Kaye had her awards day at school. She received the Creative Writer Award. That make her mommy proud. She says she wants to be an author and illustrator when she grows up, so she is on the right track.

She also had field day where they had bunch of fun activities outside. I have been at the school quite a bit these last few weeks of school. But it’s nice because I was able to get pictures of her at school.

We have been celebrating a lot. My birthday at the end of April, Nathan’s a week later, then a week and half later it was Mother’s Day and yesterday was our anniversary. All within a month. We love to party!

We even attended birthday parties for friends. Elle even overcame her fear of inflatables and went down a slide by herself.

And this little girl has been keeping me busy. She is trying to walk at 8 months old. It is helping her get into her sister’s stuff. She is loving it. I don’t think I am ready for this. She is growing up way too fast for me.

The girls also have their dance recitals coming up so we are gearing up for that. It is always so fun to see their hard work come together at the end of the year.

» Tell me… What have you been up to? Is school ending for you yet?

It’s just not fair. Moms should totally have more than 24 hours in a day. Am I right, ladies? I know we have all looked at other moms and wondered, “How does she do it all?” I do. I have that thought all the time. I want to know how you do it all, especially working mothers. Here is what I am trying to juggle in my life right now.

• Kaye is finishing kindergarten this month. So she has quite a bit of events at school.
• I am the room mom for Kaye’s class so I help coordinate some of these events at school.
• I started exercising a few times a week in fitness classes. I am still trying to readjust our schedules to fit that in.
• Being a chauffeur for all the girls’ events – dance recitals coming up.
• I want to plan fun things as well as educational activities for the girls this summer.
• Blogging. I still have a lot to work on with this new design of the site.
• I haven’t been crafting much. I haven’t had time or the motivation to do anything crafty the last few months.
• Then there’s all the other stuff that I am supposed to do but not getting around to like deep cleaning.

» Tell me… How do you juggle everything in your life? What are you not doing to fit everything you need to do in 24 hours?

It’s pretty easy for people to get a pretty decent SLR camera these days. But how many owners of SLR cameras actually know how to use them… like in the manual mode? Here’s a site, CameraSim, that will help you learn how to use your SLR camera with their Camera Simulator. You practice taking pictures with an online camera and you can see the difference it makes when you adjust the aperture and the shutter speed. It’s perfect for me who is a hands-on learner. Go try it out!

» Tell me… Where did you learn how to take photos? What do you like to take pictures of?

As a mom, I wished…

1. I had more time in the day to get things done. How do people do it all?
2. I could go to the bathroom or shower without interruption.
3. Get a full night’s sleep or sleep in past 7 a.m.
4. Had a personal nutritional chef who also does the grocery shopping.
5. Had a nicely decorated house and my children didn’t touch the decorations.

» Tell me… What are some of your mommy wishes?

I started working out last week. Ouch. I used to dance as a child and in college. That was my form of exercise. But ever since I had children, I got out of the whole dance and exercising routine. With my first child I gained 45 pounds. Yikes! My second pregnancy I gained 35 pounds. Not too bad. And this last pregnancy I gained 32 pounds. Collectively, I need to lose 20 pounds to get myself back to my weight before I had any kids. Yeah, 20 pounds. Ugh. So I decided it is time for me to start at it. Eve is 8 months old now. No more excuses. I need to drop the weight and tone up my arms, rear, thighs and my biggest problem area, my abs. No fond of the flabby stuff hanging around my waist and tummy.

However, when it comes to working out, I’m a whimp. The best way for me to get the workout I need, I am doing classes. For now, I’m doing Zumba for cardio and sculpting classes for toning. It has been painful but lots of fun. Let’s hope I can keep up with this! Will you be in my cheering section?

» Tell me… How do you feel about your body after having children? Where do you get your motivation to exercise?

