By Audrey van Petegem, Senior Editor
Every year at this time, we scour the internet looking for websites that bring out the child in all of us and help us (and our kids) get into the spirit of Christmas. Last year we found several Ho Ho Holiday sites and the year before, some Creative Christmas Magic Sites.
This year, we found another free site, PortableNorthPoleTV which creates a personalized video from Santa. What makes this one different? It’s not just for kids, but also works well for non-believers, aka teens and adults. Santa will tell them if they are on the naughty [...]

By Audrey van Petegem, Senior Editor
Need that clever gift idea under $10? How about one at just $5? Fiverr is the perfect place to look for stocking stuffers, Secret Santa gifts, humorous office gift exchange and any gift on which you do not want to spend more than $5.00. It’s also a great spot for the young ones in the family to find a little thoughtful or funny gift (most Fiverr ideas are personalized) for their siblings, parents or best friends.
That’s right! Fiverr is a site where people are selling ‘whatever’ (and I do mean whatever) for $5.00. Each gig [...]

By Audrey van Petegem, Senior Editor

I love my book club. It consists of twelve mothers, of all ages, each with very different taste in books, but we love our monthly get-togethers. We laugh, we share and we talk – A LOT!  Each year, we each sign up for a month to host the club. The host is responsible for choosing the book, hosting the event in her home and supplying food and drink for the evening. It is acknowledged by everyone that no one needs to bring a thing. That way, we are each only responsible for one book club [...]

By Audrey van Petegem, Senior Editor
Being around small children during this time of year, it is not hard to get into the festive mood. They see  joy and wonder every where they go; from Mall Santas to Christmas lights strung about. To add to the magic of Christmas here are some ever-so-sweet sites, all of which are free to use. Yes.
Last year we mentioned www.NORADsanta.org here and we want to mention it again. We LOVE this site for its appeal to children while being educational, since it is part of the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD). Today is the [...]

By Audrey van Petegem, Contributing Editor

Have you ever noticed the younger the child the more questions they have?  My two young daughters are full of them. From the easy one like “why do I have to brush my teeth?” to more difficult ones “what is tapioca?”.  Uh…
I learned from my son, who is now a high school senior, that all questions are important, no matter what. It’s my answers that need some fine tuning. I discovered this great website called Whyzz.com.  It is simple to use and all answers are written so that they are perfectly understood by [...]

There’s a wave of nostalgia going around and being shared all over the internet. Among others there is the “My Mom, the Style Icon” blog (I wrote about it here), where you can submit way-back-when photos of your mom in stylish retro garb. And we’ve seen the endearing now & then pictures of best buddies in high school yearbooks. Now Ze Frank is giving everyone a platform to submit their before and after photos: the Young Me, Now Me website.
I can’t believe the effort some people went through to replicate the scene.

I can’t remember how I came across this blog, but I was completely charmed and immediately submitted a photo of my mom (that’s her in the straw hat).

The “My Mom, the Style Icon” blog is written by Piper Weiss, an editor and writer featured in the likes of the New York Daily News, VH1 and bestweekever.tv. She came up with this the idea of creating the mom-as-style-icon website as she came across some amazing old pictures of her mom in the 60’s: “She was dressed in the most incredible frocks and she had a real attitude. I instantly realized I’d [...]

A friend of mine turned me onto Groupon about five months ago. I am thankful for that tip every time I scoop up one of their great deals. I thought that I was the last to know. But, as I’ve since introduced Groupon to several equally unenlightened friends, I thought that it would be worth a mention here, just in case you were also in the dark about this great coupon site…
What is Groupon? It’s an online deal-of-the-day/group-buy website that offers city-specific deals (usually between 40% to 60% off) with a whole panoply of local businesses.  Each daily deal only [...]

I’m not big on New Year’s resolutions. If I were, by now, I’d have no more than 10% body fat, I’d be able to do the Dwi Pada Sirsasana yoga posture, I would meditate 30 minutes every single day, I’d never ever raise my voice at my kids, I’d send birthday cards, on time… But since I’ve liberated myself of the concept of New Years’ resolutions years ago, I have accomplished none of these things.
However, clearing clutter has been a general resolution that I’ve kept up with very nicely (I’m even a little overzealous). And, should that be on your [...]