Want Not

Were you around this weekend, and smart and pretty enough to enter the contest to win some Nestle Toll House goodies? If so, you may be about to be a whole lot happier. And cookies-ier. Cookier? Whatever.

(Aside: I love how some contests which I expect to be hugely popular end up being kind of lukewarm, but then I announce I have coupons for free cookies and y’all come out of the woodwork. I like the priorities here.)

Anyway! I have only one prize pack to give away, on account of my children already swarmed over the other one. Hee. Our winner out of 237 entries—according to the random number generator—is commenter number 10, Brunette. Congratulations, Brunette (thinking that may not be your real name…)—please check your email! I’ll be sending you Nestle Toll House aprons, cookie recipe ideas, and coupons for free chips and cookie dough.

As always, big thanks to all who played, and special thanks to the generous folks at Nestle for donating the goodies both to my rotten kids family and to our winner. If you don’t love cookies, you may just be dead inside. (That would be a great tag line, Nestle. You have my permission to use it, free of charge!)

Don’t forget, you can still enter this week’s contest to win a Babies ‘R’ Us certificate from Trading Cradles, so don’t forget to do that if you haven’t already.

If you’re all about the bargain, you’ve probably done the jumping-through-hoops thing for eBay, the weeding-through-the-crazies thing for Craigslist, and even the hours-of-your-life thing to yard-saling when it comes to getting the gear you want for your kids, at prices you can stomach. Here’s a new tool for your arsenal: Trading Cradles is the newest destination for parents looking to buy and sell gently used baby gear, and it couldn’t be easier. It’s completely free, too! (Take that, sliding eBay fees that I could never decipher.)

Just pick your area and start buying or selling. I like it so much, I reviewed the site for Cool Mom Picks long before they ever came to me about a contest.

But. But! Now they’re sponsoring a contest for us. They’re hoping you’ll check them out and maybe connect on Facebook and follow them on Twitter, too. And you? You’re hoping to win a gift certificate to Babies ‘R’ Us, for whatever you can’t find on Trading Cradles (or need to buy new because some things just need to be bought new).

So. The rules on this one are going to be a little different, so pay attention. For this contest, two lucky Want Not readers are going to win $25 gift certificates to Babies ‘R’ Us. However, if you also post a (legitimate; don’t try to cheat on this, please) ad on TradingCradles.com during this contest and then win, they will double your gift certificate value to $50. Cool, right?

To enter, first go review the contest rules and regulations, then come on back here and leave a single comment on this post completing this sentence: Trading Cradles is great because __________ . You may also tweet about this contest and then leave a link here in the comments for a second entry. Entries must be submitted by 8:00 a.m. Eastern (that’s 5:00 a.m. Pacific) on Thursday, September 2nd, 2010. Winner to be determined by random number generation and resale value. (You’re all priceless, though, so I guess just the random number thing.)

Ready? Go!

The first cookies I ever made on my own were—of course—the Nestle Toll House recipe on the back of the bag of chips. I was probably about nine years old at the time. I have baked (and eaten) many, many cookies since that first batch, but I always come back to the Toll House recipe on the bag, because why mess with perfection? Yum.

Nestle was kind enough to send me a box of goodies to share with my family and my readers. Unfortunately, because I live on the surface of the sun, their new mini morsels “toppers” that they included pretty much melted and reformed themselves into one giant glob inside the containers, so we are going to skip those, but fear not! I have other fabulous items to share.

The winner of this weekend’s contest is going to receive a Nestle prize pack containing: One Nestle Toll House adult-size apron, two Nestle Toll House child-size aprons, five mouthwatering Nestle dessert recipe cards, and four coupons for free Nestle products (two each for refrigerated cookie dough and bags of Toll House morsels). In other words, you’ll be completely outfitted to create some ooey-gooey chocolate memories right in your own kitchen.

Want to win it? Of course you do! First go review the contest rules and regulations, then come on back here and leave a comment on this post by 8:00 a.m. Eastern (that’s 5:00 a.m. Pacific) on Monday, August 30th, 2010 to be entered. Winner to be determined by random number drawing and crispy edges.

Ready? Go!

Goodness, but all of my fellow pretty-lovers went gaga over this week’s contest. And why not? The chance to win a Shabby Apple dress is a chance to be fabulous at our very favorite price, am I right? I am.

It’s winner time! I had a chat with the random number generator and for some reason it still refused to pick me as the winner even though I’m, you know, ineligible for my own contest. Stupid random number generator. Instead, it picked commenter number 131, Nancy S, who at least chose my favorite dress—the Scarlett Raven. Congratulations, Nancy—please check your email! We’ll get you set up for receiving your gorgeous new dress and all your friends will be jealous.

Big thanks to all who played, and special thanks to the generosity of Shabby Apple in hosting this contest. Pretty and magnanimous, wow. I shall doodle your company name in my notebook surrounded by little hearts and possibly glitter.

Didn’t win this one, but still need a gorgeous Shabby Apple dress to call your own? Shop through the end of August and you can use coupon code WOODS to ship your order for free.

If you didn’t win this week, sit tight—there’s more contests coming up.

Don’t forget—you have until early tomorrow morning to possibly win a dress from Shabby Apple’s new Berkshire collection, and you can’t win if you don’t enter.

Of course, you may (in fact, probably will) enter and still not win, but entering greatly increasing your chances of winning (from zero to maybe). You don’t even have to be good at math for those odds!

