How I Feel...

Honestly, it's been awhile since I've felt this good.

I know that the word "this" isn't a very good descriptive word for how I'm feeling.

But,

I'm feeling GREAT!

I've been really productive the last few days as you can tell by my posts below and it's making me feel really good about myself, about being a good wife and about being a good mom.

I feel like I have more time for myself, which is weird because I've been doing more. I just realized how much time I could successfully waist in a day reading blogs and surfing the web, oh, and playing video games. Yes, you heard that right, playing video games. Not one of my finer things to admit, but I really do enjoy them and they suck the precious time I have when Monkey is napping.

If you walked into my house today, you'd honestly see a lot of things out of place, but that's good because I'm actually forcing myself to either find places for the out of place stuff or get rid of it. But, I have a few VERY clean areas and those make me feel great!

Oh, and about the laptop, it was a VERY sad moment. It was on top of Kyle's dresser plugged in and when he came to bed last night he tripped on the cord and it fell just right and totally broke the screen :-( It was so nice, too, because the church just bought him a new one on Monday so he didn't have to use ours any more and it was going to be so nice to have it around for me to use. But, like I said earlier, at least it was just a computer. We're trying to decide if we're going to replace it or not. It's not really something that we need, but it is really nice to have one. I was hoping for a Dyson this Christmas, but we might be replacing the laptop with an Eee PC, instead. We're evaluating things right now. Really trying to think things through.

Monkey just woke up, better go get him!

Bathroom Time!

I don't know about you, but this challenge has been SO good for me and I can already tell my husband feels blessed! He couldn't believe how good the laundry rooms looks (which is good because it's centered in the middle of our house, right inside our entry way). For some reason when I post this stuff on my blog I can't NOT do it! I have successfully done 3 days and am looking forward to another great day!

Lucky for my husband it's bathroom day. He's been promising to clean our unsightly master bathroom, but I guess this is a great way for me to bless him tomorrow. Since he doesn't read my blog, he'll never know it's coming :-)

Refresh Your Spirit (5 minutes)

I was able to do my quiet time this morning in the company of Monkey. He sat there quietly for 15 minutes, not enough time to complete my daily portion, but I was able to get a good chunk of it done.

1. I'm thankful that our catastrophic late night accident resulted in the injury and death of our laptop and not Monkey, Kyle or myself (the cord was tripped on and it fell about 4 feet:-( )
2. I'm thankful that God keeps me on my toes and never gives me days like I planned.
3. I'm thankful for Thursdays because of great TV (bummer The Office isn't new, tonight)

Colossians 1:19-20

For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.


Take Time to Plan (5 minutes)

1) Coffee with a friend Canceled (she has a sick girl)
2) Exercise
3) Clean off tables in living room (my "hot spots")
4) Put laundry away
5) Organize Recycling
6) Clean out the car

Do Something (10 minutes) More like 1 hour!!!

I'm not kidding, I just spent 1 hour in my master bathroom and it's not even done! The toilet, counter, sink and mirror are clean and I got about 1/4 of the floor done (I'm scrubbing it on my hands and knees; it's gross). That will be on my list of "To Do's" tomorrow, finishing the floor. But, it does look great and smells great!

Dinner menu:

Cheesy Gordita Crunches

Left over Pesto Pasta - I forgot to defrost the beef, I've been work too hard. I suppose that's a good problem to have:-)

Graphic from www.art.com

Haven Challenge: Day 3

I'm jumping on the laundry wagon today! We're leaving town in less than a week to go back to my home city for my "little" brother's wedding and I, of course, need all of my cutest clothes clean to wear :-)

1. Refresh Your Spirit (5 minutes)

Spent some quality time with God through working on my Bible Study and praying.

3 Things I'm Thankful for:

1. My wonderful family. They are such a blessing to me!
2. A warm place to live. Sometimes I complain about my house and really, I shouldn't, it's warm and dry inside.
3. God's total provision for us of good health, financial security, etc.

