Wife, Then Mama

When I saw Buttons Diapers, I REALLY wanted to try them.  They were totally different than anything else in my diaper stash, and they looked awesome! Alas, my bank account was near empty and I only had $22 in my PayPal account.  That was more than enough for a cover and inserts, but not for shipping.  So I contacted Amy at Buttons Diapers and offered to do a review in exchange for a discount so I could try them out.  She did way better, and offered to send me a cover, daytime insert, and nighttime doubler, free of charge, to review!  As if that wasn't generous enough, she also offered to host a giveaway for my readers!  So one of you lucky ladies gets to try Buttons Diapers too. Buttons Diapers are AI2 diapers (I believe, I am not a diaper expert, but there are two pieces, and no pocket, so I think all in two is an accurate description...).  They consist of a PUL cover and snap-in inserts.  They are one size diapers, fitting babies from 9-35 ...

I am not a great housewife.  In case you somehow missed that in all the posts I have written (or not written rather) this month. But there are a couple of things that make it look like your house is cleaner than it is. Shut everything.  Your house looks a lot cleaner if the cabinets are shut.  Same goes for the shower curtain. Make your bed.  Your room instantly looks much tidier. Collect all the dirty laundry in one place.  In my house this 2 minutes of work makes both bedrooms, the bathroom and the living room look much better. Stack the dishes.  My husband actually tricks me with this one quite often and it annoys the crap out of me.  Because if you take all the dishes around the kitchen (or house if you are as bad at housewifery as I am) and stack them in and right next to the sink the kitchen looks about a thousand times cleaner, without actually doing work.  Then I am all happy cause Michael cleaned up the kitchen for me, only to fi...

Yup, its official, I CANNOT blog about things 31 days in a row.  Or even like 7 days in a row.  We can't all be good at everything right? Anyways, I have completely ignored my schedule after the first two days.  It was to much, and to early.  I have however been keeping the house fairly clean. The other day Michael even said something about it, which is either an insult (at how I usually keep house) or a compliment, but I chose to take it positively. Since my schedule was not really right for me, I went back to an old stand-by:  FlyLady Bingo.  Now I love the idea of FlyLady , but because it is about making habits and I can't seem to make good habits for the life of me, I never get very far through her baby steps .  Plus she wants me to wear my shoes in the house , which is both gross and uncomfortable.  (Hmmm, FlyLady has 31 baby steps, perhaps I will skip one and do them all next month as a challenge.  You know because I love failing...

I was the happy receiver of a #MamaVoxBox from Influenster.  In other words, I tried this for free, but its still 100% my opinion. There were some pretty awesome products in the box, including a White Cheddar Microwavable Mac and Cheese cup from Annie's. I was completely stoked about this, because as anyone who knows me is aware, macaroni and cheese is one of my favorite foods.   Annie's has some fun infographics about cheese, including this one on the history of cheese. Cheesy! Anyways, I was really excited about this, and popped it in the microwave at lunch the day I got it.  The girls were a little jealous, but they survived. Sadly, I was not impressed.  The taste was pretty good, but the texture was kind of off-putting.  It is made with 100% real cheese, but honestly, the sauce was pretty slimy.  It wasn't super gross or anything, and I ate it all, but it was not really the quality I was expecting.   

See, I said I would have a giveaway for something that wasn't baby related, and I came through! Great things about this giveaway: This product is awesome! It is relevant to a wider variety of people It is open to Canadian residents Alright, review time! The DivaCup is awesome! It took me a ridiculously long time to be able to do this review and giveaway because I had a 99 day cycle right after getting the cup in the mail (for free, but this doesn't change my opinion!). So I had to wait awhile to try it out. Reusable menstrual cups sound gross, just like mama cloth, but they are actually great! They actually cover that on their website saying - "A common response we hear when we tell women (and men) about our product is “Ewww! That’s gross!”. With our culture’s fascination with disposables it’s no wonder this response prevails. However, once you take the time to learn about The DivaCup, and actually try it for yourself, you will be surprised at how clean and...

So, I am posting A LOT today.  Because I always forget to do the reviews from Tomoson until they write and remind me that they are due today. Anyways, I am a little bit neglectful of my dogs hygiene so she has amazingly long nails.  She also has not ever had them clipped. Daisy was NOT impressed with having her nails clipped, so I only did two of the twenty nails.  My husband wouldn't hold her down anymore because he had important things to do, like shoot down tanks on World of Tanks. I have always been pretty terrified of clipping my dogs nails, since I really didn't want to have blood spurt out her paws.  But these stainless steel clippers have a guard on them, so that eased my nerves a bit.  The clippers were really strong, and left the nails smooth. The clippers have a safety latch on them, which is good since they are on a spring (very good, I guess some clippers you have to pull them back open, which would be unpleasant). You can purchase the...

