Just Say NO- to guilt that is

As Moms we have a hard time saying NO. We have a hard time saying no to playdates, baby sitting, visiting family that hates us or is destructive towards us, sales parties, and just about anything else anyone asks us to do. We feel guilty if our kids aren't entertained every second of every day. We feel guilty if they aren't involved in 3 sports, dance, music lessons, scouts, and tutoring. We feel guilty if we don't attend every wedding, birthday party, bar mitzah, sweet 16, baby shower, batchlorette party, sales party, meeting, and it goes on and on. Some Moms are so lucky as to work and try and cover all of the above bases.

The guilt needs to stop! If you don't have the time, it's OK to say no. If you don't have the finances, it's OK to say no. If you just need time at home, as a family, its OK to pick and choose a few events to attend, and opt out of the rest. If people hate you because you just couldn't make it, due to whatever reason, then they weren't very good friends to begin with. Good friends understand that you may be tired, broke, or just simply overwhelmed and need to rest.

It took me 4 years of Mommy-hood to learn to say no without feeling bad. It took another 2 years to be able to say it and not feel any bit of guilt. My family is important, and my time with them is important. Sometimes we just need time to stay home, rest, relax, and do things like play board games or do puzzles. Sometimes we just need to stay home and get schoolwork and housework done. We pick a few parties and events to go to, and the rest we let go.

With all the holidays coming up, take the time now and remind yourself of your priorities. Mine are to make special memories with my family. To bake cookies and decorate with a smile on my face. To sing Carols while making hot chocolate and watch old movies. Not to rush from event to event, being tired with overwhelmed kids.

Good luck on letting go of the guilt!

Simple Woman's Daybook

FOR TODAY...Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Outside my window... its stopped drizzling and today was sunny, slightly breezy and cool. Perfect sweatshirt weather.

I am thinking... about Doorbuster's 1st birthday party, finances, and schoolwork we have done and will do next.

I am thankful for... healthy children, a nice house on a quiet street, the time we have been spending with friends lately.

From the learning rooms... lots of reading, and lots of math. Lots and lots of repetition, hoping that memorization will follow. And a month spent on Earthquakes that I loved, even if they didn't!

From the kitchen... Made a yummy steak yesterday, may have spaghetti
today, or pizza, as the stove is in the proccess of being deeply cleaned and I am not done yet.

I am wearing.. black yoga pants, blank nursing tank, pink workout shirt. Park day gear! Since we stay at the park on Tuesdays for 4-5 hours.

I am creating... Nothing at the moment. Creating a clean and organized house for the upcoming birthday.

I am going.. thankfully, nowhere but Awanas tomorrow. PE class starts next week. Then Thurs a teacher meeting, Friday a birthday party. I think Sat we actually can stay home before the Halloween crazies!

I am reading.. nothing at the moment either. Might buy the new Lee Child book. Just finished reading Scarpetta Factor. I love Patricia Cornwell's books.


I am hoping… for a smooth meeting Thursday. Sometimes my kids are quite a pain in the rear about what they have done the past month. I'm hoping for Daredevil to suddenly become a great reader. On a nerdy note- I'm hoping for the headless horseman mount.

I am hearing.. Baby crying, children explaining things to each other, Princess whining.

Around the house... we have grass in the backyard! Yay! Now I pray for a swingset. Things are getting thoroughly cleaned up for the holidays. We even decorated for Halloween.

One of my favorite things… Princess helping Doorbuster push a shopping cart around the backyard. He thinks the world of his sister.

A few plans for the rest of the week... trying not to loose anyone or end up in the wrong place at the wrong time. Finish laundry. Build a igloo out of milk cartons.

Here is picture for thought I am sharing…

Friday Final

I think I'm now going to start wrapping up what the kids have learned for the week on Fridays. It helps to keep tabs before our teacher meetings when I think of things in week long chunks.

