During NHL’s birthday, B and I were talking with my family a bit about our blogging activities. Specifically, we spoke with my sister. She was interested in how we were getting so much "free stuff." Skip forward a few weeks to earlier today when Jenn (aka KissMyKitty) tweeted:

Who the hell blindly contacts a company to ask for free shit w/o offering *anything* in return? Bloggers like these do us ALL a disservice.

This got me to thinking. When I first started TechyDad.com, I’d see companies sending products to bloggers and, I’ll be honest, I thought "Man, I’d love to get free stuff like that." I had fallen into a trap that a lot of people can fall into. They only look at one side of the equation: Blogger Gets Something For Free. There’s a whole other side of that equation: Blogger Reviews Product Thus Increasing Product’s/Company’s Exposure. When done properly, both sides come out ahead. The blogger gets free merchandise and content for their blog (the review) and the company gets exposure, usually in the form of a product review.

Now, obviously, companies aren’t just going to start shipping free products to random bloggers with no expectation of anything in return. In general, bloggers with a bigger following will get more review offers and more expensive offers than smaller bloggers will get. Of course, you don’t need to be King Of The Bloggers to get some great product review opportunities.

First of all, bloggers who are just starting out should expect to recieve nothing for free (unless you happen to have company contacts). For these bloggers, I would recommend cutting your product review teeth on items you buy for yourself or your family. Did your kid get a new game for his birthday? Review it! Did you buy a new kind of frozen meal? Review it! This way, when a company is evaluating whether or not to give you a review opportunity, they will see your past reviews. In fact, this is a good practice to keep doing even when you start getting review opportunities. After all, if you like a product enough, why not give it a little shout out on your blog?

So now your blog has been going for almost a year and you’ve gained a decent following. What do you do? Well, you could join a review group like Family Review Network. (NOTE: I don’t know if FRN is accepting new members or not.) You will recieve possible opportunities e-mailed to you and can apply for ones that interest you. You might not get all of the ones you like. You might not even get that many at first. But it will begin to open doors.

In addition, don’t be afraid to approach companies yourself. I’ve gotten review opportunities out of simple Twitter messages or e-mails. Just be sure that you research the company first, that your messages are professional and that you express how your review could benefit their company. Remember, they’re going to be looking for ways to improve their product’s/company’s exposure. They don’t really care about how you’d love to have a free item.

If a review possibility doesn’t pan out, be cordial. Thank them and ask them to keep you in mind for future review opportunities. You definitely don’t want to burn any bridges. Even if you aren’t going to review Company X’s products, that PR representative might get switched over to Company Y. If they then remember your blog and think it might be a good fit for Company Y, you don’t want their last memory to be a "frell you" letter.

When you do get a review opportunity, make sure you keep your time committment. If, for some reason, you are going to be late, let your PR contact know why and when you expect it to go live. If you find you can’t post a review of the item at all, be honest with the PR contact. Give them specific reasons why. (I have actually done this when something turned out to be not quite what I expected. It wasn’t bad, but just not quite applicable for my situation and therefore I felt I couldn’t give an honest review.) Keep those lines of communication open.

Remember, review opportunities aren’t about free products. It’s about establishing and maintaining relationships with companies. There’s a balance here and any free products that you recieve are just one side of that balance. Focusing on the "free" too much will upset the balance and make it harder to get review opportunities in the future.

I’m in a long term, comitted relationship that has lasted many years. The two of us have produced many great things together. Yet, while at BlogHer’s Sparklecorn party, I looked at Louise at MomStart and felt a certain desire. I even cheated a bit.

Now, before I start too many rumors, I’m not talking about the relationship between B and me. The “long term relationship” is with my camera. I’ve had this camera for about 3 years now and the “great things produced together” were the many, many photos taken. The desire I felt was not towards Louise herself (though I’m sure she’s very pretty, I just don’t desire women other than B). No, the desire was towards her camera. I don’t even remember the exact make or model. Just that it was a DSLR. And it was a beauty.

