Thrifty Thursday with My Memories!

*Alert:  Free Digi-scrap pages ahead!*

Every Thursday I will be featuring a Free digital scrapbooking page set giveaway from My Memories!  Click on the image below to download this week's free kit!

If you haven't read about it on my blog before, My Memories Digital Suite is scrapbooking software that allows you to create beautiful digital scrapbooks, calendars, gifts, movies and more that you can download, print and share in so many ways.  Christmas is right around the corner... it would be great for creating a holiday family newsletter or creating a calendar for the grandparents.

For busy mommies like me and many of you who don't have time to do 'real' scrapbooking, this software is a steal at $39.95 and with my code STMMMS40533, you can get $10 off your purchase and a $10 coupon for the MyMemories.com store - a $20 value!  Happy digi-scrapping!

 

Get this kit for free and use my code to get $10 off the software!

Beware the Mommy Brain!

...or just crazy!

I frequently do silly things.  Silly may be the wrong word...  others may use the words...crazy, irrational, funny, weird, bizarre, unique or slightly out of my mind.  You say po-tay-to, I say po-tah-to.  Do not go calling the nice men (or women) in white coats to come and take me away just yet.  I think it is Mommy Brain.

Do you have Mommy Brain?  Or if you're a daddy, is there such a thing as Daddy Brain?  You may have it if things like this happen to you.

You pack your clothes for a long-distance trip.  You're so pleased at your super awesome packing skills that you get done early and play on the computer, forgetting that YOU GOT TO GO to the airport so you jump in the car, leaving later than you wanted.  You get halfway to the airport and it occurs to you that you forgot to pack ... wait for it.... underwear!  Too late to turn around.  You spend your time in both airports with your coworker, answering the question - Do they sell underwear in airports?  The answer is - Yes but only expensive Calvin Klein underwear that might as well be called Wedgie underwear.  Yes.  This happened.  To me. 

Or - you are so happy with your skills to pay the bills - online!  Technorific!  Efficient!  You can do it during the kids' naps or on your break!  No problem-o!  But wait - you think, hmmm, have I paid the power bill?  Let me check.  Yeeessss  buuutttt... that amount looks like the exact same amount I paid to the credit card company.  OH NO I DIDN'T!!  Oh yes I did.  Thankfully -- and coincidentally -- they were almost for the exact same amount and due around the same time.  WHEW!  Crisis averted, no thanks to Mommy Brain!

I am going to advocate for the creation of  an official DSM-IV mental illness diagnostic criteria for Mommy Brain.  On the other hand, scratch that, because that would probably lead to those little women and men in nice white coats coming to take all the mommies away.... because I think I'm not alone in my illness.  Am I....?

More with My Memories

So - even though I've already given away the free copy of the My Memories software, you can still use my code to get $10 off plus a $10 coupon for the online store.  I should be sleeping but instead I'm playing!  Look what I did in the past 20 minutes or so.  I didn't have in mind what I wanted to do, but I took a few pictures from a trip we took in the early Spring to UNC Chapel Hill.  I like the way it turned out....  this was one pre-designed page of a 5-page album but I changed the photo layout very easily, adjusted the photos to black and white and added the word "family."  What do you think?  Pretty cool huh?

The code to get the discount is STMMMS40533 on the My Memories Suite webpage.  

It would be great for making a Holiday letter, wedding album, baby album, calendar for a gift and much more!

Pulling the Santa Card

Picture of me, taken by Ivy - Summer 2011

It is official.  Threes are more terrible than the two's.  I love her dearly but Big Sister has taken an interesting turn lately.  It all started with a bad report at school.  She had scratched another little girl and gotten time out.  Time out?  My child?  We had just had Parent's Night where her teacher raved that she never has any problems with our angel!  Perhaps my daughter had her super radar far-away hearing aid on that night and heard it....  and decided "I'll show them!"  Her first time out was the next day.

Then the next day, she got sent to (wait for it...) the director's office.  Her little yellow behavior school bus went from green to yellow to RED!!  The details are foggy now...  it involved scratching several times, and laughing when she had to sit in time out.  Today was the fourth day we've gotten such a report.  No more trips to the principal's office, but time out nearly every day!  What is going on?? 

We've made her apologize to the teacher each time (again), and she's grounded from the iPhone and special things like watching movies and playing on the computer.  She doesn't seem to care.  We talk about it (maybe too much), she says she doesn't know why, and gets upset and looks like my precious tears-streaming-down-her-baby-face angel.  (Her teacher says it's because she wants whatever they have and gets mad when they won't bend to her will).

I am reminded of a line from Tangled.  "I can't help but notice you seem to be at war with yourself." 

While it's maddening that nothing we do or say seems to have an impact, it does seem like she's having an internal struggle too.  Trying to figure out right and wrong, what to do with some feelings she has - like when she wants something but can't have it, how to resolve that.  It's tough to be on the parenting end of this because you need to accomplish all of the following:  discipline your child, help her understand and resolve her feelings about things, figure out how to help her behave when mom and dad aren't around - and protect her current and future victims.  As if she'd listen to us.  Hah.

Tonight I pulled the Santa card.  "He's always watching you, and he only wants to give toys to children who are nice to their friends- not little girls who scratch their friends."  (Oh yes I did that, and I cringe now.... I don't want her thinking she's a bad girl.)  But she's too smart, she's not buying it.  "He can't see me from far away."  Ever the realist, I played the Santa card and it fell flat.  Got any ideas?