Hotline to God Story Stix: Review of a great Children's Toy #sponspred

I received the products in this review for free in exchange for writing a review. All opinions are 100% my own. The products were supplied by Hotline to God. I signed up for the review through Buzz Plant's BuzzBlogger program.


When I received the package from Hotline to God we were having a crazy day getting ready for Little Man 2's first birthday party. I didn't have time to deal with it so I put it up on a shelf and forgot about it. I remembered it the other day when it was raining all day and I needed something to occupy the little men so I wouldn't go crazy. When I pulled them out and let the kids play with them I wished I wouldn't have waited so long.

The kids loved them! Little Man 2 was the first one who got to explore them because he woke up from his nap earlier than Little Man 1. He couldn't figure out how to push the buttons so I pushed them for him. You should have seen the huge smile when it was talking to him. Then he put it up to his ear like a phone (he has seen Little Man 1 talk on various objects like a phone). He gestured and smiled just like he was listening to someone on the phone. Whenever it stopped talking to him he handed it back to me and I started it again. I wish I could post the pictures I got of him listening and smiling, they are super cute. But Mr. Random and I agreed when I started this blog that I would not post pictures of any of our faces. You can see a few pictures below of my kids cute arms etc and their new favorite toys.

When Little Man 1 woke up he loved them too. He pushed the buttons over and over. He also loved the Serenity Prayer key chain. He really loves key chains right now. He will loop them around his fingers and carry them around. This key chain recites the serenity prayer when you push a button. SO now I hear the serenity prayer a lot :)

Hotline to God sent us 4 Story Stixs, 1 Key Chain, and 1 Phone to God. I haven't gotten batteries into the phone yet, but I have no doubt the boys will love that too. They both love pretending to talk on the phone. The story sticks are interesting. Each of them tells 1 bible story: Jesus, Noah, David & Goliath, and Adam & Eve. The stories are broken down into 6 parts, each button tells a sentence or two of the story. If you press each of the buttons in order you will hear the entire story. But they also set it up so each button makes sense on its own. They were well designed. The only thing I would change is the option to turn down the volume. The website says they are recommended for ages 3 and over, but my 2 (almost 3) year old  and 1 year old love them.

If you are looking for a good toy or present for a children these would be great!

The 14 Most Underviewed Posts from 2013

Hi all!

I like to do roundup posts this time of year highlighting some of the best posts of the previous year so that any new readers I have can find the most awesome posts from my site easily. I will be doing 3 roundups from 2013:

The 9 Most Popular Posts From 2013 (written in 2013)
The 10 Most Viewed in 2013 (written anytime, viewed in 2013)
The 14 Most Underviewed Posts of 2013 (my favorite posts from 2013 that I didn't think got enough attention)

If you want to see last year's roundups you can find them here:
Top 10 Most Popular Posts of 2012
Top 15 Most Underviewed Posts of 2012


So Without Further Ado The 14 Most Underviewed Posts From 2013:

1. Thank You God

2. DIY How to make Dude Family Shirts

3. Super Fun, Cute, and Easy Pregnancy Costume

4. The $1 Date
5. Little Man 1 Birth Story
6. How to get Feedburner to send emails again
7. Computer Tips from Mr. Random: Tab Your Way to More Time
8. Let's Talk: What does it feel like when the baby hiccups?
9. Let's Talk - A fun little Mommy Quiz
10. How to Earn Swagbucks for Free post 2

11. The Ultimate List of White Elephant Gifts for Women! #Sponsored

12. Let's Talk - About Breastfeeding - It Hurts!

13. Blast from the Past 24 - 25 deep questions, only answer for yourself if you really want others to know the real you :)

14. How I Planted My First Vegetable Garden Sponsored Post #MiracleGroProject

The 9 Most Popular Posts From 2013

Hi all!

I like to do roundup posts this time of year highlighting some of the best posts of the previous year so that any new readers I have can find the most awesome posts from my site easily. I will be doing 3 roundups from 2013:

The 9 Most Popular Posts From 2013 (written in 2013)
The 10 Most Viewed in 2013 (written anytime, viewed in 2013)
The 14 Most Underviewed Posts of 2013 (my favorite posts from 2013 that I didn't think got enough attention)

If you want to see last year's roundups you can find them here:
Top 10 Most Popular Posts of 2012
Top 15 Most Underviewed Posts of 2012


So Without Further Ado The 9 Most Popular Posts From 2013:

