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Have I ever mentioned how much I love breakfast? Yes, I know – I’ve said it a time or two! I can’t help it, it’s my favorite meal of the day and I am a true believer that you can in fact have breakfast for dinner. My family may have done that such thing a time or two!

Well when I heard that IHOP was celebrating their 55th Birthday with New Summer Signature Pancakes, I really wanted to try them. Lucky for me, they wanted me to try them too, yay! They are offering the following varieties:

• Jelly Donut Pancakes ? Fluffy buttermilk pancakes filled with layers of luscious raspberry jelly then topped with glaze, more raspberry jelly and powdered sugar.
• Tiramisu Pancakes – Buttermilk pancakes and sweet mocha cream topped with a drizzle of chocolate, whipped topping and a dusting of cocoa powder.
• Banana Graham Nut Pancakes – Sliced fresh bananas grilled inside buttermilk pancakes layered with marshmallow cream, graham cracker crumbs and crushed honey-roasted pecans then topped with cinnamon cream cheese.

IHOP’s “official” anniversary/birthday is July 7th, but the pancakes will be available through July 21st, which just happens to be my 1 year wedding anniversary!

My sister and I planned to go wedding dress shopping last Thursday, so I thought that would be the perfect occasion for a “girl’s brunch”. We headed out and made IHOP our first stop. We looked over the menu and had a tough time deciding which ones to try. She opted for the Tiramisu Pancakes, while I chose the Jelly Donut Pancakes.

What I found to be pretty amazing is that you can order the pancakes alone or with eggs, bacon and meat. Of course we got the whole works!

I thought the Jelly Donut Pancakes were absolutely delicious! A little maple syrup on top and it was the perfect combination of flavors. I will definitely be back at IHOP for more!

I tried a bite of my sister’s Tiramisu pancakes and they were quite delicious too! I know she was in Chocolate Heaven while eating them! Next time I’m going to try their Banana Graham Nut Pancakes! One of these days I am going to have another of their Griddle Melts too – those were quite amazing. I swear, IHOP is just one of those places where you want one of everything on the menu!

Connect:

You can connect with IHOP on Facebook!

I received a sample product for this review. All opinions are my own and/or my family’s, take it or leave it. Click here to view my whole disclosure policy.

Summertime is all about family gatherings complete with delicious food. We often host gatherings at our house, so I’m always trying to save a buck when it comes to food. I’m able to do that when I shop at Aldi, because their prices are pretty much unbeatable!

A few weeks ago, we hosted a gathering for a friend’s birthday. Our theme was Kabobs. Armed with some great ideas straight from Aldi, I headed to the store to shop for kabob ingredients. I was able to purchase all of the goodies for our kabobs without spending a fortune!

First on the list was Cheese and Sausage Mini Kabobs. I grabbed a tube of summer sausage and some different cheeses.

I sliced them up into bite size pieces and stuck a fun colorful toothpick right through the middle, alternating cheese – meat – cheese. They were the hit of the party and so easy to just grab and eat! My kids actually requested I serve them like this every time!

No summertime party is complete without the fruit. Instead of throwing together an ordinary fruit bowl, have some fun with it and make some delicious Fruit Kabobs. I mixed marshmallows in mine for fun! You can do this with any fruit and Aldi has pretty amazing prices on their fruit. Strawberries were around a buck each, amazing!

For the main course, I served chicken, shrimp and sausage kabobs with assorted veggies. I have to say, it was much easier than having to cook all of the meat, make a few salads and prep other stuff to go along.

At Aldi you can get bags of shrimp and chicken tenders in their frozen aisle. Then just grab a pack of your preferred flavor sausage and some veggies. I think I spent around $25 on all of those ingredients. That’s not too shabby since I usually spend double that just on meat for parties!

The Shrimp Kabobs were the biggest hit! I don’t know what it is with seafood on the grill, but everyone just ate it up! We all decided that we need to do Kabobs more often. They’re great to eat right off the stick and clean up isn’t half bad!

Next time you’re prepping for your summer gathering, consider Aldi. You’ll get so much more for your money! They carry things aside from food too. When I was in store I saw outdoor games, kids toys and lawn decor. You’d be surprised at what they have!

Aldi shared a Italian Summer Kabobs recipe that you might want to try.

Prep time: 25 minutes Cook time: 5 minutes Total time: 30 minutes Yields: 20 skewers


Ingredients:


? 2 onions, cut into eighths
? ? cup Tuscan Garden Italian Dressing
? 14 ounces Parkview Italian with Sundried Tomato Griller Sausages, cut into 1″ sections*
? 8 ounces edenVale Fresh Mozzarella, diced into 20 pieces

Directions:

1. Marinate onion petals in dressing for 20 minutes.
2. Skewer 2 onion petals and a piece of sausage onto a toothpick.
3. Grill until sausage reaches 165? (approximately 5 minutes).
4. Add a piece of mozzarella to each skewer; serve.
Tip: You will need 20 large toothpicks or small skewers for this recipe.

Recipe courtesy of Chef Stacey, ALDI Test Kitchen

*These are Seasonal items that are only in stores for a limited time and may no longer be available.
**For more recipes from the ALDI Test Kitchen, visit www.aldi.us.

Connect:

You can connect with Aldi on Facebook!

I received a sample product for this review. All opinions are my own and/or my family’s, take it or leave it. Click here to view my whole disclosure policy.

Our dog Gunner does not like thunderstorms, fireworks and other loud noises. When I say he doesn’t like them, I really mean he freaks out – bad! He will cry, shake, pant, you name it. Nothing could calm him and he would keep us up all night during overnight thunderstorms. For sanity’s sake, we needed a solution, one that didn’t involve massive amounts of doggy meds.

That’s where Thundershirt came in. I made a comment on Facebook about poor Gunner’s anxiety and a few people recommended Thundershirt. I immediately went to their website to see what all the hype was about, sent an email to see if they’d like to be featured and that was that. Now Gunner has a Thundershirt to help calm him during storms.

“As the name ThunderShirt implies, thunder and noises was the first fear we tackled, but along the way, we found that simple pressure helped with a multitude of pet anxieties including separation, travel, vet visits and much more. Our proprietary research also uncovered that over 30% of pets suffer from one or more of these anxieties making anxiety one of the leading issues for today’s pet parents.”

The Thundershirt was easy to put on. It has velcro straps, so you can adjust it to fit your dog comfortably. It wraps around their torso and front legs only, so they can still go to the bathroom with it on.

We’ve used our Thundershirt a few times over the course of storms we’ve had in the past few weeks. At first, it didn’t really seem to help much. The second time, Gunner seemed a bit calmer. The third time, we had storms late in the evening. We put the Thundershirt on and left it on for the entire night. He still had some anxiety, but nothing like usual. We were actually able to sleep through the night.

Now that he’s used to the Thundershirt, it really seems to help with his anxiety through the storm. I highly recommend trying the Thundershirt before you take drastic action such a medication for your pup. At around $40, it’s worth a shot!

Connect:

You can connect with Thundershirt on Facebook, and/or @ThunderShirt on Twitter!

Buy It!

You can buy the Thundershirt for dogs for $39.95.

I received a sample product for this review. All opinions are my own and/or my family’s, take it or leave it. Click here to view my whole disclosure policy.