Category: Reviews & Sponsorships

Last week, not only did I blog (for once), I also happen to be hosting not one… but TWO giveaways.

And the winners were…

For a Samsung Rugby Smart phone from AT&T, it was Stacey Nerdin (@StaceyNerdin) from Tree, Root, and Twig.

By the way, my Wonder Tech Twin, Leticia Barr is giving away a Samsung Rugby Smart too. Enter to win it by sharing your cell phone horror story her site, Tech Savvy Mama, by May 15th.

For the $100 eBay Gift Card just in time for Mother’s Day, the winner was… Carmen Nuland (@cmouse01). A girl after my own heart, she plans to spend it on something techy.

A special thank you to all who entered this particular giveaway. We are so pleased to have eBay as a Splash Creative Media client and there are actually two more chances to win a $100 eBay Gift Card at Julieverse at Just Precious and The Centsible Life … but hurry! Their drawing are ending soon.

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UPDATE: The winner for the $100 eBay gift card was contacted via Twitter twice and did not respond… So sad!

Congrats, @cmouse01 you won the $100 @ebay GC on my site DM me your name, address and phone number when you get a sec. #eBayMom

— graceduffy (@graceduffy) May 2, 2012

@cmouse01 Hey, you won my $100 @ebay gift card. Woot! DM me by tonight with your info. Otherwise, i’ll have to pick another winner :-/

— graceduffy (@graceduffy) May 2, 2012

@cmouse01 Since it’s past the deadline, I have to pull another winner for this giveaway bit.ly/IDNyzx Sorry :-/

— graceduffy (@graceduffy) May 3, 2012

I don’t like it when this happens, but it’s past the deadline and she was given well over 24 hours to respond. Per the rules outlined within my giveaway post, I am drawing another winner using Random.org.

This means the winner is….

 Congratulations, Lolli Franklin (@1momof5) of Better in Bulk. I hope you have a wonderful Mother’s Day!!!

The Samsung Rugby® Smart phone is dust-proof, water-proof, and supposedly kid-proof, but is it Duffy kid proof? We’ll find out…

The Giveaway

One lucky winner will win their very own AT&T Samsung Rugby® Smart phone (retail value $449.99) to put to the test.

To ENTER…

Leave a comment below about your own cell phone horror story.

Have your kids ever tried flushing your last phone down the toilet? Or maybe they decided to give it a bath… in the tub… because they thought it was dirty?

Have you ever driven over your phone with your car? Or did just the thought of leaving it in the car make you shudder? (Yeah, been there!)

Deadline

Drawing held at 11:59 pm PST, on Sunday, April 29th, 2012. Please see fine print below for more rules.

Additional Entries

For extra entries, you must complete the above comment and do any or all of the following, Leave a comment for each one.

Tweet this daily and leave the link in the comments:

@graceduffy is giving away a Samsung Rugby Smart phone. Enter to win: http://bit.ly/Jz6E8e

Like my video on YouTube: http://youtu.be/RIOygzskVWk (Please!!! It’s my very first vlog!)

Read my review of the Samsung Rugby® Smart phone and tell me which of the phone’s many feature you think will be most useful to your family’s lifestyle. You can leave a comment on either post or both. This one counts as two entries.

Subscribe to Formerly Gracie via RSS Feed.

Follow @graceduffy, @ATT, and @SamsungMobile on Twitter.

Disclaimer: This post and giveaway was sponsored by AT&T. I was compensated for the video, however the thoughts and opinions expressed above are my own and do not reflect those of Samsung Mobile, or Fleishman-Hillard . I was asked to share my cell phone horror story and offer a giveaway to promote the new Samsung Rugby® Smart phone 

Fine print: One winner will be randomly selected by Random.org on Sunday, April 29, 2012 at 11:59 pm PST and contacted via email or Twitter.  Winner must provide name and US mailing address for direct shipment of products within 24 hours of being contacted or an alternate winner will be selected.  If winner comment does not meet the aforementioned criteria by containing the necessary contact information, another winner will be selected. Prizes will be shipped directly from Fleishman-Hillard.  

Grace Duffy and FormerlyGracie.com are not responsible for items lost or delayed in shipping.

Opening day for my son’s very first year of tee ball could not have been more cold and dreary. It had rained all night and it was threatening to rain all day. The actual game and parades had already been cancelled, but we still had to show up for the team photos.

Every Little League team in our city was required to show up in the same park that day. I found ours huddled under a tree, which was as close as they could get to the shelter of the  lone covered awning where the photographer was stationed.

Go Cardinals!

As we waited our turn, the parents and coaches for our team created a barrier around the boys and I could tell exactly what every single one of them was thinking at that moment.

“Stay out of the mud. Don’t go anywhere. Stand still. Keep those stupid white pants clean! Who thought it was a good idea for little boys to wear white anyway!?”

Out came the smartphones with their cracked screens, scuffed cases, and dinged corners. It was pretty easy to figure out what had happened to them… Kids!

Enough parents happily acquiesce their devices to their young children in order to keep them amused and out of trouble that there’s a name for it– the “Pass-back Effect“. As in, you pass your shiny, new devices over to your young kids. Unfortunately, the devices are seldom returned to the parents in the same pristine condition…

On this particular day, the boys were nicely taking turns with Angry Birds and Fruit Ninja on their parents’ phones. So I reached into my handbag to add my smartphone to the mix—the one I was given to review by putting it through the “kid ringer” (so to speak…)

An assistant coach caught a glimpse of the shiny screen with nary a fingerprint, much less a scratch, and the smooth case and warned his own son, “That’s a new phone… Don’t touch it!”

