This photo of my goofy 8, 10, and 5 year olds was taken earlier this summer. Enjoy!

I just wanted to let you know that Sweet Leaf Stevia has discontinued the Milk Chocolate flavor.  I have no more in stock, so have removed it from the site.

The GOOD news is that NEW FLAVORS will be coming up!  They haven’t told me yet what they are, but I can think of many that I would love to see.  (strawberry would be a great one, I think)  I don’t know how long it will be before the new flavors are ready to sell, so we’ll all have to be in suspense together. 

Your company is great!  You offer what most people lack……..service!

Service is HUGE to me.  I am always so disappointed when I shop somewhere and it is apparent that my purchases there mean nothing.  My goal is to get orders out the same day when possible, and the next day without exception.  I love to pack up your orders and get them on their way to you speedily.  :)  I think of how delighted you will be when the package arrives and you say, “Wow!  That was fast!” 

Thanks for your support of my little home business!

 I wrote this post several years ago, and now dig it out every year and re-post to share with people each summer.

We have an Easy Set pool at our house. It’s a pretty big one, and we have floatation swim suits for our three youngest boys to wear, although we keep the pool shallow enough that all of them can walk around in it and still have their heads above water. Last year when I bought the suits the baby was one and the better quality suits did not come in his size, so I got a cheaper one, which he had continued to wear this year.
The other day the kids were playing in the pool while my husband and I sat on the deck watching them and chatting. Our youngest, who is now 2, lost his footing in the pool and very quickly was floating face down in the water. Fortunately my husband saw it right away and got to him within just a few seconds, so everything turned out ok.

BUT

The problem is that this suit was not designed to flip a child over onto their back if they needed to rely on the floatation! Our baby was helpless, face down in the water. He would have actually been safer with no suit on at all, since he would have been able to stand to his feet after losing his footing.

It only takes a very few moments for a little one to drown. I am so thankful we were right there with our eyes on the pool happenings.

We tossed out that suit and today I went and bought him one of the better ones, that are designed to keep a kid floating on their backs.  Here is the difference between the two suits:

The kind that flips a child onto their back has a float in the front of the suit that is longer than the one in the back.

The kind of suit that put my baby into the pool face first is a kind that is designed for children who need a floatie while learning to swim.  The floats are all around the suit and are the same size all the way around.

Just thought someone else might appreciate the reminder. Go check and see if your little one’s floatie suits will flip them to their backs in their moment of need.

I thought it might be fun to get a Supermom’s Health and Wellness group going on Facebook.  We have a discussion board for sharing tips and recipes, so I think this could be very fun!  Just go to Facebook.com and then do a search for Supermom’s Health and Wellness.  Click to join!  And tell your friends–the more, the merrier!

Hey folks,

I am considering adding two cool new products to the store, but wanted to get some feedback from you to see if these would even fill a need.

The first item is glass baby bottles with a cool silicone sleeve. Many parents are becoming increasingly concerned about the chemicals in plastic baby bottles, particularly when warming them or having warm milk in them. Glass bottles are great for the safety, but can be too hot to hold, slippery, and of course there is the concern about breakage.

These cool silicone sleeves go over the bottle, so they protect little hands (or yours!) from the heat of warm milk and slippage, and still allow you to see the measurement markers.

These come in both 4 and 8 ounce bottles, and would be priced at $10 and $12 respectively.

The other item I am considering adding to the store is this:

These are knee pads for your little crawlers! They can slide right over bare legs or pants, and provide a silicone cushion at the knees for your little tyke as they explore their world. I think these are really cute and smart, and wish there had been something like this back when I had crawling babies!

These would be priced at $17.95 for a pair.

What do you think? Any interest?

Just a quick reminder that any orders placed from now through next week probably won’t be sent out until Friday, June 13, 2008.  Thanks for your patience! 

~Erica

Here we are, in the car on our way to the Games. We took 7 kids + 2 adults. Woot!

The next photo is of my oldest son, demonstrating How Not To Sit While Wearing a Kilt. His was given some skirt-wearing pointers, but as you can see, he didn’t take the advice.