A little history. My first digital camera was purchased in 1999 just a short while before my sister’s wedding. It was 2 megapixels and had no optical zoom. Yet, it was pretty good for a consumer camera of the time. Before B and I decided to seriously try to have kids, we went on a “last hurrah” trip to Las Vegas. (Little did we realize, NHL was tagging along.) I took 110 photos using my camera. That number is burned into my brain. I just wish the photos were burned in there, because at some point heading home the camera was lost or stolen. We were pretty sure when/where it happened, but were told that no investigation would be done and we would only get a police report to help with insurance.

Luckily, my insurance company was great and I was able to buy a camera with 4 megapixels and a 3x zoom. Before long, I was delving deep into the world of digital photography. I was shooting macro photos, landscapes, whatever I could. A poster I made still hangs on my wall. It depicts a small flower I macro-photographed which, upon examination on the computer, turned out to have tiny ants on it that I didn’t see before hand. The poster’s caption: “Even the tiniest flower contains and entire world just waiting to be discovered.”

During a trip to a local park, I was switching out lenses. Holding my camera in my left hand, I unscrewed the lens with my right hand and then reached into my camera bag with my left hand to get the case for the lens. Unfortunately, I forgot I was holding the camera and I watched in horror as it dropped to the concrete and bounced. Luckily, except for a few scuff marks, it seemed fine. But, over time, it started having more and more problems focusing.

That’s when I bought my newest camera. 4 megapixels, a 12x digital zoom and anti-shake controls so that it doesn’t blur with the slightest twitch. Plus, it does video with sound! (This was amazing to me when I first got the camera as many cameras at that time did video but didn’t do sound.)

Now, this camera has been good to me, but I’ve often fantasized about a DSLR. I would love to have one of those around my neck. At one point, during Sparklecorn, B and a few of her blogger friends wanted their picture taken so I agreed. I was handed a beauty of a DSLR and snapped a few photos. I loved it, even though I only got to take two quick photos with it.

I’d love to run out right now and bring home a nice DSLR, but there’s a little matter of money. DSLR’s tend to be pricey and we have bills to pay for things that are more important than a new camera for me. Plus, I haven’t figured out a compelling argument to get B to agree why I need to plunk cash down for a DSLR when my current camera still works well. Oh, well. Until I can find a nice, used one for not too much money (or somehow land a DSLR review *wink* *wink* *nudge* *nudge*), I guess I’ll just have to continue to have Photo Geek fantasies while I take more photos with my current camera.

I mentioned a couple of days ago that I went up on a ferris wheel, facing my fear of falling primarily to take photos. That wasn’t entirely true. The original plan was that I was going to go up with JSL. He didn’t want any part of the ferris wheel, however, so I wound up sitting next to NHL.

While up there, I did what I usually do on rides such as this: I surpressed my fears so as not to panic my son. In fact, I’ve done that a lot over the years. You see, NHL has turned out to be quite the ride daredevil. He likes going on rides that are fast, twisting and make me afraid that one of us will fall out. Yet, in nearly every case, I supress my fears in order to make him happy. (This isn’t to say that I let him do purposefully dangerous things. Just that I know the difference between real danger and my phobia.)

My Aloha Friday question for today is: Do you have any fears that you have had to overcome when you became a parent?

BTW, if you like of The Wiggles or know someone that does, be sure to enter my giveaway for their new DVD. In addition, stop by TheAngelForever.com blog for a second chance to win.

Thanks to Kailani at An Island Life for starting this fun for Friday. Please be sure to head over to her blog to say hello and sign the MckLinky there if you are participating.

Aloha #52

After lunch, B, CutestKidEver and I went to separate sessions. Before my session started, I waited outside of Anissa Mayhew’s session hoping to get to say hi to her. I saw her and suddenly no words popped in my head. I quietly said hi as they passed and hurried into “ROYO – Screw Work/Life Balance, We Need Work/Life Policy!”

