October 2010

Welcome to Friendly Friday!

Remember, YOU can host the link list on your blog too! Just click “Get the code here…” at the bottom of the list. The code is different every week, so be sure to get the new code when hosting Friendly Friday on your blog. Hosting the list is a great way for everyone to get even more traffic to their blog.

Thanks for joining the Friendly Friday celebration hosted by Christi at Frugal Novice, Xenia at Thanks, Mail Carrier and Charla at Healthy Home Blog! We invite you to join us every Friday to make more friends in blogville, get more blog followers and follow other great blogs out there.

To join in the Friendly Friday celebration, include your family-friendly link in our list, follow the hostesses in the first 3 spots and then start blog hopping! Visit other blogs on the list and comment to give them some blog love. Then take a minute to follow them through Google Friend Connect – this is a good way to keep up with other blogs, but also lets us show support to each other! Please DO NOT list your giveaways here, links must be to either your homepage or your Friday posting with your blog title. All others will be deleted.

When people comment on your blog and let you know they’re a part of Friendly Friday, return the favor and follow them back. This way everyone gets traffic and followers out of participating, and it’s a win-win situation. We would love for you to also grab our Friendly Friday button and post it on your blog and/or in a post – the more bloggers that find out about Friendly Friday and participate, the better!

Spotlight on Friendly Friday Followers! We love your participation and want to show it! In addition to gaining followers, each week we’ll select three blogs at random and will feature links and a write-up for those blogs in the content of next week’s Friendly Friday post. There are so many seriously wonderful blogs out there, and this will be a great way to highlight some of those each week. Say hello to the lucky chosen 3 for this week (and feel free to stop by and give them a little extra love):

The Nesty Girl over at – you guessed it! – Nesty writes about pursuing a happy home and a honeyed life through simplified living! She updates her blog three times a week with recipes, creative ideas, scrapbooking projects, and stories from her day-to-day life. Her writing is charming and relatable, and, well, a lot of fun to read!

Jill (who lives in Florida) and Denise (who lives in California) are the bloggers behind Cottage Sisters. Denise is married to Jill’s brother Mike, so they’re related by marriage but are, according to them, sisters by heart. Their blog started as a way to share their homes, recipes, great books, and everything in between. You’ll find photos galore and get a taste of both coasts!

Kime’ at Adventures of the Domesticated Mama is a Christian SAHM (stay-at-home-mom) to six children. She homeschools and loves to sew, knit, crochet and bake. She hosts a lot of great reviews and giveaways and is very active in the blogging community. You’ll also see fun photos of her family for Wordless Wednesdays from time to time!

Now that you know about these 3 wonderful blogs, it’s time for you to join in! Add your family-friendly link below and we’ll see you back here every Friday! And don’t forget, you can grab the code to share the link list on your blog too.

All three hostesses appreciate followers through GFC and Twitter, and we’ll follow you back – be sure to leave a comment with your URL and/or Twitter username.  Hope everyone has a great weekend!

The Hershey Center for Health & Nutrition, (HCHN) in collaboration with the American Dietetic Association,  has created a new national program called Moderation Nation. With this program you can now have access to a variety of tools that will help you achieve moderation – and you don’t even need to give up your favorite foods!

When I first read about Moderation Nation, I had to smile – we’ve been teaching that word to J (our 3-year-old) for the past several weeks. We’d hand him his drink when we got in the car to go somewhere, and he’d drink it all within a minute, leaving him without any for the rest of our trip out. So, we tell him to drink a little at a time and then he’ll have more later. Now if I hand him his drink and say, “Don’t drink it all right away!” he’ll say, “I know, Mom – moooooderation!” :) I know I could use some help with moderation myself – it’s too easy to eat more than I mean to!

There’s also a new Moderation Nation iPhone app, free and available on iTunes or via www.themoderationnation.com, that will reward you for the activity you’re already doing, while encouraging you to do even more in a way that suits your busy lifestyle. With an easy-to-read tracker and a comprehensive list of activities to choose from, you can earn badges for your progress and go from a Starting Gun to a Healthy Hero!

