National Suicide Prevention Lifeline
We can all help prevent suicide. The Lifeline provides 24/7, free and confidential support for people in distress, prevention and crisis resources for you or your loved ones, and best practices for professionals.

1-800-273-8255

 Sprout Foods, the largest independent infant nutrition company, today announced the launch of “Eat & Sing with Sophie Sprout,” an Amazon Alexa skill that helps parents make eating healthy foods more fun for their kids. Thanks to Sprout’s new Amazon audio skill, parents can now ask for songs and sounds that help make mealtime engaging and exciting for babies and toddlers, without the use of screens on smartphones and tablets.

The skill, which works with Amazon’s Echo and Dot, features three different modes, each designed to support parents’ efforts to get their children to eat healthy foods and to occupy kids during mealtime with fun, food-centric edutainment. Parents and children simply open the skill by asking Alexa to launch Sophie Sprout, then choose from three different options:

• Songs offers nine, upbeat, kid-friendly songs, each featuring a different musical style and healthy food focus. Play songs about fruits and vegetables, like Blueberries or Butternut Squash, or the Color Song that teaches children about vibrant foods, like yellow bananas and green peas.

• Mealtime Adventures features fun sound effects, including the traditional train and flying airplane, to get food from the spoon to your little one’s mouth.

• Eat a Pouch with Sophie encourages children to take sips of their Sprout organic food pouches.

The “Eat & Sing with Sophie Sprout” skill supports Sprout’s commitment of delivering healthy, organic foods to families across the United States, and to educating parents on the nutritious food options they can introduce into their baby’s diet. With over 50 SKUs in its current portfolio, Sprout is the only brand that has pledged to formulate its baby and toddler puree products with only certified organic, non-GMO whole foods, no concentrates, preservatives, fillers or thickeners. And unlike other baby food brands that use added chemical fortification in their purees, Sprout delivers nutrition only from the organic food source, and never uses any additives or anything artificial. 

Sprout, the fastest growing organic baby food brand in the U.S., is recognized as leading the plant-powered movement in infant nutrition, with the largest assortment of vegetable-leading purees and snacks. Sprout’s new Amazon Alexa skill, narrated by Sophie, a friendly talking plant, helps introduce children to healthy plant-based foods and encourages them to eat their vegetables and beans.

According to Amazon, audio skills for kids are the fastest growing category of skills for its voice assistant Alexa. The retail giant currently offers hundreds of kid-targeted voice skills in the United States and recently hosted a contest for children’s skill developers. Sprout’s Sophie Sprout skill capitalizes on this trend while providing invaluable support to parents looking to instill healthy eating habits early on.

The Eat & Sing with Sophie Sprout Alexa skill is free to all users and requires no registration. 


About Sprout Foods

Sprout® provides premium organic foods and snacks for babies and toddlers that help parents raise healthy, adventurous eaters. With a broad range of choices including only USDA certified organic, non-GMO ingredients and a mix of whole fruits, vegetables and grains, Sprout’s products are designed to expand baby’s palate beyond sweet and establish a love of nutritious foods early on. Founded in 2008, the independent company is at the forefront of innovation in organic infant nutrition and is committed to re-imagining healthy eating for modern families. For more information on Sprout®, the Sophie Sprout app, and Sprout products, visit http://www.sproutorganicfoods.com

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It’s back-to-school season, and I’m thrilled to introduce you to UNiDAYS, an exclusive, members-only way for students to save up to 50% off big name brands. With a student email to register, students have access to discounts on brands like Apple, Samsung, Under Armour, Hello Fresh, Clinique, Ray-Ban and more.


Here’s how the process works:

Step 1: Join. All you need is your student email to get started.

Step 2: Explore. Grab discounts on your favorite brands.

Step 3: Save. Get more, spend less!

Easy, right? It’s a great way for students to balance what they want and need during the back-to-school shopping season. I’ve included some of my favorite back-to-school offers below:


20% off Clinique from July 31 – Aug. 5

20% off Adidas from Aug. 12 – Aug. 14

15% off Kaspersky from Aug. 14 – Aug. 20

30% off Levi’s from Aug. 28 – Sept. 4

Back to school can be really stressful, especially when kids want to wear everything they own in the very first week.

Trust Me, parents, I know it can be very daunting to have to spend money on new clothes. That's why I like UNiDAYS because it has the best offers for our students.

