Funny Days with Mommy and Maddie

Dulce de Leche Cheerios GIVEAWAY

2012-01-29T07:00:00.000-05:00

I have worked with Cheerios in the past. A lot. We LOVE Cheerios and I was thrilled when My Blog Spark asked if we would like to try the new Dulce de Leche flavor... ummm yes! I have yet to find them at my local grocery or even the peanut butter ones {insert sad face} so we didn't hesitate to tear into the box when they arrived.

I am not a huge caramel fan but the Dulce de Leche Cheerios are delicious! Similar to the other Cheerio flavors like fruit and chocolate the flavor isn't too intense. It's the perfect mix of sweet without feeling like you are eating a bowl of sugar. Make sense?

The hubby and I enjoyed a bowl as a late night snack and were tempted to go for a refill. Cereal is the perfect evening snack in my opinion. Anyone else? Brandon is a big caramel fan and after some thoughtful chewing decided he was a fan of the new Cheerios too.

We try to stick to Honey Nut Cheerios for breakfast so Maddie was delighted to try a bit of caramel before school! Err.. I promise she liked them, it was early, she isn't always happy at the breakfast table!

Cheerios also has some delicious looking recipes to make with their new cereal. This Dulce de Leche No Bake Cheesecake looks delicious... but I need more Cheerios before I can make it.

Dulce de Leche Cheerios Snack Mix- combine pretzels, nuts, and other sweet treats with Dulce de Leche Cheerios for a sweet and salty munching mix with a crunch
Dulce de Leche Popcorn Balls- Gooey popcorn balls that melt in your mouth as you bite into the caramel flavors
Dulce de Leche No Bake Snack Bars- Hearty bars with bits of fruit and nut for on-the-go snacking
Dulce de Leche Apple Bread- A hint of caramel paired with refreshing apple flavors that is perfect for any time of day
Dulce de Leche Cheerios Parfait- Jazz up your yogurt with Dulce de Leche Cheerios and fresh fruit

See Cheerios aren't just for breakfast!

So now you want to get your hands on a box of Dulce de Leche Cheerios too right?

One lucky winner will receive a box of new Dulce de Leche Cheerios, an orange polka dot cereal bowl, a Cheerios spoon and a Dulce de Leche scented Cheerios candle.

How do you win? Easy peasy, leave me a comment below of either your favorite cereal or your favorite late night snack! Don't forget to leave your e-mail so I can contact the winner.

This giveaway will close on Friday February 3rd.

Disclosure: The new Dulce de Leche Cheerios information, product, and prize pack have been provided free of charge by Cheerios and General Mills, through MyBlogSpark. All opinions are mine and exactly how I feel about Cheerios. PS I love them.

My Week in iPhone Photos {week 6}

2012-01-28T19:14:00.000-05:00

Week from HELL. Sick baby. ER visit. Sick mommy. Way too much laundry.

Sunday: Maddie and I started making her Valentine's for school. Early? Yes. I am always early.


A late afternoon birthday party left us far away from home at dinner time. Thank goodness for Five Guys!

Peppermint Oreos. Nuff said.

Monday: Zoey's chicken legs finally have enough meat on them to not allow poop to flow out of her cloth diapers.

Now starts the magic trick- see happy baby.

See happy baby run away. Wait for it....

Best broccoli ever. Who even says that?

Happy Pie Day!

Tuesday: Horse in the tree house. Obviously. Very Pippi Longstockingsish

Uh ohs. No more happy baby. Projectile vomiting early in the morning had daddy heading home for the day.

Non stop vomiting landed someone in the ER with her very own puke bucket.

She perked up a bit when there were cords to chew on.

Wednesday: After 24 hours of vomit I learned it was best to cuddle with towels. All the better to clean up with.

Pitiful baby.

I got happy mail though!

Aww someone smiled for mommy's new bag!

Thursday: Zoey got her appetite back in the middle of the night so spent all of Thursday drinking coffee. Lots and lots of coffee.

Maddie loves her chopsticks- even if she coated her stir fry in ketchup. Gross.

Happy baby! Finally!

Friday: You don't want pictures. I got what Zoey had. It was not pleasant or pretty. I also missed the hockey game that we were supposed to go to. On the bright side Maddie had a great date night with daddy at the game.


Saturday: After a week from hell we enjoyed the gorgeous weather and some frozen yogurt.

Fingers crossed this week is MUCH better!

Rub a dub, baby in the tub

2012-01-26T19:15:00.000-05:00

When we found out I was pregnant with Zoey we immediately started discussing how we would do things differently this time around. The main discussion was the STUFF.

Babies require a ridiculous amount of stuff. Crib, bouncer, changing table, swing, travel bed, bottles, diapers, clothes, blankets, swaddling blankets, wipe warmers, mini vans.... and the list goes on. We were not spending a boat load of money on all that stuff for a second time around.

The crib was kind of pointless for Maddie, we transitioned her to a regular bed at a year in a half so we skipped the crib this time and went with a pack and play with an extra mattress for Zoey. A life saver let me say, the first 6 months she was in our room and then boom bang we moved her to her room.