When I lived in Hawaii, we made candy leis a lot. Just about for any occasion worth celebrating. So this week being teacher appreciation week, we are showering Kaye’s teacher with love. We had a week’s worth of events planned out for her to make her feel appreciated. This was something quick and simple but turned out really cute. If I had more time I was going to add some flowers or yarn pom poms to add to the lei. You can get as creative as you want!

Supplies:

• candy
• plastic wrap
• ribbon

2. Wrap the plastic wrap around the candy so it is all the way wrapped.

3. Pinch the space between the candy because that is where the ribbon will tie.

4. Cut your ribbon and tie it between the candies.

5. The two open ends, put them together and twist. Tie a large ribbon into a bow. And done!

» Tell me… What are you doing for teacher appreciation week? What did you get your child’s teacher?

Money is such a touchy subject because everyone deals with it differently and everyone spend it differently. So when it comes to teaching our children about how to save and spend money, it’s may be a tricky thing to do. Tykoon is a tool for parents to teach their children about money. There is a family account where each parent and child has his/her own login. Then the parents set up things the child can do to earn money or some other kind of non monetary reward. The child can login and track his progress. They can save the money earned, give it to selective charities or spend it by purchasing items from Amazon. How cool is that?!

» Tell me… At what age do you start to teach your children about earning and spending money?

I’ll be the first to admit that I am not a camper. I have only been camping a few times in my life. I like the idea of camping it seems fun. But what keeps me from going is the bugs. I’m not a bug person. It all stems from the fact that I am allergic to mosquitoes. Yes, there is such a thing. So if I keep my bug sprays close, I’m usually OK. Anyway, now I am tempted to go camping because I found out about this program for us newbies. It’s called First time Campers and it is only available in a few states right now - Texas, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Maine and Michigan.

First Time Campers Program is where you pay a small fee and the state park provides most of the camping gear and equipment you need. They will even get you situated and help you build a fire. This is a great option for those who don’t have or can’t afford camping gear. And it’s also a great way to test the waters of camping if you have never done so before.

» Tell me… Do you take your children camping? Do they enjoy it?

1. My mother, my friend necklace. A charming necklace from Red Envelope. 
2. Personal embosser. This great for labeling books in her library or making tags for gift giving and such. 
3. Recipe journal. Keep track of new recipes created or tried. There are also other journals available like a wellness journal or travel journal. 
4. Sea bag. They take old sails and make them into bags. This metallic tote would be perfect for the beach or pool this summer. 
5. Wooden terrariums. Fun to grow and always make the home more lively. 

» Tell me… What are you getting your mom for Mother’s Day this year?

Last Thursday was my birthday. My mom and I went thrift store shopping and visited a new antique market we found. It’s one of our favorite past times. My style is very eclectic. So I like vintage and antique things, but I also like a mixture of several different styles too. But there are definitely things I found that I would love to have in my house. Like the basket of milk jugs. And this metal bench pictured below. It would look lovely on our front porch.

And I could definitely use this apothecary cabinet. I have been looking for an old library card catalog shelving. I saw one at an antique store a few years ago for a really good price but I didn’t buy it. Now I totally regret not buying it. I want one so bad. Ever since then I have been looking for an old library card catalog shelving. So if you find one, let me know!

» Tell me… Do you like to go antique shopping? What is a piece of furniture you have been looking for for you home?

Teacher appreciation week is next week. The actual day is May 8. But since we love teachers so much, it’s now a week long event. I am the room mom for Kaye’s kindergarten class. So I planned something simple for the week. We are “showering” her teacher each day with a theme.

Monday (May 7th) - shower the teacher with flowers/gardening stuff. Bring a bouquet, single stem flower, fake flowers, paper flowers, homemade flowers, silk flowers, etc. Or any gardening things like seeds, tools, plants, etc.

Tuesday (May 8th) - shower the teacher with pictures. Have your child draw a pictures of him/herself with the teacher. Or print a picture of your child with the teacher if you have a picture of them together. You can have your child decorate a paper frame or get a frame for it.