Genius- He has completed the first chapter of his Video Game Design Class. This taught him not only video game design, but how to listen to instruction, follow along, and answer quizzes. He did some more sentence diagramming, learned about presumed subjects, and adding es, s, ies at the end of the sentence. He reviewed his multiplying by 2, 5 & 10 and is starting on 3s. He also reviewed rounding to the nearest 10, and skip counting. In Science we covered earthquakes, safety, what the earth is made up of, plates and fault lines, and how to read earthquake maps. In History, he has been learning about the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and Fire.

Daredevil is making large strides in his word recognition, by filling in missing vowels in words, choosing correct spelling, and sorting based on beginning sound. He is making Tiny steps in reading. Oh all the sight words we try to do, he has poop down. That's a 7 year old for you! He is learning to count to 50, and adding and subtracting things. He also is progressing through doubles from 5-10. He knows his 0-5 well. He also learned the same earthquake things.

Princess- Can now write the letter I and O and E. She can count to 10. She is still confused over earthquakes. She thinks the earthquake is going to visit our house, or come like a rain storm.

Doorbuster- He can take two steps unassisted from thing to thing, and also can somewhat sing our little Halloween song and make the motions with it.

It's been a fun week!

Allergic to the Word NO!

Princess has started itching her stomach in the evenings and complaining that she is itchy. I'd throw her in the tub, she'd play and the itching would stop.

Then it was in the middle of the day. The only time her itching would stop is if she took a bath. Then I figured that itching was just a ploy to take a bath 3 times a day. It wouldn't be a huge deal, but we pay the water bill. And we are on water rationing- go over your allotted amount and you play almost double for all the water you use over it. So I told her no, she gets one bath, each night before bed. Even this is overkill when we aren't outside getting dirty or sweaty. So she would spend the whole day whining, I'd say no. Eventually she gave up on it.

Then one night she was throwing a big fit over how itchy she was and we noticed a big rash on her thigh. And on her arm, and on her neck, and we lift up her shirt and she is all red and splotchy. We couldn't figure out what it was. It wasn't chicken pox, and it wasn't measles. It wasn't bug bites. She didn't have a fever. It just looked like hives.

I changed detergent a week before this to using the safe for darks Woolite on everyone's clothes. That was the only thing I could come up with that we've changed. She didn't eat new foods, she hasn't tried new soaps or anything else. Regardless, I cleaned, dusted and disinfected her room top to bottom and re-washed all her clothes in water, then with free and clear soap.

Then in the afternoon, what happens? "I'm itchy!" A look at her and yep, more splotches. We put some lotion on them, change her clothes, give her some benadryl. We start going through our head of what
she did in the past few hours.

After a week of this, we caught on. Anytime she was told NO, she couldn't do anything, or was told to pick up or help with something, it would start up. "I'm itchy! I'm itchy!" Anytime she was stressed over something she couldn't do, it would start up. No! I'm itchy!!! Then she'd scratch until she would get red and blotchy.

At least now we have gotten to the root of the problem. When she is told No and she starts getting stressed, we remind her to calm down, and we give her some benadryl. She's realized she isn't going to get her way even with the itching.

Microwave 1, Me 0

It says Microwave and Dishwasher safe. I guess not.

I appriciate my husband because......

Sometimes when our husbands are being particularly annoying, it's calming to remember what we love about them in the first place. There are a lot of things that I really appreciate now, that I didn't even think to appreciate or consider when we were first married.

1) He lets me stay home and raise our children. He understands how hard I work raising the kids all day and keeping the house standing. Even when the budget is particularly tight, he looks for ways to save, or to get another job, rather then try to have me work. He feels its more important to have me home with them, then to have a fancy car or house. It's all just stuff!

2) He's not afraid to use coupons at the store. He wont match deals and stuff, but if he has the coupons and the shopping list, he has no problem getting what we need. He also looks at the sale fliers for the stores and helps figure out what to buy and make for dinner.

