Meal Planning 101...201...ummmm

It just isn't easy flipping through the recipe book every week trying to figure out what we should eat and when.  Using my marker board on the fridge was a great first step to getting us out of the last minute 'what do we have in the pantry' crunch.  What I really disliked about my otherwise enjoyable process of planning out meals that didn't feel like they were too repeated, was the constant erasing and reworking for about 40 minutes when I'd find a different meal to plug in.  This doesn't include when plans during the week change and a meal needs to be rescheduled or cancelled completely.

So in walks Pinterest and a random pin that caught my eye with its post-it abundance....

Here is a sample week in the planning.  Can you see how this might make that revamping worthwhile already?  Too many beef meals in the week?  Pull and replace!  Have too many things on your schedule one day to cook something longer than 20 minutes?  Pull and swap until you've got everything looking just how you want it!  The laminated sheets make it simple and the post-its stay reusable this way also!  If you still prefer markers, they'll erase off of this easier than my cheap marker board on the fridge after the couple years I've had it.

Rather than the categories on the side, I chose to change it from Lunch/Dinner to Meal Ideas, along with Breakfast, Salads/Appetizers, Drinks, Desserts, and Snacks pages.  On the Meal Ideas pages (4 of them) I changed the interior categories to various categories that suited my family.  I am sure this will change over time as this is a new system to me still and I'll refine it as I go.

I've printed and laminated the calendar pages as well and will include it into my own binder Command Center.  I'll figure out what else needs to go into it as I go along but I am already LOVING this system so much more than where I was previously!  Thank you Ursula at Home Made by Carmona!

The Epic of Monday...

Some days are just too fantastic to be believed...those of us with toddlers can believe just about anything though.  Which is probably why this epic will resonate with your own experiences.

We haven't been able to take the gate down at night for our toddler.  She is too independent and headstrong to come into my room and get me in the morning.  It used to be that she would just go get into anything that she normally is not supposed to so we had to put the gate back up.  In our new house there is a flight of stairs that leads to a basement family room.  She isn't used to stairs from the old house.  I was a nervous Momma, glad to keep the gate up a little longer.  Now that she tries to potty train some mornings, I can't have the gate up if she is going to be independent like she wants to be with her potty training experience.  So......

8:15AM

*calling from a distance*  "Momma!!  Me went out in the RAIN!!"

Momma jumps from her bed and runs to the living room to see Alyssa taking off rain boots and coat in the dining room looking extremely proud of her adventure and being able to let herself back in without help.

"Me no get any wet, Momma."  Grinning and pleased at how well behaved she was to get all her gear on and play out in the wet morning with her chalk on the backyard steps.

She doesn't even remember that she is NOT allowed to go outside without someone.  She probably has forgotten that just last night she was asked to not color on the steps and to keep it to the sidewalk at the bottom of the steps instead.  She hasn't even realized that it isn't raining but just wet from the rain overnight.  She is so proud of herself and I'm horrified at what could have happened.  Wyatt slept in, she didn't wake me....she went out back instead of the front, thankfully!  She was able to get back in without help, thankfully!  She put on rain gear so that her sockless feet wouldn't get too chilled....

I tell her sternly in the split second that I've had to register all of what could have happened that she DOES NOT GO OUTSIDE WITHOUT ME!  I watched her proud stance melt a little.  She looked a little confused about why I wasn't so excited about her doing such a great job with remembering her rain gear and coming in dry and 'all myself'.  The next moment is where I realize that stern time is over. She knows.  She forgets.  She is three and did some really smart things while she was being forgetful.

"I'm glad you didn't get wet, Alyssa.  Can you pick up your boots and coat?  Next time you want to go outside you have to remember to come get me first.  I'm glad you were able to open the door all by yourself to come back in!"

I don't have any idea how long she was out there.  It scares me...there will be some new toddler-proofing today though I'm not sure what yet.

----A few minutes later, I'm mixing a bottle for the little guy who is just waking up to the voices.----


**WARNING: Potty Stories are rarely pleasant...and not for the weak stomachs.**



"Me have to go POTTY!"
"Okay, go in there."
*sounds of diaper being taken off and climbing onto the toilet*
*sounds of running out of the bathroom*
"Me already pooped!"