I laughed and told the boys, “Oh no. I want you to play with this phone. Do your worst, kids!” Then, I showed them the Doodle Biker app. It’s the one where you have to tilt your phone to the left and to the right in order to race your way through the levels… possibly dropping it in a puddle in the process. Oops!

Samsung’s new Rugby® Smart phone wasn’t in our home a day before it was dubbed the “Indestructible Phone”.

Designed to be dust-proof, water-proof, weather-proof, and even “drop-proof” (up to 6.6 feet), my family was eager to take this military-grade device to the limit!

“Can we run the car over it? Can we put it in the dryer? Can we throw it in our pond?” my son wanted to know.

“No. No. No.” my husband said, secretly coveting the new device.

“But I am supposed to test the phone, Mike!” I insisted.

Well,  I can’t think of a better test for an “Indestructible Phone” than handing it to a team of antsy 4-, 5-, and 6-year-old boys standing within spitting distance of a mud puddle… Even then, I knew the phone would do a good job surviving the day. I could not say the same for their white baseball pants.

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The Specs:

The Samsung Rugby® Smart (SGH-I847) is designed to go up against almost anything– extreme temperatures, rain, dust, sand, high humidity, solar radiation, salt, fog, and thermal shock. The rubber seals over the ports help to keep out dirt and moisture and a screw lock on the battery cover provides added protection for the internal components. The plastic case keeps the phone thin and lightweight, but still protects it from the elements and drops up to 6.6 feet.

The display is a 3.7-inch Super AMOLED™ touch screen with a layer of scratch resistant Corning Gorilla Glass as added protection against bumps, scratches, and drops. With a resolution of 480×800 pixels,  I was impressed with how brilliant the images appear on the screen. Colors are crisp and video graphics were bright and smooth.

The phone runs on Android™ 2.3 Gingerbread,  which is a popular operating system because of its streamlined interface, simple navigation, and easy-to-use features like copy-and-paste, battery life monitoring, and built-in task manager. Paired with AT&T’s 4g network, this phone runs with amazing speed and efficiency!

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A Final Endorsement

And just in case you need a more winning endorsement… this is the first smartphone that I’ve brought into this home that finally… FINALLY… convinced my economical husband that he NEEDS a smartphone. (New Year’s Tech Resolution #4, check!)

Until we moved to Silicon Valley, I never had to leave my child with anyone other than family and/or  ”nearly family”. With my mom, dad, sisters, brother-in-law, and tons of long-time friends within driving distance, there was never any need to hire a “stranger” or a teenager to babysit for us.

If something came up at the last minute, my dad would giddily rearrange his entire day  to come over. If there was a party, my son was more than welcome to spend the night… if not the entire weekend… at my parents’ house. Even then, they always begged to keep him a little while longer. “Go out to dinner. Do your  thing. He’s so happy here! There’s no need to rush back!” they would say.

I never knew how good I had it until I moved 1,671 miles away! (Yes, I have counted.)

Finding a good sitter and learning to trust them is one thing. (That’s a whole other post in and of itself.) Finding someone who will drop everything at the last minute to be with your precious child because they just love them so very,very much is nearly impossible!

I wish it were even as simple as only having to call ONE person, setting a time, and going off on your fun night out.  Oh no… finding a sitter takes far more time and carefully planning than that, my lovelies!

The process actually goes something like this…

I find a sitter (usually a recommendation from a friend). I call her, leave a voice mail, and wait for her to call back. She checks her schedule and realizes she’s babysitting for my friend that night. Bummer! 

So I call another sitter and wait for her response. She calls back a day later, checks her calendar, and says she can do it but can’t come until after my event has begun. I tell her to pencil me in, but Gah! I really need to be there on time so I call yet another sitter to see if she can come sooner… and back and forth and back and forth.

As much as I adore my children, I also appreciate the time I have alone or just with my hubby… and my goodness, have I earned it once I find, schedule, and get the sitter to my house!

Introducing SitterScout, an app that makes booking babysitters a breeze!

This clever little app works from any mobile device or computer. It helps book your existing babysitters faster, by instantly contacting one you prefer and enabling them to respond right away through a text message.

How does it work?

SitterScout is…

• Free to use. (Data rates from your carrier do to apply)
• Easy to set up .
• Completely private.
• Completely safe.

Only you can see your sitters’ information. Conversations are held one-on-one via SMS text messages. You only give out the info you want and chose who to contact first! It will even send a “nevermind” notice to the other sitters once the job has been accepted.

Schedule your babysitters with SitterScout. It’s so simple a dad can even do it. 

Thank you for everyone who commented, tweeted, and shared the Quaker Oats Leap Day Giveaway featured on this site. The contest is now closed. I drew the magic number…

And the winner is…  Rachel Veuve (@VeuveFamily).  Yay! Congratulations!

She will receive a $75 Visa Gift Card courtesy to put towards her own “Delightful Discovery” and the full product line of Quaker Oatmeal Squares. 

But, wait! There’s more… You still have a chance to get a  FREE sample box of Quaker Oatmeal Squares Brown Sugar for yourself to up to ten of your friends just by “Liking”  the Quaker Oats Facebook page (… if you haven’t already) See, everybody wins!

Disclaimer: This post and giveaway was sponsored by Quaker Oats. I was compensated for this post, however the thoughts and opinions expressed above are my own and do not reflect those of  Facebook, Quaker or its parent company, PEPSICO. I was asked to discuss my Delightful Discoveries for Leap Day and offer a giveaway to promote their new Honey Nut Quaker Oatmeal Square.