Review: Second Nature Snacks

When you are on the go a lot like I am, whether it is for business or pleasure, nothing sucks more than being on the road with a big dose of “hangry”.  For those not familiar with foodie terms, hangry is the mood you are in when you are so hungry you get angry, hence “hangry”.

One of my favorite to-go snacks for between meetings or while out camping in the woods, is a good nutty trail-mix.  Unfortunately eating the same trail-mix every day can get boring and some of them are full of trans-fats or sodium, which doesn’t help my blood pressure during business meetings.

When I received my box of Second Nature Snacks, I was pleased to see they have a simple spin on my trail-mix dilemma.  They carry a variety of mixes AND sizes, and their snacks have no trans-fat and very little sodium.  Plus, their wholesome medley had chocolate chunks and cashews, two of my favorite things.

My medleys arrived in a plain brown box rather quickly (within a week), and the two types of medley’s each had their own individual boxes with the individually packaged snack bags inside.  The two medley’s I received were:

• Wholesome Medley - almonds, cashews, peanuts, cherries, cranberries, and dark chocolate
• Simplicity Medley - almonds, cranberries, cashews, sunflower kernels, dried blueberries

Second Nature Snacks uses all natural ingredients, and mix their assortment with things that compliment each other well so they don’t need extra sweetness or salt in order to taste good.  Each ingredient looks hand-selected to provide a powerful punch of nutrition while out and about, such as dried blueberries which are rich in Vitamins A, C, E, beta-carotene, fiber, and antioxidants.  They are gluten-free as well, which is excellent for my paleo-minded friends.

You can purchase in 14oz resealable pouches (great for family camping), or 2.25oz single serves (great for the purse or hiking).  They are easy to tear open, and I prefer the single serve packages because I have no manners and just pour them down my gullet.

My favorite was definitely the wholesome medley, mainly because of the chocolate, but they have several to choose from on their website.  They have a cranberry medley that looks divine with a mix of chocolates and some tart cranberries (I’m a big tart fan).

These will definitely be a requirement for my many camping trips I have planned for this year.  I love the idea of natural and wholesome ingredients in my mixes that will provide me with the nourishment I need and not all the unhealthy stuff from conventional mixes (trans-fat, extra sodium and sugar). 

You can find a store near you to purchase your own flavor package to take on the road or just enjoy in your back yard.  They are also available online from Amazon. Give them a try!

Second Nature Snacks

Second Nature Snacks on Facebook

Review & Giveaway: Exo Cricket Flour Protein Bars

When the opportunity came up to review a product made from insects, you might expect a lot of “hmms” and uncertainty here at Reviews, Chews, and How-tos. However, a broad sense of curiosity and willingness to try anything once, combined with my passion for sustainable practices and innovative ideas, made this one review that really excited me.

Exo is a fairly new company, started by two guys in college that were inspired by their passion for having a tasty protein bar, and an MIT lecture on the breakdown of global systems and the idea of insects being a sustainable food source. They took this mix of passion and innovation and started a crowd-funded Kickstarter campaign that raised $55,000 to make their idea a reality. They teamed up with renowned chef Kyle Connaughton, and the rest is history.

The idea of insects as a food source is not new, but modern society still gets nervous when we think about eating crickets, larvae, spiders, etc. In other countries this is more common, but here in the States it’s virtually unheard of. The reality, however, is that we are getting close to a food and water crisis, currently becoming clear to see in California. The amount of water used to sustain our meat supply is far greater than our planet can sustain, so the search for alternative sources of protein is (or should be) very high on our priority list. This is where the beauty of Exo comes in.

According to a handy chart that arrived in my package, there are many advantages to using cricket flour over other food sources. Some of these include:


 Contain 2.2x more iron than spinach
 Produce 100x LESS greenhouse gases than cows

 Require 1 gallon per pound of water, compared to cows that require 2000 gallons per pound

 For every 100 pounds of feed you get 60lb of cricket protein, compared to cows where you only get 5lb of beef protein

A bonus for my fiance and I, since we both eat Paleo, is that these protein bars are also 100% paleo-friendly according to their ingredients list. Some of the ingredients include: almonds, dates, honey, cricket flour, flax seeds, vanilla extract, sea salt and coco nibs.

