{Not So} Shameless Plugs!

If you aren't reading my posts via Google Reader or some other reader (or in mobile format for that matter), then I'm sure you've noticed 2 things by now.

<------ On the left hand column here there are 2 things:

1) At the top is my blog button with code, as all the "cool" kids in Blogland have these now

and

2) If you scroll down a bit there's a bunch of buttons with some {perhaps familiar?} faces on them. These are peeps I have "swapped" blog buttons with in a way to help promote each others blogs!

I LOVE the idea of "sponsoring" other blogs as it helps get the word out about various awesome bloggers. And well, frankly I love the idea of button swapping because it's free and I'm cheap. Some bloggers charge for adspace, which is great and dandy and all, but not everyone can afford to pay on a monthly basis and some of us don't use Paypal anymore either so that kinda nixes that.

If you'd like to swap blog buttons with me, feel free to grab mine, add it to your page (tweak the size if need be - I don't mind!), and lemme know so I can grab yours and put it here on my blog!

Anyways, I figured I should probably share a bit about these awesome bloggers, even though some I have mentioned previously around the blog here!

First there's Nikki Darlin' from Southern Mama, Bad Mouth. I don't remember how I came across Nikki but after following her blog for some time and eventually her Twitter, I've learned that her and I share a lot of common interests, which is awesome! Nikki is down in the great state of Georgia and has a super cute little girl - we've sorta bonded over the fact that our kids both have unique names. She also has an Etsy shop - Southern Survival Charms - which specializes in military-style bracelets with fun charms! Be sure to check her and her shop out!

J, from An Unstyled Life, is a mommy and a blogger (ie: not JUST a mommy blogger, as she blogs about other aspects of her life as well) from Texas that I believe I came across during a huge blog link-up last summer. She is also a mommy to a toddler not too much older than Jay I believe so we've bonded some over mommy-stuffs on the Twitter. She's an awesome person so be sure to check her out!

Vicki, from My Vickilicious Life, is one of those bloggers I kept hearing being mentioned around Blogland and amongst fellow bloggers on Twitter. Eventually I checked out her blog, started following her on Twitter and have really enjoyed getting to know her! She also is a co-host of the weekly Friday blog link-up "The Nail Files." She's a fun gal, so be sure to give her blog a visit and link-up on Fridays!

 

I came across Celia, from unSimply Celia, due to various Scentsy giveaways of hers that were being held on various blogs I read regularly. Realizing that hey, she has a blog, I decided to check her out and eventually got to know her a bit on Twitter! She really is a sweet girl from Texas and is engaged to her love of 7 years! She is currently in the process of closing down her Scentsy biz, but if you're interested in the products (which are great by the way!) she can definitely make some recommendations for you and point you to a good consultant to order from! She also often co-hosts various blog swaps (like for nail polish and Valentine's Day goodies!) so you definitely don't want to miss her blog!

Gigi, from Sweet & Sassy Texan, is a fairly new blogger in Blogland, and as she puts it, she is "sweet tea drinker, sassy talkin Texas Lady! A housewife of 3 boys - 2 teens and one husband whom refuses to grow up." I definitely know that feeling on the last part (just kidding, hubby! Well... kinda, lol...). I actually just came across her recently, as she found me on Twitter and started following me. I get notifications sent to my email whenever I "gain" a new Twitter follower and reading her profile description, she didn't seem to be one of those obnoxious "spam-bots" (if you're familiar with Twitter, you know what I mean!) so I checked out her page and blog and really liked what I saw! Help a new blogger out and give her a blog a view - hopefully you'll enjoy it like I did!

And last, but not least - the wonderful Ms. Neely from A Complete Waste of Makeup! I actually just recently added her button as an extra entry into her 1500 follower "15 Favorite Things" giveaway, but I gotta be honest, I love her blog's name as it's too true - some days really are a complete waste of makeup! Like Vicki, she was another blogger who's name/blog kept popping up around Blogland and amongst various bloggers I follow on Twitter. Neely is from Dallas (one of my favorite places thanks to football!) and hosts the weekly Thursday link-up known as "It's OK Thursday." Her blog is full of fun and snark and wit and I love it! Be sure to visit - you'll find some posts that'll really make you smile!

Nikki Darlin': Check her out!

For this month, Nikki Darlin' was offering free sponsor spots for her blog and since the more I read about Nikki, the more we seem to have common interests and I love her blog posts, not to mention she's pretty awesome herself, so of course I volunteered to sponsor her this month!

I'll let Nikki tell you a little about herself:

Hi I'm Nikki I blog over at Southern Mama with a Bad Mouth.

I'm a 22 year old, part time working, mommy and wife. 

My husband and I have been married for 2 and a half year now. I met him when he was in the army and we got married married when he came home for R&R on September 1st 2009. 

We have a beautiful 2 year old daughter named Skylee. She's a mess on two little feet. 