3) He tries to figure repairs out instead of calling someone to fix it or replace it. Our dryer broke, so he found a youtube video, took the dryer apart, and figured out how to fix it. Total cost- $16. Considering we bought our washer and dryer off ebay for $150, and I wasn't quite ready to buy new ones yet. Same thing with most household repairs.

4) He doesn't have his heart set on living someplace we can't afford. He knows our budget (after all, he brings in home!) and he isn't set on living in an expensive city just because HE wants to. He knows what we can afford, where those areas are, and has no problem with where we end up. His only requirement is central air. That's a pretty easy one to handle around here!

5) He doesn't mind bringing his lunch to work to save money. It was costing about $40 a week for his lunch. Now he brings his own for about $10 a week. Plus he has lost almost 20lbs by forgoing fast food. I bet his cholesterol has gone down too.

6) He doesn't mind cooking dinner, lunch or breakfast. It gets tiring when everyone is depending on you to cook and serve 3 meals a day, 7 days a week without end! My husband doesn't mind getting in there and cooking anything. He makes the best BBQ!

7) He is a hands-on homeschool dad, who comes up with trips to take and experiments to do. He even spent time looking over things to buy with the kids curriculum moneys that he could do with them. He takes them to work and shows them how to work equipment and run things.

8) I don't have to worry about leaving the kids with him. He can handle it, easy. He is only hampered by not having the equipment to nurse a baby. Friend shows up to go on a impromptu shopping trip with no kids. No problem! He waves bye, and I come home to happy, taken care of kids.

To be continued......

Cheap & Fun Halloween Decorations

Now that we have our first house that we are not afraid of people stealing decorations out of our yard, we've been starting to decorate for Halloween. I wanted to put up some decorations so that people would know that we are passing out candy. I figured it would be a neat way to meet some of our new neighbors.

One of my favorite websites for activities is http://www.dltk-kids.com/  They have a treasure trove of free printable activities for every holiday and theme you can think of. There are many easy and fun projects you can make with your kids. We are using the simple bat coloring page, tracing it onto black paper, and taping it to the windows to look like a (flock? family? group?) of bats flying.

Martha Stewart also has some ideas for silhouettes of pumpkins and cats. We always seem to have tons of construction paper around, so making a few more silhouettes for mirrors, baseboards and windows is a cheap and easy thing to do.

You can use cotton batting to make spider webs, or if you have some black thin string or thread, you can drape it into a spider web patter, or with a few little nails, make a HUGE web that takes up a wall or two.

Scraps of white plastic bags can be turned into ghosts with a bit of paper stuffed into the heads, and some string to hang them up.

Stuff old clothes with newspaper and lay them out to make dummies.

Always look to see what you have and think about how it can be used differently!

The days after Halloween are the best time to start thinking about next year! Stock up on inexpenisve decorations to pull out for next time.

Weird Dreams

I rarely dream, and if I have a dream, it's rare that I remember them when I wake up. Sometimes I'll have the best dreams, and I'll think, I hope I remember that when I wake up! I wake up remembering I had a dream, and that it was a great dream. But I wont remember what it is about!

Last night I played warcraft for about 15 minutes before going to bed. It must of been on my mind, since that's what I dreamed about. I dreamed I went raiding (that's going with a group of 25 friends- yes real people- to go kill a really big bad guy). When I got to the cave we were going to find the monsters to kill, my computer wasn't fast enough to handle the raid.

The funny part here, is I didn't see myself as being on the computer during this dream, I was a person in the game. What my computer had to do with anything, beats me.

So since my computer wasn't fast enough, I was running a soup kitchen for the monsters I was supposed to be killing. I had a bunch of little bowls from target (the little bowls my youngest two eat cereal from), and some little tiny spoons (the ones from my daughters play ikea dish set) and I was giving them frosted flakes and milk. Each huge (I'm sure they were like 10 feet compared to my 5ft)  monster was getting tiny little servings in their tiny little bowls. Then they had a monster camera crew show up. With a tripod. I thought they were there to film what was going on. They just wanted some cereal too, but if they didn't get a bigger serving size, they were going to start a fight- with the tripod.

