Summer Craft for toddlers

My son is at that age where everything about nature fascinates him. He loves bugs, plants and all kinds of wild life. He loves animals in general, so does his sister, but she is still a little too young to understand it yet.

June brings one of my many favorite critters... Fireflies! Or, as I call them, Lightning Bugs (the hell if it's not "politically correct" I will always think of them as Lightning Bugs because that is exactly what I called them as a kid).

For a project, we cut out shapes of a firefly in construction paper (black), where we cut out the hole where the firefly would light up, we turned it over, and taped a piece of tissue paper (or plastic wrap works too) over the hole.

We held up our fireflies and shined our flashlights through the holes and watched the fireflies glow!

Like I said before, I love to use specific things each week to teach the kids, I will pick things like colors, numbers or the alphabet, and I incorporate animals into this now. So this week we have been learning about fireflies! This was a fun project of many that my son really enjoyed. We took the fireflies outside at night and he had a blast!

The Royal Treatment

My amazing husband surprised me with a spa basket when he came home after work.

I've felt sick all day, and last night I started to feel nauseous, too. :( So he decided to give me a restock of my bathroom spa supplies, and it was perfect! I had the facial, Epsom's salt, coconut milk, exfoliation, sugar scrub, everything. So tonight I thought it's been a while since I've blogged, and I decided to share my personal skin care regimen with everyone.

To start, I love anything coconut. I'll eat it, wear it, soak in it. It's amazing. I've done this since I was 13. I absolutely LOVE coconut milk especially. I use it in my baths every night.

I usually add around 1/4 cup of coconut milk to a luke warm (not hot!!!) bath, I add bubbles, Epsom's salt, bath beads, or anything like that if I want to.

I use a sponge, a buff puff and nail brush. I use these near the end of my bath, because first I like to soak and read a good book with a glass of wine, some relaxing tea, or even coffee or a martini etc. It doesn't really matter how long you soak. I soak for a good 20-30 minutes, then wash, exfoliate, shave and step out.

Before dressing, I moisturize. Not just my face, I moisturize my legs, my arms, my neck. Your skin needs moisture. So I am really big on moisturizing and exfoliating. It's amazing and my skin stays super soft and smooth all year round.

I am a big exfoliation buff. I exfoliate with a number of things, from Brazilian nut to caffeine and coconut. I like to use whatever I am in the mood for. But I always make sure to use one every weekend.

I do the facial masks as well, and I moisturize moisturize moisturize! I can't stress how important keeping skin clean and moisturizing is for me. It's something I never fail to do each day and night.

I also don't eat a ton of sugary foods, or salty things. I'm not a huge pasta fan and I love water and I drink plenty which also helps your skin stay beautiful.

I don't know if it's just genetics, but I've never had a pimple in my life. It's weird. I've never had acne or anything either, not even in high school. But my mom and my grandma were really big on skin care and so they taught me a lot about taking care of yourself.

I also shave every night. I can't stand the prickly feel of leg hair. I guess I'm weird that way, too, haha. But I've always found my legs rubbing on pant legs or the sheets to be really annoying and so I prefer smooth legs at all times. (It's just me).

After my bath, I rub vitamin E oil or coconut oil into my nails and cuticles. I apply hand cream and read more of my book and have more wine or tea and then go to bed all clean and moisturized.

Wow! So much is going on this year and I've had very little chance to get on here to update or do anything else besides cooking, kids, cleaning and wedding planning! While it's true, my husband and I are technically married, (we were privately married four years ago and none of our family or all of our close friends could make it due to us not making our marriage public back when it happened), so we decided to have an actual ceremony where we exchange our vows and celebrate with our close family and friends.

It feels like we have been waiting for this special day forever! And now it's almost here! We only have 5 months to go. I can't believe how fast this year is flying by!

Well, between wedding planning, I've been doing a lot of things with the kids indoors due to the weather taking a bad turn this past weekend, freezing cold temps and frost and cold rain. Yuck! I know we need it, it is Spring after all, but the cold temperatures I could do without. We also need sunshine. :-/

Our days have been centered mostly around arts and crafts, indoor games, reading and other things that usually fail to keep my otherwise repetitive childrens' minds occupied. They have about a 3 second rebound rate at this age, so I am trying to do everything possible so I do not go insane haha.

I love my kids so much and I absolutely love what I do, so I'm not complaining. I do, however, see the humor in everything and just laugh about it all. Like I do with just about everything in life ;).