Swing and or bouncer? Maddie hated the bouncer and lived in the swing. This time we went big money and bought the expensive swing that plugs into the wall. Go figure, the kiddo could take it or leave it. Luckily we were able to sell it and get almost full price.

My big no-no for buying a second time was the baby bath. We used it at most a dozen times with Maddie, so really not worth the money. Of course I caved and ended up buying another one for Zoey. I don't even think we used it 5 times. FIVE TIMES. When she was super little Zoey got all sponge baths until her stump fell off. Then you hit the optimal time for using the baby tub but really how dirty does a baby get? It was so much easier to bring her in the shower with me and then pass her off all squeaky clean to the hubs. Then Zoey was big enough to plop in Maddie's lap in the bathtub and give her a quick scrub down. And now....

Big girl is splashing and playing in the tub with big sister Maddie. This kid LOVES the tub. Bath time is a big hit every night. Now the getting out and into jammies part.... oy.

So what was your biggest waste of money with baby?

My Week in iPhone Photos {5}

2012-01-22T11:05:00.003-05:00

Saturday: We refrained from hammering anyone's fingers at a Lowe's Build and Grow event

A trip to Target for actual things we NEEDED ended up with this in our cart.

In our defense it is crazy cute and we had fun building it.


In other news teething baby LOVES cucumber spears.

Sunday: The hubs made his mandatory weekend pancakes. They are demanded. And then devoured.

This NEVER happens.

Football at the park. Hubby is from Texas so football was destined for our future eventually.


Touchdown!!

Monday: No school, no work. I made mini chicken pot pies. AMAZING.

Tuesday: Err.... We went frolicking with unicorns over a rainbow and then dined on ice cream sundaes with leprechauns. I forgot my phone. Bummer.

Wednesday: Banana muffins by the dozen. I made a lot of muffins.

Maddie got a special delivery in the mail.

Zoey ate an entire muffin and then attempted to eat her sisters.

Thursday: I don't want to talk about it.

Friday: Zoey and I were bored so we sent daddy this picture. He gets a lot of pictures like this during the day.

Saturday: Despite NO sleep the night before I woke up and made bagels.

See! I MADE bagels! That's my no sleep, and still in pajamas face.

BAGELS!

2012-01-21T10:43:00.002-05:00

Did you know you can make homemade bagels and they are actually easy to make and even better they actually taste good?!?!

I am genreally pretty crappy at anything that requires bread dough, me and yeast do not get along. I was hesitant to make bagels but they looked so easy to make. So I did. And they are delicious!

I found a recipe floating around Pinterest this week from an actual bagel maker and he made it look too easy to not try. So of course I ran out and bought a giant bag of bread flour. I am compulsive.

You can find the recipe and a handy video on rolling bagels HERE but all you need is 6 ingredients: bread flour, yeast, sugar, salt, oil and water. The recipe calls for vegetable oil but all I had at the time was peanut or olive- I went with peanut and they are still delicious!

FYI these photos are craptastic since my good camera battery died last night while taking pictures of Z splashing in the tub. I forgot to charge it last night. Oops. iPhone pictures to the rescue!

I suppose the most time consuming part was kneading the dough but that only took 10 minutes so really not a big deal at all!

Then you roll cute little bagel snakes and loop them around your hand.

Bagels! Not perfect looking bagels but handmade and not from the factory bagel.

While my water came to a boil I chopped up some onions and dumped sesame seeds onto a plate. I have a container of caraway seeds but have no clue what they even are... Hmm... good on a bagel? Not sure.

The bagels boil for 2 minutes. EASY!

I quickly drained them on a dish towel.

Next the toppings!

Topped and ready for the oven.

After the first 10 minutes.

Flipped, ohhh pretty!

Ten minutes later my house is like a New York bagel shop!

I made these!!!

Delicious!

Now go! Go make bagels! Enjoy your carb filled stupor!

On a boat, near a goat...

2012-01-20T09:35:00.000-05:00

So boobs. Yeah, they have been on my mind a lot lately. It probably started most recently with the Target nursing scandal that had me in a bit of a tizzy reading all the comments on different news sites and Facebook news feeds, but this post isn't about that. Well I do have one thing about that- where on earth are all these commenters seeing nursing women "whip it out" and expose their breasts for the world to see? Some of the comments make it sound like the average breastfeeding mom pulls out a boob, plops it on a plate, and serves it up to the baby in the middle of a restaurant. If this is the norm I am clearly living under a rock!

I may not be that woman but I am a nursing mom. Watch out folks I am a nursing mom that nurses in public, without a cover! Go ahead pick your jaw up off the floor. Oh wait, I am like a million other women out there. I wasn't always this mom though.

5 years ago I knew I was going to breastfeed Maddie. It wasn't really a question, I knew it was best and I wanted to provide this wonderful gift for my daughter. And I did, for 6 weeks. At the time we were living in Washington (state) and all my friends, family and support were all the way on the other side of the country. Being my first baby I was I was in an unknown territory. I was the first of my friends to have children and I hadn't spent any sort of significant amount of time with another breastfeeding woman.

