#GiveBack National Breakfast Week: You can help #ShareBreakfast with kids!

Kelloggs Share Breakfast

I am so blessed that each morning, I can stare in my pantry, and staring back at me is about 5 options for breakfast, let alone all the options I could throw together from things in my refrigerator. I am so blessed that I even have so much to eat. I don’t want to ever take these little things for granted.

Because sadly to say, so many people don’t have options for breakfast. Did you know one in every five children don’t get breakfast in the morning – the "most important meal of the day"?share-breakfast-kellogs-pro

I don’t like the idea of so many kids missing out on such an important meal, whether they miss it for monetary reasons or for not having the knowledge of how important the meal is. Kids need breakfast to start their day, so they can be more focused in school, have more energy and grow healthy and strong. Yet so many kids don’t have this opportunity!

That is why, I have teamed up with Kellogg’s this week for their 3rd annual Share Breakfast movement – during National Breakfast Week (March 4-8), to help share the importance of breakfast! It’s easy to help – and they donate on behalf of my share every time I do!

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Kellogg’s wants to make it easy for families everywhere to join in the effort to share one million breakfasts to children that may otherwise go without this meal. So how can you help?

    Support the Cause – It’s simple!

Kellogg’s® needs your help to "share" breakfast this year too! When you share – Kellogg’s will share right back! It’s easy – (1) just visit the Kellogg’s “Share Breakfast” website and (2) share via Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest and more! You can learn about Share Breakfast by watching the public service announcement on You Tube (below) – and with every view – they share a breakfast! So watch, tweet, pin, and share!

* Each time you share, Kellogg will donate the monetary equivalent of a school breakfast shared. Kellogg will donate up to $250,000 – the equivalent of 1.25 million school breakfasts shared. Program ends 4/15/2013.


Disclosure: I participated in a campaign on behalf of Mom Central Consulting for Kellogg’s. I received a product sample as well as a promotional item as a thank-you for participating.

How to Help: Send Kernel Season’s to Military Heroes {It’s National Popcorn Month}

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    Hey everyone, I’m just poppin’ in to tell you about something really neat that Kernel Season’s is doing during National Popcorn Month (October 2012). This company is appreciating the efforts of our Military, by sending popcorn seasonings overseas to the brave soldiers that serve our country! Kernel Season’s is working with Support Our Troops, a nonpartisan, nonpolitical organization providing millions of dollars in goods and services to the military community.
    Have you heard of Kernel Season’s before?
    They are a USA-based company that makes delicious seasonings, best known for popcorn! Of course you can add the seasoning to other foods, fruits and vegetables too… for example, how good does cheesy jalapeno seasoning sound on potatoes?
    The seasonings are offered in more than 27,000 movie theatres nationwide, and you can buy them across the nation at retail stores including Wal-Mart, Target, Safeway and more. Their blends are all natural and made with real cheese. Some of the blends are: Bacon Cheddar, Ranch, Sour Cream and Onion… just to name a few! So now that you know about the company… what is it that you can do to help?
    Want to help send seasonings to our soldiers?
    Well here is what you can do: Post a photo to the Kernel Season’s Facebook wall. Easy as that! When you post your photo of a military, community or personal hero, Kernel Season’s donates a CASE OF POPCORN SEASONING to the troops! Here is our family’s hero, my brother-in-law, Matthew who is a pilot for the United States Air Force!Matthew-Hero-Picture-milita

Kernel Season’s will be donating throughout the month of October for National Popcorn Month, but I encourage you to post your hero picture now, while it is on your mind. They would love to give thousands of cases of popcorn seasonings to the Military, but can’t do it without you! It is such a simple thing to do, and a special way you can help support our troops who are away from the comfort of their homes and their families on assignment.

Where do you go to help support?

For more information and to post your own photo and give back to our troops during National Popcorn Month, visit Kernel Season’s Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/KernelSeasonsPopcorn.

Disclosure: I did receive a sample product from the sponsor for the purpose of this post. All opinions are 100% my own. For full disclosure click here.

Donate to Boys & Girls Club Just By Playing a Game!

boys-and-girls-club-raiing-The Boys & Girls Club of America (BGCA) has provided kids with a safe environment for fun and friendships for over 100 years! It is an amazing program that provides activities to encourage artistic, athletic, educational and leadership development. I have volunteered with them in the past, and truly love everything this organization stands for. Actually, some of the friends that I used to volunteer with are still working for them today!

Since back-to-school season is here, I thought I would tell you about a few of the neat things going on with the Boys & Girls Club of America (BGCA) and their partners!

JCPenny Cares

The Boys and Girls Club of America (BGCA) have also partnered with JCPenney. How? Well the whole month of August you can join JCP cares by rounding up your store purchases at the register to benefit BGCA. This is a simple way to make a small (but meaningful) donation!

I encourage you – when you are out shopping for new school clothes, don’t forget to teach your children a little about what it means to give back to others in need.

BGCA, Disney and The Back-to-School Initiatives

Boys and Girls Club of America (BGCA) and Disney have partnered to launch the Tools for Back to School initiative. This initiative features a pop-quiz style game, where supplies are donated to BGCA for every correct answer you score! It’s a a quick and fun quiz where you can easily get the kids involved too (I took the quiz and scored 100%)!

I encourage you to play here and watch the donations roll in!

