Everything.

After two years of total immersion in everything boy, the prospect of walking the path of motherhood with a daughter as well, is really amazing to me. I feel so lucky to be able to experience all the sweetness of raising a boy, and a girl, and wow — is this girl sweet.

At 7-weeks-old now, Kara has really started to blossom in significant ways.

I forgot how fast the explosion of personality comes with a newborn. Within a matter of a few short weeks, your baby goes from tiny, wrinkly, and sleepy to chubby, bright-eyed and vocal.

It is really just like looking at Evan at times when I watch Kara’s facial expressions, and listen to her little baby noises. If she continues to progress as her brother did, she’ll be successfully mimicking words in no time, and speaking clearly soon after.

One thing about Kara’s development that seems different than Evan’s, is the control she has over her body. She is a strong little thing, and I am predicting that she’ll be rolling over any day now. Evan was never the first baby on the block to hit physical milestones — just average.

Of course, I have to say it. I just can’t believe how fast my sweet, special little girl is growing up.

Want to see some more photos of Kara? I posted a series of adorable, and funny outtakes from this photo session on Babble today.

Tell me what makes your little girl special!

I ganked this image from the brilliantly funny Michael Knepprath. Please visit his site for more similarly witty images. Haha, how true is this though? Hah!

Are you in the mood for some shopping? I’ve teamed up with a group of bloggers, and we’re giving away $400 in Target Gift Cards to one lucky person! Yippee!

Please note, you only need to enter once on any of the participating blogs — we all have the same form. The giveaway is open to both US & Canada. Good luck, and happy shopping!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

In the image above, you will notice Mean Joe Greene of the Pittsburgh Steelers, and Downy Unstopables spokesperson Amy Sedaris recreating a classic Coca Cola advertisement from the 1980′s. This Downy Unstopables commercial is really pretty cute, be sure to check out this special sneak peek!

About the #TouchDowny Twitter Contest

• Downy will be giving away surprises to Twitter followers for every touchdown scored in the game, including free samples of Downy Unstopables and Unstopable Fan Packages

• Consumers can participate in the Touch Downy giveaway on the Downy Twitter page using the hashtag #TouchDowny

• Each time a team scores a touchdown, people who tweet the hashtag at the Downy Twitter account will receive Downy products and gift cards to the NFL shop

About Downy Unstopables

Downy Unstopables in-wash scent booster shakes up the laundry routine by adding a boost of freshness that stays feisty until the next wash.

I am always looking for ways to make our laundry smell fresh. In fact, I’m pretty picky about the products and scents that I will use, because I like a pleasant, mild scent, but I also like a scent that will stick with the clothing for more than an hour after pulling the load from the dryer.

The scent-boosting formula contains four times more perfume ingredients than liquid Downy, so, if you really like to smell the freshness of your laundry, this is the product for you!

Downy Unstopables is a really great product, and I am amazed at its staying-power in the clothing. Plus, hello? Cute bottle. Does that matter to me? Kinda! :)

Be sure to jump on Twitter during the game on Sunday and Tweet with the #TouchDowny hashtag to win some great prizes!

Are you ready for game day?

This is a sponsored post. Downy product and additional incentives were provided to me. All opinions stated are my own.

Just a random snap of my husband trying to calm Kara, a.k.a Fitz (for all the fits she throws). Yes, she’s mine, but how beautiful is she?

More great Wordless Wednesday bloggers

Angry Julie Monday,  Better in Bulk,  Five Minutes For Mom,  Live and Love…Out Loud,  The Divine Miss Mommy

Enter below to win one of TWO $60 Target Gift cards. This giveaway is open to US and Canadian entrants. Those of you in Canada can enjoy some cross-border shopping if you win. Good luck!

Can you believe that January is nearly behind us, and that we have Valentine’s day to look forward to in just two weeks? Be sure to check out my latest post on Toddler Times, where I created a gallery of funny conversation hearts for toddlers.

Hope you get a kick out of them!

This is one of my older photographs. I really need to make some time this spring to get outside and shoot more, I really miss shooting for the sake of shooting.

Not that I don’t love taking iPhone photos of my kids, I do, but I need to get back to externalizing the pictures in my head.

Until very recently, I was outnumbered by guys in my home. Moms of boys know, there are several areas where the preferences of men and boys intersect — loud cars, power tools, and certain delicious foods — to name a few.

One of those foods that gets a huge thumbs-up from the big man, and the little man in our home? Ball Park Franks! We actually go for Ball Park Beef Franks in our home. Made with 100% beef, they make a delicious choice for a quick lunch or fun summer grilling option (is it summer yet?)

You know, this commercial for Ball Park Franks really cracks me up. I think my husband is probably 99% sure about everything. Good thing that 1% leaves room for me to be the one who is usually right!

The importance of guy time!

While this video features some grown men enjoying “guy time”, this quality bonding time between father and son is particularly important too, and the conversation can be equally entertaining. Recently, my husband and my son have been spending a lot of time with each other finishing our upstairs renovation.

