Ten Thousand Villages!

My sister moved to North Carolina a few summers ago. When I went to visit her, I found this wonderful store called Ten Thousand Villages.

The store features jewelry, art, baskets and other home goods, furniture, games, singing bowls, ornaments, and really too many items for me to list them all here.

The items are beautiful and colorful. My favorite thing about the store though is that its all fair trade.
Decent wages for artisans across the globe. None of the child labor in sweat shops to produce the plastic garbage sold at many chain retail stores.

I've listed some of my favorite picks from today's browsing through the online store.
They also have a sale going on right now... 20% off.  A decent deal for those early holiday shoppers out there.

20% off 1 regularly price item

I tend to procrastinate and wait for Cyber Monday, thus utilizing my Amazon Prime Membership and getting fantastic deals....  But each Christmas I try to get less and less commercial and more heart felt. Maybe this year will be exclusively from Ten Thousand Villages (with an exception here and there for special items for my son. I don't think I can get a punching bag through them.)

Here are just a few of my favorite items when recently visited the store....

• Sari Everyday Bag
• 
• Price: $19.50

• Colorful Lightweight Pins 'Flower Power Hair Pins'
• 
• Price: $7.50

• Shesham Wood Puzzle ''I Love You' Puzzle'
• 
• Price: $24.99

• 'Amazon Memories Earrings'
• 
• Price: $59.99

• 'Tree of Light Pendant'
• 
• Price: $175.00

• Silver Earrings 'Infinity Knot Earrings'
• 
• Price: $39.99

• Pearls & Silver Earrings 'Pearl Earrings'
• 
• Price: $29.00

 
If you feel inspired to visit the Ten Thousand Villages online store through one of my links and decide to purchase something from there, as an affiliate marketer I can receive a small commission (at no additional cost to you).  Thanks for your support!

Puppy Toys!

This summer we got a new puppy.

My beloved Kira died suddenly in June. 

My son, who is 9, is now ready for a puppy and to learn all the responsibilities associated.  He chose the pup, the name, and is responsible for her. 

We rescued her from PetPromise in Columbus, Oh.

6-8 weeks old

12-14 weeks old

Her name is Ruby.

He's getting really good at the taking care of the messes Ruby makes. 

Soon, when she's old enough, he'll take her to puppy classes.

We recently upgraded her tiny puppy collar to her permanent Lupine Collar. 

I love Lupine collars, not only do they come in awesome colors, but they are guaranteed for life. 

That's right, have a dog who likes to chew through leashes? (Cough, Cough, SPARKY).
They'll replace it for free.

My son chose our dog Sparky's collar, which I didn't care for, but he chose it, so there you go.
This summer however, Sparky met our neighborhood skunk. So out the collar went, and hello skunk bath!

A perfect time to replace his collar with a better Lupine collar. 

Sparky sports a blue and brown Muddy Paws collar.

And Ruby has the Purple Jelly Roll collar.

Now just wait until she's full grown for the matching harness!

Ruby certainly keeps us on our toes. At 14 weeks, she's getting into everything.

As her confidence and strength increases, so does the amount of "everything" that she gets into!
She's only 5 pounds but she jumps the last 2-3 stairs on our staircase.

Now something our other dog sparky absolutely adores is his Wobble Kong.




It keeps his mind busy and entertained while working for the treats and food inside.

I think it took him about 30 seconds to figure out how it works.

Even Ruby is jumping onto the wobble kong wagon, even though its as big as her!

Two Peas in a Pod - SNUGGLES!