1. The Ultimate List of Carry-In / Potluck Meal Theme Ideas!
2. A Coffee Themed Bridal Shower (and free supplies list printable!)
3. Blast from the Past 20 - A Cut Up Poem - You and Me
4. How to write a wedding toast
5. Let's Talk: What do Braxton Hicks feel like?
6. Diaper Wars Review 7: Huggies Little Movers
7. Blast from the Past 21 - For guys who think they're so good but can't find a good girl, and girls looking for a good guy8. Blast from the Past 31 - funny name slogans, read this it's hilarious
9. Pregnancy Week 25 Update - Little Man 2

May Sponsor Spotlight

Super Spot Sponsor

Wedding Speeches Solutions has the answer to your wedding speech dilemma. Inside you will learn that there has to be a balance between being funny, serious and including memories in your speech.



Super Sponsor Sponsorship

From Paula:
Paula and her husband have been married for 4 years. They have 2 lively and rambunctious kiddos and all live together in a tiny 2 bedroom apartment. Paula's passions include writing, the hot Houston weather, watching her kids giggle, budgeting and encouraging people. You can find more of Paula's writing on her blog www.BeautyThroughImperfection.com where she writes candidly about her life as a young wife and mom.

You can also connect with her on Facebook or Twitter.

From Me:
Beauty Through Imperfection is one of my new favorite blogs! I am so glad that Paula won the giveaway and got this ad spot so that I could get to know her blog. She is so sweet and encouraging and I have loved almost every post of hers that I have read. She is also in the same stage of life as I am and her kids are close in age to mine so her posts are very relevant to me right now :)

Here are some of my favorite recent posts:

5 Ways to Prepare Your Toddler to be an Older Sibling  and 8 Ways to Help a Toddler Adjust to the New Baby - These two posts are absolutely great for me right now. It sounds like her two kids were the same number of months apart that mine will be and these two posts are a minefield of useful tips that I plan to utilize in the next several months. The first one is tips that you can do before the baby comes, the next is tips for after the baby comes. Super great info!

 Top 10 Blogging Tips - Some great tips for bloggers who are looking for some advice!

Top 10 Ideas for Family Time with Toddlers - I don't know about you , but I sometimes have trouble thinking of ideas for family time with toddlers. Toddlers have short attention spans and don't always seem to understand what we are doing. So this list is great to jump start my ideas!

Beyond Movie Night - 10 at Home Date Night Ideas - Sometimes it is hard to get out on a date. And when we are at home we generally just put on a movie and work on our separate projects. I am just starting to realize how important at home dating is and this list is a great resource that I plan on using!

Supporting Unwed Moms - I have not been an unwed mom, and neither has Paula, but this post is a great one! I have never been the type to look judgementally at, or make rude comments to unwed moms, but I have silently judged them. This post confronts my sin of judgement and helped me to realize that the fact that I am very pro-life means that I must be pro-unwed mother (not pro-premarital sex, just pro-mom). If I want ladies who find themselves pregnant to give the child life then I must support them when they do. Thank you Paula for helping me realize this!

DIY Free Personalized Coloring Sheets - This is such a great idea! Make personalized coloring sheets for your children using your own pictures. So cute, and so much fun! And Free!

March Sponsor Post - The Thriftiness Miss

Today I get to tell you about a super awesome blog. Here is the information about her blog:

Hello there! My name is Jessie and I blog over at The Thriftiness Miss. 

As you can assume from the name, I love to do things the thrifty way. It's kind of turned into a passion on mine since I started blogging.  At The Thriftiness Miss you'll find lots of crafts, DIY projects, recipes, refashions and re-purposes, kid's stuff, and some sewing all rolled into my little corner of web.  Let's Connected! I'd love to have you stop by and say hello sometime. I truly enjoy meeting and getting to know all of the wonderful people out there! Thanks so much for having me Randie!

Some of her super great posts include:

$16 No Candy Easter Basket - I ran into this problem this year, I wanted to make an easter basket for Little Man but didn't want to use any candy. The Thriftiness Miss has some great ideas (including a super cute homemade alphabet soup)!

DIY Batman Cape and Mask - She made these super cute cape and mask out of a t-shirt, with no sewing. They look easy and super fun! I also love the idea of making multiples for the dress up box, great for boys!

DIY Common Cold Relief - The poor thrifty family had to stay home nursing colds on Easter :(. On the up side she posted some great ideas for fighting colds!

Graduation Money Tree - Graduation Season is coming up. Looking for a creative way to give a money gift? This money tree is super cute!