The Moderation Nation Web site (www.themoderationnation.com) provides a host of new tools, including:

• Recipes and Expert Tips. Here you’ll find advice from Cheryl Forberg, registered dietitian (RD) for NBC’s The Biggest Loser, award-winning chef and New York Times best-selling cookbook author
  • Additional recipes and tips from Regina Ragone, Food Director at Family Circle magazine; Keri Glassman, author of the O2 diet; and Liz Ward, author of Expect the Best Pregnancy.
• Moderation Menus. Seven-day meal plans – with snack ideas – that will help you plan out your week. Each menu is based on an individual lifestyle, such as Single, Adults with Kids and Adults with No Kids.
• Balance the Meal. This cool balancer tool allows you to input your main dish and its preparation method; in return, you’ll receive ideas for complementary side dishes that round out the meal smartly.
• Useful Facts. Here you’ll find everything from a “portion distortion” guide – providing cues on what actual portion sizes should look like – to a grocery shopping fact sheet – to a guide on how to start and maintain a food journal.

Are you ready to embrace moderation? Check out the Moderation Nation website or download the free iPhone app! One lucky reader will also win a Moderation Nation prize pack provided by Hershey’s through MyBlogSpark. This pack includes, among other things, a bag of Hershey’s Kisses – the perfect way to have chocolate in… say it with me… moderation!

One reader will win a Moderation Nation Prize Pack, which includes a Moderation Nation t-shirt, Hershey’s chocolate and a nutrition journal to track your food and activities. Entries will be accepted until midnight CST on Monday, October 25.

Mandatory Entry: Visit TheModerationNation.com and comment back here sharing a fact you’ve learned from the site!

(Only valid after the required entry has been completed)

Please leave a comment for each extra entry – if you blog about this giveaway and get 3 entries, for example, comment 3 times.

• Subscribe to my RSS feed and comment letting me know you’ve done so {1 extra entry}
• Blog about this giveaway and link it back here {3 extra entries}
• Follow me on Google Friend Connect {1 extra entry}
• Follow me on Twitter {1 extra entry}
• “Like” Frugal Novice on Facebook {1 extra entry}
• Tweet about this giveaway {1 extra entry per tweet; 2 tweets (not back-to-back) per day}

Note: Hershey’s provided me with the information, a prize pack for myself, and a prize pack for giveaway through MyBlogSpark. Any opinions in this post remain my own and I was not compensated monetarily for this post.

Hi everyone! I’m so late with my menu plan post today! We were out of town this past weekend and didn’t end up getting back home until late last night. I had all these grand plans for my post this week, but that is now put on hold until next week.

We went to Austin for the Day Out With Thomas, which was so much fun! The boys both loved it – I’ll have to post photos and tell you more about it later. I’ve heard the event varies from location to location, but I’d highly recommend the one we were at.

While in Austin I also got to meet up with the lovely Amanda from Food on the Table! I could tell from talking to her just how passionate they are about making a product that really helps people… and about food, which is something I’m totally passionate about too. :) I was planning on including a Food on the Table recipe this week, but our dining table is still covered with luggage, if that’s any indication of how prepared I am for the week.

Sooo, here’s what I’m going to do. Next week I’m going to include 5 – count ’em, 5! – recipes from Food on the Table. I’ll be trying all these new too, and I am going to update my Menu Plan Monday post for next week each time I try one of the recipes, including a photo and a review. That’ll get me motivated to be creative in the kitchen, since I’ve fallen into a rut the past few weeks, and maybe it’ll give you some ideas for fun new things to try too.

For this week, here’s what I *think* we’ll be eating:

Monday: Turkey & cheese paninis – did I tell you I got a panini press with some of my birthday money? I love it! We’ll have veggie chips too – we’re all about going simple tonight.

Tuesday: Chick-Fil-A again! <3

Wednesday: Chicken taco soup. It’s a slow-cooker recipe, again, following the theme of simplicity I so dearly love, PLUS it’s pretty low-fat/healthy, depending on how much sour cream and cheese you use.

Thursday: Leftover soup!

Friday: Buffalo chicken tenders & sweet potato fries

Saturday: I think we’re going to the pumpkin patch with friends earlier in the day, so I’m trying to think of a good fall recipe to try… still searching!

Have a great week!! I have another giveaway this week involving CHOCOLATE, by the way. :)

It’s October now and I’m sure many of you have Halloween costumes on the brain – well, for one of you it’ll be a lot easier! The winner of the AnytimeCostumes.com giveaway is…..

Mami2jcn – Congratulations! Thanks to everyone who entered. :)