The ferry tank top. Not my first choice of clothes for that day.

I don't recall any specific issues with breastfeeding Maddie but I do know I wasn't happy. The leaking, oh the leaking! I specifically remember going out shopping a few days after Maddie was born and I proceeded to leak through my nursing pads and shirt. I was mortified. I hid in the car while my husband and baby finished the shopping. A few days later we were on the ferry headed for Seattle when once again I leaked. I planned ahead and had a spare tank with me but I was still embarrassed. I lasted 6 weeks before we broke out the first can of formula. I certainly do not regret formula feeding Maddie but if I knew then what I know now things may have been different.

After we moved back to Connecticut I begrudgingly made a new friends, hi Suzanne! I hate meeting new people, but my husband insisted we meet up with his buddy from work and his wife and it actually worked out. We have things in common, we have kids, we have husbands that get and along and worked together. Suzanne was the first person I was around consistently that was currently breastfeeding and she seemed to do it like a pro. Here was this cool chick who nursed her sweet son anywhere and everywhere without a second thought. On a boat, at the beach, playing marbles it didn't matter. If Evan was hungry he would eat.

I am crediting my (almost) 7 months of breastfeeding success to Suzanne. I didn't ask for her support but being around her gave me the (ugh) courage to nurse Z without any hesitation. If you need some boob support (not the bra kind- though if you need that check out this post by Mandy) Suzanne is your girl, she writes about boobs A LOT.

Things have been surprisingly smooth sailing without a hiccup so far. Granted now that I say that next week I am going to wake up with a wicked case of mastitis, Zoey is going to decide to start biting and my nipple is going to fall off. God I hope not. Zoey is my little boob buddie, we have our routine and it works. Although if you have some sort of miracle lotion to take care of the nasty marks this kid has left on the ladies from all her scratching and pinching please send it my way!

Milk drunk baby smiles for Santa!

And oh my the places I have nursed! On a dolphin cruise boat. At a bazillion benches at Busch Gardens. The playground. Chick-fil-a. Standing next to a concession stand at a baseball game. The zoo (next to a goat!). Standing in line to see Santa (milk drunk babies have great smiles for Santa pictures!). The list goes on and on. A hockey game will be added to the list next week!

Every new breastfeeding mommy needs a Suzanne or their own personal breastfeeding hero (she totally deserves a cape). It may not always be milk drunk smiles and tummy tickles but the more you know the easier it will be for you to figure out what works or doesn't work for you. Does that make sense? I am not going to say breastfeeding IS the way to feed your child but hearing stories of other moms and their struggles and successes may be what you need to make it work for you (if that's what choice YOU make).

A few days ago a link to the Support with Integrity pledge popped up on Suzanne's Facebook feed which sort of put me on this tangent in the first place. I pledged. Will you? I will be a mamma that supports your choice to the boob milk no matter when, where, how long, however you choose to do it.

Finding my footing

2012-01-18T20:02:00.001-05:00

It's no surprise that I haven't blogged much since Zoey has been born. Heck 2011 didn't lead to much blogging. I guess I feel like I have lost my place.

When I started Funny Days Maddie was little and we spent our days crafting and cooking in part to keep her occupied and in part to keep my sane. It was a creative outlet for her and it helped me feel like I was doing something with my day as a stay at home mom.

Happy, happy, happy. We crafted, we cooked, we explored. Then I got pregnant and lost my umph. We still crafted and definitely cooked but blogging about it felt so ugh. So time consuming. Then I had Zoey and holy crap did I forget how demanding a newborn is!

Then things sort of settled down at the house. We got in our groove and I didn't feel like I was always drowning. THEN Maddie started school. Our days start at 7am and are super rushed to get ready for school. We walk back in the door at 3:30pm just in time for homework and dinner prep. Then dinner, then baths, then story time, then bed. That doesn't leave a lot of time for crafting. Our weekends are occupied with jamming in family fun since it feels like we don't really see each other during the week.

I suppose I could fit blogging into my day with Zoey. Probably. Err maybe. But what to write about? Do you really want to know that I made banana muffins today? Probably not. But if you do these ones ROCKED. What about the complete over haul of Maddie's bedroom? Eventful for us yes, but for you? Not so much.

I guess I am in sort of a transition area at the moment. Not quite sure what I want to do. I LIKE blogging. It's a nice outlet. I don't really have a chance to talk to adults most of the day and my blog used to be a nice little space for me to speak. This certainly isn't goodbye but I think I need to THINK about what is next for my little space here in the great wide interwebs. Thoughts?

December in iPhone Photos

2012-01-02T13:34:00.000-05:00

I have been a horrible blogger. BUT I am not going to apologize for it. I have spent the last month with my family squeezing in every last little bit of Christmassy fun we could manage. I spent my days with my amazing husband and my wonderful daughters and I wouldn't change a thing. So instead of a lengthy post about what we have been up too I am opting for an iPhone photo dump from the past month. Enjoy!