2. Take Time to Plan (5 minutes)

To Do List:

1) Exercise
*got side-tracked by a phone call- I should have called back later!*
2) Make applesauce
3) Grocery Shopping
4) Take care of church utility bills
5) Organize cabinets in laundry room
6) Sweep and mop laundry room floor

3. Do Something (10 minutes)

My laundry room is CLEAN! It looks so nice and sparklie!

Dinner:

Pesto Pasta
Salad
French Bread

I have only started one load of laundry.

Even though I was up earlier than normal, I had a clingy baby, so I'm getting off to another late start. But, here goes nothing!

Breastfeeding

My day definitely started off earlier than usual, but not by my choice. I'm not sure what's going on with my little Monkey, but he's not sleeping well. I've been suspecting that my breast milk has been lacking as of late and I'm starting to wonder if he's hungry. He'll lay in bed and just cry, really whiny like, forever and he's never been like that. He did it for 1 1/2 hours last night between 9-10:30 and then again from 11:30-12pm. He finally fell asleep "for the night" after I nursed him at midnight, but I could definitely tell that he wasn't getting enough to eat. Same thing this morning, I fed him at 5:30 and he was acting just ravenous, he never fell back to sleep, just cried. I really don't want to switch to formula, but I also don't want to be starving my child. I've been struggling with keeping my weight on since I had him almost 10 months ago and I wonder if my body is just saying that it's done? I really don't want to be!!! I don't know what to do at this point. I was thinking I might buy a container of formula and just supplement at night and see if I can boost my milk supply by eating more calories and drinking more water during the day. I know I don't drink enough, maybe that's it? I just hope it's not too late. Does anybody have any advice?

Making Your Home a Haven Challenge: Day 2

I have been ever increasingly sad at the condition of my house. I don't feel like I have done a very good job at keeping it nice for me and my family. It is often a source of stress and frustration for me. Crystal is doing a challenge over at her blog to do little little things every day to keep our houses nice for our families. I'm going to join in and see if things will help me to stay motivated each day to do lots of little things that end up making a beautiful place for us to live and feel relaxed.

This is the outline of what I'm to do today and I'll keep updating my blog as I complete them.

1. Refresh your Spirit (5 Minutes)

I'm going to work on my Beth Moore study for my women's church Bible study.

I spent about 15 minutes working on my Beth Moore study learning about the peace of God.

2. Take Time to Plan (5 Minutes)

Make a tangle list of things to accomplish in order today.

Here is my list for today:

1. Exercise
2. Shower
3. Make lunch
*Here I left with my husband to go shopping for supplies for our youth group 3rd Annual Christmas Extravaganza *
4. Fold Laundry
*Here I made dinner- BBQ Chicken Pizza- I used a yeast-free pizza crust recipe because I didn't have any yeast, hopefully, it turns out!**update: it turned out and was a HUGE hit!*
5. Put laundry away
6. Vacuum rug in living room
7. Sweep floors - In Progress
8. Shine Sink -In Progress

I feel so good now that I've finished everything on my "To Do" List. It's only 9pm :-) I still need to clean off my dining room table, but I feel pretty good about what I got done today.

Tomorrow, my goal is to start my day a little earlier, hopefully, by 7. I have a really hard time waking up in the morning especially since Monkey wakes up to nurse around 5am.

3. Do something (10 Minutes)

I'm going to do my daily "Flylady" routine as well as straighten up my living room.

So far today I've gotten off to a very late start. It's almost 10:30am and I haven't done anything besides get Monkey up, feed him breakfast, get him dressed and play with him. He has another cold, so he's been rather clingy, so I'm going to tackle my daily "to do's" when he goes down for his nap in about 30 minutes.

This is how I'm hoping my day will play out:

1) Bible Study
2) Workout (can't remember the last time I did this- maybe 9 1/2 months ago?)
3) Shower, get dressed, put on makeup & do hair
4) Spend 10 Minutes cleaning

Of course, this is how I'm hoping it will play out and all things are subject to change without notice. I'll keep you posted on how my day is going.