Wednesday (May 9th) - shower the teacher with sweets. Bring homemade or store bought candy, cookies, desserts, etc.

Thursday (May 10th) - shower the teacher with gratitude. Bring a note or thank you card with the child saying thank you to the teacher.

Friday (May 11th) - shower the teacher with love. Bring something in a shape of a heart like paper cut outs, confetti, necklace, candy, hair tie, etc.

The image above is from Fiskars where they have a bunch of simple and fun ideas of things to make for teacher appreciation week.

» Tell me… What do you like to gift to teachers?

Ever since we got our new furnace in, it has been high 80 degrees weather. So gearing up for the summer heat, I thought I would put some of those strawberries from the strawberry farm to use in a milkshake. This shake has a creamier taste with the whipped topping in it. If you don’t care about the calories and would rather have a really creamy shake, substitute half and half instead of milk. The recipe after the jump.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla
• 3 or 4 scoops of vanilla ice cream
• 1/2 to 1 cup whipped topping
• 1 cup (5-6 large) frozen strawberries
• 1 cup milk or half and half (or more depending on your desired consistency)

1. Place frozen strawberries at the bottom of the blender. Then everything else on top. Blend on high speed until a smooth consistency.

» Tell me… Do you prefer milkshakes or smoothies?

Last week Nathan was in Austin, Texas, for a business trip. The first night he was gone was… let’s just say, interesting. I woke up at 3:50 a.m. to nurse the baby. It was really cold and windy with high temperature around 40 degrees and 15 to 20 miles per hour winds. The heater came on that night. When I went to feed the baby at 4 a.m., I smelled gas upstairs. I checked downstairs to make sure I didn’t leave the stove on. But no gas smell downstairs. Then I knew it was probably coming from the heater and coming through the vents. It wasn’t really strong. I figured it could probably wait until morning.

Next Elle came into my room because she needed to go potty. I took her to the potty and I could smelled the gas more that time. With Nathan not around, I Googled the situation to see what level of emergency it was. We have a carbon monoxide detector in the house so I knew we didn’t have that. Pretty much everything I read online said I needed to call a heating and AC professional as soon as possible. Considering it was still in the wee hours of the morning, I called our gas company’s 24 hour hotline. The operator on the other end told me I needed to quickly evacuate the house and stand outside. She also said to not turn on any switches or use anything electronic including a cellphone. Although I was calling her using my cell phone. She was sending a technician out to my house right away but it was going to take anywhere from half an hour to an hour for him to get there. I was instructed to stand outside at the end of my driveway and wave him down when he got close to our house.

Considering it was 40 degrees outside with strong gusty winds, I changed my clothes and wore jackets. Then I gathered blankets and jackets for the girls. Next I woke them up and told them we had to go outside because mom smelled gas. They weren’t quite sure what was going on since they were still sleepy and just went with it. As we got out the front door, the girls were shocked by the chilly wind blowing them over. They started crying and complaining. I decided it wasn’t a good idea for all three girls, ages 5 and under, to be sitting out in the cold. So we went back in the house. I knew it probably wasn’t a good idea but I looked at my options and decided to back the van out of the driveway and have all the girls at least sheltered outside of the house in the van. I did so only because I knew there weren’t any gas downstairs, especially in the garage.

We were all sitting in the van at 6 a.m. awaiting the technician. He showed up 45 minutes later. And the first thing he said to me was, “Oh, you didn’t really have to wait outside.” Oh great. Thanks for telling me now. He said it was protocol for them to tell me to evacuate since they didn’t know the extent of the situation. And if the house were to blow up, sitting in the driveway in a minivan wouldn’t have helped. Good point. He spent the next hour checking our house with a meter trying to find the source of the gas leak.

I asked him if he could smell gas in the house and he said no. However, in school they taught him that women are more sensitive to the gas smell then men. So if a woman said she smelled gas, there was probably a leak somewhere. Of course he went around and checked everything and it all seemed normal. All except the last thing he check, the furnace. And sure enough, it was emitting gas through the heat vents. He turned off the gas for the furnace and told me I had to get a heating and air professional to come look at it.