We..... baked cookies, ran with the cows, dressed as an angel,

ate holiday pancakes, had some 'special hot cocoa', cuddled by the tree,

went to Busch Gardens Christmas Town, wrote to Santa, modeled new boots, checked out Lynnhaven Lights,

played Kinect sports, built Legos, ate Christmas paper, chilled on a zebra,

enjoyed peppermint popcorn while watching Elf, cuddled with Nanny and Poppy, had a lovely Christmas dinner, played with LOTS of toys, wrote tons of thank you notes,

finished a dress-up wardrobe project, snacked on fondue, spent a sick New Years Eve munching on Chinese take-out, were surprised by gifts from Santa,

ate an iPhone, modeled new winter clothes, ate Poppy's face, spent an afternoon at the Children's museum and snuggled with a bunny.

Hope you all had a wonderful 2011 and have an even better 2012!

Classmate Treats

2011-12-03T17:06:00.001-05:00

Its ALMOST time for winter break. HALLELUJAH! I need a break! And by break I mean I want to spend a week in my pajamas. I really don't think that is that much to ask for. Pretty please?

Well of course I felt the need to punish myself by thinking up something fantastic for Maddie's school friends. Maybe not fantastic BUT we made some little treats to send warm wishes to her friends.

Even better I did it on the cheap. Candy canes were a $1 a box and so was the hot cocoa. The biggest expense was $3 for a box of Hershey Kisses. Everything else I had on hand so for $8 total I made 22 treat bags with some supplies leftover. Not bad.

Before Maddie got home from school on Friday I prepped the little bags with craft scissors and printed and trimmed little tags to attach with ribbon.

Awww!

Child labor? Absolutely! Maddie filled each bag with one hot cocoa packet, a candy cane and 2 Hershey Kisses. A perfect hot cocoa treat!

Cute!

Nothing spectacular but I think they will be a nice treat for Maddie's classmates this winter break!

Week {4} in iPhone Photos

2011-11-27T09:22:00.001-05:00

Sunday: Sister cuddles!

It was a beer, root beer float and football kind of day. And Dallas WON!!! Barely.

Did you know salt is the cure for wine and tea spills? Yup. Its a miracle worker. Sadly that was the second cup of tea that was dumped that day.

Monday: Zoey ate a turkey. A hand-me-down baby's 1st turkey. It matches all the rest baby's 1st hand-me-downs she gets because I am too lazy to go find another one so they each have one.

Tuesday: Maddie is very fashion forward. In her defense it was raining that morning. I hate that sweatshirt also. Only because she wears it EVERY.SINGLE.DAY.

Wednesday: Thanksgiving preparations

Thursday: Why just splurge on a huge holiday dinner when you can cheat and eat donuts for breakfast too!

This kid was in heaven. Thanksgiving is a baby food heaven, everything seems to be mashed. She gnawed on turkey, crescent rolls, crackers and chowed down on mashed tomatoes, sweet potatoes, butternut squash and cranberry sauce. Then she pooped a rainbow.

I made my first turkey EVER!

Turkey comas

Friday: Maddie woke up demanding pancakes from dad and that our tree was put up then.

Baby's 1st Christmas hat and Baby's 1st Christmas doll. Hand-me-downs again!

Maddie has been begging to build her gingerbread house for a month.

This is why I made a turkey- leftovers.

Saturday: Great grandma had to leave, it was sad goodbyes for all.


And for good measure a bit of baby cuteness.

Do you have phone photos to link up? Stop by Amy's!

Send a little Cheer!

2011-11-26T18:23:00.001-05:00

The giveaway winner is...
tmc480

As many of you I am sure know we are a Navy family! I have completely lucked out and had my husband around A LOT in our 7+ years together for which I am extremely grateful but not many other military families have the same luck. The holidays are always a bit tough for me when I am not in Connecticut but having my husband here makes all the difference. Having him not home would be a tough one on me like it is for so many other families this time of year.

Weeellll the USO and Cheerios have partnered up this year to help spread a little Cheer to those families! For each Cheerios Cheer postcard mailed between now and November 2012 Cheerios will donate $1 to the USO to help fund programs that support military families. That would be a win win in my house! We live on Honey Nut Cheerios and obviously would love to help our fellow military families!

To kick off the campaign, Cheerios has already donated $150,000 to the USO and will donate up to an additional $100,000 based upon the number of postcards received from specially marked boxes now through November 30th, 2012.

Sending a “Cheer” postcard is a simple way to say thanks and lift the spirits of our country’s military families. So, take a moment out of your day to spread some Cheer and send a message of thanks!

Cheerios website: http://bit.ly/CheeriosCheer
Cheerios Facebook page: http://on.fb.me/CheerioCheer/cheerios

Would you like to win a Cheerios Cheer package? I am sure you do!

All you have to do is leave a comment telling me how you will be spreading a little Cheer this holiday season!