The bars arrived in a standard brown box within a few days, and I was delighted to see that I would be taste-testing two of my favorite flavors. Blueberry Vanilla and Cacao Nut! The other two available flavors are Peanut Butter and Jelly and Apple-Cinnamon.

I also convinced my farmer father and my fiance to try them as well. My father has very American views on food, so his opinion would be the most valuable to me.

My first choice to try was the Blueberry Vanilla, since it is one of my favorite flavors, especially for a nutrition bar. I dove in expecting there to be some sort of “dirt flavor” or “uncomfortable grit”, because in my mind, despite knowing that this was made out of cricket “flour”, that there would still be bug parts in it. Thankfully this is not the case, and I just had to remove my mental misconceptions about what I thought I would be eating and openly enjoy it.

From the first bite, I could tell that this was going to be a treat. Soft and sweet with a gooey texture like you would find in any LaraBar. No crunchy bug bits, just decadence and healthy sustainable protein. My father remarked that if he had not known it was made of cricket flour, you would absolutely never know.

The Cacao Nut bar was also good, but included some coconut for crunch, which weirded me out a little bit at first due to those same mental misconceptions of bug parts.

Again, I just had to mentally make myself aware that this was a flour, and the crunchy bits were delicious coconut and not bug parts. Instead, I was enjoying a delicious chocolate bar that was packed with nutrition and environmentally savvy ingredients.

Exo has earned my dad and fiance’s stamp of approval, and my personal vouch of delectability.

These bars will be perfect for camping trips, with the knowledge that I am supporting a more sustainable food system and the environment. Dad wants me to order some more!

I highly recommend giving Exo bars a shot. Replace any of your granola or alternative snack bars with something that is healthy, has amazing flavor, and supports the environment and food supply at the same time.

Exo Protein Website
Exo Protein on Facebook

If you're intrigued, you can win a chance to win a box of the Blueberry Vanilla ($36) bars by entering in our giveaway!

To enter the giveaway, leave a comment in this entry as instructed by the Rafflecopter, then leave the name you commented under and your email in the box in the Rafflecopter entry. (This allows us to contact you if you win!)  This will open up additional optional entries to increase your odds of winning.

This giveaway is open to US RESIDENTS ONLY
and will end just before midnight ET on 4-23-15. 

The winner will be notified by email within 24 hours after the end of the giveaway.  In order to claim the giveaway prize, the winner will need to respond within 24 hours of notification, or an alternate winner will be selected.

Good luck everyone!

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Review: EcoClear RatX Pet-Friendly Rodent Bait

I have lived on farms with many animals my entire life. It is unfortunately common when you are dealing with farm animals to also deal with rodents on a regular basis. Farm girl or not, though, rodents are still not something I’m interested in having around. They are dirty, spread disease, get into things, tear up equipment, eat our chicken feed, etc.

Despite wanting to rid of these “varmints”, I am also very conscious about the well-being of my animals and pets. I lost a young pup once in my early 20’s that was half wolf and half German Shepherd due to him killing a rat that had eaten rat poison. It was fairly devastating, as it’s not a mix of breed that you run across very often.


When I was presented with the opportunity to review a product that was both friendly for pets but heralded as being effective against mice and rats, I was very intrigued. EcoClear RatX has the added bonus of being environmentally friendly and biodegradable, which are top concerns in my book.

The creator of EcoClear RatX developed this product after having experienced the same type of tragedy that I had.

The site says he has worked with some of the top scientists in the United States to develop this product to ensure the protection of your pets while still being effective.

On the linked page, he provides MSDS (Material Safety Data Sheet), product labels, and test results all for your review before purchase.  The product arrived in a regular priority mail box with a sealed package and some pamphlets to provide information on what I had received.

They give clear instructions on how best to use the product effectively and what not to do, such as mixing with other rodent eradication products.