This week, the kids learned about frogs. It's one of their favorite animals. For whatever reason they love reading about them and my son especially loves them. I don't know where it comes from, although I love frogs. :)

Yesterday, for Father's Day coming up, we made a frog card out of construction paper and a paper plate. My son painted the plate green on one side, then colored it pink on the other side. We folded it in half and glued a scrunched up (accordion style) piece of pink paper into the folded inside of the frog's mouth and wrote Happy Father's Day on it, so when you pull the tongue out you can read what it says.

We cut out legs and arms for the frog out of green construction paper, and glued that to the paper plate in the back. We took two cotton balls, glued them to the face, marked two nostrils with a black marker, and then glued googly eyes to the cotton balls. I can't wait to give it to Tim! I know he is going to love it. And this is the first year Lukas has been able to make anything for him, last year we did finger paints and other cool things. But this year we got way more creative! ;)



Today we made a chart out of construction paper and frog pictures from Lukas' used up preschool book. I ended up having to cut out the frog pictures because they were so small, but Lukas helped me with the rest and it turned out pretty awesome! We purposely shaped it like a lily pad. I wasn't really sure where we were going with it all at first, but everything came together the further we worked at it. This is the result:

Well, the kids are asleep and so now I plan to do more DIY wedding stuff, and then read a good book with a glass of wine and then get some rest! (Hopefully). My daughter still wakes up at night, so I can use all the sleep I can get at this point! Between her growing, teething and everything she has been a little stinker when it comes to a full night's sleep. :-/ Oh well. Such is parenthood! :)

Where I've been...

It's been a while since I have posted on here, not because nothing exciting has been going on (because it has) but because I have been so busy I have not had any time to blog lately.

My mother came to visit Saturday and we went to David's Bridal to meet with alterations for my wedding gown. This is my first fitting in my gown sicne the first time I tried on dresses here, so i'm nervous to see if it fits right! It's a size 2, and I am not used to wearing such a small size. When the woman tod me she was ordering a size 2 I stood there stunned, because I never believed I would hear those words.

I'm not a vain person by nature, I'm not very focused on body image as much as I probably should be. But I am a female, and I've had 2 kids. I can't really explain why this stunned me like it did, but it jsut did. I think it's because I wore a size 12 while pregnant and even after. I wore at least a size 10 or 8 before pregnancy. I think the last time I wore a small size (size 4) I was in high school. But for years after that I ahd always been careless with my weight and didn't put much thought into it, until the day I stepped on the scale at the doctor's office, 9 months pregnant with my first baby, weighing 207.6 pounds, that it hit me. I DID care. Suddenly I realized I was ina  rut. I didn't want to be 207 pounds, or even remotely near it. I was so uncomfortable, I was constantly out of breath. I was tired all of the time, and when my babya rrived, is til had no energy or stamina to keep up with him.

It wasn't my body image that hit me. It defintiely wasn't the number on the scale either, although at the time I thought that's what it was. But it was my continuing to be disgusted with the shape my body was in, as in I was out of shape. I was exhausted. I was walking to the mailbox and feeling almost winded. I was sick of feeling that way. I wanted to get into shape for my health and for my system, not how I looked.

So, it struck me because I really hadn't been paying much attention to the actual size of my clothes. I just wore what fit. I know wedding gowns tend to run smaller, so it shocked me to hear those words even more, considering.

I suffer from this anorexia thing, I won't call it anoerxia because I don't have an eating disorder, I eat very healthy and get my nutrients and vitamins, but I ahve this imprinted image in my head, where I always SEE the fat me, ratehr than the body I've accomplished. In spite of all the weight loss and muscle tone, I still see myself negatively sometimes.

Our Anniversary 2015!

Well, today my mom and dad came to stay with us for the weekend and babysit the kids so Tim and I could go out for our Anniversary. I can't believe it's been 4 years already! It actually feels like it's been about 8, because so much has happened in these 4 years we have been together. We found our dream home, we had our beautiful kids, and we have finally decorated our home and gotten some other things accomplished as well.

Tim took me to one of my favorite restaurants for a delicious dinner and some yummy wine, but, of course, being out of our normal daily routine, we missed the kids haha. It was still ncie to get out and enjoy time to ourselves though!

I had a delicious Steak toscano dinner and Tim had a steak alfredo dish that looked yummy! Afterward, we had one of my favorite desserts....

BLACK SILK TIE PIE!! :)

Tim got me gorgeous flowers and a sweet card, I love them so much! He is always doing romantic things like this, even for no reason. He is such a sweet, thoughtful person and I am so lucky he is my husband :).