Toddler Play Date - I wish we had one of these bounce houses near me, that looks like a lot of fun! (Although Little Man is scared of slides and new situations, he would probably like bouncing once he got used to it :). What a great thrifty toddler play date!

8 Easter Tradition Ideas - It is too late for this year, but there are some fun traditions in there for next year!

A Week of Freezer Meals - I have been trying to get more freezer cooking in and she has some great ideas. I especially love the smoothies! I never thought to individually package them like that.

Aren't they great, she has plenty more so go check it out!

Friday Fascinations 9 Features

March Super Value Sponsors:

Snack Cups and Smiles is a family centered blog that is about her life revolving around her grandson. She shares their daily lives and silly stories, recipes, photography and more. They love to spread happiness and share a smile.

eMeals is the revolutionary way to free up your brain, your budget and your family time. eMeals takes the dinner menu and meal planning stress off your plate...as easy as 1-2-3!

March Super Sponsor:

Winning for Christmas offers all sorts of giveaway for you to enter. Maybe you can win yourself (or someone you love :) something for Christmas!


Friday Fascinations 9 Features

I realized that I haven't posted features from Friday Fascinations 9 or 10, if I try to do them both at once it will be too long. So I will post FF9 Features here, and FF10 features with Friday Fascinations 12. Enjoy all these great posts! In the meantime if you have anything to link up, please feel free to link it up at Friday Fascinations 11.

For those who are featured get yourself a button!

<a href="http://domesticrandomness.blogspot.com/"><img src="http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/ii521/RandomlyFascinated/Buttons/FeaturedFFbutton.jpg" width="175 height="175/" /></a>  

Favorite Food Related Post

One Creative Mommy linked up I {Heart} You Pancakes - Easy Valentines Day Pancake Tutorial. I know it's not Valentines time any more but this is a great tutorial on how to make shaped pancakes!

Favorite Blog Related Post

Designed Decor linked up How to Make Your Own Blog Planner and Free Blog Printables. Great resource for us bloggers!

Favorite Random Post

Bekah's Bits linked up A Pinteresting January. This is a cool collection of her adventures exploring pins. A fun read :)

Favorite Children Related Post

We Made That linked up an Indoor Snowball Toss Game. I am totally done with winter, but it seems to be hanging on, so if you are still stuck inside here is a good game for you. Or maybe you can tweak it to be for spring, flower toss anyone?

Toddlers Through Preschool linked up Black and White Week. She offers all sorts of ideas to incllude Black and White in your play centers.

Favorite Inspirational Post

31 Cups linked up Opening That Can of Worms. She shares how she ignored a prompting from God and feels guilty about it. She prays that God will give her another chance to do as he asked. I pray that you will get that opportunity too!

Well go on over and check them out!

Friday Fascinations 11 - Everything Linky Party - Party Time! Linky Party Features

Hi all! I was hoping to post these features earlier in the week, but I have been too busy keeping up with the giveaways, and totally forgot about this, also an unfortunate side affect of the busyness is that I forgot to post the Friday Fascinations party last week so there was a week with no linky party available. So sorry to anyone who came looking for the party. I hope that you were not disappointed when you found 15 giveaways instead :). There are still several giveaways running right now so take some time to look around and see if you want to enter! The last giveaway will end the 23rd, so unless you are visiting on the 24th there is at least one giveaway running right now! (I am not going to link to all of them right here because there are too many. Just go to the homepage and below this post you will find 15 giveaway posts). There were many other great posts linked up to Party Time! be sure to go and look around.



For those who are featured get yourself a button!

<a href="http://domesticrandomness.blogspot.com/"><img src="http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/ii521/RandomlyFascinated/PartyTimeFeatureButton_zpsff28af2c.jpg" width="175 height="175/" /></a>  

Party Time! Linky Party Features


Most Visited Posts



The Tao of Poop linked up Table Manners of Lesser Primates. I think the name was probably what caught attention :) She writes about rules she wishes she could give to restaurant employees for helping families who are eating out with toddlers.

What Happens at Grandma's linked up More Snakes! More Festival! She is doing a snake festival with her grandkids and this post talks about snake breadsticks (in the picture) and snake paintings.

Favorite Money Saving Post

Your Modern Family linked up How to Become a Stay at Home Mom on One Income. She has lots of great tips that work not only for those wanting to transition to one income but also for anyone who wants to save money.

Favorite Blog Related Post

Family Home and Life linked up Celebrating What I've Learned. In honor of her 2 year blogiversary she offers several tips for blogging that she has found useful in the past couple years.