Later that afternoon, the heating guy came. He saw that one of the burners in the furnace wasn’t burning at all. So it allowed gas to go through rather than burning the gas before the heat blew out. He said it should be an easy fix by cleaning out the burner. He did so and it still didn’t work. Rather, a footlong flame blew out of the furnace. He said the furnace wasn’t safe and needed to be replaced. He could be back the next day with a new furnace. It also turned out that our 5 year warranty on the furnace expired last October. And that night it was supposed to be cold too. Luckily we have two furnaces in our house, one for upstairs and the other for downstairs. That night I turned the heat up a few degrees higher than normal so the heat from downstairs could travel up. We survived and the new furnace was installed the next day. Since then, it has been really hot. In fact, this week it is supposed to be around 90 degrees. Nice. We’ll use our new furnace next winter!

» Tell me… Does it seem like emergencies always happen when the husband is out of town? Have you had any emergency experiences where it required you to evacuate your home?

I love to eat strawberries on lots of things. We put strawberries in or on…

1. Water. A fun way to color your water and give it a little taste is dump sliced strawberries and lemon into a pitcher of water and ice. Or instead of using ice, chill your water with frozen strawberries (cut the stems) and grapes. It wouldn’t hurt to toss in a few fresh mint leaves too.
2. Ice cream. Fresh or frozen. With simple vanilla ice cream. Prefect summer treat.
3. Sweetened condensed milk. Strawberries and cream. Skip the whipped cream and instead put a tablespoon of sweetened condense milk in a big bowl of fresh strawberries.
4. Salad. I don’t mind a sweet salad with strawberries, spinach, walnuts and a vignette. Simple, easy and quick.
5. Parfait. Vanilla greek yogurt, granola, chopped nuts and a few other types of berries. Layer and devour.

» Tell me… How do you like to eat your strawberries?

Nathan had been gone earlier this week on a business trip. He was in Austin for a conference. Rough life, right? I’ve always wanted to see Austin. When we dropped Nathan off at the airport on Sunday the girls had a rough time seeing dad leave. So they were pretty excited to go pick him up at the airport yesterday.

» Tell me… Do your children have a hard time when they see a parent leave?

Yesterday I showed you how to make strawberry freezer jam with regular pectin. Well, I decided to attempt freezer jam using the less sugar pectin too. Those of you who know me or have read the blog for a long time, you know I’m not big on lots of sugar. So when I saw there was a less sugar version of freezer jam, I decided to try it too.

So here’s the difference between the regular freezer jam and low sugar freezer jam. There is a difference in the process of making it which I will show you below. And when making the strawberry freezer jams using less sugar pectin recipe there is 1 cup less sugar but more strawberries. Therefore, just because it says less sugar, it still tastes pretty sweet because it uses more strawberries. And lastly, this version made a little more jam than the regular pectin recipe. I filled two 12-ounce jars and four 8-ounce jars with this less sugar recipe.

Ingredients:

From the Sure Jell recipe

• 1 box of less sugar pectin
• 4 cups of strawberries, crushed
• 3 cups sugar
• 1 cup water

1. Measure the ingredients exactly. To crush the strawberries, see instructions in the strawberry freezer jam tutorial step 3. Have the crushed strawberries in one bowl and put the sugar in a large saucepan. It needs to be large enough to eventually add the strawberry into the pan.

2. Pour the box of pectin in the sugar. Mix it well in the large saucepan.

3. Stir the water into the sugar and pectin mixture. Bring the mixture to a boil on medium-high heat. Stir constantly. Allow it boil and stir for about 1 minute.

4. Remove from heat. Quickly add the crushed strawberries to the sugar mixture. Stir for a minute or until mixed well.

5. Pour in jars. Leave about half inch room at the top for the jam to expand during freezing. Let it sit at room temperature for 24 hours. Then freeze for up to 1 year or keep in refrigerator for 3 months. And done!