Since our garage is right next to our chicken coop, we see a lot of traces of mice there, so that is where I decided to experiment with the product. I did speak with the creator and he said that the product may not produce dead bodies, as often the mice will die where they sleep and not out in the open.

My dad and I placed the product where mice frequently travel, and over the course of a few weeks we monitored the activity, even though the food is supposed to take effect in 3 to 5 days..

The bait was definitely being eaten, but it is honestly not easy to tell whether it is working. They are clearly eating it, but I have not yet seen a dead mouse, and perhaps the amount of mice we have out there is not conducive to the amount of product I had to test with.

I am confident that those that are eating the product are being eliminated.

I will also say that none of my other animals appear to have gotten sick, and I think with more persistent availability of the product I could see a great difference in activity in addition to the sparseness of the product being eaten.

I am very supportive of a product that can provide results without harming the environment or my pets and animals.



EcoClear Website.
Search for a distributor of EcoClear products near you.
Also check them out on Facebook.

Review: Miss B's Rumballs

Rumballs are a favorite holiday treat in this house. A dessert snack that brings out the sweetness of alcohol but with a decadent smooth cookie flavor that removes the bite from harsh liquors. What’s not to love?

The problem with most rumballs is they are tedious to make, and not many stores locally sell them. When I saw that there was a service called Miss B’s Rumballs that will deliver a variety of specialty flavored rumballs via mailorder, I was ready to take action! lol.

But this presents a new problem, now I would be ordering a food item I have never tasted, without actually knowing what I was getting.  Miss B’s has a solution for that, too. You can order a sample of 2 rumballs for free, and all you have to do is pay shipping. This allows you to at least taste test your preferred flavor before investing in purchase a lot of them.

When doing a normal order, if you are local to the creator in California, Miss B even offers free shipping for those orders.

When I initially requested my rumballs, I was expecting them to arrive within seven to ten days as stated on the website.  This is a perfectly reasonable time frame, because each rumball is HAND MADE, and rumballs are made by letting them soak in the liquor for a period of time.

I guess because my order happened during the holiday season, it took significantly longer for me to receive them. Fortunately I wasn’t ordering them for a specific party or anything, so the hold-up did not affect me as much as it might have. However, because of the delay, I definitely suggest giving yourself ample time for delivery if you are ordering for a specific event just to ensure they arrive on time. They do keep in the fridge if you are worried about them arriving too early.  Better to get them too early than too late!

The rumballs arrived in a regular brown box with the Miss B's Rumballs logo. They are wrapped securely in bubblewrap with a business card.

Once I peeled off the bubblewrap, I was inundated with powdered sugar (not always a bad thing, ha). The plastic casing that they arrived in was not quite what was expected, as I thought they would arrive in the little red bags I'd seen advertised on their Facebook page.

The plastic casing used for my order was not completely secure, so the powdered sugar settled outside of the case some during delivery. So, be gentle when unwrapping the bubblewrap, which helped keep my rumballs intact.

On top were instructions to shake the container upside down, I assume to help disperse the powdered sugar that may have settled during shipping.

The container that arrived was organized into four sections for four different types of rumballs. It wasn’t entirely easy to discern which label went to which section, as they were mostly placed on the dividers (or the dividers shifted during delivery, who really knows) , but I think I figured out which was which by assuming what side had more label than the other.

The flavors I received were:

•  Rum
•  Cognac
•  Whiskey
•  Bourbon

I taste tested all of them, shared them with my fiance and father, and they were very rich in flavor, with a great sticky texture that was complemented by the powdery sweetness on the outside.

The cognac had the most discernible flavor, and was actually my favorite of the bunch.

The remaining three were also delicious, but the taste was very similar between them that one didn’t really stand out from the other.

Still, we devoured these in fine fashion and put ourselves in a delectable sugar coma, with a chaser of fine alcohol.

So if you have been suffering from rumball withdraw and wanted a nice handmade rumball delivered right to your door, I would suggest checking out Miss B’s Rumballs and sate your need for delicious cookie and alcohol.

She appears to always be working on new flavors on her Facebook, and I am interested to see what additional variety she is planning to whip up next.