Here, though the lone dad voice amongst moms, I felt completely welcomed. Everyone in the panel recognized that work/life balance wasn’t just something moms needed. In fact, it wasn’t even something only parents needed. A person might need it to take care of their ill spouse or parent. You can read more about what I learned here from my DadRevolutions post.

After this, I attended the “Creating (or Massively Altering) a WordPress Theme (Int. to Adv.)” session. This I was extremely interested in. I do freelance work on the side and would love to do WordPress theming for people’s sites. Unfortunately, this session was a big dud. During my previous Geek Lab session, I found out that half the room was without surge strips. So I positioned myself at the other half of the room. Unfortunately, after the session was supposed to start, I realized nothing was happening.

We were eventually told that there were 2 sessions in this room. When both speakers speaking at the same time didn’t work (duh!), we were told that the beginners (who weren’t even listed as a session) would have the first half of the session and then the advanced folks would get to work. I was being asked to sit twiddling my thumbs for half a session to possibly learn something before time ran out! Session FAIL!

Needless to say, I left the session. I went into “How to Run a Group Blog for Fun, Advocacy and/or Profit” (where B and CutestKidEver were) but spent too much time trying to catch up so I’m afraid I didn’t learn as much as I might have had I been there from the start.

When the session was over, B and I returned to our room to organize our swag for the return trip the next day and to change for the night’s parties.

When party time came, we met CutestKidEver and headed to the Warwick for the Eden Fantasys “decorating” party. Here, we saw Jenn again. We were presented with…. “adult items” as well as glue, feathers, pipe cleaners and various other items for decorating. There were also chocolate lollipops in various… uh, shapes. It was all a ton of fun. Yes, I took photos during this event. No, I won’t be sharing them… Not in this post at least. Maybe I’ll make a “TechyDad After Dark” post with those. (So people can avoid NSFW images if they want to.)

After about an hour, we left our creations with Jenn to dry and headed over to A Green Affair and Bloggy State of Mind. Unfortunately, these parties didn’t seem as interesting and the Eden Fantasy’s party. We finally started talking about dinner options since we were all getting hungry. We opted to walk around the corner to…..

NYC Pizza FTW!

We waited quite awhile, but it was worth it. We carried our pizza back to the Chill Space and enjoyed some delicious slices and conversation.

We also met CoupleDumb during this point and talked with them a bit. Eventually, we realized that SparkleCorn should be starting up. We got our sparkle necklaces and rings out and went to the party.

We had a blast walking around seeing all of the pop culture posters and standees.

Then, we saw the amazing cake and heard it was from Charm City Cakes. Yes, Ace of Cakes’ Charm City Cakes! Sadly, no sightings of Duff or anyone else from Charm City Cakes. Also, sadly, it won’t be featured in an Ace of Cakes episode. It was delicious, though.

While at the party, we also met up with a bunch of people that B knew and some people we met previously (including Jenn and Dadarocks).

Finally, we attended CheeseburgHer. As I don’t eat cheeseburgers and lounging on a bed with a group of lady bloggers whom I didn’t know didn’t appeal to me, I really couldn’t get into the whole thing. It looked like fun, but I was beginning to get partied out. (Must be getting old, right?) We stopped by Sparklecorn for a bit longer, talked with some more people, then dropped back into CheeseburgHer. B took some cheeseburgers and a steak wrap to bring back to our room. On our way out, I saw Anissa Mayhew for the third time that day. (The second time was as we were entering Sparklecorn, I spotted her leaving.) As before, I wanted to say hi but there were a bunch of people around her and no words came to mind, so I walked on. (Anissa, if you’re reading this, consider this a belated “Hi!”)

B and I retired to our room to get things ready for the next day’s trip home. We were exhausted but felt sad knowing that BlogHer 2010 was over! (Next up, our trip home.)

My parents visited over the weekend and we all had a blast. First, we went to a local playground. While B pushed JSL on the swing, NHL skipped the usual slides/climbing playtime routines to check out the hedge maze. Soon enough, his brother joined us and we were running through the winding hedge maze paths together. We also checked out the duck pond which seemed short on ducks but loaded with fish and people sailing model boats.

