Product reviews: Mabel's Labels "for the stuff kids lose"

Label your life and gear -- end the madness!

by Sarah Pendleton guest writer

[Editor's note - Sarah is a full-time freelance editor and writer]

Kids lose stuff. A regrettable fact, but true. When you live in a small town and everyone shops at Wal-Mart, everyone owns the same stuff. This can make the lost and found pile at school difficult to traverse.

I used to rely on the tried and true permanent marker method. I scrawled my kids' names on everything I could… but somehow the the permanent in front of marker didn't always hold true. Besides, it looked tacky!
Sew-in labels take forever, and I'm the queen of procrastination. So when I found Mabel's Labels, it was like they were made just for me! As a matter of fact, they were - all of Mabel's Labels come with free personalization.

Mabel's Labels come in a variety of shapes, sizes, styles and materials so everything my kids own is clearly marked. The iron-on labels stay on, even after dozens of washings. The Tag-Mates are even better for a lazy mom like me - you just peel and stick it to the clothing tag. I didn't think these would stay on after a round in our crammed washing machine, but so far, so good!

There are labels for everything you might take anywhere - cups, cookware, beach towels and sleeping bags. Mabel's Labels even carries sturdy metal 'Bag-Tags' for sports equipment bags, luggage and overnight kits. Camp equipment can be tossed in with everyone else's and easily retrieved later.

The one tag that really got me was the Shoe Label. Remember, I said small town - I mean small. If I think every fifth kid has the same coat mine does, every other one has the same pair of sneakers. Permanent marker just isn't when matched up against the relentless friction of little feet.

The Shoe Label is a stick on tag that won't come off, wear off or even fade - it has a water resistant coating for sweaty days or rainy ones when they jump in puddles. Just slap one in the insole of each shoe, and nobody can miss it.

I could go on and on. There's labels for organizing your house, your garage and the rest of your life. They've even got tags to label your cords so you don't spend an hour unpacking your computer after a move, trying to figure out what went with the printer, the modem, the mp3 charger and the fax. (Can you tell I moved recently?)

I have to put in a word for the wristbands, too. I used to write my cell phone number on my kid's arm in indelible ink when I dropped them off for field trips, day camp or VBS. You think I'm kidding? I invented paranoia. Now my littlest can sport a tricked-out wristband with his name and my number on it, and I can be confident whoever's in charge knows how to reach me!

I actually plan to give a friend of mine some of the special 'Allergy Alert' labels and wristbands for Christmas - her little boy has severe allergies, including peanuts and bee stings, so she is constantly having to write and stick notes on everything. These labels will make her life 100% easier!

Mabel's Labels - for the stuff kids lose, and so much more.

copyright 2009 - all rights reserved, Sarah Pendleton for Just Camping Out
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Lizzie Sorensen, founder of 32FlavorsPR, representing Mabel's Labels, adds:

"One product that I think campers would like is the Skinny Mini labels. They are waterproof and would work very well to help campers identify which belongings are theirs. Skinny Mini labels can be personalized and there is even a pine tree (also a tent) icon! Picture this -- a skinny adhesive label [with your name] on your compass, your tent, your cooler, your thermos, headlamps, hiking boots, fishing poles -- you name it. Literally." [~Jim]

Why is winter so long?

...and summer so short?

Our little camper -- a nearly 30-year-old, 19-foot restored Shasta -- sits in the yard beside our garage. She's sinking into the soggy sod right now, after spending the bitter months shrugging off the wind and snow, mostly unscathed. We've had a few days with temperatures in the low sixties recently; makes me glance longingly at our old trailer, hoping for warm nights and 9 pm sunsets soon.

I no longer love winter. It's too long. We're just far enough north here, near Lake Ontario, that the cold and gray months encroach on the end of fall and the first half of spring. We joke that spring is about two weeks long. Our "leaf season" is longer than that, but prone to early snowstorms. I used to love winter -- when I was young and single and could afford to go skiing.

Now I spend the weeks following Thanksgiving waiting for summer. It's a long wait, punctuated by the six weeks of Christmas and a couple of oddly-scheduled school vacations. Once Santa has finished flying there's that long no-real-holidays time. Who celebrates Groundhog Day? It often snows on our St. Patrick's Day parade.