Miss B's Rumballs Website/Shop
Miss B's Rumballs on Facebook

Review: PowerBark Bars

I have been a dog owner since the day I was born.  As a farmer's daughter and avid outdoorswoman, I’m also outside quite frequently.  

Most of the dogs we had growing up were working dogs, but also pets.  We have fewer working dogs now, and way more pets, but their needs are still the same.  

When I was given the chance to try out these PowerBark Bars, I was very excited, because I've been wanting to involve my pet in more of my outdoor activities such as camping trips.  PowerBark Bars are a nutritionally complete dog meal in an easy to carry solid bar, making it easy to take along and to serve your dog while you are both out roaming. 

They also store easily and for a good length of time, which to me was just practical.

When I received my bars in the mail, they were in a protected envelope, complete with an instruction document on the bars themselves.  Each bar is individually wrapped in thick packaging that ensures it will last with a shelf-life of 12-18 months, which makes them really handy to keep with your emergency supplies just in case.

One bar is a complete meal for a 30 pound dog, so your dogs needs will vary depending on how big or small they are.  Our pitt mix, Cort, is approximately 50 pounds, so a bar and a half does him pretty well. If we were going to be out for a whole day, we would take 3 bars with us for the day.

The ingredients in each bar started out as ingredients in the creators kitchen, one of which happens to be a nutritionist.  So in them you will find things like oatmeal, molasses, and oils.  There are some supplemental vitamins included, and most of the protein comes from pea protein.  It’s a healthy mix and balance for a meal replacement bar on the go.

 Each bar is around $4, but you can get an entire box for under $50.  They also provide FREE SHIPPING, so you can’t go wrong with that deal.

 When I opened the first bar, Cort must have smelled them and became very intrigued.  As you can see, he was “patiently” awaiting the new noms he smelled before him  I am happy to report that Cort approves his new PowerBark Bars.  The taste test did not last long, and he devoured it fairly quickly.

 Once I had Cort's approval on the taste, I knew I had the rest of the bars to use when we go camping next.  Funny enough, later that week we ran out of dog food and I was out of town for an interview and my dad was tending to Cort at the time.  He remembered about the PowerBarks, and was able to use one to act as a meal replacement until I could get home to replenish Cort’s food supply.  So this has a very practical value for even the non-outdoorsman.

Keep a few bars in your house for a snow day, keep some in your car ,for road trips, take some with you when you go for extended hikes or camping.  Whatever your needs, think of your furry companions needs in an emergency or when away from home.  These bars are an easy way to set your mind at ease.

https://www.facebook.com/PowerBark
http://www.powerbark.com/

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Review & Giveaway - Mud Pie Soaps and Lotions

I've mentioned in my previous reviews on soap products that I have a mild case of determined psoriasis, which means I am very careful about what I use on my skin for fear of agitating the underlying beast.

At the same time, I like a good smelling soap with a good lather and a smooth after-shower feel. These are the four main proponents I judge soaps by:

1. A pleasing scent, added bonus for unique scent combinations. One of my favorites is a mix of patchouli and vanilla, or vanilla and orange.
2. A good lather so I at least feel like I am getting clean. This pretty much negates any and all glycerin based soaps, which never lather for me.
3. My skin feels smooth after the shower and not sticky or rough.
4. Healthy and natural ingredients without skin irritants

If you can match the above requirements, chances are you have a damn fine soap. I am not even worried about the coloring or shape of the soaps, so long as I am getting my money's worth. 

I am pleased to say that, for the most part, MudPie Soaps meets these requirements.

And they don't just stop at soaps. I was given the opportunity to try their soaps and some of their body butters. Who doesn't like a good body butter?

The items they sent over to me were:

• Blueberry Soap
• Patchouli & Lavender  Soap
• Eucalyptus and Chamomile Soap
• Blueberry Body Butter
• Lavender & Chamomile Body Butter

My package arrived in a plain brown box within about a week of my order placement. As soon as I opened the box I got a potent waft of blueberry ambrosia and knew I was in for a scented treat, if nothing else. 

