couponing site Living Rich With Coupons.

DIY: I "Wheelie" Like You Valentine

With Valentine's Day less than 1 month away, I wanted to get a jump start on Leah and Joey's Valentines to hand out to their classes.

My dad went to an auction one day and bought an ENTIRE lot of matchbox cars brand new in the packages and there was many more than my kids will ever play with, LOL!! One of Joey's favorite things to play with is matchbox cars so I saw this as the perfect opportunity for Joey to give some to his classroom friends!

I got a package of Wilton Treat Bags at Walmart then printed off the labels and glued them to red construction paper. If anyone wants to download the labels and make your own, you can get it here.

Thank you to Avoiding the Laundry for the idea!!

DYI Christmas Present: "For your mistletoes"

Even though Christmas has come and gone but I wanted to share this one as well. As many of you know, I LOVE my couponing and I get a lot of stuff for free including free nail polish I scored a few months ago. Seeing that I have one sister and eight sister in laws, I'm always looking for super cute things to add to their Christmas gifts!

And I couldn't pass up the opportunity to add the "for your mistletoes" tag to the polish!!

DIY Project: Birthday Board

My husband is the oldest of 7. The majority of his siblings are now married and are having children so our family has been growing very quickly!! It's very hard to keep track of everyone's birthdays and I knew this would be the PERFECT Christmas gift for my mother in law!

My mother in law has 7 children, 3 daughter in laws, 1 son in law, 1 mother in law, 8 (soon to be 9) grandchildren, her mother in law, 4 of her own brothers, 3 sister in laws, 1 brother in law, 2 nieces, 3 nephews, and I'm sure I might have left a few more out, LOL!!

In addition to all the disks I already personalized, I've painted an additional 12 since I know our family will continue to grow for several more years!!

The large board I got at Michael's Craft Store and used one of the 50% off coupons so I got it for $7!! I spray painted the green base coat that way the paint would be nice & smooth. For the letters, rather than going out and buying stencils, I found the perfect font and printed out the letters in 150 font then cut them out and traced them with a black sharpie marker and painted them in black. I also added a coat of black glitter paint on top of the letters so they would "pop" a little.

Then I bought a few bags of little wooden disks similar to these. I painted them then drilled small holes in them. For the lettering I used a black fine tipped Sharpie Marker. Then I added a clear clear of glitter paint to the top to make the disks sparkle a little.

Then I used metal jewelry findings similar to these  to attach the disks to each other.

I am tickled to death how awesome this turned out!!

This year's Christmas cookie tins

Every year for the past 7 years, I've made homemade cookies and candy to give out to my husband's co-workers. Every year growing up, my mom made holiday goodies for my dad's work, along with my brother's work, and several of our friends & family. This was something I've always wanted to continue doing even after I got married and moved out on my own. I love the idea of spreading the joy of Christmas in an extra yummy way! 

This year was tough figuring out what all I wanted to include in the tins. I wanted to make a few new things rather than the same stuff I make every year. I always make fudge, spritz cookies, and cutout sugar cookies along with a few others but added in the rest I ended up making:

• Homemade fudge
• Spritz cookies
• Pecan Sandies
• Snicker doodles
• Cranberry pinwheels
• Buckeyes
• Homemade candy canes
• Cutout sugar cookies

The end result, it was so much fun making everything. The only thing I won't make again next year in the candy canes. I enjoy baking so much, the past week has been a blast for me!!

Tips for an easier Christmas with your child with special needs

After I posted about our visit to Santa, I thought I would share a few resources I've found to help fellow families that have children with Down syndrome, Autism or even a Sensory Processing Disorder around Christmas.

Joey gets over stimulated VERY easily, especially in situations/ events that don't happen on a daily basis. I'm talking total meltdowns or just going to hid in a corner/ another room away from everyone else.

I do want to start by saying that Joey LOVES seeing Santa on TV (obviously not in person) and watching children's programs on TV about Christmas and he LOVES our Christmas tree!!!

The past few years we've barely gotten him to open up a wrapped gift, he just can't handle it. It's very upsetting at times seeing Leah and Aiden opening up gifts on Christmas morning and Joey wanting no part of it. This year, I've decided to try gift bags with his gifts rather than wrapping them to see if that makes a difference.

It's so difficult that he won't sit at the table to eat a meal during any holiday or event at my in-laws house. I just want to see him participate with our entire family but I know it's too much for him. I just hold onto the hope that someday he will participate in the festivities rather than hanging out in the family room watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse on TV while we all eat.

Needless to say, I'm desperate to find new ideas of things to try during this holiday season with him! I've been surfing the web reading other parents experiences and any advice that they might have to share. I wanted to share my findings with anyone who may possibly be in the same boat as us. Here are some of the articles/ blog posts I've found that may also help you out:

• Talk about Autism: Tips for having an autism-friendly Christmas
• Making the holidays happier for children with special needs
• 5 Tips to help children with special needs feel comfortable at holiday parties
• Enjoy the magic of Christmas, Autism style
• Holiday gifts for Autistic children
• Autism & Christmas: Different but no less 
• 12 Days of Autism Christmas
• Living Well with Autism: December & Christmas
• The Autism Christmas Guide: What to get a child with Autism on your Christmas list
• What does Little Suzie want for Christmas? 

As I find more articles and blog posts, I will post them. 

24 books for Advent, the kids LOVE it!

Days 1-4 have been a total success with giving the kids 24 books to Advent. Unfortunately  I can rarely get Joey to sit for a picture, so many of the pictures you'll see will be of Leah and Aiden, LOL!

Before we open up each book, we've been taking a minute to read  the reading associated with that particular day of Advent and then explain it to the kids. I'm so happy to make this an annual tradition for our family!!

Check out my post from last week: 24 Books For Advent

Free Baby Carrier (just pay shipping)!

Another awesome Christmas or baby shower gift for any new or expectant mom! I got one of these for my sister in law last year for Christmas! 

Seven Slings is offering customers one of their slings for free (a $39.95 value!). They have some super cute colors! Personally, I love the Supernova one!! Shipping is $11.95 for 2-8 day UPS. Just enter promo code "MYSAVINGS" when you check out. 

Free Carseat Canopy!!

Freebies rock! The Carseat Canopy retails for $49.95!! You just have to pay for $12.95 for UPS 2 – 8 business days shipping! What an awesome gift to give someone for Christmas or a baby shower!!! 

Use promo code “MYSAVINGS” and snag this awesome deal today!! 

You can get more details or order yours here. 

24 Days of Books for Advent

I really wanted to find an extra special way to celebrate Advent this year. A few of my friends told me how they give their children 24 books, one each day of Advent, I couldn't help but think what a wonderful idea that was! I've been wanting to add to our bookshelves, so I had to jump at the chance.

I decided rather than just wrapping the books and giving them to the kids, I would go a step further. I went online and found popular daily readings from during Advent. I did one for each day THEN I went one step further and searched Google Images for pictures for each of the readings. Believe me, this took A LOT of time but it's going to be so worth it. Not only to give the kids a new book each day but also to read the reading from the Bible and explain Mary & Joseph's journey leading up to the day Christ was born.


Since I want to make this a yearly tradition, I cut each day's page down to a good size then laminated each page. I bought this laminator on Amazon last year, which has been so handy for many projects, LOL!

If anyone is interested, I made the daily readings into a Google Doc to share with anyone that would like to use it. You can access it here.

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