Fabulous Finds Friday: Advent Calendar Alternative

One thing that I loved as a child was the Advent Calendar. Waiting in anticipation for the next morning, opening the little door to reveal a sweet chocolate surprise.

One thing I love even more is getting creative with my son's advent calendar. Last year, we had a fun garland with a different family activity to do everyday. This year...maybe more of the same, or maybe something fun like this fabulous find on Pinterest

I can only imagine his excitement with opening a new book every day up to Christmas. Educational and fun all wrapped with kraft paper and embellished with wrapping paper leftovers, ribbon and numbers. And it can be something super economical as well with books at the dollar store, maybe coupons to go to the local library, or even a book or two to donate to a family in need during the holidays!

SWH4T$: Free Books for All

A very happy 2012 to each and every one of you!! Shannon and I are thrilled to welcome you back to She Works Hard For The Money, with some format changes!

Shannon has some exciting couponing news for you all, and I'm stoked to offer up amazing crafty tutorials for home decor, hostess gifts and more!

Now for the rules!

1.) Follow your hostesses at Baby Shmizz and Sweet Stella's via GFC

2.) Link up a specific post that relates to money and time, your job, your business, couponing, anything that shows how you "work hard for your money".

3.) Post our button on your post

Have fun linking and finding new blogs to read!

a href=" http://sweetstellas.blogspot.com/target="_blank/"img src=" http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c91/zippinviolet/SWH4T.jpg " /></a>
Free Books for All

My lovely Husband got me a Kobo for Christmas, and it seriously has been the absolute best thing ever.

What's a Kobo? Well, it's the Canadian version of the Nook, available through Chapters and Indigo. Much like the Kindle and Nook counterparts, and even the Sony e-reader, the Nook downloads ebooks from the internet for easy reading. It has a few more functions than the other ereaders, but that's neither here nor there for this post.

What I love the most are the free ebooks. I didn't realize just how many free ebooks there are on the Kobo platform! I've already downloaded 32 books! Most are classics that I either haven't read at all, like Pride and Prejudice, and some are classics that I want to revisit, like The Last of the Mohicans, Cinderella and Beauty and the Beast.

I just finished....

And have started....

While I know that I will eventually run out of free books to read (I have 30 in queue....should last me a while!) I love that I can get some books for as low as $1.99 and that my Kobo will store 1000 books in total. Considering that I would be spending approximately $4.99 at minimum per book, plus the $9 at Starbucks when I stop at Chapters...and walk away with approximately 3 books for myself, as well as two for Owen...plus the gas to get to the bookstore...

You're looking at about $34 (+gas) just for one trip!

Or...you could plugin your Kobo and synch up over 100 free books! Most I bet are ones that are amazing and wonderful, but that you've never given the time of day.You can even get some new releases for about $8, which is approximately $4 off the cover price (and cost of gas!) per book!

Have you gotten any amazing gadgets over the holidays that will end up being huge money savers? Link up with us!!

Talk-To-Me Tuesday: Favourite Products

I've been asked time and again...what is your favourite product to create?

Hands down, board books.



The first one that I created was for my son, Owen, so that he would have pictures of all of the special people in our family and would know what they did with him when he was just a baby.

I love to write, and have written some short stories, tonnes of poems, and even a few children's stories in the past, so writing the board books about someone's silly special family is amazing. it's such an honour to work with a family on their story too!

I get a crazy list of family members, their special names and what they do with the child. From there, I create a one-of-a-kind story while the Mama choose papers, stamps and inks, a theme for the backgrounds and cover.


After that, I get crafty and create a board book like no other...unique and special, just for them! Some I have handwritten and others I have done some graphic design for. It brings me so much happiness to know that I've created something truly wonderful and unique for a family!

Finally, I put clear photo corners on the pages so that the family can fill the book with pictures of their child (or children!) with their special family members.



I think I may need to expand the selection of board books as well...shapes, letters, animals...maybe even those stories that I wrote a number of years ago about a lazy otter named Ollie who loved to daydream...

Think Pink with Bellflower Books

I've had the honour of being at featured Etsian over on Bellflower Books, and when I found out that they have a strong Breast Cancer Awareness fundraiser going on, I knew that it was my turn to repay the favour.



Just Be Enough

Link up with the {beautiful} Just Be Enough blog on Monday's, and for the first 20 people who do, Bellflower will donate a $75 Bellflower Gift Certificate to Crickett's Answer, an organization that offers help and support to women who've been diagnosed with breast cancer.

There are so many ways that you can honour someone with breast cancer, or remember someone you've lost, like creating a memory or Legacy book with Bellflower Books.

Be kind to yourself

Love yourself

Love those who take the time to love you



*the Bellflower Books button will be up for the month of October to remind you to take a moment and reflect*