I decided to try out the Blueberry Body Butter right away on my hands. 

Being a computer programmer and farmer means I am constantly using my hands, and sometimes am very hard on them. I dislike the feeling of cracked, chapped, or dry hands, especially while trying to knock out some hefty website code. 

So keeping a small container of blueberry scent in a bottle is a great bonus for me.

Of course, if you do this at work, like I did, your co-workers are going to ask who is eating blueberries, and where can they get some. I did share once, and the whole office smelled like blueberries, added bonus.

The body butters go on thick, so you don't need a whole lot. Because it has shea butter, you can easily overdue the amount you rub into your skin, but at least it will last a long time. Your skin feels moisturized for a good long while, and the scent stays with you so you don't have to reapply often. 

I was very pleased with these creams and they were the perfect size to keep in my purse-where-all-things-get-lost.

I was unsure about the blue color and whether it would leave colored residue, but as you can see it blended in nicely.

I saved the Lavender & Chamomile Body Butter for next to my bed before I go to sleep because both scents help promote a restful sleep.

What I noticed immediately about the soaps was the beautiful color combinations used to create these delicious bars. They use tints and glitters to create creamy colorful waves of design into each batch, and my blueberry bar was topped with glitter!

Mud-Pie Soaps are made of olive oil, coconut oil, avocado oil, castor oil, shea butter, and cocoa butter as a base, and then the scents and extra oils are adjusted accordingly to create the various types.

The first soap I decided to try was the Blueberry soap. I couldn't help myself, that's how good this stuff smelled. I was very pleasantly satisfied. 

The scent was amazing, the lather was great, the after-shower smoothness was spot on.

The patchouli soap also had an amazing scent and lather, but unfortunately my skin felt sticky/rough afterwards, so it was not my favorite of the bunch. Which sucks because patchouli is one of my favorite scents of all time.

The eucalyptus soap was an aromatic herbal scent that opens up my airways when I shower and leaves me feeling refreshed.

Overall I am very happy with my package from Mud-Pie Soaps. It was a fun and pleasing package of aromatherapeutic goodness that made me smell great, lifted my spirit through scent, and made me feel clean and delicious. Highly recommended! Body Butters cost $4.50 each, and soaps are between $5.00 and $5.50. Because these are small batch artisan soaps, the available scents change often, so check in frequently.

Mud-Pie Soaps Etsy Shop
Mud-Pie Soaps on Facebook

To share the gloriousness of these fine delectable soaps, Mud-Pie Soaps is offering a giveaway of 3 of their favorite soaps to one lucky United States winner. What varieties the winner gets will be a mystery, but that's part of the fun! This giveaway will end just before midnight ET on November 3, 2014, and is valued at approximately $16.00.

To enter the giveaway, leave a comment in this entry as instructed by the Rafflecopter, then leave the name you commented under and your email in the box in the Rafflecopter entry. (This lets us contact you if you win!)  This will open up additional optional entries to increase your odds of winning.


Good luck, everyone!

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How-to: Make a Basic Stew

I grew up with two southern grandmothers, both of which taught me some basics of country cooking.  I have a fantastic recipe from my maternal grandmother that grew up on Montgomer, Alabama for Chicken and Dumplings, which may be included in another meal plan post later on :)

What I wasn't taught as a young'un, I have since taught myself through research and with help from the Internet (and Pinterest, oh how I love Pinterest).  This has been more of a passion of mine in recent years with my health transformation, because I've also been trying to "get back to my roots" and live as sustainable a life as possible.

There are some basic things that all people should know when it comes to food.  How to make a good bone broth, which is one of most nutrient dense things we can consume for our bodies, and how to make a good basic stew.

