Bleu needed a light for his room, so I ran over to Family Dollar to pick up a couple of desk lamps and some light bulbs. There were no carts, so I just carried the items in my arms. Halfway to the checkout I saw a display of brightly patterned pillows. The kids had been fighting over pillows so I decided to buy each one of them a new pillow. I set the lamps down on a counter by the checkout and told the cashier that I would be right back with some more things. She got this annoyed look on her face. “Why don’t you get a cart instead of leaving your stuff right there?” “I couldn’t find a cart. Do you have any?” Big roll of the eyes. “Why don’t you go to the store next door and borrow one of theirs?” I couldn’t tell if she was serious or just being sarcastic, so I kind of laughed and walked back for the pillows.

When I came back to check out, she started getting more and more upset with each item she scanned. “They don’t even care,” she said. “Who? What?” “The people next door. We borrow their carts all the time.” Oh. I got the feeling she wanted me to go get a cart, but I was already done shopping. “I don’t need a cart. I parked right by the door.” “You sure got a lot of stuff. How am I going to bag all this?” WTF??? “Don’t worry about putting the pillows in bags. I’ll just carry them out like this.” She stopped and leaned back, crossing her arm. “I have no room to work. You need to go next door and get a cart before I can finish.”

This is the point where I should have said something. There weren’t that many items. I got four pillows, two very small lamps, two packages of light bulbs and a pair of sweat pants. BUT, always the people pleaser, I didn’t want to make a scene so I went and got a cart. That’s right. I walked OUTSIDE and took a cart from the store next door, just to make that girl happy. It was silly. I was parked right in front of the door! I pushed the cart out and unloaded my things. As soon as I was done, a guy from the store next door walked over and took the cart back. He was shaking his head in disgust and who can blame him? What psycho person steals a cart from a store to carry things five feet?

A lot of bloggers try to keep their ‘real’ lives separate from their blogs. They use fake names and blog anonymously, careful not to reveal too much personal information. Then there are the rest of us. Hello, my name is Kristal Armendariz and I live in Las Cruces, New Mexico. And if you happen to run into me in real life, I might just give you my business blogger card. The inspiration for the cards came from Jon [who is a real photographer and has a legitimate need for cards]. I’ve ordered a second set from qoop, so I thought I’d compare the two services in case any of you would like to give it a go.

caution: the quality on these scans is terrible, but with my recent computer problems, you’re lucky to get any visuals at all

Overnight Prints

While not ‘overnight’, these came in pretty quickly. I didn’t particularly love any of the standard designs, so I created my own. In hindsight, this wasn’t the brightest idea. Unless you are a designer, you should go with a template. My ‘design’ looked great on the computer, but on the card the lettering was too small, making it difficult to read. I love the black; it really makes the photo pop. One thing I would recommend is that you avoid the optional glossy coating. It looks fantastic at first, but shows every little thing: dust, fingerprints, etc. The coating also makes it difficult to write on the card. Beautiful, but not practical. They were very affordable, starting at $9.95 for 100. If you aren’t sure or just want to try something out, this might be the way to go.

Price: Excellent
Ease of design: Fair
Quality: Excellent

MOO
Like many other flickr users, I got the free sample pack of cards from MOO. I don’t have a picture of mine, but they are very cute. The beauty of these cards is their small size. There are a million things you could do with these. I wrote before about using them on Christmas gifts. Because you can crop the photos to fit on the cards, it would be great to use them at parties. For example, you could make two cards from each photo, cropping the top and bottom. Hand out the cards at the door and have people find their match for games, etc. With a little imaginative cropping, you could make puzzles. Being able to have different pictures on each card is great! They start at $19.99 for 100. This is a great site to use if you want to get creative and have something different.

Price: Good
Ease of design: Good
Quality: Excellent

qoop

Now that qoop is offering business cards, I was curious to see how they compared to the other ones I had gotten. The process was much easier. It is integrated with flickr, so it was simple to choose the photos. You pick the background color, the number of photos and the text on the top and bottom. There isn’t a lot of flexibility as far as font/styling, but the finished product is clear and easy to read. If you need help designing, this was by far the simplest. ANYONE could make these cards, and make them look good! I have a feeling they will be adding more options soon, but the basic setup is good. They run $19.99 for 100, but they are also available in a smaller pack of 50 for $9.95. They are on sale 50% off, so now would be the time to try them out.

Price: Good
Ease of design: Excellent
Quality: Excellent

As soon as we get home next week, it is time to get ready to send the kids back to school. This year I will have six kids going to four different schools. Do you know how much paperwork that is? Two information cards, a medical card, a handbook, a contact form, a language survey, a free lunch application, an internet release form and a behavior contract x 6. Three of the kids need physicals and sports packets completed. Two need shots. And have I mentioned the supply lists? Shopping with four different lists is a headache, so I’m going to consolidate them here. I can guarantee you that when it comes time to shop, all the kids are going to want to go with me!

6 backpacks [the kids use their backpacks for two years if possible and this happens to be the year for new ones]
72 pencils
erasers: 4 pink and 1 art gum
3 2” three ring binders
3 packages of dividers for binders with tabs
2 packages of dividers with pockets
7 pencil sharpeners
spiral notebooks: 9 wide rule, 8 college rule
3 boxes of crayons
markers: 3 regular, 1 fine line
glue: 5 bottles, 2 glue sticks
3 pair of Fiskar scissors
5 boxes of tissue
1 Sharpie permanent marker, fine tip
28 pocket folders with prongs [I can never find these!]
12 packages of loose leaf paper: 6 wide, 6 college rule
2 boxes colored pencils
6 packages blue or black pens
highlighters: 8 in at least 3 different colors
3 rulers with centimeters and inches
2 pencil pouches
1 composition notebook with 5×5 graph paper
2 packages red pens/pencils
calculator
2 packages graph paper
1 protractor

If the kids in middle/high school have P.E. we will need to buy their uniforms. Plus, each teacher can add additional items once school starts.

I love cooking and I love food, but I hate spending so much money on it! I had to go to the store last night and get a few things that we needed and ended up spending over $100. And I didn’t even get groceries to last more than a few days! Help!! I am SOOOO glad that the city has that free lunch program. Yesterday, each of the kids had a salad, turkey, roll, watermelon, sunflower seeds and a milk. Whatever the kids don’t want, they put on a sharing table for other people to get. My kids were in heaven. I think they went to the sharing table to GET food at least three or four times each. What is with all these kids who won’t eat fruit? Mine were like OMG WE GET MORE FRUIT! The people in charge probably think I don’t feed them…

The first thing on my list last night [and every time I go to the store] was milk. I walked to the cooler and the store was completely sold out of milk. NO. MILK. Then I saw why. They were having a promotion and selling gallons of milk for $1.00. Do you know how excited I was? And how bummed that I got there when it was all gone? I figured I can fit eleven gallons of milk in my fridge at one time and they would all be gone before the expiration date. I am so going back there today. I hope it wasn’t a one day sale or something.

In the interest of making this blog as boring as possible, click on the extended entry for a list of what I did get. [Read more]