Sharing the Savings

Sam’s Club Wants to Know: What’s Your Funniest Holiday Tradition?

October 18, 2010 By Rhea 5 Comments

Every year at Thanksgiving, my mom buys a giant turkey. I mean a giant, must have been exposed to radiation, 30 POUND turkey. Talk about artificial hormones! Anyhow, one time several years ago, she held this enormous turkey up by it’s wings and started spanking it. I don’t even know why she did this. But it was they funniest thing I’d ever seen. Maybe I was drunk? It’s quite possible. But we both burst out laughing and took turns spanking the turkey.

I’m sure we must have both been drunk!

And so now, every year since as long as I can remember, we spank the turkey at Thanksgiving.

I sure wish I had it on video! Instead, I have to settle for a poor graphical rendition and my memory.

I only tell you this because now Sam’s Club wants to know what your family’s FUNNIEST, CRAZIEST, WACKIEST, and FAVORITE holiday tradition is! This is your chance to show off your funky family and spank that turkey for the world! All entries have the chance to be featured on the Sam’s Club holiday website!

That’s right people. Sam’s Club is looking for video submissions of your funny and wacky holiday traditions (holidays as in whatever holiday you celebrate in the winter: Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah, Winter Solstice, Kwanzaa, etc etc) They want to feature real stories and real videos on their holiday website that will be launching real soon.

Is video not really your thing? Then feel free to submit a short written essay (200 words or less) describing your wacky relatives…err…I mean TRADITIONS.

Here are some technical details:

Each entry MUST address “Holiday Traditions and/or Holiday Stories”
File format for uploaded video must only be .MP4 or .WMV
Each entry must be in English
Video must be no more than 3 minutes in length
Essay entries must be no more than 200 words long
Each contest entrant MUST provide name, address, phone number and email address
NO sexually explicit, disparaging, libelous or other inappropriate content or nudity
NO dangerous acts
NO copyrighted or trademarked property of Sam’s Club competitors or entities

Prizes!

GRAND PRIZE VIDEO WINNER will receive a 26″ Magnavox LCD 720p HDTV (estimated value of $279.87)

GRAND PRIZE ESSAY WINNER will receive a Nikon Coolpix S3000 12MP Digital Camera (estimated value of $119.88)

How To Enter your VIDEO

CLICK HERE to upload your .MP4 or .WMV file to the Sam’s Club file share account.

See below for instructions how to fill it out:

How to Enter your Essay

Email your submission to holidaytraditions@rockfishinteractive.com. In the body of your email, please include your Name, Address, Email and Phone number. Entries without full contact information will be DISQUALIFIED.

I hate to keep saying “Disqualified” but I do not want that to happen to you, so please pay attention to the rules!

Terms & Conditions

Submission’s close on October 22, 2010 at 11:50pm EST. Contest open to US residents age 18 and over. Each entry will be judged by a qualified judge or panel appointed by Sam’s Club who’s decisions will be based upon the following criteria: Humor (50%), Innovation & Creativity (25%) and Originality (25%). Please read the full Terms & Conditions here.

I can’t wait to see the entries! GOOD LUCK!

Hey, while you are here, have you entered your best Halloween Costume? You could win a Wii bundle in that one! GO!

FTC Disclosure: I was provided monetary compensation for my participation in this Holiday Traditions campaign. All opinions are always my own.

Filed Under: Giveaways, Sharing the Savings Tagged With: holiday tradition, sams club, Sharing the Savings, video contest

Celebrate Halloween With Sam’s Club!

October 12, 2010 By Rhea 34 Comments

I love Halloween! It’s such a fun holiday, completely pointless and full of candy. Adults get to have just as much fun as the kids since there is nothing to “believe” in and no age limit on dressing up.

This year, Sam’s Club wants to help you with your Halloween celebrating.

Sam’s has a website dedicated to all your Fall entertaining needs. Everything from Oktoberfest to Halloween, and stuff in between.

Halloween Decorations

Omgosh, look at these adorable ceramic candy bowls! I want need the pumpkin. So cute! Sam’s has great deals on filling the bowls with candy, too as well as other spooky decorations and costumes.

Halloween Food Ideas

The Fall Harvest website has super spooky Halloween food recipes, too. Check out these little ghostly pizza’s made with English muffins and mozzarella cut out like ghosts? Isn’t that clever? I’m totally making these for my boys.

And check out these Jiggly Jack O’Lanterns, too. I mean, what other holiday has such creative and fun food options? These are made with oranges and Jello. I wish I was so creative to think of this stuff on my own. But I’m not, so I’m happy that Sam’s Club has a holiday website to tell me how to do these fun things.

All my boys love Halloween, but Anthony LOVES Halloween. He’s a big prankster and he just loves all the spooky decorations and opportunities to “scare” people. I’m going to be in trouble with this one!