If you have never made your own bone broth before, it is very simple and easy to store for when you want to throw together a quick stew.   This is my method:

Crystal Groves' Bodacious Bone Broth

Ingredients for Bone Broth:
About 2 pounds of bones, marrow preferred
Water
Vegetable scraps from the week
Spices
Apple Cider Vinegar

I don't measure exactly any of this, but the general idea is this:

- Put 2 pounds of bones in the crockpot
- Fill crockpot with water
- Add any vegetable scraps from the week, or even during the cooking process if you make dinner and have bits of onion, zucchinni or potatoes to discard.
- Add some spices like garlic, onion, all-purpose seasoning, cumin
- Add about a tablespoon or two of vinegar to help leech the nutrients out of the bones
- Let all this stew for a week in the crock-pot. (yes, a week!)
- Every two days empty out the "broth" and put it in quart sized bags (labeled so you know what bone broth you are cooking) and refill the crock-pot full of water.

After about a week I figure I've gotten everything I can get out of the bones, so I throw them out.  A good way to judge this is if they feel rubbery then they are probably done.  The longer you let the broth sit in the pot (instead of emptying out every 2 days) the darker and more rich your broth will be, but also the less you will have.

I like to keep broth of every type of meat in my freezer if I can so I know what flavors are going into my stews.  Chicken (if I roast a whole chicken I save the broth and put the carcass in the crockpot with the broth to simmer down some more), Pork, Beef, Lamb, even Fish-head broth for fish stew are all labeled neatly and thrown in the freezer for later use :)

A good bone broth becomes the starting point for a good stew.

This recipe is intended to be a guideline for you to create any type of stew that you want.  You can mix and match any type of meat, veggie, broth, or spices and come out with a glorious, nutrient-rich, easy stew that will provide you with not only health benefits, but excess stew to store for lunches or dinners later on.  It's a complete time-saver, and it's something I cook literally almost every week in different forms.

Basic Slow Cooker Stew Master Recipe

A basic beef stew

Basic Ingredients:

1-2 pounds of meat (frozen or fresh doesn't matter)
3-4 cups of veggies chopped into bite-size pieces
1 quart of broth
1 onion (whole or half, depending on preference)
1/2 bulb of garlic (adjust depending on how much you love garlic), or just a tbsp of garlic powder
1/4 cup of varied spices (ideas: cumin, red pepper flakes, all-purpose seasoning, thyme, cayenne pepper)
A tbsp of sea salt
A tsp of black pepper
(Optional) 2 cups of sauerkraut for extra flavor

Put all of this in a crock pot for approximately 6 hours on high, or 8 hours on low.  Come home from work, pour in a bowl, kick up your feet, eat, and enjoy.

The combination of vegetables, meats, and spices doesn't really matter.  You can mix this up in so many different ways that you can create dozens of new meals, all while you're away for  the day, and then you can freeze the excess in quart Ziploc bags to re-heat and eat during the week.  This is a very basic but very delicious guideline for creating some great stews, and it doesn't take a lot of work or know-how to do.

Note: I use sweet potatoes instead of red or white potatoes because I have a skin condition that is susceptible to nightshades.

Experiment with your recipes.  Try some lamb shanks with rosemary instead!

A couple of my absolute favorite stews are:

Basic Beef Stew

2 pounds of stew meat, grassfed
2 medium sized sweet potatoes, chopped or 1 large sweet potato and half a head of cauliflower
1 quart beef bone broth
1/2 onion, chopped
1 sweet pepper, deseeded and chopped
2 jalapeño peppers, deseeded and chopped
3-4 carrots, chopped
3-4 stalks celery, chopped
2 cups of sauerkraut
2 tbsp garlic powder
1 tbsp all-purpose seasoning
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
1 tsp Old Bay seasoning

Cook on low for 8 hours in a crock-pot.

Glorious Ham-hocks and Green Beans

1 fresh or frozen ham-hock
1 pound of Canadian bacon (not traditional bacon)
1 quart pork bone broth
2 medium sweet potatoes
1 quart fresh green beans
1/2 onion
3-4 carrots, chopped
2 cups of sauerkraut
2 tbsp garlic powder
1 tbsp all-purpose seasoning
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
1 tsp Old Bay seasoning

Sit all night on low for 8 hours in a crock-pot.  The bacon and ham-hock infuse an amazing flavor into the green beans and sweet potatoes.  The meat will fall right off the bones and the bacon will pull apart with just a fork. Traditionally white potatoes are used in this recipe, and the flavor is to die for.  A sweet ambrosious death of pork and broth goodness.