......ALYSSA!  Ughhhh, ew.

Has it sunk in yet?  Diaper came off but she already pooped?  Yup.  My bathroom has already met with toddler grossness and thankfully survived the event.  So, after cleaning up the tub side, the floor where it landed, and the toilet where she dragged her little gross butt across...

8:28AM

Monday has officially begun.

Bathroom Overhaul 2013

Our house has been hectic lately!  We had that week away followed immediately by a bathroom overhaul.  This is the first major project for the house and it was the top of our list.  I mean, you can only live with a tub/shower that has a register (AC/Heat) in it--think toddler bath time.

Yes, that is a window that you can see through easily there also.

Demo started on Monday afternoon (having returned home Saturday night).  My husband worked his job and then came home to do this big project with the help of his younger brother (13).  My job was to keep the kids out of the way.  Easier said than done with a curious three year old and loud noises!

The floor broke up a lot easier than they thought it would be...considering that one of the previous owners built up the floor with over an inch and half of concrete before tiling....over an old floor which was on top of the subfloor.  Oh, and it had the metal rolls through the whole thing!  It was also used as a corner form with the sheetrock/tile on the walls.


After that mess got cleaned up we had a blank slate.  Okay, so there really wasn't any way to reconfigure it when the door stays in place as does the plumbing.  But at least we could do everything else new!

Slowly the bathroom is getting put back together.  A week later we had the new tub and surround in, the electrical and plumbing completed, the register relocated, the laundry chute moved a bit further from the tub, and the window replaced.  I can hardly wait to have a complete bathroom across the hall from me again rather than in the basement (in an unfinished half without walls or door to separate it from the laundry!  We have the toilet installed, the sink is in (but not hooked up), and the shower will be the next step (right after the window trimming!).  I'll get some pictures of a finished bathroom up in the midst of my overwhelming excitement I'm certain.

Just a taste of what is going on still.

Family Rooms

When we lived in our old house (starter house for us), there wasn't any extra rooms.  We had our room, Alyssa's room, the bathroom, kitchen, laundry/furnace room, and the living/dining combo.

Now we have all that PLUS a basement!  Oh, and a whole third bedroom (where the laundry/furnace was in the old house is a bedroom in this house and that was relocated to the basement here...seriously, it is funny how very similar layout this house is with a mere addition of a second level)!

What can we do with all this extra space?  Well, we definitely can fill it....They usually call it a Family Room nowadays.  The upstairs living room is considered the 'formal living room' and the basement is a Rec or Family room.  Here is the kids' half:

Yes, that is just under half of the family room filled with kid things.

The couch that you can barely see is the invisible barrier signal that toys SHALL NOT PASS (says Momma every night just after picking up the half of the room not shown).  There is a tv for movies across from the couch and the other half of the room is currently emptied of boxes but not furnished.  I have such grand plans...Momma plans....

In the meantime, I love our kids' side.

Did you see our Ikea storage for crafting/coloring supplies?  The chalk/colors are in lockboxes in those pop-out drawers so there will be less chance of wall coloring rather than table or color books.  I love these things and they just look so fun!

Regardless of what a parent thinks of the kids' play areas...they always enjoy moving out of there whenever possible.  Toys are like invasive species that way...they hitchhike rides from unsuspecting toddlers.  Notice the lacing boards beginning the trek from one end of the room, along the couch, and eventually they'll make it across there to the unfurnished area.  Sneaky things, those toys.

I'm still thrilled to have this extra space to spread out to on rainy days like this week has been and is continuing to be.

Three Years Old and Always a Handful...

Our daughter has been working very hard to drive both Papa and Momma into the loony bin lately.  Mostly she is just being Three(!) but the big issue happens to be her behavior with the animals.  Nala, the poor little 9lbs dog that we have, is tormented nearly every waking moment that Alyssa can possibly spare in between bites of lunch and asking 209809845 versions of "why" a day.  The cats barely leave the unfinished portion of the basement that is gated off (Sanctuary! Sanctuary!) when she is awake.  Overall, Alyssa seems to have lost all of her listening skills when she is dealing with growling or hissing animals.  Rather, she simply laughs, or shriek-giggles, in their faces and nearly gets bit.

Truly, she will learn one of these days that the nicer she is, the sooner the pets will actually come to her instead of running away.