Dan Simmons, Drood and The Fifth Heart

I am a book junkie, I read so much it's actually an addiction. I never go a day without a book in this house. Even if I already have about five or six books to read, I get more. I always worry about not having something to read, and I always have plenty of "back ups" just in case one book doesn't turn out like I thought it would.

I absolutely love my local library. It is my refuge. Seriously.

While browsing the catalog one evening (they have this new feature on there, where you click on a favorite book you have read or want to read, something you find interesting, and it will automatically suggest others related to that genre or story line etc) and this is how I was introduced to the wonderful novels by Dan Simmons.

I just finished Drood by Dan Simmons and am sad it's over so soon.

This is the first book I've read by Dan Simmons but it certainly won't be the last. I was drawn to this particular book because of my love for the works of Charles Dickens, but I knew I had to read it after attending a book signing where Mr. Simmons talked about the book and its "unreliable" narrator, Wilkie Collins. I was not disappointed!

The richness and depth of Mr. Simmons research and prose is exquisite. It is the sort of book one must immerse one's self into. I nearly felt the stays of my Victorian corset poking my ribs it is so spectacularly reminiscent of the writing styles of the period. The story is redolent with details sorely missing from more modern twenty-first century works. I particularly like the way it left me with things to think about for days and days after reading the last pages. Each reader gets the ending they want, really. It's brilliant the way Simmons doesn't tell the reader the ending, but lets you imagine your ending. I would venture a guess that if you asked ten different people the ending, you would get then different answers. That, is true artistry.

Since I discovered Dan Simmons and his novels, reading Drood got me hooked. I love his style and how he puts a story together and how he lays out the events. Some people have said the books are too long. I disagree. I think for some that get into this book expecting a big edge-of-your-seat-thriller, they just go into it with the wrong expectations and feel let down once the story carries out into events that will only appear banal (but really aren't).

It's all in your expectations and how you approach this story. I can't say anything for his other novels, I am just starting the Fifth Heart tonight, and I am very excited for this story!

I will defintiely update whne I get further into it and, of couirse, after I finish it. :)

Good Riddance, Not-so-helpful Potty Training Book

It's another yucky, rainy day outside, cold and damp. I am grateful for the rain we are getting in spite of my kids' obvious boredom and the fact that their short attention spans are going to drive me crazy for the next week. (I say that with humor) in case someone reading this doesn't know me well enough to get my sarcasm or my humor.

Recently, I've begun the journey of potty training my boy. It's been pretty hectic these days with just that alone. It's just me doing it because my husband works long hours, by the time he comes home we have dinner and put the kids to bed and that's pretty much it. The kids go to bed by 7:30, so we get down time to ourselves at least, but the whole potty training thing has been insane, and I don't have anyone here helping me with it most of the time. If ever.

Don't misunderstand that last part. This isn't a rant or a vent. It's a simple fact. It's a part of my life that's been keeping me super busy and on my feet with a can of Lysol and a clean rag. Following a toddler around all day and sitting them on the potty isn't as easy as it sounds. It's very time consuming when you do this all yourself.

I bought (regrettably) this book called Potty Training Sucks! I thought it would be humorous, great. The book itself sucks more than the potty training, to be totally honest. For one thing, it's extremely contradictory, and in turn only renders it totally unhelpful and pointless to read.

The author drones on and on about hugs and kisses and praise not being enough to help your kid figure out using the potty is good. But turns around, in the same chapter, and starts bashing the parents who give their kid an M&M for using the potty and then says "hug them instead...." What a load of crap this book is!

Needless to say it went straight into the garbage. I wouldn't even give this book away to the Goodwill because why should another parent like me have to suffer while reading over such a stupid dialog of misinformation and bias?

The M&Ms and suckers have been working just fine, thank you very much.

If you let your kid be a kid, like, you know, be active enough, you shouldn't be too worried about them getting obese by eating a dum dum sucker. Or a skittle. I really hate that book.

So far I let the kid run around in sweatpants without a diaper. I tell him to go potty every 15-20 minutes, give or take. It's "working" but as far as him understanding to hold it before he gets to the potty is a whole other ball game entirely, and that I believe is the challenge here. Getting the kids to figure this part out can change the entire process of potty training. Once he gets this I think it should be smooth sailing (at least as smooth as it can get for the time being) rather than having accidents all day long, mommy cleaning up all the "accidents," plus taking care of the 1 year old crying child while potty training the other. Yes, parenthood is insanity.

But it's a good insanity, and it is one I would do all over again and again, because I love kids. I am definitely crazy! But I am a Virgo so it's kind of my department anyway ;)