» Tell me… When you grocery shop, do you look at the ingredients and sugar contents of food you buy?

I love homemade jams but have always been too intimidated by it to make it myself. But my friend Julia talked me into trying to make it myself this year. She convinced me that it wasn’t hard at all and I could totally do it. She was right. I was impressed by how simple it was!

Because we went to the strawberry farm and picked 20 pounds of strawberry I used some of it to make jam. I’m not a fan of the store bought stuff. Doesn’t taste good at all. I figured out that it is actually cheaper to make my own jam and enjoy fresh strawberry goodness in a jar for a long time. I would only have to do it once a year because one box of regular pectin filled six 8-ounce jars. That’s enough to last us a year.

When I asked around, everyone liked the jam recipe provided in the box of Sure Jell pectin. I skipped over the regular jam portion of the instructions and went straight for the freezer jam instructions. The difference is regular jam you cook the fruit. Freezer jam you just mash the fresh fruit and use it as is. Even easier!

I’ll show you how easy this is. And if you never made jam before, you will want to after reading this post. It didn’t take long either. Maybe 1 to 1 1/2 hour tops.

Ingredients:

From the Sure Jell recipe

• 2 cups mashed strawberries
• 4 cups sugar
• 1 box pectin
• 3/4 cup water

1. Wash the strawberries.

2. Cut off the stems. No need to chop or cut into smaller pieces.

3. Mash the strawberries. The box recommends using a potato masher and doing it by hand. I prefer the faster way where I toss about a cup of strawberries in the blender and gently blend it on a low speed into a mashed consistency. Leaving strawberry chunks because I like my jam with chunks.

4. Measure the ingredients exactly.

5. In a large bowl, mix the mashed strawberries with the sugar. Let it sit for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

6. After waiting for the strawberry mix, start on this next part. In a small sauce pan, mix the water and pectin. Bring it to a boil on high heat. Stirring constantly. Allow it to boil for about 4 minutes.

7. Pour the pectin mixture into the strawberry mixture. Stir and mix well for about 2 minutes.

8. Pour into the jars but not all the way. Leave some room for expansion during freezing process. Cover and allow it to set in room temperature for 24 hours. Then put in freezer. It keeps in the freezer for 1 year. And done!

» Tell me… Do you make your own jam? Have you found a kind of store bought jam that you really love?

I have been watched the weather all week. Nathan and I had planned a strawberry trip a while ago but the forecast called for thunderstorm and scattered shower on that day. Last year we didn’t make it to the strawberry farm because of rain. So I was really hoping the weather would be on our side this year. And it was. It turned out to be the perfect day for picking strawberries. A bit overcast with no rain.

Strawberry picking season doesn’t usually start until now. However, spring hit the South early this year and the strawberry farm had already been open for picking for four weeks. I just hope this doesn’t mean the summer is going to be scorching hot.

It has been a while since I’ve talked about baby Eve. I don’t know if I can even call her a baby anymore. She will be 8 months old in a few days. What?! There are days when I just want to hold her close because I know she is growing up much too fast. So in one week she started doing all these new tricks…

• Went from lying to sitting. Yup. Just like that she started to put herself in a sitting position. Hello world.
• Scoot crawling. If that’s such a thing. She got on all fours then rather than using her knees to crawl, she pushed with her toes. Most of the time it caused her bum to go up in the air. But if she did that enough times, she would move.
• Pulled herself up. The only reason she is crawling is to get to her sisters’ toys or to get to a larger furniture where she can pull herself up to standing.
• Teething. Her top two teeth popped in. Her teeth count is now four. Ouch. (For me who is still nursing.)
• Said, “Ma.” Aww. Melts my heart hearing her say ma. She’s a mommy’s girl.

» Tell me… Do you find your second or third child learned to do things faster than the first child?