I have a confession: I suck at sending out greeting cards.  Other than Christmas cards, I don't really send any out.  Actually I might have skipped Christmas cards last year (if you are someone that usually gets Christmas cards from me and didn't, sorry, but I looked super fat in the picture on the cards) but this year I will be sending them! A possible solution to this problem is SendOutCards .  It is an easy to use system, starting with buying points.  You can either buy them as you go, or as a monthly fee.  Obviously the monthly fee gives you cheaper points, but it might be more than you need depending on how many cards you send out every month. The cards are well priced, with a two panel card can be as cheap as 62 cents, and even at the highest price they are only $1.98.  You can completely customize the cards, adding text in various fonts, decorative clip-art, even photos (there is an extra charge for adding photos). There is a large selection o...

I Just Joined Smiley360 So I should be getting more free products to review :) If you would like to join, click on the link above!

SUCCESS!!!! While I didn't follow my schedule, my house did get cleaned! For this I thank FlyLady Bingo !  If you have issues getting your house cleaned, I HIGHLY recommend FlyLady ! My whole house got picked up, dishes were ran, vacuuming done, and ALL the laundry was washed.  Sadly, I didn't manage to fold it or put it away, but I did change my sheets. Michael is going to have Saturday and Sunday off now instead of Sunday and Monday, which will be awesome for my schedule, and in turn for my house.

Wanna know a secret?  I am totally cheating and backdating this post.  I am actually writing it at 11:56 pm on the 12 of October. Anyways, "today" was Friday, and as such it was POPCORN PARTY DAY!  I did a tiny bit better than usual, but no where near well enough. I did however eat delicious popcorn and watch Enchanted with my two favorite girls (Hadlee and Miss Baby).  So the day wasn't a wash :)

Epic.  That is the word to describe this challenge.  Epic failure anyways.  I couldn't even manage to blog everyday.  Next week I will be restarting, but with a later wake-up time.  I can't handle waking up that early, I require more sleep than my husband does apparently.  Plus he told me that if I can't get up earlier than him and make him a "real breakfast" (sausage or bacon) not to bother because he doesn't like taking cold lunches and he can pour himself a bowl of cereal.  Tomorrow I will get the house back to clean, so that next week I can get back to doing things everyday.  My mom helped me out a lot while she was here, so the house isn't destroyed or anything, but it is cluttered. So for me it will be a 21 day challenge instead of 31.  But I don't have anymore planned interruptions, so I should get back on it on Monday :)

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I got a full size bottle of  Core  from  Immuno-Viva  to try out and review. Sadly, you are supposed to take 2 of them twice a day, so since I can't remember to do anything, far less to do it twice a day, so I don't know if it "works". They claim that it supports the skin, heart, and immune system.  It contains cold pressed black raspberry and black cumin seed oil (apparently taking 8 POUNDS of berries to get one HALF TEASPOON of oil.  It is non-GMO and full of Omega 3s. Like I said, I didn't take it well enough to vouch for its ability to improve my health, but I do have a positive (and very weird) word for it.  It isn't gross.  Usually vitamins and supplements smell horrible, taste nasty, and give you disgusting burps.  This one didn't.  It didn't smell great, but it didn't make you wanna puke either.  It didn't taste like anything really.  And disturbingly enough, it tasted good when I burped.  Kind of like tea t...

As usual, make sure you click on the pictures to enlarge them :) Carnation Milk  is still around.  In fact I opened a can of it the other night when I made macaroni and cheese and realized that I was out of milk.  I don't think we tend to give it to babies anymore though.  Instead we take all the fat out, add corn syrup and soybean oil, dehydrate it and give it to babies.  A big improvment? Tidykins doesn't seem to exist anymore, except on ebay.  Where they have snow suits for sale.  I like this ad though, I think its sweet :) Glendale doesn't seem to exist either.  But I do like these sleepers.  They are pretty cute, and available in "gay" colors. I don't know why these are called Little Ego's Cunning Creepers, in fact the name is pretty terrifying if you think about it.  I don't actually like this baby shirt/romper thing because the "non constricting waistband" (which means you don't need a belt-did babies really used ...

I should really give up now, since I am obviously going to be a giant failure at the Housewifery Challenge.  But, I won't.  Because I still have 25 days to get it right.  Plus the two days that I did manage to not suck, my house looked nice, and the day went well. I just don't do well with keeping up on things when I am not home all day by myself. Today was a nice day though, and although I didn't work on my house at all, I DID help Michael with some yard work this morning after church.  Then we went and ate dinner with our friends, and went back to their house to play games and watch YouTube videos (because we are all just that cool LOL). Tomorrow I will probably suck because its my birthday, so my mom is taking me shopping.  But maybe I can manage to do something :)

Have you ever had a day where you didn't do anything, but you were still exhausted at the end of the day? Today probably wouldn't have been very successful housewife-wise even if things had went according to plan.  But they didn't so I can pretend it was not my fault. Our car has broken FIVE TIMES since we bought it in like February.  It is a nice car, in theory.  But in reality it has cost us over $4000 in repairs, not counting this time.  It broke for the fourth time on Wednesday, when it started smelling like gas.  Michael figured out what was wrong and ordered the part, which my mom and I picked up on Friday.  This morning he fixed it.  He went to fill up the gas tank and the car alerted him that there was a problem with the fuel pump.  The light went back off, and he came home and told me to get me and the baby ready because we were going to trade the car in.  We cannot keep paying to fix it.  We already had to refinance the...