I hate driving in the snow anymore. We used to brave blizzards to go skiing; now that I'm older I can't see through the flakes as well. I'm approaching a million lifetime miles of driving, with about a third of them in snowy conditions. I've paid my dues, haven't I? Someday I may actually have to consider "flying south." What a terrible thought.

The only consolation to New York's seemingly interminable winters is that they force you to appreciate summer. You hear that from people who simply refuse to move to warmer climates: "I'd miss the seasons, and get sick and tired of warm sun." While that's probably true, it's probably also a fairly lame rationalization. While I'm not sure I could stomach the air-conditioned lifestyle of Floridians, I'll bet I could make do in Honolulu.

My home, however, is here in upstate NY. Most of my friends and almost all of my family are all here. Moving is expensive, emotionally demanding, and ultimately life-altering. I'll stay here, as long as the bank doesn't reclaim our house. In that event, we'd have to live in our little camping trailer. That would probably take most of the fun out of camping.

The summers here are too short, though. That's just a fact. When you balance "perfect camping nights " against "gloomy winter days" the scale always hits the table hard on the "gloomy" side. It's not uncommon for us to suffer through a solid week of sunless days between October and April. I honestly believe that people have "solar batteries" that need to be recharged regularly. I do, anyway.

For me, the beginning of NASCAR racing season signals that summer is almost here, somewhere -- Daytona, at least. All the early races are in winter-warm states at first, so we see "summer" long before it arrives in NY. Then the Masters teases us with gorgeous verdant fairways and brilliant azalea blossoms. It's hard for me to watch, when we still have bare trees and brown lawns.

Then suddenly, after a couple of "fooled ya" days above seventy degrees, it's summer in New York. The willows burst into pale green abundance first, with the hardwoods last to follow. Before we know it, the days are fourteen hours of sunshine and we're complaining about the heat. We think about buying air conditioners, knowing we won't need them for long. Our lawns need mowing twice a week.

We launch some fireworks, grill some hot dogs, take impulsive trips to nearby campgrounds , leave the TV off, and stay up 'til midnight because it's too nice out to go to sleep. We spend two weeks watering our browning lawns, worrying needlessly. And then, quietly and with little warning, our local NFL franchise team arrives for training camp at St. John Fisher College.

You know what NFL means, don't you? -- "Fall." Just like that, our summer is nearly done. We savor the final few days in the eighties, or maybe even above ninety degrees, while the merchants scream "back to school!" My wife and I frantically try to decide how we'll spend the Labor Day weekend -- camper or no camper ? Home or away?

Then the school buses return for their endless trips up and down our hill (the high school is just down the road), and we know it's over. Another summer is gone, the fleeting weekends already fading memories. We begin to watch TV shows again in the evening. We check our tires to make sure we have good "snow tread" left, and gas up the snow-blower. We park the camper in the side yard, and drain off the water lines. I think about writing an article for Helium titled, "Tips for storing your RV camper for the winter." There's that word again: winter. Where did the summer go?

copyright 2009 - all rights reserved
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How about you? Do you have an opinion about camping and weather you'd like to share? If you'd like to submit your thoughts for posting, you can reach me via Comments or by using the link at the top of this page.

See my article about RV camping on Helium.com

New York Outdoors: Campground closing alert

Here's an important campgrounds closing notice posted recently in Rich and Sue Freeman's New York Outdoors Blog - one of the very best Internet resources for all things outdoors in New York State.

DEC to Leave 6 Campgrounds Closed in 2009

Posted: 24 Feb 2009 08:32 AM CST

The state Department of Environmental Conservation says six campgrounds in the Adirondacks and Catskills won’t open in 2009 due to the state’s continuing financial crisis.

In the Adirondacks they are Poke-O-Moonshine in Keeseville, Sharp Bridge in North Hudson, Point Comfort in Piseco and Tioga Point in the town of Raquette Lake.

In the Catskills, the campgrounds are Beaverkill in Roscoe and Bear Spring Mountain in Walton.

The agency says the six often have occupancy rates of 20 percent or less and other DEC campgrounds are nearby. It manages 52 campgrounds and seven day-use areas in the Adirondack and Catskill forest preserves.

Click here for more info on the Adirondack closings.