After this, we went to a local ice cream place for a sweet treat. Here we learned three important lessons: 1) Their small is really large, 2) They have huge ears of corn for sale, and 3) They’ve got cows! In fact, JSL seemed more interested in the moo-ing cows than his ice cream. (Sadly, the cows weren’t out on a return trip the next day.)

The next day, we went to the Altamont Fair with my parents, B’s parents, B’s brother, his wife and their kids (aged 2 and 5 months). Here we went on a lot of rides:

We also saw horses and rabbits:

By far the most terrifying experience (for me, at least) was the ferris wheel. You see, I have a huge fear of falling. So why would I willingly go up 100 feet in one? For the photo opportunity of course! My photo geekery did battle with my falling fear and won. In the photos below, see if you can spot B and our families talking. (For a better look, click on the photos.)

All in all, it was a fun, but exhausting couple of days. It didn’t help that the day after this was NHL’s 7th birthday party. But that’s a post for another day.

There are many things that dads will do for their kids that they previously would never have thought of doing. At the risk of stereotyping, I doubt any guy without kids would spend a day on the couch watching a Dora the Explorer marathon. Neither would he play on the floor with plastic dinosaurs (at least, not with other grown-ups watching on). And he definitely, positively, would never paint his toenails purple. Of course, once we guys become dads, these “never ever” activities become “always” so long as they bring a smile to our kids’ faces.

In My Purple Toes by Blair Hahn, the father of the story is introduced as having purple toenails. (This is explained in the forward as having happened when a dad brought his teenage daughter to a nail salon for a pedicure.) Instead of being embarassed by his colorful toes, he revels in them. He walks barefooted, showing off his purple toes, in all seasons (though his toes get cold in the winter) and enjoys spending time with his family and their non-purple toes.

I read this book to both NHL and JSL. They both enjoyed the story as well as the little extras within it. (For example, there’s a purple-toed frog “hidden” on every page.) I also enjoyed that the book was interactive in that is asked the child questions (such as “Where are my purple toes?”). When I got to the end, JSL asked me to read it to him a second time. How could I refuse?

In addition to their website, where you can purchase My Purple Toes for $10.99, the author also has a Twitter and Facebook presence. (No word on whether he tweets with purple fingernails.) Also, a second book, titled My Purple Kisses, should be released in time for Valentine’s Day 2011. Finally, a portion of the proceeds from My Purple Toes goes to the nonprofit organization Soles4Souls which collects and distributes shoes free of charge to people in need.

Disclaimer: I did this review as part of a campaign on Family Review Network for My Purple Toes. I received a complimentary copy of My Purple Toes to facilitate my review. The opinions expressed here are my own and no other compensation was received.

I began my second day of BlogHer by myself. B had an event to attend, so I went to get breakfast by myself. I’ll admit, sitting down at the table by myself, with other tables filled with people talking amongst themselves brought back some uncomfortable memories of High School. I wanted to pick some random table, sit down at it and strike up a conversation with the occupants, but wasn’t feeling brave enough. The food, however, was great.

As I finished my food, some ladies from XhaleIsProVoice sat down at my table and we struck up a conversation. Before the planned BlogHer speech began, I excused myself. I had decided that I wanted to go to the suites during this time instead of sitting and listening to speeches. As I got up, I felt my leg ache a bit but ignored it. I went to the 43rd floor where I found… nothing. The Microsoft suite was open but they told me they were seeing people by appointment only and had no open appointments at that time. The FireFox suite wasn’t opened yet. I went to the 42nd floor but didn’t fare any better.

Then I thought to myself: How often to you find yourself in a 44 story building? So I took the elevator to the top and took some photos from really high up.

Then, I decided to kill time by going to street level and walking around for a bit. I wandered only a block or so taking photos along the way. During my walk, I almost fell into the street as my leg gave out. Not a good sign.

Finally, I got a message from B and CutestKidEver that they were returning to the Hilton. I met them out front and we proceeded to the MomSelect Swag Suite where we got some swag, but more importantly met up with Deb (Mom of 3 Girls), Kailani (An Island Life) and Xenia (Thanks, Mail Carrier).