Don’t forget to leave your entry on the contest post. Comments left on this post are purely for entertainment purposes only. Please contact your doctor if you find yourself leaving a comment for four hours or more. I am not a doctor, nor do I play one on the Internet.

About a zillion years ago—when dinosaurs still roamed the earth—I began my college career in Massachusetts’ Berkshire Mountains. It’s a breathtaking, scenic area, and mostly inhabited by hippies, if memory serves. My idea of dressing up when I lived there was to put on shoes.

So you can imagine my surprise when I was invited to take a look at Shabby Apple’s new Berkshires collection and found an assortment of retro ooh-la-la dresses ready to take on the office or a night out. It’s certainly not the Berkshires I remember, but I’m not going to argue. These classy new styles appeal to my grown-up taste a lot more than my crinkly skirts of yesteryear, anyway.

Go, take a look. Drool-worthy, yes? I hope you agree, because one lucky Want Not reader is going to win the Berkshires dress of her choice this week from Shabby Apple. Is that awesome or what?

Want to play? First, go review the contest rules and regulations (including the one about not playing if you’ve won something in the last month… sorry, this morning’s yogurt winners!), then come on back here and leave a comment telling me which Berkshires dress you’d like to receive on this post by 8:00 a.m. Eastern (that’s 5:00 a.m. Pacific) on Thursday, August 26th, 2010 to be entered. Please review the general rules! Please follow the specific rules! (Hint: If you don’t name a dress, your entry is disqualified.) Me, I had a terrible time deciding, but if I was eligible for this contest, I’d definitely go with the Scarlett Raven. Or the Jacob’s Pillow. Maybe. Ack! Thank goodness I don’t have to decide, I guess.

Winner, as always, to be determined with the help of my old pal the random number generator. And possibly whether or not you know how to make victory rolls (for you young whippersnappers, this is not bread).

Ready? Go!

Coupons… I’ve got coooouuuuuupons….

Big thanks to everyone who played along in this weekend’s contest to win coupons for Breyers new YoCrunch parfaits; I feel like the lunchbox fairy, getting to give these out. I promised you four winners, and the random number generator has dutifully provided. Without further ado:
The winner of 1 coupon is Indra (commenter 18)!
The winner of 2 coupons is Laura (commenter 89)!
The winner of 3 coupons is Tran (commenter 16)!
And the grand prize winner of 4 coupons (16 cups of YoCrunch!) is elizabethk (commenter 151)!

Congratulations, winners—please check your email!

And of course, big thank-yous going out to Breyers and their helpers at RF|Binder for hooking us up with the deliciousness.

Didn’t win this time? Don’t be sad! I’ve got another fantastic chance to win coming up later on today, and I promise it’ll make you feel incredibly pretty.

Sometimes people send me things, and then I turn around and give them to you. And sometimes they say, “We’d like you to try this product to see if you’d like to share it with your readers,” and then I generously take that bullet on your behalf. Because I care.

This week, some folks contacted me on behalf of Breyers new YoCrunch Parfaits, adorable 4-packs of cups meant to mimic the more expensive yogurt parfaits you can buy at your favorite coffee place. You get the fruit, the low-fat vanilla yogurt, and then some granola to sprinkle on top. They sent me a 4-pack to try and my children descended upon it like locusts. The verdict? “When are you going to buy some more of these, Mom? I want one in my lunch every day!”

And the truth is, you know how I am about convenience packs. Generally speaking, I’d rather buy my own fruit, yogurt, and granola separately (heck, most of the time I make my own granola, and sometimes I make my own yogurt, too!) to save money and reduce waste. But the other truth is that at 6:00 in the morning when I’m packing lunches, it’s awfully nice to have these perfectly-sized single-servings ready to go. And—unlike so many of the alternatives—the YoCrunch parfaits don’t contain any HFCS or artificial sweeteners. Awesome.

Guess what I have! 10 coupons, each valid for a free 4-pack of Breyers YoCrunch Parfaits. And they’re all for you, my pretties! For this contest, we’ll have four winners: One of you will get one coupon, one will get two, one will get three, and the big winner will get four.

Want to play? First go review the contest rules and regulations, then come on back here and leave a comment on this post by 8:00 a.m. Eastern (that’s 5:00 a.m. Pacific) on Sunday, August 22nd, 2010 for a chance to win. Winners to be determined by random number generation and fruitiliciousness. Whatever that means.

Ready? Go!

My week is already all screwed up, and it’s only Tuesday. This does not bode well for the rest of the week, I fear. Ack.

But I do have the winner of last week’s contest for you, finally, because everything does get done eventually. Usually. We hope. Anyway!

The winner of the latest $50 gift certificate to GiftsForYouNow.com is commenter number 50, Heather. Congratulations, Heather—please check your email!

As always, thanks to everyone who played, and special thanks to our generous pals at GiftsForYouNow for providing the prize. We love generous sponsors, oh yes we do.

Didn’t win this time? Don’t be sad, emo kid! (We say this to my daughter all the time. She… may not find it as hilarious as we do.) There’s always more chances to win coming up, so stay tuned.

Don’t forget—you have until early tomorrow morning to enter to win a $50 gift certificate to GiftsForYouNow.com, because it was so popular the first time, we’re doing it again. But you can’t win if you don’t enter, you know.

As always, valid contest entries go on the contest post. Leaving comments on this post won’t help you win the contest, but I’m always up for conversation. Or random compliments. Whatever.