***This giveaway is open until December 2nd when I will pick a winner with Random.org Please be sure to leave an e-mail address so I can contact you if you are the lucky winner!***

Disclosure: Cheerios cereal, information, And giveaway have been provided by General Mills through MyBlogSpark.

Winter To Dos- Cookies

2011-11-21T07:00:00.000-05:00

We had a summer to do list but that one didn't fare so well. I am blaming it on having a baby and all. Then we did a fall to do list and I am shocked and thrilled to say we actually completed it. ALL of it! So of course that means a winter to do list is a must. Although to be truthful the majority of the list is local events that I want to go to and this was the best way for me to remember them all!

This past weekend Maddie and I started on the list with BAKING COOKIES. Hmm I guess we can't really cross that off the list though because the cookies have yet to be baked. We made the dough though!

At 7am Saturday morning Maddie and I were creaming butter. That's just how we roll around here. Or it may have something to do with the fact that I have two children who hate sleeping.

We have been doing this whole eating good and exercising bla bla bla stuff but a girl still likes her fresh baked cookies. SO instead of baking a batch of cookies I make the dough and freeze individual cookie dough balls. I make a batch of basic chocolate chip cookie dough minus the chips and then add anything and everything.

Lately I have been splitting the batch into 4 bowls and making a variety of cookies. This time we did chocolate chocolate mint, butterscotch dark chocolate chunk, peanut butter chip and chocolate chunk. Yum!

Then I just scoop the dough onto plastic wrap lined baking sheets and toss them in the freezer. After a few hours I pop the balls into labeled bags and my freezer is stocked.

Cookies? What is YOUR favorite cookie? I need ideas. I need to stock the freezer a bit more!

Week {3} in iPhone Photos

2011-11-20T14:37:00.001-05:00

Sunday: Day 3 of C25K. Not bad. Not good. But not bad.

This what we did on Sunday. Nothing.

Oh my bad we played Kinect football.

Monday: Maddie decided that it is officially fall here in Virginia because there is FINALLY one tree with non-green leaves.

Yippee! Lego Harry Potter 2 came in the mail! I will be hoarding the XBox until the game is 100% complete.

Nice try kid. That's MY bed.

Tuesday: Some Christmas gifts arrived in the mail. Is it for YOU?

Wednesday: I went all Martha Stewart and made some Parker House rolls. Then I froze them for Thanksgiving. Hopefully I remember they are in the freezer and thaw and bake them BEFORE we sit down to eat.

I picked Maddie up from school and Zoey mauled a zebra.

Thursday: It was cold and rainy so I hunkered down in the house with coffee.

Then I made a table runner and Brandon brought me home Starbucks. DOUBLE coffee day! Score!

The hubs was feeling bad about his late nights all week so he took us out to Red Robin for dinner. Burgers and no cooking for me? Score!

Friday: The Muppets have been invading our TV lately so Maddie and I spent the morning before school watching YouTube Muppet videos.

After dinner I made Brandon help me move furniture around so that I can prepare for Thanksgiving. GAH! Thanksgiving! At my house! I have never cooked a turkey before. Save me!

Saturday: The plan was to NOT disturb the babies napping schedule so we spent the morning in pajamas doing nothing. It was nice.

We surprised the girls with a trip to the local mall to visit Santa and the arctic wonderland exhibit. It was even snowing fake snow!


I picked up some treats for Maddie's teacher too. I figure packaged up with some homemade cinnamon butter it can make a nice treat for winter break.

Did you take phone photos this week? Link up with Amy!

Week 2 in iPhone Photos

2011-11-12T18:05:00.003-05:00

Sunday: It appears all we did was eat corn chowder. With goldfish crackers. They are the only crackers we have in our house.

Oh yeah we watched Muppet Treasure Island too. WE got halfway through the movie when Maddie finally asked "So where are the muppets?" Oh what a deprived child.

Monday: Maddie only had 2 days of school this week so instead of my usual morning work out with the stroller I had to dust off the coat rack err elliptical machine.

Then we went to the dentist. Maddie LOVES the dentist. No really.

Maddie got a cute Hello Kitty hat in the mail. Hurray for Etsy.

Our evenings consist of laying in the bed with little miss talks all night long and....

playing Words With Friends. Which I generally suck at.

Tuesday: Still no school. So I dragged both kids around town to get an oil change and safety inspection on the car.

iPad to the rescue thankfully.

I was exhausted from running around town so we cuddled in bed. Well Zoey and I napped and Maddie watched PBS kids. Mother of the Year over here!!!

Wednesday: I made bacon, chicken, cheese and avocado quesadillas. Delish. My tip to you? Mix one packet of 100 calorie Wholly Guacamole with a spoonful of sour cream and lime zest- happy dance in your mouth. You are welcome.

Zoey likes to try picking my nose with her toes while she nurses.

Thursday: Maddie said this was THE BEST spaghetti and meatballs ever. It was. Parmesan herb meatballs with brown butter tomato sauce is ahmazing.

Bedtime stories.