The first thing I did when we got to the Games was to fall and hurt myself, thanks to a sharp difference between the pavement height and the grass next to it. Somehow, I was so skillful as to have my right foot get half on the pavement and half off of it. So my right foot kind of rolled sideways downhill, and my left knee went crashing into the cement. So here is a picture of my scraped up knee, just to prove it. (thankfully, I was wearing cropped pants that covered my knees. I am so thankful that I didn’t hit the concrete with bare skin. And, extra bonus!, my new cropped pants *did not rip* which I thought was pretty great)

I got right up and kept walking. My husband has been ahead of me, as had most of the kids, so they hadn’t seen what happened, although they heard me say ouch. They checked in with me and I thought I was fine, so we kept on truckin’ for another few feet, and then I decided that maybe I should get some ice.

We found an ambulance so walked over to it, only to find not a single emergency services type person in sight. What a crock. We couldn’t find any ice near where we were, and then we saw a pipes and drums band starting, so we just went to watch that. I toughed it out.

After that we had to go to the farthest reaches of the grounds to find The Old Man, who is the vendor with the cheapest array of wooden swords, knives, and muskets. THIS is what our boys were looking forward to more than anything.

As you can see from the next photo, they had fun selecting their weaponry just in time to take the closest hill in a battle.

The thing that I was most looking forward to was seeing NeedFire play again. We just loved this group last year and have listened to their CDs since then. Well, they did not disappoint! Such a fun group to watch on stage, and super nice to their fans off the stage. Four of our kids had t-shirts that they got signed by the band members. Cool people. Very fun to see them again.

The one and only down side to the concert was that as I sat there, I noticed my foot starting to hurt. It had hurt just a little bit after it twisted as I fell off the pavement.

I don’t know if it was sitting for so long, or the amount that we walked, or just the amount of time since I fell, but the pain started intensifying and then extending all the way up my leg, almost to my hip. And that was just when I was sitting.

When I got up to walk…zowee! The pain was quite intense, and all I can say is that having birthed six babies, I do know how to breathe through pain. However, constant pain is quite a bit different than intermittent contractions with a cute baby to show for it at the end.

My husband stopped at a store on the way home to get me souvenir meds. (My daughter said to him, “Maybe you could find something herbal and natural for mom..” He was like, “Honey–they aren’t going to have anything herbal here….” It was nice of her to think of that, and I realized that I really, really need to get that first aid kit made up for the car like I’ve been thinking of doing for….years!) Neosporin for the scrape, Blue goo to make my foot feel cold, and Aleve, which ended up saving the day.

I could walk on my foot without too much misery by the time we got home. Yay! Thankfully, by Sunday my foot was feeling quite a bit better, although I took a lazy day to mostly stay off of it, seeing as how *Monday* we will be helping my husband’s sister’s family move into their new house, near us! They are moving here from 14 hours away.

Overall, it took a lot of energy and patience to take the kids to the Games, particularly when speaking through teeth clenched in pain. They had fun, though, and say they want to go back next year.

True to my make-lemonade-out-of-lemons personality, I have decided to experiment with a wonderful herbal healing salve on my knee scrape. One side of the scrape is getting the herbal stuff, the other side I am leaving alone. I already notice an obvious different in how much each part hurts. (the herbal side feels much less painful) I am thinking of offering this new product after I return from my vacation. This is a perfect opportunity to give it a good test.

So it’s been a year since my husband and I first went to the Glasgow Highland Games, and the whole family has been looking forward to attending in 2008. Since we knew we’d be going back, we started accumulating some good Scottish garb for the children. Would you like to see…??

This first little Highlander is my 5 year old. It was kinda sunny that day, so he did a lot of squinting.

Pained squinting, to be exact….

And this is my 6 year old. Cute, eh?

My daughter was quite happy with her costume.

Wild clan of cute young men…

Here’s one of all the kids together.

We had these kilts and my daughter’s outfit made by some very sweet and talented young ladies. You can go to their web site here. I highly recommend them.

Tune in next time for actually photos from the Games!

My family is looking forward to taking some time off from tending the home businesses, in favor of some family fun.  This coming Saturday we will be attending the Glasgow Highland Games, in Glasgow, KY. Last year I took my husband to it for his birthday, and we enjoyed it so much that this year we are taking all the kids. All of the boys have kilts, and my daughter has a coordinating dress to wear.  :)  I will be sure to post pictures so you can see us in all our celtic, plaid, kilted glory! 

After that we are looking forward to spending some time with various family members and  celebrating my grandmother’s 85th birthday.

If you need to place an order, get it in by June 3.  After June 4 I won’t be sending any more orders out, probably until June 14.  If you do happen to order while I’m unavailable, your order will just be On Hold until I get back.

Thanks for your patience while we enjoy some family time!