Check IT OUT!

It's official. It is summer, can believe it!  But for many of us even though the doldrums of winter are far behind us, the world is still feeling a bit dull and grey. If you are interested in how to become a better version of your self this summer, here are 8 ways to get your mojo back and keep it flourishing through the rest of year. 

The article below provides tips from Dr. Sherrie Campbell, a veteran, licensed psychologist with two decades of clinical training and experience providing counseling and psychotherapy services to children and adults from all walks of life to manage their highest highs and survive their lowest lows.

8 Steps to Get Your Mojo Back This Summer
By Dr. Sherrie Campbell

New beginnings are the most exciting and energizing times in life. Summer is always a new beginning because it’s a new season. Now is a great time to get fired up, motivated, and start making changes to get to your next level of YOU. Mojo is that magical charisma you carry that makes you feel good and infectious to others.

Most of you are great starters but not all are great finishers. If you have lost your mojo and want to be a better you for summer, commit to a new beginning right now. Here are 7 ways to get your mojo back and keep it flourishing:


1. Change your environment: Change the environments in your life which are now grey and uninspiring.  Do some of your work out of the office, redecorate your house and add more color, spend time on your patio, leave your cubical and go out for lunch. If you are getting tired, get up and move to another room. Add music or white noise to create something soothing. Changing the appearance and location of your differing environments helps you to think in more different and innovative ways. The more innovative you are the more mojo you have.


2. Strive to be your best: Always envision yourself as being your ‘ideal self.’ Your ‘ideal self’ is that part of you which is in front of you encouraging you forward. This part of you is holding up the guideposts and possibilities for your growth, happiness, and expansion. What you think determines your outcome.
Strive towards meeting your ‘ideal self’ at the finish line. If you can dream it, then you can achieve it. Work backward from the ‘ideal self’ by setting small, incremental goals for each area of your life to keep your mind positive. Before you know it you will be thriving as a much better you before you hit summer. You will feel your confidence growing as you begin to manifest all you have been working towards.


3. Change Your Patterns: When you break your routines you essentially create a new life. Habits are easy but there is no risk in habit because ultimately habits are lazy. You cannot grow stuck inside the traps familiarity and comfort. To get your mojo back, be brave! Buy that Groupon for the new class around the corner and give it a go. Change your diet, change your work out, change your wardrobe, buy different make-up, and class-up your personal style. Eat at new restaurants, go to new bars. Go to the gym after work? Try raising your heart rate before you get to the office. If you eat at the same restaurant for lunch all the time, walk one block farther to check out a new spot. See what happens by simply sitting on the other side of your desk, giving you a new perspective by looking out at different wall or window.


4. Shift Your Priorities: Your daily schedule is a reflection of your deepest priorities. If you have zero fun, free time or time for family and friends actually on your calendar, and instead your calendar is booked up with meetings and other task-oriented responsibilities, then you are missing out on the juiciest parts of life. Robots do not have mojo. To re-ignite your mojo schedule time for yourself first. On a plane, they always tell you to put on your oxygen mask before helping someone else. Once you have given yourself time to refuel, block times to enjoy with family, friends, children to add joy and vitality to your life.
On your deathbed, you are not going to look back and wish you had worked more hours.


5. Invest in personal growth: The best of the best have the best of the best of the best as mentors, friends, family, and colleagues. Learn as much as you possibly can from other successful, happy people who want to share their wisdom with you. The ball is in your court: Make the effort to keep yourself in a place of personal expansion, whether that means going to seminars, meeting weekly with a coach or therapist, reading books each night and writing goals, but strive to be your very best at all time. This always gives you something to talk about and it makes you interesting to other people.


6. Change your friends: The people with whom you surround yourself heavily influence you. If you’re lacking motivation and feeling down about everything, it might be time to upgrade your circle of influence. Negativity is contagious, as is positivity. Those closest to you should be those who bring out your best qualities, including your mojo for life’s adventures. If more time with family is important to you then start planning some vacations and staycations for all you to get away and enjoy being a family without other distractions. Take time out to have dinner with the girls or watch the game with the boys or go play a round of golf. Your net worth emotionally is the average of that of your five closest friends. When you hang out with successful people, happy, fulfilled people you elevate your own mojo, so choose wisely.


