DII Kitchen Millennium 4-Piece Heat Resistant Seamless Non Stick Dishwasher Safe BPA Free Silicone DII Kitchen Tool Set, Red

In my time as a reviewer of books and products for Amazon and some other companies that send me things, I have received some great products. Other products are such a waste and yet they garner so many positive 5 stars reviews that I wonder if the reviewer had even tested them (much less seen them or taken them out of the package). Such is the case today. My son Steve and I were making spaghetti last night, both sauce and noodles. This gave me a chance to try out this silicone kitchen tool set. I ended up giving them one star because no stars isn't an option. I thought they were absolutely worthless. I never read other reviewer's reviews until I have actually posted mine. I was shocked to see all the 5 star reviews and they had an average score of 4 stars with 80 reviews done at that point. What did I miss or did they 'cheat'. I will never know.

I also found it interesting when I saw more of the product information on the product page. They made a big deal about them being hygienic and that the red color stimulated the appetite. Since most kitchen tools are left in the kitchen when the food gets served I wouldn't count on them being much in the appetite stimulate department. Anyhow here is my review for these poor excuses for kitchen tools. Hygienic, possibly/probably but I have cooked with wooden spoons for years without dropping dead from a food borne pathogen hiding in the wooden spoon.

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This is my third time attempting to try out and use silicon kitchen ware. Even the one item that I had thought turned out while even after scrubbing it clean I discovered it to have congealed grease several months later when I went to use it again. Other than prep to be able to use these, I haven't technically washed them and I'm not sure they are worth the time. I tried the spatula while making a scrambled egg and it is a good thing it was scrambled as the spatula has a very thick and short 'ramp' up onto the flat part of the spatula. I don't think I could have gotten a friend egg out without scrambling it since it was too thick to get under food in a pan without the food being damaged.

Yesterday I made spaghetti sauce and tried out the spoon. Just stirring the sautéing onions and garlic the spoon didn't want to do much and as soon as I included thawed, loosely packed hamburger and tried to stir it in the spoon bowl literally bent in half! Again and again and again. Nor was it possible to scrape up the fond (those yummy brown bits on the bottom of the pan) without the spoon bowl bending in half. It was only once I had some tomato sauce in the pan that the spoon stopped bending with every stir. I would it consider impossible to stir things like cookie or bread dough by hand with this spoon and certainly won’t try as I don’t need the frustration.

Then I tried the pasta server thinking there couldn't be much difference between this one and the super cheap one I have used for years. Wrong. The tines or whatever you call them were so thick that they pushed the noodles out of the way in colander instead of collecting them so I got about half the amount of noodles in it at a time as my other one.

I haven't even tried the slotted spoon and doubt if I will. Working with these things made me honestly wonder what the manufacturer was thinking and did they even give them a casual test in a kitchen? These are worthless and don't waste your money on them! And just to be clear, I'm not a newbie to a kitchen. I've been cooking for about 50 years now at this point. I know that cooking with a spoon that bends when you need it to be stiff while stirring something.

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The Joy of Kindle Unlimited!

I love to read. I mean it. I read lots and lots of books. While I thought I would never enjoy reading on a Kindle, I discovered it was much easier to hold for my hands. I could read while eating since I don't have to hold pages open and with Kindle Unlimited I have so many books at my finger tips I'm in readers heaven. I truly thought that the only 'free' books would be cheap romance novels written by 6th graders. Instead I have found some terrific authors that write serious pieces of work.

Before you download any book to read on the Unlimited program or buy for that matter, most have book samples to read of around 5-10% of the book. If you get through that sample and go argh! because the book is so enticing, exciting, etc. when the sample is finished it is so great to be able to download the book and find your places and continue reading. This is one thing that I would like to see improved since the Kindle can keep track of our places in all the books we may be reading at one time, I don't know why when we finish a sample and then download the book we have to manually find our place where the sample left off. Perhaps there is a way and I just haven't found it yet on my Kindle keyboard which I don't think they make anymore and if someone knows how to do that, please let me know!