Creative Halloween Costumes

Halloween would not be Halloween without costumes. And I really miss the days when people made their own costumes with old junk out of their closets. Today every child is wearing some commercialized piece of polyester costume that they buy in the store. And these are so expensive! It’s a lot more fun, and usually cheaper to make your own costumes. Too bad my boys didn’t get the memo…they want to be Toad, Yoshi and Darth Maul, all because a catalog came in the mail and now their hearts are set. *sigh*

But a few short years ago, before they developed their own opinion, we made their costumes. And it was my favorite Halloween with the boys I’ve ever had!

The Nathan and Gabriel were home made ghosts (white clothes and lots of tulle) and Anthony was a robot. I even wrote about the process for making the robot costume. It was such a fun Halloween and we got so many compliments on their creative costumes. I was a proud momma.

Costume Contest!

Sam’s Club want’s to celebrate FUN and CREATIVE costumes by having a Costume Contest and you can win a Wii!

Dig out a picture of your favorite, most fun and most creative costume. It can be one you, your child, or your spouse, past or present costumes.

On October 20th, I will choose my THREE favorite submissions to send on to Sam’s Club (finalists). All of the Sam’s Club Community Bloggers are hosting the contest on their sites. Each of us (10 bloggers) will send in our three favorites. Sam’s Club will then choose ONE Grand Prize winner from the blogger submissions to receive a very cool Wii Prize Bundle (including Wii System, Wii Fit Plus, Balance Board and Controller) Valued at $294.81.

Using the form below, upload your Halloween Costume photo. Important: Be sure to name it so I know who’s picture belongs to who! THEN, you MUST leave a comment telling me which picture is yours so I can contact you if you are chosen as a finalist! If you don’t leave a comment, I can’t contact you and you will be disqualified. I don’t want you to put your email on the picture submission because then it will be public…unless you don’t care about those things.

I will choose my three favorites on October 20th. Grand Prize winner will be announced by Sam’s Club on October 31st.

Terms and Conditions:

The Sam’s Club Halloween Photo Contest starts at 12:01 a.m. Eastern Standard Time (“EST”) on October 12, 2010 and ends at 11:59 p.m. EST on October 21, 2010 (“Contest Period”). Participants can enter the Contest by submitting a “Halloween costume photo” and completing the Contest registration form at only one (1) of the ten Contest blog sites.

Be sure to check out the full Terms and Conditions here

*Please note that new images must be approved by me before they appear publicly. Please contact me if it’s been 24 hours and you don’t see your picture posted. Thanks!

*Please be mindful of your image size. Images larger than 1000 pixles wide will be rejected.

FTC Disclosure: I was provided monetary compensation for my participation in this holiday campaign. The opinions expressed are always 100% my own.

Filed Under: Giveaways, Sharing the Savings Tagged With: costume contest, Halloween, sams club

Sophyto Teams Up With Sam’s Club

October 7, 2010 By Rhea 12 Comments

Part of the reason I was invited to Arkansas last month was so I could be introduced to an organic skin care line called Sophyto® (so-FY-toe). The Sam’s Club Bloggers were invited to a beautiful executive home where we got to meet the creator of Sophyto and hear all about her product. As a no-poo, “wannabe crunchy” mom, I was really interested in what she had to say.

Inspired by nature and backed by science, SOPHYTO® is a breakthrough line of professional anti-aging skincare products previously only available through professional locations.

By working with your skin to naturally optimize pH levels and moisture content, SOPHYTO® helps all skin types to look and feel healthier and more radiant. Every eco-friendly product has been developed by green chemists to contain optimal levels of certified organic botanical ingredients. And the entire SOPHYTO® line is guaranteed to be free from artificial fragrance, colors and fillers, including parabens and processed nutrients.

I had a great time meeting the creator, Karen Sinclair Drake, who does NOT look like a woman in her 50′s! She is beautiful and smart and is a self-proclaimed science geek. She worked hand in hand with chemists and doctors to create Sophyto after she became frustrated with her own skin issues. When Sophyto launched in 2008, it was welcomed by the American Academy of Dermatologists, Neurologists, Integrative Doctors and Estheticians. Since then, it has only been available in Dermatology offices and leading Spas.

But Karen’s vision was to have her skin care line available to everyone and she is thrilled to launch Sophyto at Sam’s Club.

Natural Skin Care

I’ve been using the Sophyto Phytotherapy Anti-Aging Care Kit for 3 weeks now. This kit contains pH optimizing restorative toner, anti-aging antioxidant serum and marine peptide brightening treatment. Up until now, if you had purchased these items separately in a dermatology office. they would have cost you around $90.00. At Sam’s Club, they only cost $34.98! This is great, affordable skin care.

In addition to the Phytotherapy Anti-Aging kit, I have been using the Purifying Silken Cleanser which removes all my make up and skin impurities. The cleanser retails at Sam’s Club for $14.98 for a twin pack.

So everything I need to take care of my skin for 30-60 days (depending on how heavy you use the cleansers) costs less than $50.00. I was spending $30 on cleanser alone with another anti-aging brand! And it wasn’t “natural” either, I couldn’t even pronounce half of the ingredients.

Sophyto Demonstration

Check out my demo. You know you want to see me without makeup (and don’t you dare laugh at me since I hate being on video and totally look like a dork!).