So enter a new and fun issue...MESSES!

Monday--open a weight attached to a balloon, which happened to be sand, on the living room carpet.
Tuesday--Dawn poured out all over kitchen and dining room floors.

--soap in eye while washing it off hands....*sigh, Momma needs to make sure to put toddler's hair in ponytail before letting her wash her hands while cleaning up messes*
--Removes own dirty diaper and THEN yells for me....Thanks kid.

What will Wednesday bring me??  Hopefully a nap!  I mean, I vacuumed on Monday and mopped on Tuesday...I should be good for the week, right? HA!

Baby #2...We Aren't Ready!!

Here we go!  We are in the last couple days before the new guy finally gets here and my physical body is the only thing actually ready for it.

The house is still in general chaos (what can I really expect having moved in roughly a week before Baby Boy joins us?).  The crib isn't even assembled!!  We don't have a crib mattress yet!  Most of the baby stuff is in storage four hours away.  The clothes that I have for him--admittedly sparse still--are still in the apartment along with the car seat (thankfully that isn't four hours away!).  We just bought the first bottles for him Wednesday night (less than a week before he gets here remember and one of the first things you need for a bottle feeding baby!)...Can we say UNPREPARED, people??

While I am mostly concerning myself with the baby prep and the related house things that will make my life easier coming home from a c-section which I'm sure I'm working up into a much more horrific recovery than I need to-hopefully...My husband is dealing with the rest of our lives.  He is basically a rock and even rocks can show cracks now and then.  Between work (he is the first and only IT guy at his company and they are hitting major renovations pretty much RIGHT NOW), school (he is going for his BA, or maybe it'd be a BS in computer stuffs..yeah, I suck at technology), moving a family, and welcoming a baby and a recovering wuss of a wife home...well, let's just say that he deserves some kind of reward!  Like something massive IMO...I figure I'm not "pushing" this time so maybe he needs the "Push Present" that I heard tales of last time.

So just to clarify...I am literally days (DAYS) away from delivery.  We are still in moving process.  My hubby is AMAZING.  Oh, and he has drill just under an hour out of town this weekend...don't we have such wonderful timing?  At least we made it past Christmas...wish us luck!  Please?

Excited About Garbage?!

What?  Did you see that??

Yeah, I saw that!  There are some PINK garbage cans around our new city!  Y'all may not know this but I love pink...Specifically, I love Pink things that donate to cancer research.  Whoever thought up a garbage service that gives you that option is FREAKING AWESOME in my opinion!!!

So yes, I am excited about our garbage service now too...Does your local garbage service offer anything like this?  Do you have a charity or research that you love to support?

*Photo Credit (and a way to see if you might have this option available in your area!): Pink Cart

I'm still here...now with a house!

So in the interest of not disappearing on y'all...We have closed on our house finally!

This process was a long thing and very stressful but now we have our new home to fix up while we settle in (with a mere eleven days before Baby is supposed to arrive--and this is a no-later-than time frame).  We were lucky that even with the delays between banks, underwriters, and the general "short sale" process that we actually got to sign before Baby came.  That fact gave us time to paint this weekend!  People...you will not believe the amount of painting that got done just yesterday.  Seriously!  My mom and aunt made a last minute choice to make the four hour drive to paint with my husband.  We both were blown away by the tornado of accomplishment that they brought with them!  Chris and I figured we would get Alyssa's room done and MAYBE a base coat in Baby's room...My mom and aunt were able to get through Alyssa's room, most of the living room, the dining area and are tackling two more rooms this morning before heading back.  I can't believe how much the place improves just with paint.

I actually had to go buy the living room paint when they got here to make their trip worth it...Crazy, right?  So today we are headed back to the house to get Alyssa's POLKA DOTS (pink, purple, teal, and bright green) up on two of her walls, along with other rooms' finishing coats/touches and possibly some painting in the other two rooms of the upstairs.

I swear I'll get some pictures up soon!  (I hope)

The Blogging Adventure....probably taking a backseat.

I've been at a loss on how to keep up with my blogging over the next month or so...It might get pretty sporadic around here but I'm determined to not let it get dropped altogether.  I'll try to keep up with updates of our holiday, birthdays, moving, and a birth (of course with an introduction to the new man as well).  Bear with me through the crazy hectic life that is our December/January...