I read serious books as well as cozy mysteries and vintage books that are hard to find in print anymore. My constant companion when reading any book taking place in the US is my large print atlas (10 cents at the thrift store!). A book that takes place in other parts of the world I have an atlas for that as well, but much more difficult to find some countries that keep changing their names and boards. The worst being the former Soviet Union and the eastern side of Europe where battles seem to be continually fought and the boundaries keep changing. It would be nice to have an atlas built into the Kindles as well with maps for the different time periods. But even with a current atlas that shows only our more modern world, I'm still learning more geography. One of the last books that I read to review on Amazon, took place between 1912 -1922 mostly in Russia and India where boundaries constantly where changing then. It was hard to follow the character's travels without getting lost.

Now that was a 'serious' book which meant I had to clear my mind out before reading another serious one and so I found a new cozy mystery writer who writes in a series and so far I have been able to read her books for 'free' through the Kindle Unlimited program. Why do I need to clear out my mind? Many times on the Amazon review program that I am on I get books by new authors and lets just say they may never get past that first book. I rarely ever do reviews here of books that were disappointing to me. I would prefer to review here books and products that I truly like and if most of my recommendations are ones that you find that you like as just as I do so why bother with the lousy books? You can always find my reviews on Amazon here.

Vaseline Intensive Care Healing Serum Advanced Relief

I got to try this Vaseline Intensive Care Healing Serum lotion as part of the Amazon Vine Reviewers Program. Here is the review that I left and then additional comments about the product.

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I'm always dubious about claims of great performance when it comes to lotions and potions, so I was pleasantly surprised to see that after using this serum my skin did look and felt better. I have noticed over the years that most hand lotions within an hour or less of putting it on you see the same flaky, dry skin. I did not notice that with this lotion. When using it on my feet, not only did the skin look better, but the day after using it it still looked better and some of the calluses were easier to remove than usual.

Why the 4 stars instead of 5. I don't like the smell of this item. Reminds me of men's aftershave.

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When I do a review of a book or product from the Amazon Vine program, I do not look at what others have to say about the product as I don’t want to encourage ‘lemming’ behavior, even if unconsciously. So I wrote my review for this serum and after posting it, looked at the reviews that have been left for it. At this point in time almost ALL the reviews mention the scent as being too overpowering. A male reviewer felt that it was flowery smelling, I thought it smelled like aftershave, other compared it to room deodorizer, etc. I think the point has been made. If you are sensitive to scents, you are not going to want to use this product. If it doesn’t bother you what something smells like, then you might like to try it.

Others also mentioned the viscosity of the product. The manufacturers call it healing serum and as some noted, serum is usually a thin clear fluid. This looked and acted as a lotion just like any other kind of lotion. I thought it felt tacky the first time I tried it, but didn’t have that sensation after that, perhaps because I used way less.


The product seems to work as it should, by it is important to know some of the problems with it prior to buying. If you can test a sample first, that would be much better than buying the full sized container, especially at around $10 a pop for it.

When I signed up several years ago to be part of the Amazon Vine program, I thought all I would get to review is books. Over the years, I have gotten more and more products and less and less books that I would be interested in reading. Like the last type of book I want to read is one aobut Vampires or witches and those paranormal themes and I seem to be offered a lot of those. However, I have gotten some excellent products to review and this is a review about one of them.

I love children but my youngest is going on 32 and no grandchildren in sight, so I don't have kids toys around any more. I've had plenty of opportunities to review kids toys, but with no child to help me out I've had to pass them by until this month. So here is my Amazon review about a great toy train set called

Fisher-Price Thomas Wooden Railway Set .

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Over a month ago, the lady who cleans for me had to bring her son with her as she had no one to watch him for that time period. Jasper is a real cutie-pie and is 4 years old. While he brought some crayons and a coloring book with him, it dawned on me that I had no toys at all for him to play with if he had to come again. When you have a good cleaning person you want to keep them happy, so when I was offered a chance to review this Thomas Wooden Train set I grabbed it. It came on a day that she was cleaning again so I showed it to her and asked if she thought Jasper would like to play with it and ‘absolutely’ was the answer. So I asked if she could bring him by so he could play with it.