Thoughts on Sophyto

I really like this skin care line. My face doesn’t tingle when I’m done using it. My eyes don’t hurt because I’ve had to scrub my make up off. My eyes don’t sting from using harsh chemicals on them. My skin feels clean and balanced. I’m really happy that I don’t have any crazy science experiments on my face. Just natural plant products, things right from the earth.

I have had a few breakouts, but I think that’s pretty normal when you change skin care routines. But by breakout, it’s been like 3 little pimples (in 3 weeks). Nothing life shattering.

I can’t really say if I look younger or not. Maybe I should have taken a before and after picture? The packaging does say it can take 12 weeks to fully see results, so perhaps if I’m feeling brave I will do another video in 12 weeks and then we can compare.

Sophyto is currently available in 150 Sam’s Club stores. You can go online or call your local club to see if your club is one of them. The 150 clubs that do carry it now will be doing demo’s twice a week until the end of the year. If your club does not have it yet, it can be ordered online with free shipping until the end of the year!

Sam’s Club is currently offering 15-week club memberships for only $15.00! This is great for the upcoming holidays. The offer is good in club only until October 10th, so hurry! This could be your chance to use Sam’s Club during the holidays as well as try out Syphoto at the great club store prices!

FTC: Sam’s Club provided product to try and compensation for my time in creating this post for you. My opinions are always my own.

Filed Under: Product Reviews, Sharing the Savings Tagged With: organic skin care, sams club, skin care, sophyto

Recipe Using Gourmet Cheese from Sam’s Club

September 23, 2010 By Rhea 5 Comments

Did you know that Sam’s Club is now carrying beautiful, creamy, yummy and stinky cheese? Why, YES, they certainly are. And do you know what else? I LOVE CHEESE!

I think Bleu, Asiago, and Gorgonzola are my favorite “gourmet” varieties but on a day when I need a quick snack, I often reach for my kids’ favorite: string cheese (which we all know is just mozzarella!).

Sam’s Club is really excited be bringing these gourmet cheeses from around the world into the club. To celebrate with it’s members, Sam’s Club is launching a a very cool Facebook App that is all about cheese and you can enter there to WIN a TRIP TO FRANCE! The app will take you on a cheese journey around the world where you can learn about different cheese and wine pairings as well as other fun stuff. And if you are a cheese lover like me, then you’ll want to check it out.

I was really excited to get a sampling of the new cheeses to try out with my family. It was so hard to narrow down a single cheese recipe to share with you, but falling back to my Italian roots, I picked an Italian meatball recipe using Grana Padano which is very similar to Parmesan. In fact, it’s so similar that I added some fresh Parmesan to my recipe since I didn’t quite have enough Grana Padano.

Meatballs with Grana Padano Cheese

Ingredients

1 pound ground beef
3 eggs
2 cups grated Grana Padano or Parmigiana Reggiano (parmesan)
generous handful of bread crumbs (purchased “canned” bread crumbs) soaked in milk for 5 minutes and squeezed dry. If you start rolling your meatballs and they seem too “loose” then add some more breadcrumbs to the mixture).
salt & pepper to taste
olive oil
oil or unsweetened butter
small bunch of minced parsley (optional – I did not use this, instead I used some dried Italian Seasoning)

To make a large batch of meatballs for my boys, I doubled this recipe.

I grated my cheese using my Ninja Master Prep. Grana Padana is a hard cheese, so it crumbles easy in a food processor or blender.

Combine meat with the eggs, cheese, breadcrumbs, parsley(or Italian Seasoning), salt and pepper. Add just enough olive oil to make mixture soft (I omitted the olive oil).

Shape into meatballs. Now the original recipe says to roll the meatballs in a beaten egg and then roll them into more breadcrumbs, but I didn’t do this either. Just want to mention it in case you feel you want to add this step.

Brown your meatballs in heated oil/butter until nicely browned on the outside and cooked through to the center.

All the cheese in the meatballs started cooking and it just smells amazing!

Serve over pasta. Or eat alone because these are that good. I served a traditional red sauce with dinner this night, but an alfredo would probably be good, too. We had a bunch of meatballs left over and they were good warmed up the next day.

ALL the boys liked their Grana Padana Meatballs. YAY!

So if you are looking to experiment with some new cheeses, or just have a hard to find favorite, go visit your local Sam’s Club and check out their new cheeses. I was really impressed with their selection. Also, visit their Fall Harvest website to learn more about cheese and explore other fun fall decorating and entertaining ideas.

Oh yeah, don’t forget the Facebook App where you can WIN A TRIP TO PARIS!

Did I mention that already?

Just checking.

Recipe adapted from About.com

Sam’s Club provided my family with a variety of cheese in order to share a fun new recipe with you. They also provided compensation for my time in creating this post. My opinions always remain my own.

Filed Under: Recipes, Sharing the Savings Tagged With: cheese, gourmet cheese, grana padano cheese, italian meatballs, sams club, Sharing the Savings

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