Trying it Tuesday

Here is A's version of Trying it Tuesday. She went in the baby swing at the park for the very first time. And since she is such a small peanut I had to pack her in it with a blanket...man is she tiny! But it was so worth it, she loved it so much. Her highlight was seeing her big sister in the swing next to her, if she could have gotten a hold of E she would have loved it even more!

She is such a happy girl, all of a sudden she is growing up so fast. Each day she holds herself up next to things for longer and longer!

On a separate note, things are about to get a little crazy for me and I may not be updating as frequently (no, I'm not pregnant, just have a lot going on). But rest assured I am keeping this blog and will do my best to keep things posting!

Hope you have a great day!

-A

Trying it Tuesday

I'm in the swing of things...I'm getting a jump start on the holidays and upcoming birthdays. I have to admit the idea of not freaking out, rushing around, driving myself and those around me nuts is super appealing!

My lists are pretty set and I spent the portion of my weekend getting 2 major projects under way. My Mom came with the girls and I to the fabric stores to help me out. Thank God for her! I would have never been able to concentrate enough to get the items I needed with the girls on my own!

So my "Trying it Tuesday" is really just an update on my planning ahead. I'm hoping that by doing this I will be able to focus some on my Children's Clothing line and have some increase in views and sales. Let's face it if I was to wait on our personal holiday items I won't have the time for the orders and such that I hope to receive.

And on another note...it's been a few days since I included any fun pictures of the girls. So here are a few. Also I will be posting A's 8 month photos and stats later on this week!

Trying it Tuesday

I know, it's another late-in-the-day post. But I'm still getting back into my routine from my weekend away. I'm feeling better and trying to get my thoughts back together. The girls are happy to have me back home...and so it Hubs! He really stepped up to the plate while I was away...and so did Ma-Ma (Grandma) both took the girls and cared for them. It wasn't an easy task considering that A breastfeeds and luckily I had a freezer filled with milk....but A HATES the bottle. The 36 hours I was away she refused the bottle. Ma-Ma had the brilliant idea of going back to putting the milk into her food. She took the milk that way...thankfully! Then they all took turns visiting me as well, and bringing me items to fill my time up. I'm one super lucky lady!!

Back to Trying it Tuesday....

For the Home:
Now that I'm home I'm in a cleaning mode....maybe it's super late Spring cleaning? Or I think it may be more the fact that I have a 2 year old that's potty training and a 8 month old that is crawling and putting everything in her mouth. Luckily the girls are taking pretty good naps and giving me some time to clean things up.

Tonight I'm "deep cleaning" the stove top. We have a gas range and the burners are disgusting...so I went to Pinterest and read up about the Ammonia/Bag trick. It says to put the burners into a bag (ziplock or garbage depending on the sizes) and add some ammonia...seal up and let soak over night. So I did it all and have it sitting out on our deck. I'm hoping that tomorrow I will wake up and have a super clean set of burners. I will let you all know tomorrow if it worked (or if it didn't).


For the Family:
I'm pretty excited...the girls and I were invitees to a kids/Mom mini-vacation bible school. It's only 1.5 hours long each day for a week long. We will make our first appearance tomorrow (assuming I'm still feeling good). Our dear friend invited us, her in-laws are the pastor and pastor's wife of the church hosting the camp. I'm excited to see E's response to the experience.

I hope everyone has a good night!
-A

Trying it Tuesday

I feel like my "trying it Tuesday" have become more like "get back to it Tuesday"...but either way its making me get more focused.

This week I have gone back to meal planning. Mostly dinners have become more on me...Hubs LOVES to cook and it an amazing cook but he doesn't always have the time right now. I enjoy to cook, but not to creative. I prefer to have it all planned out, which also ensures I have the ingredients I need on hand too.

I'm also trying to cut down on the number of times I am going to the grocery store. My goal is to make it 2 or 3 weeks, only picking up fresh fruits in between the big shopping days.

What's nice is that I saved my meals from last year, so I can just adjust the dates and have some ideas to plan from as well. Above is my September 2011 (I did adjust the date) plan.

Starting this week I've gone back to planning out these meals and think its going to really help out.

Try it Tuesday

I have to be honest, I did this for just a few days about 5 months ago. But as of this week I'm back to 90%. What am I talking about? Cloth diapers. Since E is potty training I thought let's go as diaper free as we can!

I also went back to regular diapers with A because I had so many still left over from E. When I was pregnant with E I bought diapers every chance I got. Little was I to know E would grow faster than anyone could believe and we had many diapers left over. 

So back to cloth diapers...

It's not that big of a deal once you figure it all out. And you can save more money but the obvious...not throwing out diapers after one use, but you can get awesome deals on cloth diapers at Zulily and EcoBaby which can cost up to 60% less than buying at a traditional store.

You may be thinking, yuck what a mess...I know I did before I had kids. But it's not that bad. I hooked up a sprayer to our toliet and clean those dirty diapers and they all go in a special water proof bag. At the end of my day I throw them in the wash and dryer and in the morning I'm ready to go again. 

I also use cloth wipes too. And it's as easy as the diapers.

The money saving is great but the girls have super sensitive skin and using these diapers on A has been so great for her! So I'm one full week in to it and its been great. I'm so happy that we are doing this!

A

Trying it Tuesdays

I want my girls to look back and have memories of simple things. Things that we did together that they really enjoyed. Right now E is into animated movies (Pixar and those of that nature), rest assured that I don't plop her in front of a tv all day long...but my car has a DVD player and she loves to watch movies as we run errands. This love of movies has made its way into our home and for the last week or so E and I snuggle up about 45 minutes before her bedtime and watch a movie...or part of one.

I love this new tradition with E. It's my time (or time with Dad and I) with E...A is fast asleep and E can have 100% of our attention. While grocery shopping today I came across Tiny but Mighty Popcorn, it's the make-on-a-stovetop-pot kind and thought this could be something really cool to do with E (who recently fell in love with popcorn too). I was nervous that I would burn it and our place smell of burned popcorn, but it was quick, simple and AMAZING!!!

Here it is in the process....

I had to try and keep it healthy...after all I'm feeding it to my 2 year old right before bed! I used 2 T olive oil and 1/3 cup of the kernels. I also saw that I can use coconut oil, which I am going to do next time I think it would give it an even better flavor.

Within about 2 or 3 minutes it went from the above to the below! E loved watched the corn POP...it was the highlight of my day to see her watch in true amazement.

 I didn't deny E of the good stuff I did make sure to add some butter (the real stuff...yum!) and a bit of salt. I'm going to visit our local farmers market this weekend and see if the spice guys have a good seasoning to add as well.

The 1/3 cup of un-popped kernels made 2 of the shown containers...and E and I ate about 2/3 of it!!! I doubt we will continue to eat this much but we did indulge since it was our first night. How did it taste?! Honestly I would take it over movie theater popcorn....and the price online is so much cheaper (about 1/2 what the grocery store charged!).

Seeing that this was such a huge hit with E, I think it is needed to invest in a 'popcorn' bowl. I really see this tradition to be one that sticks!
-A