Time Traveling

Do you ever feel like you make a list of all the things you're going to get done in the day and you blink and it's three months later and only the first two things are your list are done? And it's not that your list was unreasonable. It's just the cleaning, the kids, the laundry, the kids, homework, the kids, the cooking, the kids- all of it gets together and plots to make sure your list never gets done.

I feel like I'm time traveling, only everyone else's time is going faster than mine. So what I think just took me nap time to do, was really two weeks to everyone else. I hear other moms list off all the amazing things they got done that day and I just wonder, "Did she really do all that?, cause today I tried super hard and stayed on task and didn't get distracted by pinterest and was motivated and I got a load of laundry in the wash, never put it in the dryer, but it is washed!"

So to those that still read this, if there are any left, I'm sorry that I go months without posting at a time. And I know that I always say I'm going to be better, but my list just keeps getting sabotaged and blogging unfortunately gets lost in time along with so many other things on my list. But if you want to keep checking back, maybe one day, like today, I'll get far enough down my list before my time machine throws me into the future. And thanks for your patience with me.

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween to everyone! Since I didn't get around to it last week, today I'm showing off the kids costumes for this year.

My oldest wanted to be a red gypsy. I made a peasant blouse for the top using this tutorial and a yoga waist band skirt using this one. For the wrap around scarf and head piece, I just kind of jumped in and pretended I knew what I was doing.

My next girlie wanted to be a mermaid, NOT Ariel, just a mermaid. She found this picture on line and wanted her costume to be just like it.
I'm not sure it's just like it but here's what we came up with.
And for my little man, you've been wondering what the bow tie was for right! He's Alfalfa! I used the bow tie I showed in the last post and one of his dress shirts. I made the suspenders using this tutorial. And his pants are a pair that he has grown too tall for so they are nice and short to show off those white socks! He will even have a fantastic spike in his hair. I've been growing his hair out for three months just for Halloween. Tomorrow he'll be getting a hair cut!
Happy Trick-or-Treating!

Baby Bow Tie

I finished Halloween costumes last week. Hurray!!! The kids are very excited. I'll show you the completed costumes later this week, but today I wanted to give a more detailed post on one item from my little man's get up, a baby bow tie.

I looked at a couple of tutorials to get an idea of how to make him a bow tie, one from Prudent Baby and the other from A Lemon Squeezy Home. I didn't follow them exactly. I did make a few changes. I didn't used interfacing or felt, just the material. I didn't use their measurements either. I drew on paper how big I wanted the finished tie to be. Then I doubled the length and the width and added enough for seam allowances. I did the same thing for the small piece that wraps around the center of the tie.

And my little guy won't wear anything around his neck, so I could use the neck band. Instead I sewed a small rectangle and put a button hole in the middle. Then I hand stitched one side of it onto the bow tie and added a snap to the other side. This way I can hook it onto the top button of his shirt.

Pony Party

I really like reading the blog Make It and Love It. She used to have a Make-a-Cake series that had super cute ideas. My daughter and I were looking at some of the cakes and we came across this one (go take a look but don't forget to come back). She told me that's the one she wanted for her birthday, which by the way was still several months away. And when her birthday came, it was still all about the My Little Pony Cake.

So here was our version of the My Little Pony Party! Rainbow Dash is one of her favorite ponies so she was our main focus. Here are the invites:

For our activities we melted crayons in a mini muffin tin for our very own homemade "rainbow" crayons. We played "pin the rainbow on Rainbow Dash". Ok that was a really long name but you get the idea.
And yes we had pony rides! No, I didn't rent a pony. I'm not willing to spend that much on a birthday party. We actually have a horse and access to several others, so pony rides are kind of a normal thing for us. Sorry no pics of the pony rides (I have issues with putting pics of the kids online) but the kids had fun.

And for the crowning achievement. Our pony cake complete with Rainbow Dash on top. It was a very tall cake!
What a perfect rainbow slice!

