sweetness

a good party can really wipe you out

in case you don't know

If you need a little hope or faith in your life, you can follow me here too.

a little project

It's not the best picture but here is the wreath I made out of tissue paper. You can see the tutorial here.

things i forgot to show you

I had originally planned on throwing my sweet boy a huge first birthday party, but it didn't work out as planned. But here was the original invite before plans changed! Cute right! And below are the cupcakes I ended up doing for our family-sized fiesta themed party. You can make any size party cute!

good for baby

When I first started seeing baby food pouches at Target or the grocery store, I thought it was too late for my baby. I thought they were for beginning eaters and he is almost 15 months old. But I am always really worried about the amount of vegetables he is getting, so I still have been feeding him baby food once a day. Last week he gave up on the baby food, he wants to eat like a big boy with all of his food. So I was pleasantly surprised while having dinner at a friends house, that Madden took one of their pouches and devoured it. He thinks it's a drink and he really likes it. So now I am stocking up and giving him one a day to make sure he is getting his vegetable intake along with all the other food he is eating.

We bought some of these Happy Baby pouches at Target and my friend just gave me some from Trader Joes (thanks Brooke)!

(p.s. I was always worried about his Iron intake too, so I bough a Yo Baby yogurt that has iron in it. Problems solved).

not juicy

I have kind of avoided this post because to each their own, but I have to write about it because it keeps coming up over and over again. When my daughter started drinking out of a sippy cup, our pediatrician clearly told us that juice is not something that we should be offering our kids. It has no real health benefits and we should be offering water and milk only. We did follow his advice and I never buy juice for our house. The only time my kids get juice is if we are eating out and it comes with a meal or if we go to someone else's house or to a party. To them it's a treat and I am okay with that. Not everyone agrees with me, I was told I was mean mom a few months ago. But here's the thing, I am hearing it everywhere now. It's coming out of very prestigious doctors mouthes, I am reading it in books, in articles online and on television. For some reason there is a real push right now to stop giving our kids juice so I am sharing it too!

deals deals deals

It is not cheap for our family to eat out, even at In-N-Out (yummy). We have four eaters and a mini-eater. I cannot cook 7 days a week, so right now I am kind of into Groupon.com and ScreaminDailyDeals.com. I have used Groupon a lot more, but did find a good deal on Screamin and 10% goes back to a school or charity of your choice. I know that you can easily get roped into these site with all kinds of good looking deals, but I strictly keep mine to food places for the whole family and I count it into our grocery budget. So far I have gotten $20 worth of food at 3 different places for $10 each. $10 for my family to eat is cheaper than a lot of recipes. I do try and eat dinners and lunches at home during the week and eat out only on weekends, so I make sure the coupon is for a place we could easily get to on a Saturday or Sunday. And I always read the restrictions and check expiration dates. I love a good discount!

so good (and healthy)

Tonight I made a Healthier Slow-Cooker Chicken Tortilla Soup that I found on allrecipes.com. It was REALLY good! You should definitely check it out here and I know I will be making it again. Yum!

I love reading the reader comments online and making similar changes. The changes I made to this recipe were as follows:

- I used a larger can of diced tomatoes instead of the 15oz can of whole peeled tomatoes

- I added a small can of green chilis

- I used one mild to medium pepper instead of the 2 cubanelle peppers

- I added a can of black beans (drained)

- I did not have a bay leaf

- I used a Mexican Seasoning instead of the cumin & chili powder. It just had some extras in it.

- I used crushed up low fat chips instead of making my own

- I sprinkled a little low fat Mexican cheese on top

Super easy and so yummy!

oopsie

When my kids get a scrape or any kind of boo boo, I usually hug and love on them and then tell them, "you're fine." I clean up the scrape or cut and tell them to go rest. Sometimes they will tell me it stings and it hurts after a little time goes by and I kind of just say, "sorry baby" and assume they just need a little more attention but that it can't hurt anymore.

Fast-forward to yesterday. I slipped while trying to put the baby in the car and scraped my elbow. It was bleeding a little. I went home and cleaned it up (it totally stung a lot) and even today it hurts. I am a pretty tough cookie when it comes to pain so all I can think about now are all the bumps, scrapes and bruises that my little ones got that I just said, "you're okay." I think now I'll give them a little more TLC. Funny how we do those kind of things as moms!

Lesson learned.

my little man looks cute in.....

We usually buy Brody one pair of designer jeans per growth spurt. We save them for parties, photo shoots or anything special. This time around I bought him a pair of Skinny Jeans from Gap Kids and they seriously rock. I finished hemming them last night and they look so dang cute on him. I love them just as much as Sevens or Joe's. They look especially cute with a button up shirt and some black converse. Now that I think about it, my favorite pair of jeans that my almost-three-year-old wears are her little Mini Skinny Jeans from BabyGap. I guess I am just a fan!