Anyways, to enter – check out the details at their FaceBook fan page or on their website.

(in the prize dept)

(and hell, in other depts too – we are talking romance after all!)

The Smart Bitches and the Dear Author girlz are at it again with a sweet little contest to help spread the word about the awesomeness of contemporary romance in general and author Julie James’ latest release in particular.

I’ve said it before, I wasn’t much of a fan of the contemporary – but I agreed with so many of SB Sarah’s favs that when she oozed happiness and rainbows for a book that was outside my novel comfort zone – I figured why not.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained and all that.

So reach out – be brave – try something new!

Save the ta-tas, yes, but save a contemporary too.

And I am in no way comparing the two causes, or making light of a serious issue – but so many campaigns have their ribbon – pink, red, yellow – what would the Save the Contemporary support ribbon look like? Flesh colored?

I kid!

Maybe if we found a couple hundred yards of man-titty fabric…

Go check it out…but if you win I am not liable for any injuries!

I loved Pandora, I loved how it introduced me to new artists based on stuff I already liked (hello Frou Frou and Jem (no, not with the Holograms). I loved the cute little widget I can add to my website and share what I’m listening to (I always find it interesting to see what kind of music people like). I loved that I could build different “radio stations” based on my mood or what I was doing.

But all was not perfect  in the Pandora world…my biggest beef is the limit they place on how much you can listen for free…well then, that’s not really “free” anymore.

Then along came Last.fm…oh sweetness and light, I am saved! This site is really neat – totally free, listen as long as I like, and a big list of free mp3s available to download to boot. They also allow you to select artists you like and build playlists based upon your taste, and they include videos (cool, huh?)!

Sorry Pandora, I just found something a little better.

I hope we can still be friends.

This was how I discovered that:

A – I totally missed an awesome series of book giveaways for the 12 days of Christmas at Book Binge

and B – they are featuring Karen Marie Moning in their author spotlight this month.

I love Karen’s books. The Highlander time travel series and the Fever series, she writes fun heroines, sexy sexy heroes and great dialogue. So yay for Karen!

Right now they are hosting a tournament of KMM heroes, so go and place your vote. Oh, and you can vote for more than one (kinda like having your cake and eating it too…but if I think about that too long in reference to KMM’s heroes I’ll need a cold shower).

Aside from the fact that we’d have no money left for college (or next month’s electric bill), some stuff she asks for is very spur of the moment, Gimme! Gimme! – and that’s the kind of stuff I know she can simply do without. For the most part, though, I make sure she gets what she really wants – and will go out of my way (like ordering Charlie and Lola dolls from the UK, or digging up vintage Littlest Pet Shops on E-bay) to find and buy something if she sticks with a particular request for awhile.

Here are the two items she asked for from Santa this year:

She saw this at a friend's house and calls it a "Dog Dress Up Set." Thanks Christine for helping me locate this!

Front and center you can see the dolphin I managed to find on e-bay...apparently Sea World put out a series of LPS toys in the '90s.

Overall, I think I earn my gold Mama star in the gift department. Our Santa policy is that you can only ask for one or two things from the big man in red, because he has a lot of kids to take care of, and there just isn’t room for too many toys per kid in his sack. This way, she keeps her list with Santa (whether writing a letter to him or sitting on his lap) short and sweet – and I know the things she asks for from him are what she REALLY wants, more than anything, and that’s what I will work extra hard to make sure she finds on Christmas morning.

So I kinda brought the difficult toy hunt upon myself, because it seems Miss A has decided that if a toy can be found in a store, than that doesn’t go on the Santa list. For example, she originally planned to ask Santa for one of those FurReal cats…but then she saw it in a certain store that starts with a W and told me, “I’m not going to ask Santa for that. If it’s here in the store, you can get it for me!”

That kid is sharp.

I have to admit, I like our Santa policy – sure it can make me have to frantically hunt for things not commonly sold in stores – but it also lets my husband and I enjoy the lion’s share of credit for presents.

And yes, I admit to enjoying basking in the glow of juvenile gift gratification.

I really don’t need to say anything more.

This gem, along with 9 other Twilighterrific products, is from a post my darling husband sent to me. The man loves to tease me since I read all the Twilight books this past October (and made him watch the first movie with me when I NetFlixed it, and then went out and watched the second movie with a friend). I enjoyed the series, but I am by no means a fan, and certainly not one who would hope to see anything from THIS LIST under the tree Christmas morning.

Aside from the creepy shower curtain, my favorites included:

Dude, if a guy actually made it far enough with a girl who would slip these on in the first place…he just might be weird enough to go ahead and slip them off.

With his fake vampire teeth.

Because you know he’s wearing them.

It’s how he got her into bed to begin with.

And of course, once he got those undies off, he’ll need one of these – because DEAR GOD PLEASE DON’T REPRODUCE!

And my husband’s personal favorite, more for the poster’s comment about attacking it with a lead pipe in the middle of the night than anything else…

All’s I gotta say is that there is no way that thing is going into a bedroom like that…there needs to be waaaaaaay more stuffed animals.

We Blog Artists is giving away one of their Once Upon  A Time Original Watercolors. To enter, simply post a comment on their blog. You can enter again by posting info about the contest on your blog (kinda like what I am doing right now ) The contest closes at8pm on Saturday Nov 21st.

KCW is a delightful site that creates free newsletters full of all sorts of crafty goodness and great ideas for projects you can do at home with your kids. Based out of Australia, the site is always a fun place to visit.

I just discovered KCW earlier this year, so this will be my first time trying the card exchange. Site creator Amber does a much better job explaining the details so don’t waste your time here - go check it out! The deadline to sign up for the exchange is November 18th.

So I was delighted to discover an on-line source for my “sugar.” Ok, I confess, I didn’t discover it…props to the Queen of Hearts for telling me about it (Thanks Sharon!). I’m talking about Pandora, an on-line personalized radio station. At first I was skeptical, there had to be some kind of annoying or expensive catch…but nope – from what I can tell so far, it is as easy as pie to use and even tastier.

They created a  station for me (just type in a fav song or artist), and I left the site running in the background as I typed away. It was awesome! It really was like someone had peeked in my mind and put together a radio station just for me. I heard many favorites, and many songs I love but forgot about, havent’ heard in forever, and songs I had never heard before that grew on me right away.

I had typed in Tori Amos, and got stuff from her but also songs from Fiona Apple, Aimee Mann, Cowboy Junkies, Sarah Mclachlan and others – it was a truly great mix (for me anyway, the husband would have been gagging).

There was a Faith Hill perfume commercial that popped on every 5th song or so, but there was an option to mute it out,  so that was hardly a problem.

I am totally sold on Pandora, so if you’ll excuse me, I need to get my spoonful of it and start writing. I gotta crank out 500 words before Lil’ G wakes up.

ETA: They also make cool little widgets, check mine out in the sidebar under Groovin’ Mama.