Tata for Now!

Image from Art.com

Completely Disgusted

I honestly don't think I have enough words to express distaste towards a certain company that manufactures Christmas lights that Walmart sells, of course made in China. I purchased a battery operated set of 10 Christmas lights for a table decoration for our Advent Dessert on Saturday night. I was sitting on the floor and pulled out the Christmas lights and Monkey came over an was fingering them (I was closely watching him, don't worry). I go to cut off 2 "warning" stickers on the cord so that they didn't look bad in my decoration. Seriously, who reads the "warning" stickers, don't they all say the same thing? This could cause electrocution, yadayadayada...

No....

This one says...

Caution:

Prop 65 Warning: Handling the coated electrical wires of this product exposes you to lead. (see other side)

(Continued from other side)
a chemical known to the State of California to cause cancer birth defects and other reproductive harm.
Wash hands after use.

Can you even believe it!?! LEAD!!! I'm irate! I promply washed our hands and spray painted the cord (with non-lead paint).

Man, I'm seriously thinking about not buying ANYTHING made in China any more. I know it might be difficult, but the risk on our health is unbelievable. It just makes me SO mad!

I watched a special on TV the other day about the harm of lead to children, it's honestly scary. An amount of lead a 1/4 of the size of paper clip can cause serious brain damage in children. SCARY!

Surveys

I heard about paid surveys through www.moneysavingmom.com and thought I'd give them a try. I signed up with Pinecone Research and have already made $12 and it took probably all of 45 min. to 1 hour. They pay $3 per survey and maybe take 10-15 minutes. That's a pretty good hourly rate. Obviously, I'm not wracking in the dough or anything, but for something here or there, why not. I've also received 2 packages of wipes and 1 package of diapers to try out, too! I'm not going to complain! I've also taken surveys through other companies and have been accruing points that I can use towards gift cards and such. I don't think the hourly return is as great, but it's still not bad.

Today Was a Great Day

Most days around here seem to fly by and I never have enough time to get everything done. Today, however, was one of those days that was really slow. Not necessarily in a bad way, it just seemed to be a slower day. I got a lot done! I did a load of laundry, made a batch of homemade apple sauce (yum!), spray painted a light fixture silver in my house, spray painted some sticks for my Christmas dessert table for next Saturday (I'll post a picture of the completed table next week), watched 4 hours of Gilmore girls and I got loads of play time in with my adorable Monkey! Right now it feels like it should be 1am and it's only 9:20. Weird.

Home at Last!

We're home from a wonderful Thanksgiving/Christmas with my family in Boise! It was COLD and it snowed while we were there, which was totally awesome. Unfortunately, both boys pretty much slept through it because it was the first morning we were there and they were adjusting to the whopping 1 hour time change:-)

We had a really fun time, though and we're glad to be home and recover just a bit before heading back out there in 2 1/2 weeks.

Yes, I know we're crazy, but talk to my "little" brother who decided to get married on December 15th.

No, really, I'm happy for him and I love Nicole (his finace) so I'm glad that we're able to go out for the wedding. It's just weird that we'll have just be there.

Oh yeah, more laundry to do...the story of my life...

My Baby is Growing Up

My darling Monkey turned 9 months old this week and it suddenly hit me. My baby isn't such a little baby any more. Today, he pulled himself up all by himself! He saw something up on top of a box that he wanted (actually, bait placed by yours truly) and he got his little fingers up there and pulled himself onto his knees and slowly walked on his knees a little bit until he was close enough to get leverage and then pulled himself right up onto his feet. He stood there for a few seconds and promptly fell hard to the side, looked around to see if Dad and I had noticed and then started crying. Isn't that always the way it goes? Obviously, he survived the horrendous fall and lives to the tell, I mean babble, the story.

I guess it's time to go baby proof the house...