After this, we proceeded to the MyBlogSpark suite where we spoke with many company representatives, learned about a bunch of great products (and even tried some) and, yes, got free stuff.

Following MyBlogSpark, we headed on over to the S’mores Snacktivity suite and got to make some S’mores. My only complaint here was that I found out they had dark chocolate only after eating a milk chocolate smore and was too full to make and eat a second. I guess that just means I’ll need to make a S’more at home!

By this time, my legs were really killing me. We planned to go back to our room to drop off our swag before heading to the Expo for awhile. Unfortunately, the elevators were full so B suggested taking the stairs. Did I mention my legs hurt? Every step was filled with pain and the fear that they would give out sending me toppling down the steps. Luckily, my legs held out and we made it to our floor…. the opposite side of our floor! Our hotel room was now down a loooooong hallway. *sigh*

After putting our swag away, we went down to the expo and walked around, chatting with company representatives and checking out more products. Yes, collecting more swag also.

One note here. We didn’t try to grab everything shoved our way. We even passed up on some swag that we felt we just wouldn’t use (or couldn’t give away as gifts). However, there was so much out there that we wound up accumulating a lot of swag. That’s ok, though, because we plan on slowly putting it all to use in some way, shape or form.

Back to the story, though. Our journeys were leaving us hungry. Luckily, it was lunchtime! And, as usual, the Hilton did not disappoint food-wise. One nice touch were the signs on each dish letting people know which were vegetarian, vegan and/or glutten free.

After lunch, we split up again to attend more sessions. But the story of what transpired there will need to wait for another day.

There are moments during parenting when you stop and think “Nothing anyone ever told me could prepare me for this moment.” We had one of those moments tonight. After NHL’s 7th birthday party (more on that in another post), NHL was laying on the floor watching TV. JSL decided to lay on top of his brother to give him a hug. Then, he moved so he was using his brother as a bench. Finally, he decided to change his seat… right to NHL’s face! Yes, JSL was trying to sit his rear end on his brother’s face.

I told JSL not to sit on there as B, looking up as the sight, asked “Did he fart on his brother’s face?”

Apparently, NHL took this question as a suggestion because he said, “JSL, fart on my face!”

B and I couldn’t stop laughing. I ask you, how could you possibly be prepared for an unexpected requested head fart?

This Sunday, we will celebrate NHL’s 7th birthday. As we’ve done every year, we’ll throw him a birthday party. Nothing big and flashy, mind you. Only close family will be there, not giant groups of kids. His Phineas and Ferb theming doesn’t mean a rented party hall remade to resemble Perry’s secret lair. Instead, we’ll have a cake, some Phineas and Ferb figurines that we already own, and some themed plates/napkins.

Of course, NHL’s reaching the age where he will want to start having parties with his friends. This will mean that we will need to start inviting other (non-family) kids NHL’s age. We will need to seek venues other than B’s parents’ house (e.g. bowling alleys). We may even need to plan entertainment.

Growing up, I didn’t have many birthday parties. My parents threw one for my sister and I (since our birthdays are a mere 6 days apart) when I was about NHL’s age. The party went fine, except for the clown my parents hired. All the kids gathered in close to watch his act and got in close for a good view. Everyone, that is, except for my sister and I. We birthday kids were pushed to the back where we had a lousy view.

Ever since then, we didn’t have any birthday parties. Instead, my mother would take my sister and I out to Friendly’s for lunch and ice cream. I’m not complaining, those lunches were special to me, but it does mean that I’m birthday-party-planning-challenged to some degree.

My Aloha Friday question for today is: Did you have birthday parties growing up? What special memories do you have of your birthdays growing up?

BTW, if you like of The Wiggles or know someone that does, be sure to enter my giveaway for their new DVD. In addition, stop by TheAngelForever.com blog for a second chance to win.

Thanks to Kailani at An Island Life for starting this fun for Friday. Please be sure to head over to her blog to say hello and sign the MckLinky there if you are participating.