Well.  I am at a 50% failure rate for being a good housewife.  I couldn't drag myself out of bed this morning.  But it was Michael's birthday today, and so he didn't want me to make him lunch, because he wanted to eat out.  So it was a little bit better.  Then my mom, the baby and I got ready, and were gone all day running errands and shopping.  Good day, very unproductive. Tomorrow is another day, and hopefully I can get back on track.  

Well, the downside of having a blog that I update with my progress is that when I suck, I have to admit it to the world.  Or at least the tiny bit of the world that happens to read my blog. Last night our car broke, and so Michael borrowed a car from his cousin, but he wasn't able to get it until she got off work, and then he had to drive her home, so he didn't get home until midnight, so we were late to bed.  THEN Miss Baby woke up screaming for no apparent reason at 4:20 am, so I changed her diaper, and then snuggled her for about 15 minutes, and put her back into bed.  Which made her really mad, but she got over it.  So when the alarm went off at 6:00 I was NOT really ready to get up.  So I got up and made Michael breakfast and lunch, and promptly got back in bed. I still cleaned everything that was part of my morning routine, even though Miss Baby and I didn't wake up until 9 am.  I skipped getting ready, but I wasn't planning on showering today any...

Today's post is extra special!  It is a guest post, from someone very important in my life: My mom!  Since my birthday is on Monday I thought it would be nice to tell the story of my first birthday for Throwback Thursday, but since I don't remember it, I thought why not have my mom write it.  That and I am lazy, and any post that gets written by someone else is one less post I should be writing :)  My mom is a great writer, so enjoy! The awareness that a one year old does not necessarily grasp nor even enjoy a birthday party did nothing to dampen my excitement over celebrating my beautiful little girl's special day.  Money was tight, so it wouldn't be some grand event, but an afternoon at Chuck E. Cheese's with family and friends was on the schedule; it was to be a special and memorable day.   Special and memorable it was...   The day before her first birthday began with a trip to the doctor for a re-check.  Rachel had an infection re...

That is how I feel at 7:45 am when I got up at 6 am.  I was actually pretending  to yawn, but then it turned into a real yawn so I took another picture. Despite the fact that I was asleep by 10 o'clock last night, I still was exhausted when I woke up at 6.  I was pleasantly surprised by how nice my house looked when I woke up. My morning routine went REALLY, REALLY fast, because I kind of cheated.  I didn't have to unload the dishwasher because it wasn't full until after lunch.  I didn't start the laundry because I had diapers in the laundry, and then I waited until I cleaned the bathroom to start my new load because I didn't want dirty toilet rags sitting around for very long.  And I didn't quick clean the bathrooms, because my afternoon deep clean was the bathrooms and that seemed a bit redundant.  So I finished up pretty quick. In the afternoon I was supposed to deep clean all the bathrooms, but since the cats were locked in the kid...

Today was the first day of my challenge.  And I think I did a decent job actually. Honestly I almost failed before I even started when my alarm went off at 6 am.  We had not gone to bed until after midnight, and I am someone that LOVES her sleep.  But I thought that would be pathetic to admit on my blog, so I rolled my lazy butt out of bed and made Michael breakfast and lunch. Admittedly it wasn't a great breakfast (eggs and a brownie) but he had bought brownies with the intentions of eating one for breakfast so I figured he would be pretty annoyed with me if I didn't give him one.  I was so on top of things that I even got Michael's clothes together before he got out of the shower. Then I managed to do everything on my list except start laundry, because I thought I had done all the laundry yesterday in an effort to wash my new diaper enough times to have the inserts be absorbent tonight.  Later I realized that I could wash all my winter clothes, so I star...

In case you have not figured it out, I like to start each month with a giveaway!  Luckily I have had lots of super awesome sponsors lately that have given me amazing items to give away. To start off October, we are giving away a Hotsling!  I promise to have a non-baby related giveaway soon, but I just love baby stuff, so I love reviewing it!  As with most of my giveaways I was given a free product in exchange for my honest review.   Let me begin by saying that although I just now GOT a Hotsling, they are actually the beginning of my baby-wearing obsession.  Way back when (probably around 2007/2008) my friend Melissa  showed me the Hotslings website.  Before I saw them, the only baby-wearing experience I really had was my mom and dad's old metal frame backpack carrier that I would sometimes carry my sister in to go get the mail (I was only nine or ten, but it was only probably 100 feet down the driveway).  I had also seen people use the d...