Batgirl Costume Review ~ Just in time for Halloween

Grace is all about costumes and dress up.  She is also a huge fan of super heroes and loves to run around the house wearing her "super cape"!  Super capes make you run faster, right?

So, I was really excited to be picked to do a review on a Batman costume of my choice.  Thanks to Wholesale Costume Club, I was able to add something new and a little different to her already very-girly dress up station!  While I chose a Batgirl Costume for Grace, the costume club offers a wide variety of sizes and styles, so there's something for everyone in the family!  Perfect if you have a Halloween Party to attend this year!

I always worry about sizing when ordering costumes for Grace.  The size chart was helpful in suggesting that costumes tend to run small.  Grace's size fell right in the middle of the size small range.  Knowing that I planning to add this to her dress-up station, I wanted this to be something Grace could grow into and use for a longer period of time, I ordered her a medium.

Grace was very excited when the package arrived.  She excitedly shouted "Super Hero!" loudly when she peeked inside the box!  We then sat on the floor and removed the costume from the package.  She "oohed and ahhed" over Batgirl's dress with attached cape, and all of the accessories:  mask, boot covers, cuffs and of course a belt!

With the bigger size and the quality of the costume itself, Grace should get lots of super-hero play time out of this costume, although, I will most likely have to replace the plastic mask that was included (the only flimsy part of the costume) since that's been played with the most already!


Thank you Wholesale Costume Club and Tomoson.com for the opportunity to review the Batgirl Costume.


Disclaimer:

I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.

Garanimals Wooden Blocks from Walmart

My husband and I LOVE toys!  When we were first dating and all of our nieces and nephews were babies, we loved heading to the toy store to pick out toys for them.  We would spend hours in the store looking at all the different items and testing out the ones that had "try me" buttons! 

Since then, we still love toys, but we tend to go for the more "classic" toys now.

For her first Christmas, my husband wanted to get Grace a set of wooden blocks.  We looked in several places and also online and could only find very small blocks.  We were looking for the chunky, wooden blocks that were painted with bright colored ABCs.  I almost settled for the smaller blocks, but just couldn't bring myself to spend the money on them when I knew we wouldn't be happy with them.

A month or two ago, I was strolling through the toy aisle at Walmart and there they were - the chunky, wooden blocks painted with brightly colored ABCs!  I wasn't even looking for them that day, I pretty much gave up any hope of finding them! 

Turns out, they are from a new line of toys by Garanimals and Walmart.  At the time, I didn't care about that, I was just happy that I found the blocks that we wanted for Grace!  I don't remember the exact price of them.  I'm thinking somewhere around $10 or $12.  I'm pretty sure I just put them right into my cart without even checking the price!

We didn't give them to her right away.  She had gotten so many nice gifts for Christmas so we decided to put them away for her first birthday before giving them to her.  Her birthday was little over a week ago.  Sunday night, Joe was putting together one of her toys and Grace wanted to help.  Of course, only being a year old, she wasn't much of a help. 

I opened up her blocks to play with her and she was not interested in them at all.  I was bummed.  I thought, all of that searching for them and she doesn't even like them!  Well, I guess "helping" daddy put together her new toys was more fun to watch than playing with blocks! 

Today, I tried again.  After Grace was finished eating lunch, she seemed content to just sit in her high chair.  That's not something that usually happens.  Once she loses interest in the food, she loses interest in the high chair.  Since I wasn't finished going through the mail, I thought of trying the blocks on the tray of her high chair. 

She loved them!  I built a tall tower of blocks and let her knock them down.  I pretended that I didn't want her to knock them over and when they fell, she let out such a belly laugh!  We did that several more times and she just giggled and giggled.  I tried to capture a video on my camera phone, but couldn't work the camera and build the blocks at the same time.   Grace wasn't allowing the blocks to stand long enough for me to grab the camera! 

I did manage to snap this picture of her, it's a little blurry...sorry!  Most of my pictures of Grace are blurry...she doesn't sit still for very long! 

