Home sweet Home

Our Christmas was very busy, but wonderfully awesome.  We spent a few days with my sister and her husband, then went to my aunts house on Christmas day where we saw about half of my family, then went to my other sister's house for the night and morning to hang out with them and get a little extra time with her family.  We then drove home Sunday afternoon, and Monday started the daily routines! Back into school  for Lexi and I and work for my husband. 

Monday was also my first day of my "diet". Last January I started a diet and exercised regularly and I lost 35-40lbs before I got pregnant and gained that and then some. I still have one more week until my doctor appointment where they will hopefully clear me to start running and exercising, until then I decided to at least start controlling my horrible eating habits.  I have about 25lbs to lose to get to where I was prebaby, and I'm hoping to lose about 30-35 total we will see.

I was upset with how little we were able to get the girls, but by the end of Christmas they had way more than I expected them to have!  They got a few things from my siblings and we ended up finding an awesome deal on some Dora baseball gloves so they got those too. They were more than excited to get what they got, and i think we picked just the right things.

I was VERY happy with my gift- getting to go up there! There was no room in the budget or reason for my husband to buy me anything I was perfectly content with just getting to see my family. For the first time since we've got married my husband and I were more than happy to not get gifts! He did sneak behind my back and got me The Biggest Loser game for the wii- the stinker.

Well, I need to get cleaning off my desk, maybe I'll find the scanner software, yes both mine and my husband's desks are covered with clutter again. We're so bad about that.

Happy Anniversary!

This post is about a month late, but with all the mess with my health when Josiah was born I didn't get to talk about it.

November 29th was my husbands and my 8th wedding anniversary. Our present to each other was that we got to leave the hospital! :) I don't remember too many of our anniversary presents to each other, I couldn't tell you if we got each other modern 1st anniversary gifts or traditional or if we even got each other anything.  The only anniversary I really remember was our 3rd anniversary. It was before we had kids, My husband surprised me, had a dozen roses delivered to me at work, then picked me up, blindfolded me and drove me to an adorable bed and breakfast where we stayed for the weekend. It was wonderful. We're hoping to have another good anniversary for our tenth anniversary. We shall see!!

back to normal?

After 25 months of being unemployed my husband finally got a job. Turns out trying to start your own business is harder than we expected, at least during a recession.  God has provided every need and even a lot of wants during the whole time of being unemployed. Even in the times where I doubted and worried- which was a lot. 

He worked two days this week, before we headed to NJ to visit family. Those two days were the first time I was ever alone with all three kids, not only did I manage to survive, we even did school, kept the house clean and packed and loaded the car for our trip. I realized during one of those days that not only was that the first time I was really alone with three kids, I had pretty much never been alone with just the two girls! Caylee was only a few weeks old when he lost his job so I didn't have much time to even get used to having two kids.

I must admit, even though the girls are still adjusting to having Josiah around I love our family of five.

Gruene Steam Mop Review

About a month ago I received a Gruene Steam mop and steam cleaner, I immediately opened it up, put it together and tested it out. It took just a few minutes to assemble and get ready. I was impressed with the wide verity of things it could clean, fabric, spots on carpets, tile, linoleum, hardwood, grills, counters, sinks, toilets, windows, mirrors, just about everything. It was very easy to switch from one surface to another just by switching attachments.

It uses only water to clean, and you can use about any towel or cloth for the pads to clean the floor, which means you can just wash and rewash. The product is completely green, no chemicals, no trash, and it only uses a little bit of water. I filled the tank and did all my floors, the tub, sink and mirror and it only used half the water in the tank. It left my floors clean and shiny, and ready to let the kids lay on!

The thing that made me the happiest was when I used it to scrub the spots in our rug. Again it took no chemicals, just some water. I used it as a handheld cleaner- most steam cleaners don't give you the option to switch from a floor cleaner to a handheld. I have a two year old, a four year old and a 4 week old. My two year old LOVES yogurt, but doesn't always get the spoon in her mouth, my four year old likes poptarts, but also likes to drop pieces on the floor which get stepped on and mushed into the carpet. The cleaner took ALL the spots right out of the rug, in just a few minutes.

My overall impression of the cleaner is that I absolutely love it and I love it more every time I use it!

Christmas traditions

So far as a family we haven't had the chance to make any Christmas traditions, unless you count making a paper chain to count down the days so that we don't have to answer the question "how many more days until Christmas?" twelve times a day.  We normally travel to some other state for Christmas, which is why there are no traditions yet.

 This year we will be at my aunts house Christmas day, celebrating with my two sisters and their families, a handful of my aunts and their families and my Grandma. I am super excited to see all of them and eat some yummy homemade cooking! Nothing like your mom's family's food to make you remember Christmas growing up.