We live in Georgia and we all all things country. If it comes in pink camo I'll buy it. 

I started blogging about 2 year ago and fell in love. 

I love all the new people I have met and am so proud to call them my friends. 

I blog about my life. 

I love to share pictures of my daughter and our puppy Sookie. 

I also love to vlog. my youtube channel is YouTube.com/xonikkidarlin.

I'm slowly becoming famous for my "duck face" pictures. 

I post way too many of them. 

I have a link up every Monday to share my duck face picture and I love to see everyone else too. 

You can also follow me on Twitter @xoNikkiDarlin

Valentine's Day Swap!

I participated in the Valentine's Day Swap hosted by the lovely ladies Tara, Celia and Meg!

I've been a bit hesitant regarding swaps lately, as I seem to have a 1 in 3 chance of having a crummy partner, but I was blessed this time to be paired up with the wonderful Silvergirl - Brett!

Looking over her blog, she is an older gal, reminding me much of my mother-in-law (which unlike some, I got lucky and happen to have a pretty cool mother-in-law!), as she strives to find affordable fashion and style for women over 45! She also owns Silver Needle Designs which personalizes and monograms a variety of items!

Here's my goodies she sent me (which arrived SUPER early too!):

There's a cute pocket journal/notepad (love the colors!), a Valentine's Day mix CD, some Valentine's Day themed travel tissue (which comes in handy!), some Liplicious vanilla lipgloss (yum!), a personalized RayJ keychain that she made for me via her Silver Needle Designs company, her lovely note, and CHOCOLATE!!!

Not gonna lie, I started munching on the chocolate as soon as I opened it, lol... it was gone before Valentine's Day arrived! (Oops!).

Thank you Brett for being such a great swap partner! I hope you enjoyed your goodies I sent!

A Very Bloggy Christmas swap

The link-up for this one was technically the other day, however my gift didn't arrive until this afternoon, plus I've been swamped with working this week (yay for working retail, at a mall, during this time of year - not!).

Anyways, I signed up for this swap, among several others and completely forgot about it until I got the email about who I was paired up with (doh!).

But it was fun and I'm glad I did this one (note to self though - next year, set a limit on how many swaps to do, as I sorta signed up for some and completely forgot and then signed up for others and then I started getting all these emails about who my various swap partners were and yeah... oops! LOL... swaps ARE fun though!).

Anyways, for this one I was paired up with the lovely Etosia from Raising Rylin. We didn't communicate a whole lot at the beginning aside from exchanging blog urls, but towards the end we were emailing back and forth and following each other on The Twit (and yes, I just called Twitter "The Twit." It's been a long week, next week will only be worse and I'm in a strange mood, lol...). We blog/Twitter stalked each other to get some idea of what to get the other.

Tonight when I got home from work I was greeted with a lovely package from UPS sitting on the floor of my living/family room. I almost forgot I was expecting a package and was a bit confused trying to figure out what I ordered from Bath and Body Works (as the label said) since I work just across the way from one and usually pick up whatever I need before or after work depending on what shift I'm working, not to mention I thought I had all our Christmas presents wrapped.

I opened up the UPS box though and much to my delight I saw this:

Excuse my messy kitchen table

Card reads:
To: Rachel
Merry Bloggy Christmas!
From: Etoisa

Curious and excited, I opened it up and here were my swap gifts:

At first I was like "Whoa!!! How'd she get ahold of my Amazon wishlist?!" Since several of the items were on there, but then I remembered for the Fabulous Holiday Blog Challenge last week that I showed off my Christmas wishlist with them on it, lol... I can definitely say I love it! I tried out the lip gloss right away and yep - tasted like vanilla frosting just like the scent smells! I also just tried out the mini anti-bacterial soap and it's pretty good too! And I now have a back-up bottle of my lotion/cream for when I run out of my current bottle (I use it often daily, that's for sure!)

Feel free to hop on over to Etosia's blog and see what I got her =)

Swap, swap, swap!

This holiday season I've participated in several swaps here in Blogland... here's what I've gotten so far!

For Tara and Celia's Nail Polish Swap, my swap partner was Lauren from On a Lighter Note....

Here's what Lauren sent me:

That's Essie's "Cocktail Bling" and "Buy Me a Cameo." I've been hearing some of you mention Essie lately so I'm glad I got to try this brand out =)


I also participated in Ashleigh & Co's 144 participant Ornament Swap this year!

My partner was Olivia from Simply Sunshine and Daisies and she sent me 3 ornaments:

They're all great, but I particularly love the wire star one with glass balls!


I also participated in the 1st Annual Just Add Color Fall Swap which was a scarf and nail polish swap. The link-up for this swap was 2 weeks ago, however my swap partner failed and forgot to ship it until this past week so I just got my scarf over the weekend. She did write a nice apology note though and included some cute earrings as well to make up for it.