Of course, my husband is doing the actual work, but he let’s Evan play with his tape measure and level, so he really feels like he’s putting in some hard work too.

After a grueling afternoon working upstairs, the boys come down and have a snack — Ball Park Franks are one of my husband’s go-to foods when he’s spending “guy time” with our son.

Ball Park offers a variety of beef, meat and turkey products, including a line of Angus Beef and Deli Style Franks along with a line of better-for-you options like Smoked White Turkey Franks.

I am going to check out those Smoked White Turkey Franks the next time I am shopping — sounds like a nice option!

Grab a Ball Park coupon

Like Ball Park on Facebook, and score a $1 off one pack of Ball Park Franks now!

Stay tuned for more fun posts about Ball Park, and a giveaway very soon.

This is a sponsored post. Ball Park product and additional incentives were provided to me. All opinions stated are my own.

If you were online in the late 90′s and early 2000′s, you probably received about 30 emails filled with jokes and animated gifs, every day. Your great aunt Cathy might even still forward you and 234 of her closest friends an occasional 3-mile-long email featuring pictures of beautiful vistas, overlaid with motivational quotes.

I can’t help but be reminded of those awful email forwards that most of us would sooner delete than read, when I see the new posting trend in mom blogging.

Did we all wake up one day with a deep passion for funny pictures of cats, tacky motivational quotes, and incessant Pinterest round-ups?

No. We do it, because we know that these stupid, hollow posts, will score us mad traffic via StumbleUpon.

Notice I said we, because I am guilty too. See these beautiful photos of beaches in Japan? Nice images, but do I really care about the loveliness of Japanese beaches? No. I wrote the post, because I knew that I could gain some fast and easy traffic. I feel kind of yucky admitting that, but it’s true.

Why would mom bloggers want huge StumbleUpon traffic?

Well, duh. More traffic means more ad revenue, and more appealing stats. The stats come into play when bloggers are competing for ambassadorships and other sponsored opportunities.

A blogger who is posting once or twice a week for StumbleUpon may easily have 500,000 to a million (yes, I said ONE MILLION… not me, by the way) pageviews a month.

Is the traffic legitimate?

Oh, it’s legitimate all right, and it looks pretty impressive in a media kit.

However, I just don’t think that PR and brands realize that 90% of these visitors are transient, simply passing through the blog like ships in the night.

The chance of these StumbleUpon viewers ever returning to the blog is pretty low. Why bookmark a blog for a repeat visit, when a Stumbler’s appetite for inspirational quotes can be fed by simply pressing the Stumble button again?

Granted, the same could be said for bloggers running a lot of giveaways, the idea being that the traffic is simply passing through to enter a contest.

Blogging for StumbleUpon is an addiction

That sounds somewhat dramatic, but I think that it is true. When you begin publishing posts with the purpose of gaining huge traffic, and you get that rush when you see the visitors in fact flooding into your site, it is pretty thrilling.

It is so thrilling, that you find yourself posting for StumbleUpon on the regular. You then begin asking your friends to discover or like your posts, and you may even be a member of a forum or group where members trade Stumbles — all things that are against StumbleUpon’s Community Rules. Raises hand.

There is certainly some overlap here, and bloggers can definitely rationalize that they are not posting FOR StumbleUpon, but simply posting content they already enjoy, and that is relevant to their blog, but that just happens to be a good candidate for Stumble traffic.

Really wishy washy, isn’t it? Let me reiterate… I love StumbleUpon. I love it, and I hate it, and I am also an enormous hypocrite, no need to point that out to me — I’m guilty.

So what is the problem with the StumbleUpon trend?

Well, maybe nothing.

I’m generally of the blog and let blog philosophy, and while I am pointing out an issue in our community, I am certainly not trying to smack any fingers. Again, I do it too.

I also post giveaways and write sponsored content, which makes me pretty lowly according to some.

I do know that the use of StumbleUpon for traffic has raised the bar across the mom blogging community on traffic. It used to be that 20k-50k unique visitors per month was really impressive for a mom blog, but now, if you aren’t in the 100k+ range per month, you have a small blog.

Your small blog may be thriving, and your 20k visitors per month are actually engaging, clicking, reading, and coming back for more, but again, it looks like small potatoes compared to the bloated Stumble numbers that many are reporting these days.

The same can be said for enormous Twitter and Facebook followings though, too, right? :)

I also see a major change in the quality of blogging content, which again, is really none of my concern I guess? After all, it’s your blog and you can post what you want.

I stand by that. You can post what you want, and I can post what I want. You can post for your readers, for yourself, or for a buck. You can post for all of those things together.

What do you think?

Is the focus on posts that do well on StumbleUpon bringing the quality of your favorite mom blogs down? Is this a bad trend, or just another useful tool for bringing exposure to blogs?

Do we all really want to post quote roundups, funny photos of animals, and incessant Pinterest round-ups, or do we feel like we have to in order to compete with other bloggers’ traffic?