 One of my favorite Christmas traditions from when I was young was getting the Christmas tree. We'd normally convince my parents (with lots of whining and begging) to go get a tree the day after Thanksgiving, at least that's when we'd start the begging.  We'd go to a place where we could cut the tree down ourselves most of the time- sometimes that meant walking through the woods and my brother's climbing a tree, other times we did it more civilized and went to a tree farm, and occasionally we'd go to a place that already had them cut. Picking out a tree was never an easy task for us. There were 7 of us and we all had different opinions of the perfect tree. My idea was (and still is) the biggest, fullest tree you can find and fit in your house. you CAN NOT see the trunk if you can, it's no good, that officially makes it a Charlie Brown tree and WILL NOT be in my house. Unfortunately Lexi's second Christmas we discovered she is allergic (or at least was) to real trees and we haven't had one since. Our current fake tree makes me cry almost every year, i HATE fake trees, and it's an old hand me down tree. It's very naked.  When we finally picked the right tree, we'd go home and set it up. Then my parents always made us wait a day to let the tree "settle" before decorating it. Looking back now as a mom, I imagine they were just too tired to decorate the tree on the same day as picking it out. :)

Another thing we'd ALWAYS beg for was to open a present on Christmas eve. Sometimes our parents would cave and let us, but sometimes they wouldn't. Our Christmases growing up never included sitting around the LG lcd TV, or a TV of any sort. We'd wake up early, or sometimes all hours of the night, but weren't allowed to touch our stockings until 6am, and we could NOT touch any presents under the tree until everyone was awake. We weren't allowed to wake anyone up until 7 i think... and most Christmases my oldest sister and dad slept right up until that last moment that we attacked them.  Then we'd all sit around the tree, one person would hand out gifts, one present to one person at a time and we'd all watch (impatiently) as they opened their gift. There was no rushing things, no everyone jumping into the pile and ripping off the paper.  Sometimes it annoyed me, but now that is one tradition I like to keep going with my kids. It's nice to see the kids faces as they open their gift, and it's nice to have that moment last longer than 3 seconds. 

Then of course there was always the yummy food, whether we went to visit family, or had it at our house, I enjoyed my mom's home cooked everything. Cheese log, chocolates, turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie.... mmmm, I'm drooling just thinking about it all.

One week till Christmas

Are you ready? We're as ready as we're going to be.  We got the girls two toys to share and one toy for just them. This year we're really going back to basics, Eugene and I are remembering and hoping the girls are learning the real meaning of Christmas. It's not about getting an ipod touch, or waking up to a pile of toys bigger than you. It's about Jesus's birthday. About our personal Lord and Savior coming down to earth, leaving heaven and the perfect life of deity to be born a baby in a feeding troth in a barn. He lived a perfectly sinless life despite the mocking of people around him. He was beaten, spit on, whipped, had a crown of thorns pressed into his head, was nailed to an ugly, unfinished, rough cross, ridiculed and made fun of. He died a painful, terrible death. Luckily it didn't end there, he rose again 3 days later and ascended into heaven so that I could have the opportunity to live eternally in heaven with Him.

If I keep that in mind what more could I ask for? Why would I be upset that we couldn't afford to fill under the tree with presents, does anything compare with eternal life?

Growing

Josiah is getting so big. He was 7lbs 14oz when he was born, and dropped down to 7lbs 8oz at his smallest. A little over a week after he was born he was back up to 7lbs 13oz. 6 days later we went to the doctor because he developed a clogged tear duct and he was up to 8lbs 6oz. That's 9oz in 6 days. Amazingly faster than either of my girls gained. No need to buy human growth hormone for him!!  That was almost a week ago, I'm sure he's up even more now, his little belly is starting to pork out there and his once tiny legs are starting to fill out. I'm sure we'll have another chunky baby within a few months. Wonder if he'll be like Caylee and hit 20lbs around 9 months then stay that weight for over a year and a half. She was so huge.

Each time we have a baby I am amazed at how fast they grow and change, you would think with him being our 3rd I would have expected it. The girls are growing too, Lexi is getting so grown up, she's a big help with Josiah. Both girls are really testing us a lot lately, Caylee has become just a pure disobedient fireball. She is into everything she can find, doing everything we've ever told her not to do. Lexi has her moments of disobeying, but she is still motivated by consequences. Caylee has no concern or fear of spankings, time outs or going to bed, in fact, I think she welcomes the threat.  surely there's something that will work for her...

Christmas time!

Turns out having three kids isn't much different than having two, aside from all the laundry, being extra tired, and having two kids to keep out of trouble while trying to nurse a newborn. Oh, then there's the fact that you don't have time to do things like mail the Christmas cards because you're just trying to stay on top of everything and show each kid you love them!

  Speaking of Christmas cards, I was sent two Christmas thank you cards from Pear Tree Greetings, as well as some samples of Christmas Cards they've made. They are absolutely adorable.  My favorite is this snowman thank you card, it has the snowman on the front and on the inside top says "Thank you" and the bottom "Happy Holidays". I like it because A) I love snowmen, but B) it's just an outline, perfect for the kids to color and send to grandma!! 

The other thank you card I got is more sophisticated, perfect for anyone who needs a thank you card! It's also adorable, here's a picture of the front, the inside is blank.

The cards are very good quality, the personalized examples that they sent me of Christmas Cards were beautiful too!  I absolutely love their work! They do a lot more than just Holiday cards, they also do birth announcements, birthday cards (invitations too) Graduation needs, wedding needs, even labels, and every day cards too!

So if you're looking for any cards, go check them out! They even have free two day air shipping right now, so you could still order Christmas cards!