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- TGIF is offering stating if Mom comes in for lunch or dinner, she’ll get a free Brownie Obsession or Spiced Up Cupcake for dessert. Entree purchase required. Offer valid only on May 10th.

- Kansas City Zoo is giving moms a free admission and an ice cream sandwich. Hurry moms!

- TCBY is giving moms an ice cream on Mother’s Day.

- Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse is giving moms a $25 gift card for their next meal whenn they dine today.

- El Pollo Loco strikes back at KFC. El Pollo Loco is honoring the KFC free meal coupon on Mother’s Day. Call ahead, if you were planning on using that coupon.

- Cold Stone Creamery stores in New Hampshire is giving mothers a free ice cream from noon to 10 p.m. on Mother’s Day ONLY.

- Kodak, yes the memory keeper. Get a personalized photo card for your Mom with the code FREECARD. Shipping is not included.

- Outback Gives Moms $10. Take Mom to eat at Outback, and she’ll get a $10 gift certificate for her next meal at the restaurant.

Post from: Babylune

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- time to relax?
- scents like bath or candles for around the house?
- a vacation?

Or something simpler? Why not comment on this post to help all those others out there that don’t have a clue what to get Mom/wife. For all you men out there, what have you got HER in the past. Or what did you get your mom growing up?

Course this is Friday so it is also open chat. What’s on your weekend agenda? We are planning on going to the kite festival if it doesn’t rain. Any issues you have this week? Spill it!

Post from: Babylune

Poll

  What do You Want for Mother’s Day?

Post from: Babylune

Image: http://www.forevergeek.com

We’re now 4 weeks into the Mothering Sunday to Mothers’ Day Charity Campaign. The organization that gets the most votes in the poll by the end of Mothers’ Day, will receive $1 for every 1000 page views Babylune serves up during the campaign.

Please take a few moments to learn more about RAWA, KIVA and the Society for Women’s Health Research and vote in the poll (if you haven’t already). Below the cut are a few ways you can make this campaign more successful by increasing the amount of the donation for the charity that receives the money.

The donation amount is based on page views. In the past, Babylune has served up about 1000 each day, but the way page views are calculated was changed on April first, so it’s been a little lower.

Every time you click on “more” at the bottom of the post, or on a link that refers to another post within the site, then you increase the number of page views. Also, if you read this blog via a feed or a content aggregator, like Blogburst, your page views only count if you click through to the main Babylune blog.

The other way you can help is to write a post about the campaign on your own blog. Depending on how strongly you feel about any of the three charities, you might tell your readers how you voted in the poll, why, and encourage them to vote the same way.

If you read blog headlines via Digg, Netscape.com or Babblz, it would help if you voted up Babylune posts. If you’d like me to vote up your posts there too, just leave the link as a comment.

I’d like to reach 100,000 page views and donate at least $100 by then end of the campaign at midnight on May 13th.

Post from: Babylune

Babylune’s Mothering Sunday to Mothers’ Day Charity Campaign is chugging off to a wonderful start. In the first week, we’ve served up over 10 000 pages, 25 people have voted and the poll results are neck and neck.

The campaign is to honour mothers in celebration of both Mothering Sunday in the UK on March 18th and Mothers’ Day in the US and Canada on May 13th with a donation that will go to one of three women’s charities (RAWA, KIVA, or the Society for Women’s Health Research) chosen via a poll among readers of this blog. The donation will total $1 for every 1000 page views served up during the campaign (March 18th to May 13th 2007).

There are slightly more than 7 weeks left in the campaign that ends on Mothers Day. Anyone can vote in the poll at the end of the campaign post or in the blue sidebar on the right hand side about half-way down this page.

Post from: Babylune

I often think the only thing mothers have in common is that we’re all women with children. That’s probably why it doesn’t take long to embroil a new mother in a passionate argument. The opportunity to stake out a side and defend it ferociously governs discussions about routine male circumcision, breastfeeding, sleep training, working in or outside the home, types of childcare and potty training methods, among other parenting topics.

There are as many definitions of motherhood as there are mothers. What is missing is respect for other women’s definitions of what motherhood means. A lot of energy is being wasted by arguing about what, exactly, is the “best” for children. Energy that, if re-directed, could actually be spent making a society that is friendly to mothers and children. Claiming and defending the moral highground is an exhausting and eternal struggle.
Re-directing wasted energy is the goal of Mothers Ought to Have Equal Rights. The American organization is dedicated to fighting the media-hyped divisions between women with children. The group hopes to foster inclusion and cooperation on issues that affect our children everywhere. Visit the site to find out how to support their campaign for a “ceasefire in the mommy wars.”

Post from: Babylune

In the lead up to the big day, I thought I would explore a number of issues that affect mothers’ lives. Since nothing inspires fear in the hearts of working women more than maternity leave, I thought I would start with workplace issues.

You may remember my post about study results that showed motherhood makes women smarter, more focussed and more productive. You would think business and industry would want to capitalize on this pool of intelligence, but there are some disturbing examples of the opposite. Ericsson, in particular, recently offered voluntary buy outs to 1000 of its Swedish workforce ages 35 to 50. The company plans to replace those people of prime parenting age with 900 workers under 30. Which got me thinking: are older workers so inflexible that the technology industries need to replace their employees at the first sign of gray hair? So, I thought about how my own mother has gone from completely unaware of technology altogether, to using it in her professional life. Then, I found some other stories about equally inspiring women who overcame technophobia for my Globe and Mail Technology column. The results are good for mothers and probably bad for short-sighted companies like Ericsson.

It appears I am not the only one whose research shows mothers have quite a lot to contribute to the workforce. Statscan, the government body that measures social trends in Canada, reported that the number of working women over 25 increased by 1.5%. In contrast, the number of working men increased by just 0.2%.

That doesn’t mean all the news is good. While unemployment in parts of Canada hasn’t been lower in decades, trends from around the world are evident there too. Employment may be up, but average salaries are down. And, since I’ve read Charles Dickens and Jane Austen and I’ve learned from it, this new information also reminds me of the massive social issues that followed the industrial revolution. The mills fired men to hire women and children because they were cheaper labour.

So what do I take away from this mixed news? Working mothers are productive employees who have a lot to contribute to all parts of society. That said, we cannot settle for less in the workplace. That only seems to drive our husbands, brothers, fathers and sons out of work. While gender equality in the workplace might still be seen as just a “feminist issue,” that is a clouded view. Equality is what’s good for everyone.

Post from: Babylune

All the mothers who are feeling especially tired should just celebrate on both dates by sleeping in and having breakfast brought in on a silver tray.

How do I get this declared a universal law?

Post from: Babylune