At this point, my dream ended. Maybe another night I'll find out what happened to my cereal-kitchen for displaced Cataclysm monsters.

4 Moms, 35 Kids- Breakfast Linkup

When I was a kid (well, teenager), I was really weird and liked to get up at 5:30 to get to school early for 0 period band. I never needed any prompting from my mom, when that alarm clock went off, I was up and running.

When I had one kid (well, one and a half), I had to get us all up to get my stepdaughter to school and ourselves to college by 8am. So we would get up at about 6:00 and be out the door by 7. My stepdaughter got breakfast at school, I usually ate a granola bar or something while I drove to school.

When I had two kids, we ate cereal for breakfast. We still got up pretty early. I was working outside the home and pretty much had to throw cereal at them while I made a mad dash to get everyone ready and out the door to daycare.

When I had three kids, we still had cereal. My stepdaughter and hubby like oatmeal. The other three will not eat oatmeal. They've tried it, but it's just not what they like.

Now with 4, and not having anywhere we exactly go and have to be there at a early time (this will be changing one day a week), breakfast around here is a fix it as you wake-up deal. There's toast, and there's cereal. Pour what you'd like, or toast your bread and butter or jelly it up.  As you can see in the picture above, some kids choose both cereal and a sandwich. It is usually a whirlwind of milk, boxes, spoons, and bowls.

I'm sure if I had been raised differently, we'd have different breakfasts around here. I have a hard enough time doing lunch and dinner. I give myself a break on breakfast.

On the weekends we sometimes have brunch and make pancakes, waffles or breakfast burritos, have bacon or sausage or ham, or some other treat. If we have a busy day or someplace to go, I get poptarts or granola bars and small juices- when they are dressed and ready to go, I hand them their food on the way to the car. We are not morning people at all!


Cost wise, we get cereal for free from the WIC program, plus I stock up whenever I can find it for under $2 a box (with a sale and/or coupons). The kids will sometimes eat cereal for a snack in the afternoons.

Have fun checking out the other moms at Life in Shoe, The Common Room, Smockity Frocks and Raising Olives. 

First Haircut

It's always hard to decide when to cut your baby's hair for the first time. Even with my 4th, It took a lot of debating between my husband and I as to when to cut it. Our first two boys grew so much hair, they would of been very pretty little girls! Princess didn't grow any hair until a year and a half or so. Doorbuster had some hair, which turned into quite a bit of cute hair. Little, curly cute boy hair.

Then came him sweating! All night he'd wake up in puddles of sweat under his head.

So, we figured we would cut it. We, as in, my husband and I got out the clippers and did it ourselves! So not only was it his first hair cut, it was our first time doing a first time haircut. We cut the other kids hair ourselves, but never for their first one.

I am NOT happy!

The 4th kid has to have his own special firsts, right?

How to Make a Coupon Holder

I've had a hard time finding a coupon organizer that works for me. One that not only works for me, but doesn't blow my budget either. I've found most of the coupon organizers they sell at the store to be too small, and most of the hard core coupon organizers to be too big. I needed something that had room for a lot of categories, but could still fit in my diaper bag easily. I took a good think around my house to see what things I had. I had a planner that I loved but never used, and I turned that into my coupon organizer. 

Plus, it's easy to customize! You could keep your envelope system in here too, plus your coupons.

Now is the time of the year that stores start clearance out their calendars and day planners for the new year. Or, you may have a unused or outdated day planner around the house.You'll need a daybook/small planner/small binder, some envolopes that fit inside the planner you've picked, and some sort of tab/index. You'll also need a hole punch, and scissors.

My supplies (and my old coupon book):

Remove all unwanted papers out of the planner. Maybe you will want to keep some monthly sheets in here for bill paying reminders (you could separate your coupons from your money envelopes if you follow Dave Ramsey's system).