Bedtime treats for mommy and daddy. Ticket vanilla mint hot chocolate is delicious.

Friday: Typical morning.

Mah babies!

We spent all day Friday all over Virginia. Children's Museum? Check.

Baby farmer

Abuelos? Check. Avocado cream get in my belly.

Bouncy house? Check.

Movie night again! Pizza, popcorn and Cars 2.

Baked potato pizza. Nom.

Saturday: Hubs got called to work so I made blueberry waffles. He has to make pancakes on Sunday.

Target trip. I want this, and this, and this. Tell Santa! K?

WE brought home the Lowes Build and Grow kit and did science experiments.

Chinese food for dinner is okay when I will be dragging my butt out in the morning to go running.

Zoey tried to snag the last crab wonton before hubs.

Visit Amy's blog to link up your phone photos too!

Racing

2011-11-10T11:24:00.000-05:00

That's what my life feels like right now. I never seem to stop, always racing.

Don't get me wrong I was aware that things would change when we brought Zoey home. MAYBE I forgot how little sleep I would get in the first year but I knew things would change. I did have high hopes that once Maddie started school things would calm down a bit at home. Nope. Racing. Faster.

Zoey goes to bed around 9 or 10pm and at the 2 month mark she was sleeping through the night. It was awesome. Then something happened, I don't know what but she doesn't anymore. She awakes anywhere from 1 to 4 times between going to sleep and when my alarm goes off at 7am. Most mornings she is up at 6 and then starts to doze around 6:50am so there goes my last shot at an hour of sleep.

At 7am the race is on. I have until 8:15 to get Maddie up, dressed, fed, lunch packed, brushed hair, brushed teeth. Oh yeah and nurse the baby. And get myself into a somewhat appropriate attire.

8:15 Zoey gets loaded into the stroller, backpack strapped on Maddie and out the door we go. I told myself that the day Maddie started school would be the day that I would throw myself 100% into a self makeover. Every single morning I workout after I drop Maddie off at school. Most days I really do love it. Who doesn't love watching the numbers on the scale drop? It's awesome!

This past week I even stepped it up and now I am working on the c25k program. So now I really am RACING in the morning.

I end up getting back home around 9:30 at which point magically the minute I push the stroller into the garage Zoey's eyes pop open. Gah! Shower? Nope. Time to feed the baby again. Then play. Most days I can I get in the shower by 10:30 but that means I also have to sing songs at the top of my lungs from the shower to keep the baby happy.

On a good day Zoey goes down for a nap around 11am. 11am?!? My day is half shot already! Time for the next race- food, laundry, cleaning, figure out what the hell I am going to make for dinner and prep it. Blog? BAH! Clearly that hasn't happened much.

Zoey is usually awake by 2pm so its nursing time again and playtime. Then we are out the door again at 3pm to pick Maddie up from school.

3pm starts the most stressful part of my day. Pick up Maddie, snack time, start homework, start dinner, nurse baby, deal with crying cranky baby who refuses to take a small nap, back to homework, dinner is burning or raw because I forgot to turn the oven on in the first place.

Most days hubby is home by 5 for dinner at 5. Whew. Take a breath. Serve dinner, eat dinner err or eat dinner while nursing a baby. The hubs cleans up after dinner-thankfully, so I toss both the kids in the bathtub and then we all crawl in bed for story time until 6:30pm. Maddie heads to her bedroom at 6:30 and has a strict lights out at 7pm.

At this point in the day I am done. Exhausted.

I get to the end of the day every day feeling like I have accomplished nothing. Even as I sit here typing this I know that I am wasting time. I still haven't had breakfast (its 11:19am), I have clothes that need to be folded, I have been looking at the same band aid wrapper on my floor for a week thinking I REALLY need to sweep. Wait what's for dinner tonight?

Please tell me I am not the only one who feels like this!

Week ONE in iPhone Photos

2011-11-05T16:03:00.001-04:00

I LOVE when its time to upgrade our phones and this time we got iPhones so in honor of my shiny new phone I have not yet dropped (give me a week) here is our week in iPhone photos.

Saturday: The hubs came home telling me all about his new tea addiction. We just HAD to go to the mall and he just HAD to spend $100 on tea. In his defense it is good.

And now he is a refined tea drinking man. See the pinky says it all.

To prove he is not some new crazy dainty folk from London he took us out to Chick-fil-a

They gave us waffle fries we didn't order so we gave them to the baby. She likes to shove food in her ears.

Then we went home carved pumpkins and drank the tea. It is good stuff.

Sunday: See tooth. Oh wait, no tooth!

The tooth fairy dropped by

Never in a bazillion years did I think I would be awake on a Sunday morning and out for a brogak (bike-run-jog-walk) with my family. But we were.

I even smiled about it!

And he is just weird.

Monday: No mommy I don't want to go to school! Neither do I kid.

Madison had a storybook parade at school (so the kids didn't wear scary costumes to school)- her Fancy Nancy costume is a bit small.

Clearly Zoey wasn't feeling it.