Okay, so now that I look at the picture, it's A LOT blurry and the lighting in the kitchen is pretty bad.  But at least I got the picture, right? 

She played for a while in the high chair and really enjoyed those blocks. 

After dinner tonight, we had to take Grace for her one year check up.  Poor baby needed 4 needles!  She cried much longer than she normally does when she gets shots!  Mommy too!  :)  Good thing Daddy goes with us!  

When we returned home, we played all played with the blocks on the floor while the Backyardigans was on.  She really enjoyed knocking them down!  Especially the really tall building that Joe was building for her! 

I'm really happy that we found those blocks and I really hope she will enjoy playing with them on her high chair tray again while I clean the kitchen tomorrow! 

I'll be sharing this post with  Works For Me Wednesday, a weekly blog carnival hosted by Kristen at We are THAT Family. 

Edited to add: 

I'll be making my 100th post this week and will be announcing a giveaway to celebrate!  Be sure to stay tuned so you don't miss out!!! 

Frugal Alternative to Take Out

I am known to be a junk food junkie. Don't get me wrong, I like to prepare and eat healthy foods too. I just really enjoy fast food, take-out and pizza delivery.

I mentioned before that when we lived in our apartment in the city and we both worked, we spent a lot of money on food not cooked in our home. We were paying for the convenience of not only not having to cook, but also the fact that there was very little clean up involved.

Now that we have our own home and only one paycheck, going out to eat or ordering in doesn't occur that often. Occasionally, I've made my own pizza or resorted to frozen pizza. But being a Philly girl, I was really missing cheese steaks.

About a year ago, my friend Lisa (she is also a former Philly girl) told me about a minute steak product that she found at Costco that is an excellent alternative to expensive take out. The first time we tried it, we loved it! And it's one of those must have items that we pick up each trip to Costco (about once a month).

Steak-eze is frozen, chopped minute steak. When you first take it out of the package, it looks like a frozen burger. But as it cooks, it starts to break apart and looks like authentic cheese steak meat.

Each frozen patty serves one person. Although, we like our steak sandwiches really packed with meat, so I usually cook 4 patties for the 2 of us. This makes 3 hearty sandwiches for dinner plus one smaller lunch serving.

I either serve this on a long (hoagie, sub-sandwich) roll or on a tortilla with lettuce and pickle. Hubby uses mayo for his sandwich or wrap and I use ketchup.

I like to serve oven fries on the side too. Since, in my opinion, no cheese steak is complete without a side of fries!

I don't remember the actual cost per package of Steak-Eze, but I can tell you this...we get several meals from one box of Steak-Eze for less than it costs for take out for one night!

This post is linked to Works For Me Wednesday. Since finding frugal alternatives for everything works for me! Be sure to check out WFMW hosted by We Are That Family for more great tips!

Flight 93 Memorial Fund and a review of Steven Singer Jewelers

Steven Singer Jewelers has teamed up with 1210AM's morning radio host Michael Smerconish to create the 9/11 tribute pin.

For a $10 donation, you will receive a 9/11 Never Forget Pin designed by Steven Singer. 100% of the proceeds will be go to the Flight 93 National Memorial Fund. Oh, the shipping is FREE!

Singer and Smerconish are hoping to raise more than a million dollars to donate to the memorial fund, so far a check for $10,000 has been given to the fund.

Click here if you'd like to read more about the Flight 93 National Memorial Fund.

Click here if you'd like to order the commemorative pin.
Available only until September 30, 2009.



Here's my review:

My husband came home from work late on September 10th and placed an order online for 3 of these pins. It was about 8 or 9 in the evening. He placed the order, thinking that we would get them pins in about a week, maybe more.

We were extremely surprised to see the package from the jewelers in our mail box on the morning of September 12th!

We are truly pleased with Steven Singer Jewelers not only for the attention and speedy service given to our modest little purchase, but also for his generosity in creating and selling this commemorative pin to raise money for such a wonderful cause.

5 stars, Steven Singer!!!