Aloha #51

We’ve been fans of The Wiggles since NHL was young and they were on Playhouse Disney. We’ve been to three Wiggles concerts and seen countless TV shows/movies. We’ve pointed our fingers and done the twist, mashed some potatoes, woken up Jeff and even rode the Big Red Car. When we go in the car, JSL will invariably ask for "toot toot chugga chugga" (his code word for the Big Red Car song). When NHL goes to sleep, he insists on listening to Go To Sleep Jeff (a series of slow songs designed to help kids fall asleep). Needless to say, they (and we) were excited to hear about a "best of" Wiggles compilation.

The first thing I liked about this DVD was the inclusion of Greg. As any Wiggles fan knows, Greg had to step down as the Yellow Wiggle due to health reasons. Even though Sam stepped up and made a fine Yellow Wiggle, many of the Wiggles classic songs were done with Greg. Instead of having the Wiggles re-record these past hits (with Sam), they simply did an introduction to the piece and then let the original video speak (sing?) for itself. This also gave you a chance to marvel at how young the Wiggles looked during some of their early videos!

Of course, the next thing we liked were the songs themselves. From Wake Up Jeff to Monkey Man to Hot Potato to Hot Poppin’ Popcorn, there was a good mix of classic and newer Wiggles songs. When we put this on, it didn’t take long for the boys to get up and start dancing.

Finally, I loved the bonus material. Seeing the Wiggles’ mothers talk, while not too exciting for my 3 and 7 year old, was very interesting to me. My kids and I both enjoyed seeing some of the early Wiggles videos too. They marvelled at a very young Anthony, wearing green instead of his usual blue, singing with a very young Greg, Jeff and Murray in an obviously low-budget setting (especially compared with current Wiggles productions).

All, in all, this DVD is going to see a lot of use and my kids are going to get a lot of exercise dance a lot thanks to the wonderful songs on it. Hot Potatoes! The BEST of The Wiggles is definitely a must have DVD for any Wiggles fan.

Giveaway:

Thanks to The Wiggles, one lucky winner will receive their very own copy of Hot Potatoes! The BEST of The Wiggles DVD. To enter, simply leave a comment below answering this question: Who is your favorite Wiggle or Wiggles character?

You can also earn bonus entries by doing any (or all) of the following items. Just be sure to leave a separate comment for each item that you complete.

• Follow @TechyDad on Twitter. (1 bonus entry)
• Tweet about the giveaway on Twitter. Be sure to include @TechyDad, The BEST of The Wiggles DVD Giveaway, and a link to this post in the Tweet. (1 bonus entry per day) For example: Get ready to Wiggle. Chance to #win The BEST of the Wiggles DVD from @TechyDad. http://bit.ly/cY0Yd6 #Giveaway
• Subscribe to my RSS feed or let me know if you already are. (1 bonus entry)
• Leave a comment on any of my non-giveaway posts from July/August. Leave a comment here letting me know which post you commented on. (1 bonus entry per comment, maximum 3 entries)
• Write a post on your blog linking to this giveaway. Leave 3 comments about this to get credit for all of your extra entries. (3 bonus entries)

To enter, please follow the rules above within the comment section. Contest starts today August 19 and ends at 11:00 AM EST on September 2, 2010. You do not have to be a blogger to enter, but must leave a valid e-mail address for me to contact you for mailing address once the giveaway is over. I will select the winner using random.org and contact you via e-mail. You will have 48 hours to claim the prize. If there is no response, another winner will be selected. Open to U.S. and Canada residents only. Also note that TheAngelForever is also running a Hot Potatoes! The BEST of The Wiggles giveaway on her website. You can increase your chances to win by entering there as well.

Disclosure: I received this DVD complimentary of The Wiggles PR agency in order to facilitate this review. They also sent a few other Wiggly surprises for our sons that included a T-shirt, CD and Henry the Octopus doll. No other compensation was given. The opinions expressed above are my own. The Wiggles are also providing the giveaway item to my readers.