Time to trick or treat! Maddie was Rapunzel and Zoey was a polka dot bear. Well technically she was going to wear her glow in the dark skeleton pjs but it was too damn cold for that.

Tuesday: I was supposed to run all sorts of errands that day instead I took the sleeping baby to Target, drank Starbucks and bought costumes on clearance for next Halloween.


Wednesday: This was about the 4th feeding of the day and it was only 6:41 AM. Zoey doesn't sleep much at night anymore. Neither do I.

On the bright side she is happy in the morning.


I spent the entire day like this with hopes that she would sleep at night. Nope.

Thursday: Naked baby ate peaches.


Not naked mommy ate left over beef and barley soup. I want to eat that every day forever and always. It was so good.

Despite having a baby that never seems to sleep anymore I still put these on every morning and workout for an hour. WHY??? 35 pounds down, that's why!


3pm every day begins the chaos. Homework. Dinner. Cranky baby. Baths. Books. Bedtime.


Friday: Okay maybe my sneakers don't get put on every day. In my defense it was raining. And I was tired. So tired.

Teavana delivery! Okay we may be we are a little obsessed with the tea.


I told you I was tired.


So tired the hubs took us to Gordon Biersch for dinner. They have triangle crayons there. Genius.

Saturday: We woke up before the sun on an incredibly windy and cold day for a 5K. What the hell??

Maddie even had her own number for her tot trot.

For the love of all that is good someone please tell me there is a better way to upload pictures from my iPhone or iPad into Blogger. I just spent way too much time e-mailing myself all of these pictures, opening them on my laptop and then doing the blog post. GAH!

A little fairy stopped by

2011-11-01T07:00:00.002-04:00

Miss Madison-

Oh my! Congratulations to you and your first lost tooth!

This beautiful tooth looks well taken care of. Good job on brushing your teeth!

I hope you like your new toothbrush and put it to good use. Remember- brush your teeth TWO times a day!

I hear you are headed to the dentist soon, tell him I said hello! We are pretty good friends you know. Well we are both in the tooth business!

Hope I get to visit you again soon!

T.F.

#Tooth Fairy

Pumpkins

2011-10-31T13:11:00.000-04:00

Daddy has skills! Carvings and baby holding at the same time.

Who doesn't love a pile of pumpkin guts? Madison. That's who. My job was cleaning the pumpkins. Blech.

We are super original and did a Z on Zoey's pumpkin with scraped zebra stripes. Not.

Maddie drew her Rapunzel face on the pumpkin and daddy carved. She did a great job!

I give up. Taking photos of lit pumpkins at night is not a skill a have!

She's In

2011-10-27T09:14:00.000-04:00

Miss Madison-

An alert came through this morning that you are now officially a member of the Loose Tooth Club! Congratulations! I thought it was best to give you a run down of the Tooth Fairy Rules now before you lose your first tooth.

#1 I only accept CLEAN teeth!

Make sure you brush your teeth 2 times a day so your tooth is nice and shiny for me!

#2 Leave your tooth next to your bed.

Searching for teeth under a pillow can be difficult for such a tiny fairy like me so if you could leave your tooth next to your bed that would be great!

#3 Forgive me!

Sometimes I don’t make it to every house every night. If I don’t get to your tooth the first night you leave it out I promise I will the next night!

I hope I get to visit your house soon and leave you a surprise!

T.F.

Tooth Fairy

PS Apples and carrot sticks help wiggly teeth fall out!

Wordless Wednesday: Monkey Hat Baby

2011-10-26T07:46:00.000-04:00

Hat from Little Bugaboos on Etsy

Chocolate Banana Peanut Butter Muffins

2011-10-19T10:59:00.001-04:00

I am pretty sure everyone knows about the easiest muffins ever to make (1 can of pumpkin, 1 cake mix) and I have made them plenty of times but they got me thinking. What else could I use instead of pumpkin? Maybe the collection of frozen over ripe bananas in my freezer?

Why yes, yes you can! Please tell me I am not the only one with a collection of frozen bananas....

The can of pumpkin you would normally use in the recipe is 15oz which is just under 2 cups so for me 5 mashed bananas made 2 cups. Easy peasy.

Now this gets complicated: Mix 2 cups of mashed bananas with 1 cake mix. Any kind you want. I used chocolate because I had chocolate but I think yellow would be delicious and bring out a strong banana flavor. Spice cake would practically make banana bread!

Now I splurged a bit and tossed some peanut butter chips into the batter. Magic I tell you.

Fill muffin liners or in my case squares of parchment paper.

Bake at 350 for 25 minutes and then you eat. One or two. At least.

If you are nervous about these being too chocolaty don't be. They have a very strong banana flavor with a bit of chocolate thrown in. Which makes it a muffin. And healthy. I assume.

Sunday Morning(s?)

2011-10-18T09:33:00.000-04:00

Family exercise? If you knew me you knew that wasn't happening. I have mentioned before how much I HATE working out but I have been nonetheless. Every single day. Every morning I drop Maddie off at school and then I just go. I have been doing anywhere from 2 to 5 miles a day depending on what I need to get done that day. So if you see a crazy haired lady with a baby stroller bopping along to Glee music way too early in the morning it is possibly me.

