Thoughts

Christmas was great, I enjoyed spending time with my family and got lots of neat gifts including a Hastings gift card, Blokus-my new favorite game, , Avon bubble bath, shave gel, chapstick, and hand lotion, Adventures in Odyssey cd set #2, a card table and chair set from my parents, and a dressmakers dummy from my hubby :)
I have wanted a dressmakers dummy for the longest time and am so happy to finally have one!!!

I also got a nice amount of cash and so far have used it to buy,

Bath and Body Works stuff


- Pink Stripped Tote
- Coconut Shower Gel
- Coconut Body Lotion
- Coconut Fragrance Mist
- Wallflower
- 1 Wallflower Scent Refill
- Look Ma, New Hands!
- Pocketbac hand sanitizer w/ holder
- lip gloss
- 2 Black Amethyst Shower Cream's
- 1 Strawberry Lemonade Body Lotion
- 2 Carmel Apple Foaming Soap
- 1 Sweet Cinnamon Pumpkin Foaming Soap
All for only $35 including shipping!

Tree Hut Shea Sugar Body Scrub










Cocoa and Strawberry Got Milk? Magic Milk Straws (the coolest things I have ever found at a gas station!)














4 Maternity tops and 2 dresses from Old Navy on sale for $55 including tax (free shipping).














Today I started the flylady baby steps. This is technically the second time I've started but this time I got all the way through step one, lol.

Alright, I must stop messing around and get some things done.

Have a great Monday!

The post no one should have to write

Last night I stumbled on the blog post of a woman whose 21 month old son died in a sudden and tragic accident http://roscommonacres.com/2010/12/in-memory-of-our-beloved-son/

Reading her story and watching the above video tribute broke my heart. It also made me aware of how wasteful my time is and of how much I take for granted.

I am blessed with a beautiful, energetic, healthy, 8-month old son. And if, God forbid, I were to lose him, I would regret not getting down on the floor and playinog with with, not reading to him more, and simply taking the time to cuddle.
I read a lot of different blogs with focuses on everything from crafts to daily living to leading a healthy lifestyle. But for all of my readings nothing, really, has helped me to live a more purposeful life.
And so, that is what I pray I will begin to do. I don't want to look back one day and wonder where the time went and why I took what I had for granted.

I want to live a purposeful life and I want to be proud of all I do.

No.

I'm a nosy person by nature; If I've ever been to your house I've probably looked in your bathroom cabinets. More than once.

I have a tendency to put myself into the middle of situations and to take things a little too personally when I really just need to step back and say no.

No, I do not want to go to your child's birthday party.

No, I will not help you write an email, you are 24 years old. Please act like it.

No, I will not tell you personally, this is the way everybody found out and if you don't like it then maybe you should take a long hard look at our friendship and realize that you have been backing away ever since I got married and had a baby.

No, I will not come to your Christmas party. In fact, I think it is very rude that we already invited you and your husband to our house on that night a couple weeks ago and your response is to throw a, no children allowed, Chiristmas party. Yes, I am offended by that and no, I will not be coming.

Whew, big breath.

Why don't I have the guts to say those things to people's faces?

(Another) One of those days

I have had enough.
It has been one of those, go ahead, just piss me off, kind of days.
It started out ok and then somewhere along the way it just fell apart.

I'm exhausted, I have the worst headache.

If E would just GO TO SLEEP I could take a nap to help my headache but noooo . . .

I'm doing a table at a ladies night out tomorrow so I'm trying to corall all my craft stuff and get everything ready.

I'm also trying to get the house picked up so that when Karen comes over tomorrow to watch E it won't look like a tornado just hit.

Oh, and then there's the laundry that I'm trying to finish which, own it's own, is no big deal. But combined w/ everything else . . . ugh!

Etsy Coupon

I'm busy updating and restocking my etsy shop and for the month of December I'm offering 15% off to my blog readers :)
Just enter coupon code TRABLOG12.

Cloth Diapers- the BG's

Just a quick post,
I received my Bumgenius! diapers and was soooo excited!
And then the excitement vanished :(
I received 5 pocket diapers, they are pretty good, more on those in another post.
I also received 6 Bumgenius! organic OS AIO's and 1 Bumgenius! organic AIO size small.
All the reviews I read said they were awesome, one of the best nighttime dipes available. Sadly, they are not for us. They barely fit E and they seem to be just as absorbant as any other CD we own.
After only 2 nights I have listed and sold 4 of the organic OS AIO's and the one sm organic AIO on Craigslist. I think I'll keep 2 of the AIO's to try on the new babe but for now I'd just rather have the cash. :)

Cloth Diapers: Part 2 - Getting those puppies clean!

From the research I've done I've found that a lot of people use a special cloth diaper detergent. Be it Rocking Green or Bum Genius most CD mom's have a detergent they swear by.
I've chose not to spend the extra money on purchasing a special detergent. Instead I make my own :0 I use it on all our laundry, not just the CD's.

Michelle's Homemade Detergent

1 bar Zote laundry soap
3 cups washing soda
1 & 1/2 cups borax

Place the soap bar into a small saucepan and cover with 10 cups of water. Cook over low heat, stirring occasionally, until the soap completely dissolves.

Put washing soda and borax in a 5-gallon bucket. Pour in the hot, melted soap mixture. Stir well, until all the powder is dissolved. Fill the bucket to the top with more hot tap water. Stir well.

At this point you can leave the mixture in the bucket, it will turn into a medium-firm gel and you would use 1/3 c. for a large load of regular laundry and 1/4 c. for a large load of diapers.

I like to transfer it into smaller containers. You can use old store-bought laundry containers for this but I prefer to use vinegar jugs. We use a lot of vinegar since it's my main cleaning agent so I've got a lot of gallon vinegar jugs hanging around.

To transfer it into a container you will mix 1 part soap solution to 2 parts water. You want to work quickly as it is harder to do once the soap mixture gels. One thing I do when it starts to gel is use a separate bowl, bucket, etc and a whisk to mix the soap and water together before pouring it into my jugs.

If you choose to dilute your soap and transfer it to jugs then you will use 1. cup for a large load of regular laundry and 1/2 cup for a large load of diapers.

This makes a LOT of detergent but it only take an hour or so to make once you get the hang of it and it saves a TON of money!!!


If you have trouble finding any of the ingredients you can order online. Also, I found my ingredients at a locally owned grocery store, not a mass retail store.

Good luck and let me know what you think!

True story

#1) If you go to bed feeling angry and unappreciated you will most likely take it out on your husband when you find out that he ate all the chocolate chip cookies.

#2) I currently have a line from a book stuck in my head. Some people get song lyrics stuck in their head I have the line from a book. I think it's from the book, "Dangerous Wonder" by Mike Yaconelli. The line in my head is, "Meet me in the crashing waves".

#3) Ethan went to bed for the first times in weeks without a major fuss/production. At least one thing went right in my day.