Resources and More

The BGCA website features a plethora of educational resources, news, happenings and content, offering many ways for parents to engage their children and support the organization. There are Tip sheets on the BCGA site and lots of other information on how the BGCA helps young people reach their full potential as productive, caring, responsible citizens.

Twitter Party

More fun with BGCA! Mom Central will be holding a Boys and Girls Twitter Party on Thursday, August 23rd from 3-4 PM EST. There will be prizes and more! Don’t miss out on the fun!

Disclosure: I wrote this review while participating in a blog tour by Mom Central Consulting on behalf of Boys and Girls Club. I received a promotional item to thank me for taking the time to participate.

Dreyer’s Edy’s Ice Cream Puts A Smile On My Face

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Dishing out ice cream bowls on a warm summer night is pretty familiar in our house. We each have own favorite flavors, and we take turns on who gets to choose the ice cream for the week. For someone like me, who could eat a bowl of ice cream for every meal, I need to watch how much I eat… I can get carried away! So it is good to know there are ice cream options out there with less calories.

I’ve found that Dreyer’s / Edy’s Slow Churned Light Ice Cream has all the rich and creamy taste of regular ice cream, but half the fat and one-third fewer calories than that of regular ice cream! And if you look in stores, you’ll notice on the carton something pretty cool. The Dreyer’s / Edy’s people are giving children even MORE reason to smile.Reason-to-Smile-campaign-ic

A REASON TO SMILE CAMPAIGN

Did you know, every three minutes a child is born with a cleft? Often they are unable to eat, speak, socialize or smile. Operation Smile, is dedicated to restoring the gift of a smile… and Dreyer’s / Edy’s is taking part and helping them do so!

This summer Dreyer’s / Edy’s Slow Churned Light Ice Cream is giving away 25,000 scoops of ice cream during their "A Reason to Smile" campaign.  They are traveling around the country, giving out free scoops of Slow Churned ice cream and capturing the smile on folks’ faces when they realize the ice cream they are eating has all the flavor, but half the fat.  For every smile photo captured or uploaded to the Dreyer’s / Edy’s Facebook page, $5 will be donated to Operation Smile. withourbest-ice-cream-pic

MY SMILES

I posted my smile for the campaign, to give a smile to someone else! Here I am capturing a delicious moment of ice cream heaven! To join in, I just uploaded the smile pic to the Edy’s Facebook page, and $5 was donated to the foundation! How awesome is that!

HOW YOU CAN HELP {GIVE A SMILE}

You can join in on the A Reason to Smile Program- it’s easy! Just capture your ice cream smile on photo and upload it to the Edy’s Facebook page. When you do, Slow Churned will donate $5.00 to Operation Smile… Oh, spread the word too…  tell your friends and family!

THE GOAL

The goal is to give away more than 25,000 scoops of ice cream, capture 25,000 ice cream smiles and gift 500 surgeries/smiles to children by the end of this summer. The campaign will run through August 31, 2012. So if ice cream didn’t already give me enough reason to smile, this awesome initiative to go along with it sure does!

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COMING TO DENVER

The Denver County Fair is being held this weekend, August 10-12, 2012 and Dreyer’s is a sponsor of the Fair! What that means is they are going to be dishing out scoops and smiles to all the folks at the fair! Here is a link to the website: http://www.denvercountyfair.org/ – I’ll see you there!

    Disclosure: I wrote this review while participating in a campaign by Mom Central Consulting on behalf of Dreyer’s/Edy’s and received a product sample to facilitate my review and a promotional item to thank me for participating.

This Christmas: Send a Care Package to a Soldier

Give-a-care-package-to-a-soldier-ChristmasChristmas is about giving. I encourage YOU, my reader to give back this Christmas! One way to give back is sending a soldier a care package. Because yeah, believe it or not, after all the events this year, we still do not have soldiers home for Christmas.

There are plenty of sites out there that will set you up on how to get a care package to a soldier. Just Google “Soldier Care Package” and you’ll find a ton of agencies that will help you, help them!!

The most frequently requested items (from soldiers overseas)

  • Encouraging letters
  • Nutrition bars
  • Ground Coffee
  • Flavor Packets for Water
  • DVDs and Music
  • Global Calling Cards
  • Personal Hygiene Supplies
  • Blank Cards to Send to Loved Ones

Have fun with this project, get your family involved! Have your children write letters and shop for items too!

Coupons for Troops

Fourth of July is coming up this weekend, so I thought this would be a great time to share a neat program with you: Coupons for Troops. The program provides expired and non-expired coupons to military families stationed overseas. Coupons can make a big difference since prices in overseas commissaries are significantly higher than those in the States. Families in overseas bases do not always have access to coupons in newspapers and inserts,  you might be the only way they can receive coupons!

Some of the rules: Military commissaries overseas accept coupons up to six months past the expiration date! Wow! But it is important to send coupons no later than 2-3 months expired, so they have a chance to ship and get to the families for use! So don’t throw those expired coupons out! Military Commissaries accept manufacturer coupons as well as internet printed coupons. The Commissary is a grocery store and some of the most needed and requested coupons are for diapers, toiletries, laundry soap and other household items. All overseas military families have FPO or APO addresses so mailing coupons costs the same as if you were sending them stateside.

If you would like to start sending coupons please visit THIS SITE or THIS SITE and you will be provided addresses of families… that’s rewarding clippin’!