To celebrate summer, the 4th of July and to promote summer reading with children, Olive Kids is giving away a personalized prize pack worth $30 to Props & Pans readers. The prize pack will contain a 4th of July placemat, bookmark and name tag! The winner can choose the design and personalize it for a child. You can read our review of Olive Kids here.

Enter by leaving a comment HERE and visit Olive Kids to tell us what your choices would be. The contest is open until Wednesday, June 25, 2008.

You can receive a second entry by blogging about the contest (linking to it) or adding us to your blogroll. Just e-mail us with a live link or let us know you have it posted on your site. You do not need a blog to enter, just leave us your e-mail address so that we may contact you. As always, it is Props & Pans policy NOT to distribute any information you give us (including your e-mail). Thanks for entering!

I recently fell in love with Olive Kids. Maybe you’ve heard of them or seen them around. I found them through another site and have ordered a few of their products over the past year. Each time I am impressed with their attention to detail and the quality of their work. Olive Kids believes that kids should be inspired by creativity and play - not the usual television cartoons we see plastered all over the place.

What I love about their products is that you can personalize so many of them and they offer a lot of fun designs for kids of all ages. Their placemats are perfect for keeping messes contained to one area and they are easy to clean off. We love giving these as birthday gifts to friends and relatives. Plus they make designs for all occasions and holidays.

One of their newest products are the bookmarks. Once again you can personalize these with your name and choose from fun themes. If you have several children I would think that having items with their names on them would help lessen the arguments. You can encourage some summertime reading by giving them their own bookmark.

Continue reading “Olive Kids Personalizes Fun Things For Kids”

Props & Pans is giving one lucky reader a copy of the Mia Reading: The Bugaboo Bugs! software. You can read our review here.

Enter by leaving a comment HERE and telling us why your child (or relative) would benefit from this educational game. The contest is open until Tuesday, June 24, 2008.

You can receive a second entry by blogging about the contest (linking to it) or adding us to your blogroll. Just e-mail us with a live link or let us know you have it posted on your site. You do not need a blog to enter, just leave us your e-mail address so that we may contact you. As always, it is Props & Pans policy NOT to distribute any information you give us (including your e-mail). Thanks for entering!

Have you ever heard of Kutoka? I hadn’t, or at least I didn’t think I had, until I looked at their website and saw some of their products. My husband and I had seen their software games before at Toys R Us and were never sure if our almost 6 year old would find them entertaining enough to stick with. When Kutoka asked if we would like to try their newest software game, “Mia Reading: The Bugaboo Bugs!” we were thrilled.

From the moment our son saw the box he was hooked and asking a million questions. He continued to talk as we loaded the software onto our PC and waited for instructions to begin. This particular DVD-ROM is an adventure targeted at children five to nine that focuses on literacy skills and includes lots of games and activities.

The Bugaboo Bugs! is about some pesky bugs. Mia, the mouse and star, lives in a lovely Victorian house where her family has lived for generations. The house has recently been invaded by the Bugaboos. These noisy and disrespectful bugs are going to attract the attention of the humans and quite possibly the exterminators may show up. The Bugaboos must by kicked to the curb and Mia needs the player’s help to find a way to get them to stay out of site.

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Welcome to Must Have Monday’s. Every Monday our reviewers will let you have a sneak peak into what we use in our homes and our lives. Here we will tell you about the things we can’t live without. If you have a “must have” item to pass along please e-mail us. We welcome contributions from our readers and are always looking for new reviewers.

My great uncle was a hairstylist from the 40’s and 50’s, and even though he was retired when I was a child, he still saw his “regular” old lady clients and gave them a weekly “do” as they requested. He religiously used TRESemme products and swore by them, for how gentle they were to your hair. My childhood bathroom was filled with over-sized salon jugs of the stuff.

When I saw it come to the market several years ago in these big old bottles, I pretty much paid it no mind. I assumed this could not be the same quality product now and it hadn’t ever been that good to begin with. After all, how good could some old school shampoo and conditioner be?

