Winter is upon us, and some of you are still going to be living with the cold for quite some time!  To help keep you warm, I am giving away a soft, knit Orage hat to 1 lucky winner.  To enter, do any of the following (each count as 1 entry, please leave a separate comment with each entry - so you can enter up to 3 times):

This giveaway is now closed!  Winner was Betty from Canada!  Thanks to everyone for entering!

I have finally gotten my husband to accept the fact that we are going to start composting.  We live in a heavily wooded area and typically mulch out yard clippings, but I wanted to do more.  Adam recently installed a fabulous new garbage disposal, and I noticed we used it all too frequently for orange peels, coffee grinds, potato peels, and so forth.  About three weeks ago, I set up a little plastic bin next to the sink to use to accumulate my fruit and veggie waste.  Occasionally, I would trudge outside and toss the contents down the back hill where we toss all our garden clippings.

One day, my husband and daughter came inside and my 2 year old said excitedly, "Mommy I saw pummelos in our backyard!" while my husband glared at me and muttered about trash piling up in the woods.  For those of you that don't know, pummelos are giant grapefruit-like fruit, so they stand out against the dark brown leafy landscape.  I can't believe I am actually disclosing these facts online in a public forum, but we all have our eccentricities, right?  In hindsight, I am glad I tossed those pummelos back there because Adam is convinced that we do in fact need a turning compost bin to keep pummelos out of the backyard.  To be fair, I had only tossed two or three of them back there...and they surely won't be noticeable once the leaves come out!

As a result, I am happily researching some turning compost bin options online and look forward to purchasing one.  I also purchased a new stainless steel bin to keep next to my sink from Crate and Barrel yesterday.  It is so very pretty!

Busy Working Mom is a PR friendly website that would love to hear from you!  Please contact me if you have products, website, program or companies that would like to work with Busy Working Mama.  Please email me at aleksnearing (at) gmail.com to inquire about a review, giveaway, or advertising.

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Reviews
Review items are sent at the expense of the company and are not returned.  Reviews are posted within 30 days of receiving the product unless otherwise agreed.  I will send you a link to the review as soon as it is live.  All reviews are posted to my website, twitter and Facebook.  They are also disseminated in my email newsletter the day the post is live on my website.  I do requrie a full-sized product for review purposes.

Review/Giveaways
All terms above apply for review items.  Giveaway prizes can be sent by me or can be sent directly from the company.  Giveaways typically run for a term of two weeks.

Giveaways
Giveaways take me considerable time and effort to compose, edit and market on various websites.  I work very hard to spread the word about your products.  Due to the time involved, I typically do not host giveaway-only promotions without some form of compensation (either product or monetary).  Please contact me for prices and terms.

Website/Company Feature
A feature post is great if you are not interested in sponsoring a review or giveaway, but would still like to have your company mentioned on Busy Working Mama. A feature includes a post about your company and can include an interview. I will also post keyword links and pictures of products as well as direct the readers to where they can find your products. I will send you a link to the post as soon as it is live on my website. All reviews are posted to my website, twitter and Facebook. They are also disseminated in my email newsletter the day the post is live on my website.  Please contact me for prices and terms.

ADVERTISING RATES
I would love to advertise your business on my blog.  I do not accept advertising containing adult content, profanity, or anything that is not family-friendly.  Ads will be placed in a premium spot at the top of my blog, under "Visit My Sponsors."  The size of ad is 125 x 125 button (you must provide) or a text link.  Contact me for details.

DISCLOSURE/TERMS OF USE
This blog is a personal blog written and edited by me. For questions about this blog, please contact Aleksandra Nearing (aleksnearing (at) gmail.com).

This blog accepts forms of cash advertising, sponsorship, paid insertions or other forms of compensation.  This blog abides by word of mouth marketing standards. I believe in honesty of relationship, opinion and identity. The compensation received may influence the advertising content, topics or posts made in this blog. That content, advertising space or post will be clearly identified as paid or sponsored content.  This blog does not contain any content which might present a conflict of interest.

The owner of this blog is compensated to provide opinion on products, services, websites and various other topics. Even though the owner of this blog receives compensation for our posts or advertisements, I always give my honest opinions, findings, beliefs, or experiences on those topics or products. All the opinions expressed here are mine and mine alone. I post about products that I like or prefer personally and products that my family has found, tested, and approved. This site's purpose is to provide an avenue for us to spread the word about some great products that I have found useful in my busy life as a mother, a woman and a wife. Any product claim, statistic, quote or other representation about a product or service should be verified with the manufacturer, provider or party in question. Please do your research on a product before you buy it and decide if it is right for you and/or your family.

I got this recipe from a friend this week.  When my husband came home with a huge bunch of apples from Costco, I simply had to try the Apple Bread.  I did make some slight modifications to the original recipe, mainly since our family is not big on nutmeg or too much sugar.  Next time I am going to add raisins and cut the sugar down to only 3/4 cup.

4 cups diced apples or pears (I peeled mine first)
2 cups sugar (I used 1 cup)
1 cup nuts (or a nut/raisin mixture

Welcome to my blog!
Thanks for stopping by!  My name is Aleks and I started BusyWorkingMama.com in January of 2010.  I enjoy blogging about recipe, my life, my handy hubby's household projects, product reviews, parenting tips, giveaways and more.


About Me
I am a full-time working mother of a wonderful little girl Lily and wife of a wonderful husband, Adam.  We live in a quiet little city north of Atlanta, GA.  My real job is overseeing Financial Reporting for a publically traded company, and I enjoy the work that I do.  My favorite activities include gardening, reading, cooking, hiking, traveling, running, and spending time with my family.  I rarely step foot in a shopping mall and would do all of my shopping online if I could.  My favorite products to peruse are beauty products, jewelry, purses, shoes, clothing, eco-friendly items, personalized items and unique items/concepts.  While I enjoy finding a great deal, I look for quality above all.

Note: The views expressed on this blog are my own and do not reflect the views of my employer.

Busy Working Mama's Partnerships
May 2011: I wrote an article on feeding tips that was featured on the Baby Einstein Blog!

I am an Advisory Board Member for Produce for Kids!  I am excited to be working with this great organization!

Testimonials From My Sponsors
I spend significant time and effort to ensure that my blog posts are comprehensive and honest.  I strive to market a sponsor's brand appropriately and spread the word about a sponsor's brand and products through my blog and other social media.  If you have worked with me and would like to leave a testimonial, please feel free to do so.  I appreciate all of the sponsors I work with and hope they can say the same!

November 2011
Sarah from Lee Associated for Mrs. Cubbison's recipe and giveaway post
"This looks wonderful! What a great blog you have! Thanks so much for you hard work. Please keep me posted on the contest!"

August 2011
Jeremy from Soles4Souls, Inc.
"The post looks AWESOME! You went above and beyond what I expected & made the partnership and clothing sound so amazing. Thank you for that! Lily looks adorable in the dress. I hope she liked it."

August 2010
Krug's Eco-Logic said:
"Thanks so much for the opportunity Aleksandra!  It has brought me many more followers on twitter, FB and my blog and was definitely worth it. If you ever have anyone that's hesitant to do a giveaway, I'd be happy to talk up your blog :-)"