 

Then cut the flaps off the envelopes that you will be using. You could reuse the flaps as your tabs, or toss them, or give them to your kids to play with. You could also use cuter envelopes then I did.

 Then, use a page or divider from the old planner pages to be a guide for punching holes in your envelopes:

 Then, add a tab and label with your categories. I order mine in the order of the isles of our super target, since that is where I coupon shop the majority of the time. I also keep things split up by how many coupons I have at any given time (like I usually have tons and tons of Glade/airwick/febreeze coupons- so they get their own tabs). The tabs I am using are attached to paper clips, so I can remove or rearrange them at my whim.

 Then insert them into your planner:

Finished Product:

All ready to go to the store!

The only thing that bothers me about this system is having the Target coupons be too long to fit in the envelopes. The printable coupons fit perfect, but the Target ones I do have to fold. To fit that size, I'd have to use letter sized envelopes and I'd have to get a bigger planner, which would move it out of the diaper bag sized stage.

Happy Couponing!

Why we started our family.....part 3

So here we are, little family of 4 (or 3.5 in my case). Technically, our family has been started, and by today's "standard" we should be done expanding. We have a boy, and we have a girl. That's all you need right?

Let me clarifiy a bit here. My stepdaughter lived full time with us. Her mother left to Colorado right when we got married. I thought it would be a every other weekend type agreement. It wasn't- we went on our honeymoon and came back to his daughter being left at his grandmas, and her mother a few states away. What else do you do but pick her up, pick up her stuff, and move along. In one day I went from newlywed to newlywed and full time mom. I hadn't even had my baby yet, and here I am, getting my stepdaughter to 1st grade, then getting myself to college and work. Talk about a shock!

Eventually, I got a job as an apartment manager that allowed us to move out of my mom's house and into our own place. Housing in Southern California is very, very expensive, and waiting lists for affordable housing or housing assistance can take more then 5 years.

With our own place, what did we need to go with it? A new baby! Really, I liked having brothers (wish I would of had a sister!) when I grew up and hubby felt the same way. Even though my stepdaughter is a sibling, she was 6 1/2 years older then our first, and she would always be coming and going (it's just a fact of life- no matter where her mom lived, she would be in and out of our house). We wanted our family to be more then just 4.

Luckily, when we start trying, we succeed pretty quickly, and along came Daredevil. He was the perfect addition to our family, and he was such a good baby. But with two boys and a girl, I wanted a girl of my own. One I could do all the mother-daughter things with. I did get to do them with my stepdaughter to a point, but I know she would rather have her own mother do them with her, not me. I wanted to pick wedding dresses, buy tiny pink dresses, have tea parties, all that girlishness. We loved the spacing between Genius and Daredevil, so 3 years later we followed the Shettles method and got Princess. If Princess was a boy we would of been just as thrilled as we were. Having a girl was just a bonus.

Disneyland, oh Disneyland

I love going to Disneyland. We have annual passes- it's the only way to make it affordable for us. It's a weird way to make it affordable, but once you've shelled out $90 a person, you might as well spend the extra money and get to go all year.

The kids love going too. They know more about the parks history then they remember from Story of the World. They know when rides went in, when they went out, and what they are building next. We've even playtested upcoming attractions for Disney too. Maybe someday they will be imagineers.

We were nutty and went to Disneyland during one of the hottest days ever. It was 111 degrees at the hottest part of the day. 111! It was actually cooler at our house (usually it's 10-15 degrees cooler at Disneyland). My friends kept asking, "Are you REALLY at Disneyland?". YES! Hubby had a day off and I wanted to ride Ghost Galaxy, the space mountain Halloween overlay.

The best part of the heat? NO LINES! Even on a regular Monday morning, space mountain will have a 20-30 minute line. It was 10 minutes! We got fast passes, a baby swap, and stood in line. I think we each rode it 4 times that day. I so enjoyed it! If you have little ones, they will probably get a bit scared- there are ghostly projections on the walls that are creepy. It almost seemed like there were windows that these ghosts were peeking in at us. Princess said it was scary. Daredevil held my hands and said he was protecting me, but he seemed to enjoy it. Genius would close his eyes on the lift hill because he didn't like that part AT ALL. I'm not one for things that go bump in the night, but I got startled in a good way and had a great time!