When we make pizza at our house, it looks like this. The kids prefer just plain cheese while the adults want everything on it. This time I put mushrooms, artichoke, red peppers and pepperoni. I would have added more stuff if it would have fit. I love artichokes and could eat it with just about anything.

» Tell me… When you eat pizza at your house, what toppings do you like and what toppings do your children like?

I hired my friend Melissa of I Still Love You to do all the fabulous design work. I have always been a fan of her graphic design works and so I knew she was the one I wanted to do the redesign of my site. She is so good at what she does. I wanted to update Simply Modern Mom to look more feminine and simple. So we changed up the colors, added pretty fonts and organized the layout to get better use of space.

Then one of the benefits of being married to a web developer is that Nathan put it all together. He’s amazing too. There are still a few things to put up and get working on the site. So excuse us as we keep working on the site the next few days. Feel free to explore around and let me know what you think. If something isn’t working correctly, let me know.

» Tell me… What do you like or not like about the new design?

When we got a deep freezer a while ago and I have no idea how we lived without one for so long. When I find meat on sale at the grocery store, I try to stock up on them. Much easier to do when I have a deep freeze. I was able to purchase large boneless, skinless chicken breasts for $1.67 per pound.

The best way I have found to freeze meat is using freezer paper. I have done this with chicken as well as beef/steak. Freezer paper works well because it is plastic on one side and paper on the other. Wrap your meat touching the plastic side. Then use freezer tape or in my case, I just used regular masking tape to close up any open ends. I also purchased 2-gallon size ziplock bags so I can put a ton of meat in one bag. Label the bag with content and date. Finally, I place them in the freezer. On the box of the freezer paper, it said it will keep frozen chicken for at least 3 months without freezer burn. And since the plastic side of the paper is touching the meat, you can peel the paper off the frozen meat without leaving any paper stuck to it.

» Tell me… Do you have a deep freeze or a second refrigerator? Do you stock up on meat or do you only do fresh meat?

Have you jumped on the Houzz bandwagon yet? It’s like Pinterest but all about interior design. I am one of their featured bloggers who puts together an ideabook each month on a topic or theme. This month I thought it would be fun to do swings, both indoor and outdoor. Hop on over and see some of the coolest and comfiest swings.

» Tell me… Would you ever put a swing in your house? Where would you put a swing?

Lately our Elle, who is 3, has been having a hard time going to bed at night. It’s a tough situation. She still takes a nap from about 1 to 2 p.m. No later than 2:30 p.m. But when it’s 7 o’clock for bedtime, she is not tired. If she doesn’t take a nap, she is pretty good about going to bed but extremely emotional and tired starting around 4:30 until bedtime. Here are some excuses she have been using to get out of bed…

1. “I hear thunder is coming.” Clear skies. Bright moon. Not a chance of storm in sight for days.
2. “I need to go potty.” Had already gone before bedtime. And this was the third time she went on the potty and nothing.
3. “I have an ouwie.” Hang nail on her finger. Took care of that.
4. “Kaye woke me up.” Kaye is in bed. Not a peep out of her. Or even already asleep.
5. “I need a drink.” Sorry. No drinks before bed. She’s potty trained through the night. Occasional bed wetting is why we still don’t allow drinks before bedtime.

» Tell me… What are some excuses, crazy excuses, your children use to get out of bed during bedtime?

While I was in Kentucky, I went out to lunch with my friend Julia for her birthday. Just the two of us and her newborn baby. We went to a delicious Cuban restaurant called Havana Rumba. Neither one of us had been there before but we thought it would be adventurous to try Cuban food. This picture was our appetizer, guacamole and plantain chips. Talk about delicious! This was my first time having plantain chips and it was yummy. And the guacamole was out of this world.

For my lunch I had beef empanadas and a side of creamy shrimp soup. It was a little heavy on the meat, but still really good.  If you are ever in the Louisville area, you’ll have to try out this restaurant.

» Tell me… Have you ever had plantains before? How do you like it cooked?

You can find me on Instagram by searching @simplymodernmom.