This past Sunday both the girls let us sleep until 8am so we were actually feeling rested and decided the weather was gorgeous so why not go out for a bit as a family. With the bike. And the stroller. Not for coffee. Boo.

So we went for a ride/walk/pull/push as a family. As in Brandon rode the bike, Maddie was pulled in the trailer, I walked with the jogging stroller and Zoey slept.

Hmmm maybe having hubby take a picture was not the best idea. In my head I didn't look so completely ridiculous. In my defense I am working out though so sweaty and frizzy are acceptable. Right?

Sunday morning was enjoyable for all of so I have a feeling it will be a new 'thing' for us. Maybe not every weekend but probably most. Gah! What happened to my weekends of sleeping in, laying in pajamas, renting movies and ordering takeout? Kids.

A Day At The Farm

2011-10-16T14:33:00.000-04:00

We took the girls to Brookdale Farm in Chesapeake Virginia this past weekend and had a blast! I thought I was going to be sad this time of year and desperately missing my New England apple picking and cider mill but I fell in love with this little farm. The girls had lots of fun and so did I!

We picked pumpkins here. From the vine. Crazy I know!

Brandon LOVES putting Zoey in the carrier. I do not mind.

The quest for the perfect pumpkin. Or in other words 'Family Fun Time'. MANDATORY.

It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown!

These ones will work.

Rain boots at the farm. She is very fashionable.

Looks it's me in the glasses!


Giant horses with big bums. They were cute though and they were much better at backing up the wagon than I am at backing up the car.

We may have a hard time saying no to her but we definitely did not buy a horse.


Maddie de-kerneled corn. Is that a word? Probably not.


Fun fact: It only takes one day for the corn to dry enough to go through this 100 year old hunk of mean looking metal.


And then BOOM you got popcorn. I thought it was cool.


We bought this. And strawberry jalapeno jam (OMG SO GOOD) and blueberry whipped honey. Or to be clear it was lunch time so we bought food we couldn't actually eat at that moment.

Infantino Review & GIVEAWAY

2011-10-13T07:00:00.001-04:00

CLOSED

The winner is.....
Kimberly!
Congratulations!!

Tummy time blows according to Zoey. Or at least it did. If I put her on her belly she layed there and either chewed on her hand or screamed. Fun times all around. Baby push-ups were not in her plans and she made that very clear!

Then Infantino and Mom Central contacted me about reviewing the new Infantino Right Angle Tummy Triangle. With a rather stubborn little girl I figured why not, it certainly couldn't be any worse than her nomming and on her hand and screaming.

Success! The Tummy Triangle is angled at a soft incline to help baby enjoy tummy time. Instead of shoving her little face into the ground the slight incline helped Z actually see something besides my possibly dirty carpet. The inclines uses gravity to help baby gradually develop upper body strength (all the more strength to escape me with....) and promote a sense of balance. As a side note on that one, once Z learned to roll over we had to watch her as she tended to be prone to rolling herself right off the triangle. Oops!

The Tummy Triangle also come with a musical timer to get in that pediatrician demanded tummy time. 1 minute? 5 minutes? Can she goooooo for 10 minutes?!?! Go Zoey!!!

The adjustable toy bar gives Z something to play with too. She is just reaching the stage where she is sort of kind of starting to reach for things and if it's a mirror this girl is all over that. Vanity at such a young age! The activity arch can be positioned 3 different ways and includes a baby mirror and a crinkly bee to play with. If you have some small light toys they could also be easily attached for baby to bat at.

Now to be completely honest I probably would not have actually bought one of these myself. The Tummy Triangle is definitely more of a nice to have baby item vice a baby must have item. There are plenty of ways to make tummy time fun and more comfortable for your baby and the Infantino Right Angle Tummy Triangle just happens to be one of those things.

The Infantino Right Angle Tummy Triangle is available at most Toys R Us and is available at ToysRUs.com and Amazon.com

GIVEAWAY!

Do you have a little bean on the way? Have a baby shower to attend soon? Just like hoarding baby gear? Well you are in luck! I actually won an extra Tummy Triangle at an Infantino Twitter party that I am going to give to you!

To Enter (Mandatory):

What is YOUR baby must have item? I like shiny new things so tell me what you just LOVE!

Extra Entries (Please leave a comment for each):

- Follow Funny Days From A to Z and let me know!

- Share this giveaway on Facebook and leave a link!

- Tweet about this giveaway and leave a link!

This giveaway will end on Monday October 17th. Please leave your e-mail address so that I can contact you if you are the big winner!

Disclaimer: This product was given to me from Infantino and Mom Central to assist with my review. All opinions are 100% mine... or Zoey's.

Wordless Wednesday: 7 Years of Wedded Awesomeness

2011-10-12T07:57:00.001-04:00

Photos are from my new anniversary gift- an iPad!!! Thank you babe!