When he came over he looked as if he was anticipating Christmas the grin on his face could have lit up a room! As soon as we got the box unpacked he started building. While he did look at the instructions a bit, typical guy, he proceeded to ignore them. Built the train tracks on his own. I only had to help with the fireworks piece which he very much enjoyed the way it worked. A little over half an hour later he asked if he could do something else and so we packed it up and got out crayons and paper. After spending about 10-15 minutes coloring, a Chevy emblem, a Case tractor (this kid is all boy!) he decided to play with the train set again. So he pulled it all out and set up his track with ‘mountains’ (pieces of track that didn’t meet but slanted off of boxes etc. Soon he was totally lost in his own little world, talking about riding the train and singing a song about going on the train. Later I asked mom if it was a Thomas the Train song and she hadn’t heard of it so in his angelic voice he was making it up as he went along playing. After about 45 minutes, it was time to go home. So I asked him to be honest (he is a Mennonite child and thoroughly understand what being honest is about), did he think this was a fun toy to play with? With a 5 star smile and he said yes! 

There can be no greater praise for a toy than that it takes the child into imagination land and they play with it for much longer than normal to be involved with one task for their age group. It was fun, and because of all the track pieces, the tracks can be put together in different ways each time it is played with. The curved track pieces are cut to be used without regard to up or down. Depending on with way you want the curve to go is how you can put it into the tracks. Everything seemed well made and sturdy. I believe that you can also buy supplemental parts for the train set for even more fun. Now on those days that Jasper has to come with his mom, he has something fun to look forward to playing with. I would highly recommend this train set! It was a real joy to watch him play as it has been a long time since I’ve had little ones playing in my home. 

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Cole Shoot by Michael Maxwell

Here is a copy of my Amazon review of Michael Maxwell's 5th book in the Cole Sage series.

Yet another terrific book by Michael Maxwell. The worst thing about this book is the fact that now I have to wait until his next book, Cole Fire is finished and published before I get to read another of Michael Maxwell’s books. I hope it won’t be long. Mr. Maxwell’s, main character is Cole Sage. He is in many ways a ‘mild mannered newspaper reporter‘, but when necessary for the sake of friends and family will don his super-hero cape to bring help to them. Each of his books deals with the different evils that permeate our society today. This book deals first with gang violence and the second the care and respect our special needs mentally handicapped citizens should have. We see again some characters from an earlier book as well as they help Cole’s newspaper intern out of a very tough spot.

I love seeing that a writer can have a character function in a book without all the trappings that most seem to feel are so necessary, such as Cole not drinking, or jumping into bed with his girlfriend. Cole has a moral compass so lacking in many these days. While he doesn't follow rules blindly, he does feel deeply the ethics of the choices he makes and his decisions. This book especially shows it so very well.

There are scenes showing genuine love for people, especially Marco and Cole the first time they see each other which was a delightful scene in the book. For those that would be bothered by it, there are some scenes of gang violence in graphic detail. There are however, no scenes of gratuitous sex to skip over.

Mr. Maxwell writes from a Christian perspective yet without constant Biblical references. This book has two verses brought up by Cole’s friend Kelly. And they were appropriate and in context. One of the things that over the years that has turned me off of the regular so called “Christian novels” is the almost constant quoting of the Bible. No one seems to have a voice unless they are quoting Bible passages and that sure isn't the norm for most Christians that I have met. So even if you don’t live your life with the same religious philosophy as the author and Cole, you can still read the book and enjoy it.

Cole Dust by Michael Maxwell

One of the nice things that have happened since I starting reviewing books and things is being asked by independent authors and manufacturers to review their items. One day I got an email from Michael Maxwell asking if I would read and review his book Diamonds and Cole which I thoroughly enjoyed so he sent me more of his books. At this point I think I have read and reviewed 6 of his books, 4 of which are in the Cole Sage series. Cole is a newspaper journalist. Rather than being a hard drinking, chain smoking guy that many journalist are portrayed, he is different. It is hard to put your finger on it, but he is different as he defends and helps the helpless, finds the truth behind lies and is always willing to lend a hand as he keeps his positive viewpoint through out. Even though he gets a 'girlfriend' in the third book, he hates calling her his girlfriend at their age, that is what she is. Even after 8 months of dating, they are still not falling into bed at a moments notice (some novels seem to have a couple having sex before they have even changed name or phone numbers which I hate) as matter of fact, they aren't having sex at all, just appreciating each others company. As I said Cole is a different character and if you would prefer to a read books with minimal swearing, smoking, drinking and sex, yet still have a gripping tale, this books might just be for you. Below is the Amazon review I just did for the latest book I read: Cole Dust.

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I was gifted this Kindle book in exchange for an honest review.