7. Change Your Thoughts: You are what you think. You cannot think negative and have powerful mojo. If you think you are fat then that will be your experience whether you are or aren’t. Thinking negatively doesn’t accomplish anything, it takes zero effort and is a lazy mojo-stealing habit. Discipline your mind towards the goals of what you want to look like and be like and start putting the effort in right now to get there. By summer you will feel fabulous. In any situation suffering over your own suffering doesn’t work. Know the areas of your life you want to change and be deliberate in changing them.


8. Be Authentic: There is nothing sexier than to be beautiful inside and out. When you are committed to your loving and respecting yourself you exude a quiet confidence. Your focus is on being genuine, kind, strong, courageous, intelligent, successful, elegant, steadfast and fulfilled. You possess enough composure that if you cannot say something kind you have the wisdom to remain quiet. You make sure the kindness of your character speaks more deliberately to who you are than what designer you are wearing.

True mojo is not a loud energy, rather it is an understated energy. Loud is repulsive ego-stuff. Your mojo is that more subtle energy your personal essence leaves in the wake of your presence. This is something to admire. There is nothing more mojo promoting than authenticity and having a strong sense of who you are.

Not all of these changes are easy. They all require a deliberate change of habit, which can feel like an insurmountable challenge. Getting your mojo back is critical for your quality of life so it certainly causes for some radical changes and the outright shattering of your own tired habits. Face it – feeling passionate and motivated every day for your work, family, and self is a win for yourself and those that depend on you.

Dr. Sherrie Campbell is the author of the new book, Success Equations: A Path to Living an Emotionally Wealthy Life. She is a veteran psychologist, inspirational speaker, and radio host. For more information, please visit, www.sherriecampbellphd.com and connect with her on Facebook, @sherriecampbellphd.

This post is sponsored by Michelob Ultra but the content and opinions expressed here are my own. This publication is aimed at an audience of adults over 21 years.

Every fathers day is a little too sentimental. And I do mean it in both ways, sentimental happy and a little bit sad.

See, my father past away 8 years ago, and it was on a fathers day.  4 months later my father-in-law past way also. So as you can imagine, my husband and I tend to feel a little bit weird and sad every fathers day.

Even though I didn't grew up with my dad, I do remember spending time with him. On Christmas, he used to sneak on the back of the house and knock on our window, when we opened the curtains we always found a loving Christmas card and drawings he used to paint. It wasn't much, but for us, it meant the word.

For my brother and me, not having a dad through our childhood and even more, our teenage years, was very difficult, but we learned how to cope with it, and most importantly we learned to forgive him and love him just the way it was.

I know my husband has a really difficult time every father days, he, on the other hand, grew up with his dad, they were very close. My father in law was a very serious man, but he knew exactly how to make you feel loved. He was a very special person.

I know my husband is very proud of the man he has become, thanks to his dad. He taught him how to be a responsible parent and husband. He taught him how to do hard work around the house and most importantly he taught him how to love, protect and care for his family.

I appreciate everything my father in law did with my husband because I now have a wonderful man by my side, he truly is a #ULTRADAD

Because I have a loving and hard working husband I know he deserves to relax and enjoy this fathers day. He totally deserves it!

And there is no other way to relax around here but to enjoy some cold ones with appetizers I know he loves. I mean, its the least I can do because HE IS AWESOME!😍

We like to buy Michelo ULTRA because it only has 95 calories and 2.6 carbs. Plus, is one of the largest beer brands in the U.S, Michelob ULTRA represents not only a premium light and refreshing beer but a brand that embodies wellness and active lifestyles.

It pairs perfectly with some tostadas with ricotta cheese and salsa macha. My husband likes spicy food with his #MichelobULTRA.  But of course, you can pair it with whatever appetizer your man loves.

So if you a looking into how to pamper your dad and/or your hubby, look no further. Just make him some delicious appetizer and give him a COLD ONE.

Michelob ULTRA has some great and unique gift options for "Father's Day". Check out  Father's Day shop by CLICKING HERE and learn more about why this beer is perfect for every #ULTRADad

ENJOY EVERY MOMENT WITH YOUR DAD, MAKE MEMORIES, SPEND TIME TOGETHER, GIVE HIM A CALL, GIVE HIM A BEER, LOVE EVERY DAY WITH HIM. BECAUSE YOU DO NOT KNOW WHEN IT'S THE LAST DAY YOU'LL SEE HIM.