My kids always get a map every time we go in. Then after they have checked the map over (if there is one WORD changed on the map, they know), they always hand it to me. If you look in my van you will always see a few maps on the floor. I think the maps procreate in the back of the van. I've started making them carry their own maps, or throw them out. No longer will I be the map carrier!

The best part about Disneyland in the heat is all the rides that are inside, and air conditioned. We rode It's a Small World a few times, Pirates a few times, Haunted Mansion Holiday (my kid's favorite), and Innoventions. Over at DCA, we spent a LOT of time in the animation building while Princess took a nap (along with half the park in there napping too). Thank goodness for air conditioned places, and lots of water.

One of my "tricks" for getting the kids to behave in line is dum-dum lollypops. Yes, sugar isn't exactly what you want to be giving your kids when you want them to be calm and patent, but it works well for us. With a lollypop in their mouth, they stay pretty quiet. The pops are small enough they finish them in the time it takes to get on the ride, and if you don't, tossing them isn't a big deal. In the heat, the sugar worked well as a pick me up. Of course, you could substitute organic lollypops if that is your way of doing things.

It also kept Doorbuster entertained trying to get my lollypop stick!

It was HOT and we were sweating up a storm. I think I lost a few lbs sweating, as my pants kept falling down by the end of the day.

My favorite trick when we go to Disneyland is to pack frozen water bottles in our lunch pack to keep our food cold. They stay frozen and keep our food cold until we are ready to eat. Then when we are done eating, I stick them in the bottom of the stroller so they can melt. This trip I brought triple the frozen bottles I usually do- and we drank all of them!

It was tiring going in the heat, but we can't wait to go again! 

Genius wont let me take pictures of him!

Laundry Fail

I attempted a laundry experiment this week.

Experiment probably isn't the correct word, because I really had no scientific way to measure my results.

What was I experimenting about? Laundry.

I've heard doing laundry and running other large appliances is cheaper electricity-wise if you run them on the evenings or weekends. So I saved all my laundry to do on Saturday.


Note- ALL our laundry. All towels, all blankets, all clothing. I thought I had pared everything down to the basics. I sure did! We have exactly enough for a week. Which meant I had to get the laundry done or we'd be naked.

I did laundry from the time I woke up to the time I went to bed, and still had more loads to do on Sunday.

I think I will rethink this laundry situation, and do some during the week in the evenings.

Neighborly Neighbors

When we first moved into our house, the house that is next to our front door was for sale. It's the house that my windows look right over into there's. We sort of "share" a yard (our yard looks big because it's split down the middle between us and them).

Well, it's been sold/rented. People are moving stuff in. They have no curtains. I'm nosy by habit.

Thankfully, when I went out to throw out the trash, they have put up curtains so I am not looking in their windows every time I walk by. They are BIG windows, it's hard to not look in them.

So far, I can't figure out who really lives there. I think  saw some kids. I was really hoping for some kids around my kids age, so we'd have some neighbors close by to play with. It looks like there are some kids, but who knows what age.

At least they are watering the lawn. We keep our lawn green and cut, and the lawn over there is dying and about 3 feet tall. My kids would wade through the grass and see if it was tall enough to hide in.

After being an apartment manager for so long, it's weird to not have any control over who my neighbors are. Before I'd know where they worked and what their criminal background is. Now I know...nothing. And I have no one to complain to if I don't like them, or if they play their music too loud. Or if they park their cars in front of my yard.I like the spot in front of my house empty! I like to look out the window and see down the street. Why? Why not!

Hopefully I can find time in my week to make some cookies or muffins and take them over to introduce myself. I think that's the best way to start of a neighborly relationship.