This is the fourth book in the Cole Sage series; it leads us more into Cole’s life and some of the things that made him who he is today. Right before leaving on a planned vacation he receives an envelope that had been forwarded many times due to his having moved from Chicago to San Francisco. In the letter and subsequent phone call to the attorney that sent it, Cole finds out that he has inherited property in Oklahoma and must reside in the house for at least 30 days to avoid horrendous inheritance taxes. So he changes vacation plans and heads to Oklahoma.  He comes to find a house in need of a lot of TLC and a yard piled high with tumbleweeds. H also finds a neighbor that is the neighbor we all want, who immediately jumped in to help him bring back the house to the point he should be able to sell it.

In the house Cole finds a trunk in the attic which turns out to be full of notebooks his grandfather had written over the course of his life. His grandfather had died when Cole was around 5 years old so he never had a chance to meet him nor had his father told him much about him. Cole being an only child, with his parents gone had felt alone in the world but in a prior book had meet his daughter that he had never known he had as well as his granddaughter. Just having those two in his life felt like riches, so finding even one notebook from his grandfather felt like a treasure discovered, but he found many more than more than one. So between fixing up his house, Cole learned about the family that he had never known about.

This in many ways was a touching book in that we learned from one family what the depression, the dust bowl the Spanish flu did to the family and the small town they lived in. We see what alcoholism, bigotry and poverty can do to a family. This was an interesting book that brings insight into the life of a family. It made me wish that somehow I could find something along the order of a stack of notebooks or diaries from my grandparents as I never have really heard their background and they are now no longer with us. Sometimes just knowing what past generations went through helps us to understand why we become who we do.

 

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I hope you will take the chance to read one of his books and enjoy them as well as I do.

Where They Found Her by Kimberly McCreight

I'm not quite sure where this year has gone. My blog hasn't been neglected due to not reading any books, but my Kindle sucks me in and makes it so easy to read the next book as soon as you finish one. I've had many occasions this past year to review non-book items as well, and I plan to start posting those here as well. The Amazon Vine program brings many great things into my life to try and review. My favorite item that I received last year was my  Black and Decker Convection Toaster Oven . I had never even been close to a toaster oven up to this point and so I was a complete novice upon using one. We learned fast though that it makes the best baked potatoes in the world! No more turning on our big electric oven to bake a couple of potatoes for hubby and me and no more too damp microwave potatoes. This come out perfect inside with crispy skin on the outside. Toasting my bagels is super easy as well and no getting a bagel half stuck in a regular toaster.

My latest book that I finished around midnight last night was Where They Found Her by Kimberly McCreight. To be published by Harper in April 2015. This was a very well written book that centered around the death of a newborn baby that was found in a creek. Written somewhat in the style of Up The Down Staircase, in that there were psychiatrist notes, newspaper articles, journal entries, blog articles and regular text it gives a rest from straight dialogue. Here is my review that I posted to Amazon.

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This is the kind of book that makes me happy to be an Amazon Vine member with a chance to read and comment on books before they go out to the general public. While at times I have had to read some strangely awful books, in other cases such as this, it is a very well written book and hard to believe it comes from a beginning author with only one other book to their name. This was an enjoyable book to read, even with the main focus being the death of a newborn, since it was a well-crafted story that keeps you guessing throughout the book.

This book not only delves into the mystery of a dead newborn found in a creek but also the relationships between people in a small university town. Rather than getting a series of perfect mom’s, dads as well as children, these people seem real. You find a mother still grieving her stillborn baby, another is grieving a divorce, while another is trying to be the world’s perfect mother and wife and alienating everyone around her including her husband and children in the process. All are subjects that most of us can relate to in some way. In the end we see the truth of the saying ‘be sure your sins will find you out’. This was a very interesting book to read and keeps you guessing throughout the whole book. A well told tale and I look forward to reading more books by this author.

 

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One of the difficulties of reviewing books on Amazon is the buzzards that want to swoop down and chastise you if in any way shape or form you write a spoiler, ie. telling crucial parts of the book before they have a chance to read it. In one review I mentioned that the woman had breast cancer which since it was mentioned on the very first page of the book it wasn't something that could be construed as a spoiler yet sure enough it was. So forgive me is my reviews seem a bit lackluster at times. The internet has given people a voice and they are determined to use it!