MomReviews

On a personal note

Dear MomReviews Readers,

I feel I should apologize for the unplanned-for seven day break I took from updating this blog. I didn’t have posts pre-written and waiting to publish, I didn’t arrange for guest bloggers to fill in. I just…took a break.

Okay, I’ll be honest- I took what I suppose would best be described as a BIG OLE’ MENTAL HEALTH BREAK.

Basically, a week ago I pulled my head out of the clouds and took a look around and realized that my life needed a whole lot more of ME living in it.

I can’t say that taking a week off solved all my problems, but it sure did wonders for my stress level.

So now I am refreshed and ready to dive back in to the world of reviewing products and giving products away and lots of summer surprises!

Thanks for still being here

Enough with the Procrastinating already!

I just read a post over at Take 90 West about how she finally did something she had been putting off, only to realize it wasn’t anywhere near as bad as she had built it up in her head.  I’ve been doing the exact same thing!

What I can’t figure out is WHY.  I LOVE writing product reviews and hosting giveaways. I love telling other Moms (and Dads and everyone else who reads MomReviews!) what I think of the latest products. So why have I let my inbox fill up with emails flagged as “reviews to do” and “giveaways to do” instead of just DOING THEM?

Sometimes I really just make no sense.

And then today, when I made myself make a list of how many reviews and giveaways I had to do, it turned out to be not as many as I thought!

I’ve never been a plan-ahead kind of gal, I have always thrived best under pressure. But when it’s me putting pressure ON MYSELF? Well, that’s just dumb.

SO.  Today I made a list, and I’m going to go through it one item at a time until everything is done.  Kaitlyn isn’t feeling well today, so I might get one review and one giveaway posted, or I might do more depending on how she is feeling.  I CAN DO IT!

Also, I was wondering if some of you could do me a big favor? See, my page rank on this blog is not great, I mean at least I HAVE page rank unlike a lot of my fellow product review bloggers who got “rank spanked”, but it’s not great. And according to people who understand these things, it’s because I don’t have enough backlinks.  Which is a fancy way of saying that there aren’t enough links to this blog on OTHER blogs.

But it can’t just be any blogs, it needs to be RELEVANT blogs. Meaning,  blogs that are about the same things as this blog- being a Mom (Dads can link to me too of course!), reviewing products, hosting blogger giveaways.

SO, if you read MomReviews and think your readers would like it too, it would mean a lot to me if you linked to it on your blogroll.  The URL is http://momreviews.net (no www) and of course the name is MomReviews (no space in between).  If you do, please please please let me know, I’ll be starting a “they link to me” blogroll!

THANK YOU!!

March is Spring Cleaning Month!

March is the traditional month for Spring Cleaning, and I am taking that to heart in a big way this year.  I will be spending the month of March doing two things- cleaning my house top to bottom, and cleaning out all of my email inboxes top to bottom.

For those of you not familiar with it, I have another blog called Table for Five. I started it in September 2005. As a “brand”, it’s become well known on it’s own, and I can’t even express just how flattering and ego-boosting that is. Companies contact me, ask me to post reviews of their products and host giveaways of more products, and they request Table for Five.

Which is wonderful, except that right now, Table for Five is going back to what it was at the beginning- a personal blog. And MomReviews here, this pretty baby of mine, is putting on her big girl panties and moving up to the big leagues.

The plan is 3 posts a day minimum for the next 30 days.  My goal will also be to have a minimum of one new giveaway starting every week.  The reviews will be heavy on DVDs for the first week as I get a huge backlog caught up.

My Google Calendar will be in the footer, and I’ll be adding to it as I go, so feel free to check it to see when your review/giveaway is scheduled to post.

I’m also looking for a Spring Cleaning schedule of some kind to help me stay on track. If any PR people out there have cleaning products they would like me to review as I clean, and anything I can give away, please email me!

So that’s what’s going on this morning. Thanks for stopping by!

It’s a Party! Have some Cake!

It’s my birthday today, yay! I’m 42!  You’ll be glad you stopped by,  I have birthday cake! It’s my favorite, chocolate layer cake with chocolate frosting in the middle and on top!(image credit: Hershey’s website)

Coffee to go with that? Maybe a big glass of milk? Here’s a napkin.

Now that you’ve had cake, I have a favor to ask.  All I want for my birthday is 42 comments on this post. That’s it! I’m really that easy to please   I know 42 people read this blog, and I know most of you have a bazillion blogs in your reader to get through every day, so you only comment if there’s a giveaway. And I understand, I do!  But today, if you could stop a minute and type out “happy birthday” or “here’s some prune juice you old bag”, I’d really appreciate it!

And if you REALLY want to make my day, feel free to mention my comment request to your readers! Just think of it as a group gift

Thank you my dears! I’m glad you stopped by today!

My laptop went kablooey

So yesterday I was just poking around online, clicking from link to link, looking for interesting articles about current events and movies and celebrities, just looking to be entertained. Well, I clicked the wrong link somewhere, because next thing I knew, random web pages started popping up on my screen without me clicking on anything.

My laptop got infected by a virus. Because I clicked on some spam link by mistake.

Fortunately for me, part of my husband’s job is to bring home laptops from work that no one is using and get them cleaned up and ready in case someone needs one.  He just happened to have one that he brought home on Friday, so he installed Firefox on it for me and transferred over My Documents in case I needed something, and this morning I’m ready to go.

Except for one thing- he wasn’t able to get Outlook installed. Which means that a., the emails will be piling up like mad and I’ll have a bazillion to go through tomorrow, and b., I don’t have access to the folders that I made with reviews I need to do and giveaways I need to start!

SO, if you read this feed and are waiting for me to review something or start a giveaway, please email me at the address shown under “Meet MomReviews”. I’ll get back to you and we’ll figure something out!