Two years ago when someone I worked with started taking classes at a hair design institute I noticed how shiny and beautiful her hair was and I asked what she was using on it. She giggled and said, “TRESemme, can you believe it? My teacher recommended it.”

Continue reading “Must Have Monday’s 29″

My husband and I recently took an evening to dine out, something we haven’t done in a while. We also took in a movie on our date night. Anymore by the time we get to dinner, we are so tired we skip the movie and opt to go home early to get to bed. But this evening we decided upon Outback Steakhouse and were surprised to find a table during the busy weekend evening.

We were both craving steak, so it wasn’t hard to decide upon Outback when we scanned the choices in front of us. We’ve always found quality food and service at Outback and enjoyed their appetizers. I’m fairly certain the first place I ever had a fried onion was at Outback when we had the Bloomin’ Onion one Valentine’s Day back in college. I’ve had many at other restaurants, but none come close to comparing to Outback’s.

Continue reading “Treat Dad To Outback Steakhouse For Father’s Day”

Maybe it is the former teacher in me, but I love books. Like every good parent, I foster a love of literacy by spending lots of time reading to my children. Occasionally, I do get tired of reading the same old books over and over again! When it is time for an infusion of new reading material, we usually head to our local library or download books from Audible Kids.

Audible Kids is a site that provides digital spoken audio information and entertainment, and specializes in the spoken experience by providing digital audio editions of children’s books.

They have a dizzying array of books for all ages, even for a former teacher. There are books that have been awarded various medals like the Caldecott and Newbery, favorites (Where the Wild Things Are, Arthur stories by Marc Brown, Beverly Cleary books) and classics (Make Way for Ducklings, Charlotte’s Web, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory).

Anyone can create an account to search for a book in the vast library of audio books. Various ways of searching include typing the title or author into the search field, clicking on criteria (age, grade, running time, price, publication date, and award winning books) on the left hand side of the browser, or locating books narrated by a certain person or from a specific publisher through an advanced search.

Continue reading “Audible Kids Website Brings The Local Library To Your Living Room”

Props & Pans is giving one lucky reader a copy of the Doodlebops Live in Concert DVD. You can read our review here.

Enter by leaving a comment HERE and telling us which you would enjoy listening to with your child. The contest is open until Tuesday, June 17, 2008.

You can receive a second entry by blogging about the contest (linking to it) or adding us to your blogroll. Just e-mail us with a live link or let us know you have it posted on your site. You do not need a blog to enter, just leave us your e-mail address so that we may contact you. As always, it is Props & Pans policy NOT to distribute any information you give us (including your e-mail). Thanks for entering!

I’m not sure if it’s the music, costumes or silliness, but my girls love the Doodlebops. Ever since the first time they heard, “Mo, don’t pull the rope!” they’ve been hooked.

Doodlebops Live in Concert is 55 minutes of non-stop music and performances, as they sing 25 familiar and new songs that the audience obviously enjoys. It’s kind of cool to see all the happy faces in the crowd as they sing along. The Doodlebops Live in Concert is a fun and zany production with cool dance moves and catchy music that the kids will really enjoy. Parents, on the other hand, may find it all a bit corny but if the kids are happy, so are we.

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I am not one who likes to wear a lot of perfume, but I do like to smell clean and pretty. My mother has always had good taste in perfumes and colognes, so when I found out she bought a new fragrance for her collection, I had to try it.

Can I say I am in love with this perfume? Does that even sound logical? No? Well, too bad, because I absolutely love this perfume!

What is this perfume you ask? Quite justly it is called My Insolence by Guerlain and this is a fragrance from France. I enjoyed the smell so much, of course I told her I was going to purchase some (although I rarely do so) of this Eau de toilette called My Insolence.

Continue reading “My Insolence Holds Light & Simple Fragrance In A Bottle”