Fashion Birthday Party

This week I want to share with you what we did for my girls birthday parties this year. Our first party was a Barbie Fashion Fairy Tale party. My oldest loves that movie and had to have it for her party theme.

First were some very cool invitations:

Then at the party we dumped out all the dress ups and let the girls have a ball. Then we had a fashion show and took pictures of each girl. With the pictures we made each girl a "magazine cover" featuring them! The black rectangle represents the girls pictures and we put their names into the name spot.
We also painted nails and watched "Barbie Fashion Fairy Tale". The cake, which I so wonderfully forgot to take a picture of, was pink with red and white "jewels" and a crown on top.

What Snow Does To Me

My kids and I had croup last week and they missed the whole week of school. So this week I have been super busy getting them all caught up on the gops of homework they missed. But we're all caught up now so I can have my blog time back.

It has been snowing here for the last few days. I really don't like when it snows before Halloween, I hate driving in it, and I don't like the super cold. But I will say that the first snow always puts me in a very good mood. It makes me feel like Christmas and I LOVE Christmas. We've been lighting fires and drinking hot chocolate. It's so cozy. I would listen to Christmas music but my husband won't let me until after Thanksgiving. But I have started my Christmas shopping.

Every year I try so hard to get my shopping done by Thanksgiving so I can just enjoy the Christmas spirit and not feel stressed. And every year I fail, and the stress gets to me and ruins it for me. So this year I am bound and determined to make it happen.

I've made our Christmas cards. Ordered Santa presents for 2 of the 3 kids, they just better not change their minds. I talked my husbands family into drawing names early so I can get started on those too. And I've planned most of the presents, I'm just spacing them out so the financial burden gets spread out. I think this just might happen this year.

How early do you do your Christmas shopping?

Also, go visit Raising 4 Princesses. I was featured on their link party earlier this week. I've just been absentee and haven't been on to let you all know. Thanks.

Cleaning Products I Now Love

A friend once told me that cleaning the house with small kids is like brushing your teeth while eating an Oreo. So true and therefore I am always on the look out for things that make my job a little easier. I have recently fallen in love with a couple of products that I'd like to share with you (and no I'm not getting paid, just passing on what I've learned).

Product #1

I am super picky about how the bathrooms get cleaned, especially the toilet. I've always used Clorox toilet cleaner because anything less than bleach just never felt good enough. And my Clorox has always done a great job, until our new house. We have very very very hard water and my toilets have developed nice rings inside the the bowls that my Clorox just can't get off even with scrubbing.

So while venting to a friend about it, she recommended getting the dark blue Lysol toilet cleaner. That what she uses and she has found it great on getting that yucky ring off. When I got to the store I saw this cleaner:

It's the same as the dark blue one, but with added lime and rust remover. I decided to try it out first. And guess what, those rings I've been scrubbing at for months on end went completely away in one cleaning! Now that I've seen visible results I guess I'm proven wrong that bleach is not always best.

Product #2

We bought a new vacuum when we moved into our house. It was the Eureka Pet Pal. We don't have any indoor pets, but I shed just as much so we figured it would be good. Frankly the vacuum was horrible. It had no suction power what so ever and when we tried to get it taken care of on the warranty, Eureka gave us the run around until our warranty expired. Yeah, not impressed.

So we decided just to throw the thing away and get a new one. After reading reviews we went with the Shark Navigator Lift Away. And we have absolutely loved it! It has amazing suction- the first time I used it I filled the canister twice just in my bedroom. I know that's gross but that's how bad our other vacuum was.

It has swivel head steering, kind of like the Dyson Ball. Doing the stairs is so easy. The vacuum comes apart so that you only have to carry the canister while doing stairs instead of trying to balance the whole vacuum. It can go from carpet to hard floor, but I don't use that very often, that's just me. And it's light weight making it easier to lug around the house.
Hope those were helpful. If anyone else has any great cleaning helps, let me know. I'd love to share them with everyone.