DISCLOSURE:  This is a sponsored post in conjunction with USFamilyGuide.com.  I received free admission in exchange for a review.  No further compensation was provided.   All opinions are my own.

As many times as we've been in the vicinity of a Ripley's Believe It or Not museum, we've never had the chance to actually visit one.  Recently, we got the opportunity to go to the one in Baltimore's Inner Harbor. It opened in the summer of 2012 in the Light Street Pavilion of the Harborplace waterfront complex.

It's not hard to miss.  There's a giant sea serpent named Chessie wrapped around the front facade. My boys weren't really sure what to expect when we told them we would be visiting a Ripley's museum.  But, as we walked towards the museum, I could see their excitement building.

We visited on a cold, rainy Saturday morning.  Visiting the museum then seemed like the logical thing to do.  The museum had only been open about an hour, so it wasn't too busy yet.  There were several people just hanging out outside, looking at the exhibits in the doorway.  There's a 12-foot tall sculpture of the Transformer Bumblebee made entirely of scrap car parts.  I didn't manage to get a picture, though, since there were several people blocking him!  If you look hard at the picture above, you can see him below Chessie's tail.

DISCLOSURE:  I received a free product from BzzAgent to try and review.  All opinions are my own.

I actually reviewed Secret Outlast Clear Gel Deodorant about a year and a half ago.  I had no problems with it and gave it a positive review.  But, once my sample ran out, I never bought it again.  I had other samples of different brands to use and hadn't needed to buy any until recently.  So, I was pretty happy to get the chance to try Secret Outlast Clear Gel Deodorant again.  Especially, since I was down to my last thing of  deodorant.

I'm usually not very brand loyal when it comes to deodorant.    Often, I'll use one brand of deodorant and it would fine for a few weeks.  But, then all of a sudden, it would just stop working.  I'd start getting odor again, even though I wasn't changing anything about how I was using it.  So, I'd have to switch to a different brand.  That would work for a little while and then again I'd have to switch.

When I buy deodorant, I normally choose an invisible solid.  I like that they go on smoothly and don't usually leave any white marks on my clothes.  In the past, I've usually steered away from gel deodorants.  They usually don't go on very evenly and the majority of the ones I had tried in the past didn't go on clear.  They would dry clear, but you'd have to wait for it to dry.  Plus, it took a little while for the deodorant to dry.  So, I'd have to wait to get dressed while it dried.

DISCLOSURE: I received free products from Smiley360 and Scotties to facilitate this review.  All opinions are my own.

Our house is never without facial tissues.  There's a box in pretty much every room of the house.  They're in the bedrooms, the bathrooms, the living room and even the office.  We haven't really been brand loyal.  We've used Kleenex, Puffs, and various store brands.  One brand we've never used before (at least I don't think), though, is Scotties brand facial tissues.

Thanks to Smiley360 and Scotties, I recently had the chance to try Scotties Facial Tissues.   They sent a kit that included one box of Scotties 2-ply Facial Tissues, 2 coupons for a free box of Scotties tissues and an information sheet on the Scotties TREES ROCK program.

DISCLOSURE:  I received free products from Crowdtap to facilitate this review.  All opinions are my own.

We've been trying to green our home and daily routines.  We buy natural and organic foods and products. We recycle and reuse as much as possible.  We use reusable shopping bags when we remember to bring them!

One place where we haven't really purchased too many green products is the bathroom. Aside from natural cleaning products, we haven't really purchased natural toilet paper.  We've tried some a couple times and it just didn't seem to be as nice.  It was kind of rough and not very strong. It was also pretty thin.

DISCLOSURE:  I received free products from Crowdtap in order to host a Cottonelle Deck The Stalls Holiday Party.  All opinions expressed here are my own.

The Christmas season is here! We've already put up our Christmas tree and some decorations around the house. We have a wreath up on our front door and are planning on getting the Christmas lights up this weekend.

One area, though, where I really don't do too much decorating is the bathroom.  I'll change the hand towels to something more festive and maybe use a pine-scented air freshener -- but, that's about it.  So, recently, I had the opportunity to host a Cottonelle Deck The Stalls Holiday Party, where the premise was to decorate flushable wipes dispensers!  I would have never thought to decorate them and when I told my friends and family about the party, no one was really too excited to come.