We are still in the process of planning exactly how our holiday will go this week plus the toddler birthday next weekend paired with house closing and painting and moving beginning next weekend as well!  I think Christmas is going to be the easiest part of this season since we aren't able to travel to family for it.

As exciting as all of these changes are, I can assure you that we are just short of overwhelmed when we look at a calendar.  It is going to be a little bumpy packing it all into less than a month but at least we will be super motivated by deadlines...HA

So if you could spare a little extra patience with my gaps in posts, I promise I'll try my best not to leave y'all hanging for full weeks at a time!

Climb or Fall out of Bed

So there are days that you just don't want to leave your bed.  You think that the world could keep spinning if you slept through just one 24 hour period.  Well, you'd be right...but then there are those things that wouldn't get done if you didn't drag your butt from under your covers and brave the world that you have no interest in facing.  I mean, there are the pets to feed, meals to cook, diapers to change, hugs to give and books and toys to use-abuse-and clean up after.  There are owies to kiss, noses to wipe, hair to brush and baths to prepare.  We can't forget of course the myriad of basic housekeeping chores such as dishes, floors, laundry, tables, beds, etc.  While some of those things can easily be put on the back burner (and I encourage this be done when you need to), it can't be that way every day.  It's a good thing that my daughter gets me to drag my butt out of bed every single day.  She makes me smile even mere seconds after she has me ripping at my hair in not-as-silent-as-I-wish frustration.  She brings me a book to read to her and then runs off for another one only 3 pages in.  She takes every.single.toy out to play with before going back to the first couple options for the remainder of the messy day.  Then she throws a fit that resembles a 'you stole my favorite snack and I'll never have another one!' epicness whenever a commercial interrupts a beloved cartoon (Max and Ruby, Kai Lan, Bubble Guppies, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse).  She offers me a seat on the couch to watch a movie with her and even cleans her toys away to make room.  She snuggles in and throws herself across my lap fondly smiling and declaring 'Momma!' because I might have forgotten who I am in the last couple minutes.

She is a great reason to leave the warm covers of my bed behind on cold winter days when you just don't want to face the dishes (clean or dirty!) or the mountain of laundry needing to be washed, dried and *grrr* folded....  She is a great reason to smile through the day even if you are screaming in your head that you can't give one more lecture on not pulling the cats' hair off their stomachs or that a commercial just means that the show will come back in 2 minutes!  (Remind me often of that last one please...every 10 minutes or so...)

Just because we have those days, and most everyone does, doesn't mean we can't enjoy the day outside of our bed.  I might have to work a little harder to do so, but Morning Hugs and a beautiful 'you're my hero' smile make it a lot easier.

So those days you just don't want to face the world, climb out of bed--or fall if you need to.  Paste a fake smile on and find that reason to exchange the fake smile for a real one.  You don't need a great day, just don't let it be horrible either.  And when you get to that breaking point (I have, I admit) where even falling out of bed doesn't do it, pick a day, get some help with your responsibilities and stay in bed.  Take that day off that you need.  Close your eyes when you pass the sink full of dishes or the basket of laundry.  Good luck to us all on those days that start so tough.  I hope you have a great reason to get out of bed.

Every little bit of help....helps.

For someone who *hates* yard work, I should have thought through the whole large backyard thing....I am not cut out to be a house wife based on the current status of my table top.  Dishes are endless, laundry piles into mountains no matter if I do a full load a day--and there are only two of us!!--and on top of this the grass outside keeps growing.  What can one do to alleviate these tasks?  Wish on the magic dishwasher?  Pray to the lawn gods?  Maybe the laundry elves will take pity and help out in a way other than stealing socks from the dryer...  You don't believe in those?  Yeah, you're probably right.

I think we should find a way to automate the lawn care at least.  Why can't we have a Roomba for the grass cutting?  I suppose there could be an argument made against an automated rotary blade on the loose in a yard.  Thankfully there is always help when you need it most.  My cousin loves yard work when it isn't required.  My lawn and border planters finally have someone who likes to take care of them (and actually will).  I think I can handle the dishes and laundry decently and the table top will just have to pile up until I get a cleaning itch.

Now who out there likes to push snow blowers??