Note: If a quart of bone broth doesn't look like it's enough, trust me it is, but it won't hurt to add more.

If you experiment with some combination stews, let me know in the comments.  I'd love to try out some new ideas!

To round things out, here is our week's dinner menu:

Monday: Moroccan chicken skewers with lemon
Tuesday: Ham-hocks and green beans stew
Wednesday: Chicken and Broccoli Casserole with Butternut Squash "cheese-less" sauce
Thursday: Rosemary Chicken with roasted mushrooms and a side of dill sweet potato fries
Friday: Hot Italian sausage with steamed broccoli, carrots, and cauliflower topped with BBQ sauce

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~ Cast Party Wednesday, Centerpiece Wednesday, Down Home Blog Hop, Fluster's Creative Bluster, Gluten-Free Wednesday, Hit Me With Your Best Shot, Inspiration Board, Inspiration Exchange, Link Up Your Posts, Moonlight & Mason Jars, Make ~ Bake ~ Create, Penny Pinching Party, Project Parade, Real Food Wednesday,  Share Your Fun Creations, Show + Tell Wednesday, Wake Up Wednesday, Wednesday Round Up, Wednesday Whatsits, Wellness Wednesday, What Are You Doing Wednesday, What's Cooking Wednesday, What's It Wednesday, Whatever Goes Wednesday,  Whatever Wednesday, Whimsy Wednesday, Wicked Awesome Wednesday, Wildcrafting Wednesday, Wonderful Wednesday, Wonderfully Creative Wednesday, Work It Wednesday, Works For Me Wednesday, Wow Me Wednesday, Wow Us Wednesday, Your Whims Wednesday,  The Yuck Stops Here. 
~ Creative Ways Link Party, Fabulously Frugal Thursday, Full Plate Thursday, Home & Garden Thursday, HomeAcre Hop, It's A Party, Pennywise Platter, Share Your Cup Thursday, Showcase Your Talent, Thrifty Thursday, Thursday Favorite Things, Time Travel Thursday.
~ Anything Goes, BFF Open House, City of Links, Crafting Along, DIY Projects Junkin' Along, Fabulous Finds, Fabulously Creative Friday, Farmgirl Friday, Fight Back Friday, Foodie Friday, Foodie Friends Friday, Freedom Fridays, Rattlebridge Farm Foodie Friday.
~ Creative Collection Link Party, DIY Inspired Sunday, DIY Sunday Showcase, Happiness Is Homemade, Nifty Thrifty Sunday, Share Your Creativity, Silver Pennies Sunday, Submarine Sunday, Sunday Brunch, Sunday Funday, Think Pink Sunday.
~ A Round Tuit, Amaze Me Monday, Busy Monday, Clever Chicks Blog Hop, Craftastic Monday, Frugal Crafty Home, Homemade Mondays, Homestead Barn Hop, Inspiration Monday, Inspire Me Monday, Mad Skills Monday, Making Your Home Sing Monday, Masterpiece Monday, Melt in Your Mouth Monday, Menu Plan Monday, Mix It Up Monday, Mommy Monday, Monday Funday, Much Ado About Monday, Pinterest Foodie Linky Party, Sweet Sharing Monday, Thank Goodness It's Monday.
~ Anti-Procrastination Tuesday, Backyard Farming Connection, Be Inspired, Brag About It, Create - Link - Inspire, Fat Tuesday, Handmade Tuesday, Healthy Tuesday, Hearth & Soul Hop, One Project At a Time, The Scoop, Share It Link Party, Share Your Stuff, Show & Share, Take a Look Tuesday, Tasty Tuesdays, Turn It Up Tuesday, Tickle My Tastebuds Tuesday, Too Cute Tuesday, Totally Talented Tuesday, Tuesdays At Our Home, Tutorial Tuesday, Two Cup Tuesday, You're Gonna Love It Tuesday.