Reprinted from New York Outdoors Blog
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I subscribe to New York Outdoors to find out all about interesting hikes, camping ideas, outdoor excursions, nature events and outings of all sorts. If you live anywhere in New York State and love the outdoors, do sign up! ~Jim

4 Ways to Quickly Lose Blog Readers

Reprinted from the original guest posting by Jim Bessey

February 18, 2009 · Robust Writing

[Editor’s Note: This is a guest post by Jim Bessey, who writes the Kitchens & Baths by D'Zyne blog: the online worksite home for D'Zyne Construction. You can learn more about Jim on his Helium page.]

The Internet is filled with advice for better blog writing. Robust Writing is just one fine example of the thousands of sources for blogging tips. If you take the best advice and mix it with creativity and effort, you just might attract an audience. Some of you, however, might prefer the freedom you enjoy by blogging in obscurity, unencumbered by bothersome comments from pesky readers.

As a veteran blogger, I’ve learned from experience and keen observation exactly how to get rid of those annoying readers. I can’t guarantee your success in this quest. These techniques require practice and patience.

You may want to experiment with just one or two in combination; using all four approaches at once might be too obvious and attract numerous comments. Let’s have a look at four proven methods you can use to achieve Internet Independence from blog readers... Read more...

Reprinted from the original hosted by Jesse Hines, of Robust Writing.
Copyright 2009 Jim Bessey - all rights reserved.
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My sincere thanks to Jesse Hines, of Robust Writing - for the invitation and for sharing his valuable writing advice space with me for a day.

Read Jim's Profile on Helium.com

How about you? Do you have any writing advice you'd like to share? If you'd like to submit your article for consideration, you can reach me via Comments or by using the link at the top of this page.

Practical rules for writers

Let's talk about rules for creative writing, since the rules for more rigid styles are much too boring. First of all, there are no real rules! If you can engage your readers, and make them ache for more, then you have won the game fair and square. So let's just say, there are ways that work. Call them guidelines, if you wish.

Foremost of these: draw me in! Make me want to read whatever it is you've written. Maybe your title does the job. More often your first sentence provokes success or failure. If you can't bait the hook, you can't catch me as a reader. "Dan had just three weeks to live, but he didn't know that the day he won the Mega-Millions Jackpot." There, don't you want to keep reading?

Once you've snared a reader you must work your literary butt off to keep him (or her, of course). Keep your sentences reasonably short. Take your reader deeper into the story as quickly as possible. To continue the popular fishing metaphor, this is called 'setting the hook.' Make me care about "Dan" right away. Don't tell me the color of his hair or describe the jut of his chin! Tell me his flighty girlfriend left him waiting at a bus stop, so he went into a newsstand to kill time. (That's when he bought that fateful ticket, obviously.)

Here's a good "rule" no matter what: leave your fancy writing style at the door. Certainly, you have a 'voice' unique and wonderful. Just don't distract me with it, please. I want to find out why Dan will be dead soon; I don't particularly care about your astounding vocabulary. This always works: read some of what you've written aloud. Read it to a friend. Do you sound ridiculous, stilted, stodgy, or arrogant? A good friend will help you see that, before you get too heavily invested in your 'style.'

Rule number four is: okay, there are a couple of real rules after all. Let's lump them together so we can get it over with. (Yes, silly, you can end a sentence with a preposition if you want to. It's okay, really.) The two rules you must include are typically titled, "character" and "conflict."

Give me a character I can love or hate, or one I can relate to because he or she is so much like me. Then put your character (or characters; you can have more than one) in jeopardy. That's nuts-and-bolts stuff, not rocket science or anything earth-shaking. If you try to ignore this basic advice, very few readers will follow you to your final sentence.

This brings us to rule number five: the rest is up to you. You, and only you, can take me inside your imagined world. You may accomplish this with clever plotting, with vivid sensory detail, with careful use of foreshadowing, with humor, with fabulous insight into the human condition. Whatever. If you have followed the first four "rules" and if you can tell a tale at all, then you will reel in your readers almost effortlessly. The net with which you will land your big fish looks something like this: "I can't wait to read more!" There is no greater reward for a writer than that one priceless sentence. Now go cut some bait!

copyright 2007 - all rights reserved (reprinted by request 2009)
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See this story as it appears on Helium.com

Want to dig a little deeper? Leave a comment here, or have a look at How to Analyze a Short Story for more ideas.

In a future installment I'll look closer at creating characters your readers will want to meet.