Favorite Cleaning Post

Krysta Steen linked up Cleaning Tips to Make Your Life Easier. There are some great tips in there that I've never heard of!

Favorite Children's Post

Life With Moore Babies linked up Fake Snow (from Diapers). This looks super fun, and pretty easy, we have tons of diapers :) She even shows how to "melt" the fake snow, super fun!

Favorite Recipe Post

Prudent Pantry linked up Making Almond Milk is Easy. She shows us how to make almond milk, and it does look pretty easy! Almond milk is expensive, so if you know anyone who drinks almond milk regularly you may want to pass this on.

On to the Linky Party!

This week we are going to do an everything linky party. You can link up anything that you have been working on, thinking about, writing about, whatever. Literally any post of yours that you would like to share with my readers link it up!

Oh and if you have a linky party that you would like me to visit please link it up in the Link Up Your Party Here tab above. I love visiting parties and when I have time I go to that tab and visit all the parties that are open at that time.

The rules:

• You may link up anything that you have been working on - crafts, recipes, random musings, etc. And you may link up as many posts as you like.
• Please follow me in some way. There are several options in the right side bar.
• Link up directly to the post, not your home page.
• By linking up you are giving me permission to feature your post including but not limited to pictures and quotes from your post, and also to feature your post in our various social media outlets.
• This is a family friendly, Christ following blog. I reserve the right to remove a link to any content that I find offensive or not compatible with this blog, with or without notice.
• Please add a back link or my button to your blog or post somewhere.
• Please check out some of the other links and leave some love in some way (comment, pin, follow, etc.)
• The links are inserted in random order so if you don't see your link it may have entered somewhere in the middle. Please check to be sure that it is not already inserted before you link it up again.

Oh and I'd love it if you would take a button!

<a href="http://domesticrandomness.blogspot.com/"><img src="http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/ii521/RandomlyFascinated/PartyTimeButton_zps976830c7.jpg" width="125 height="125/" /></a>  

Party Time! 15th Giveaway - 4 8x10 or 4 8x12 prints from Ana Pontes Photography

Our 15th giveaway is 4 8x10 or 4 8x12 prints from Ana Pontes Photography.

Ana is providing me 4 prints to review. My husband and I went through all of Ana's pictures and let me tell you it was tough to pick just 4. She has so many beautiful pictures it took us a long time to narrow it down.

Packaging
Ana packages her photos very well. It came in a package sturdied (is that a word?) by cardboard so that the pictures wouldn't bend. The package was also very cute (well the outside package was just brown paper but there was other packaging inside of it) She wrapped the pictures in purple tittue paper and then again in purple crinkly paper with a ribbon and a business card as a tag. That would make it very easy to gift it to someone. Here is a picture of the packaging:

Pictures
The pictures are beautiful. We picked out 4 that would go together so we could hang them together if we wanted. We have our house decorated in a beach house style so we picked 4 of her beach pictures and they match our house well! Here are some pictures of our pictures:

Mr. Random's Review
I asked Mr. Random how he would review the photographs and here is what he said: The pictures were crisp, clear and exactly what we ordered. The paper was good quality photo paper, not cheap. The shipping time was reasonable given that they were shipped from another country and had to go through customs. The packaging was good, a good presentation. They arrived safely here which is impressive given that they were coming from another country. I am looking forward to finding a place and putting them up!

 Even Little Man likes them, it was tough to keep his hands off them long enough to take pictures :)


Conclusion
Beautiful pictures, great presentation! I would definitely recommend buying pictures from Ana!



Here is a little information that Ana provided:

Color is my main inspiration. My favorite themes are Vintage inspired, Nature and Floral, Beach and Coastal Art, Still Life and Abstract Photography.

I sell also large size prints, calendars, postcard and notecard sets and printable files.


I'd love it if you'd take a button!

<a href="http://domesticrandomness.blogspot.com/"><img src="http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/ii521/RandomlyFascinated/PartyTimeButton_zps976830c7.jpg" width="125 height="125/" /></a>

a Rafflecopter giveaway


Linked Up To:
Shopper Strategy, Sweep Tight Blog Giveaways, Sweep Tight Rafflecopter Giveaways, The Steady Hand, Family Focus Blog, Home Jobs by Mom, Coupon Geek, Deal Seeking Mom, Enter Online Sweeps, Mommy Jenna, Gracious Giveaways and Reviews, Look What Mom Found & Dad too, Miki's Hope,