I'm back. I feel like I've been away from my blog forever but I know it hasn't been that long. Last weekend was my sister's wedding. I was the Matron of Honor and K, my 2 year old, was the flower girl. I was SO stressed all day trying to make sure everything was perfect and we remembered everything we needed to do. And the speech. Oh I was stressed about my speech. But the day was perfect. I got through my speech. I thought I would get through it without crying but NOPE. Cried through the whole thing. And what I thought was just a light speech with some humor apparently was more emotional because I was told everyone in the room was crying. So not what I intended. But it is over. We survived and had two very tired girls who had missed naps and had late bed times several nights in a row. So we spent the week recovering, catching up on sleep, and cleaning the house up. I was also busy prepping activities for my first grade religious ed class that I teach. This was our third week of class. I'll blog soon about some of the activities we've been doing.
On top of getting back into our normal routine this week, we also had a birthday to celebrate. Wednesday was my 33rd birthday! I thought for my 5 things this week, I'd pick 5 of my birthday presents to share. Can I just pause and say I HEART Amazon wishlist. My family started creating wish lists a few years ago - well not my whole family but a few of us have them and just add things we want as we come across them. I love having the Amazon button on my web browser because then I can add things from any site like gift cards to TpT or Etsy. This has meant that the last few years I don't have to come up with ideas when my family asks and I end up with presents that I love. Unlike my wedding and baby registries I don't check it to see what people bought so it is still a surprise.
Ha, totally random right?? I see all these yummy recipes for baked doughnuts but I never have anything to bake them in so that's why I added this to the list. I need to try some apple cider donuts while it is still easy to find cider. We love donuts at our house. Dunkin Donuts are my favorite. Chocolate Frosted Donut - yes please! So now we can make some healthier options at home.
I have a Silhouette Cameo and I love it. I have definitely gotten my money's worth with this machine. I use it for all sorts of projects (note to self: blog about the things I make.) I initially bought it for scrapbooking, but for my weekly scrapbooking layout, I don't usually use it since I try to scrap as fast as possible. But I make other projects and I love trying out all of their different specialty products. I can't wait to try these washi sheets. I use washi tape all the time. This is like washi tape but you can cut different shapes/letters out of it. So fun. I also got some sketch pens in a variety of colors. Instead of having the maching cut, you can put the pens in and it will draw the shape. I've used it a few times but I only had a white, gold and silver pen so I was limited to what I could write on. Now I have lots of choices.
Yep, I'll admit it. I'm 33 and like Taylor Swift. I've really liked her last two albums. Yes, a lot of the songs are about similar topics but I like them anyway. My daughter has been obsessed with Shake It Off. We listen to it all the time and if that upbeat song is any indication of the rest of the album, we are in for a treat! It doesn't come out til next week but apparently it will be showing up on my doorstep on Monday.
My awesome bloggy friend, Joya from
Live Love Serve Teach, has mentioned the blog
www.100daysofrealfood.com a few times on her site. I checked it out last week and am SO into it. I read a little bit of the background about eating healthier and what you should be looking for when you shop. Then I found out they had a cookbook and it went on my wishlist. I am so excited about this gift! I've read the first few pages that gives more of the background of what real food is and why this family opted to switch to a real food diet. I can't wait to finish reading and try some recipes. And I'm excited to change how we shop and eat. We generally eat pretty healthy and I make our meals from scratch but I'm learning that there are a lot of things that we think are healthy that are actually processed and refined and not too healthy. So while I don't plan to go to the extreme that this family did, I would like to make everything in our house healthier so that when we eat out or have a treat that isn't "real food" it won't be such a big deal. The recipes are so easy, healthy and kid friendly. I can't wait to try it out!!!
And number 5 is still a surprise. My husband and I are going out tonight for my birthday. I'm told I don't get my present until then and there are clues to follow to get it. So it is a surprise, which my husband loves and I hate. I just want to know. I asked him where we are going and he won't tell me. I said I needed to know how to dress. He said normal. Um like mom uniform of yoga pants normal? Like jeans normal? Like a dress normal? He loves watching me squirm! :-) And he prides himself on not needing to look at my Amazon wishlist to get presents for me. I'm just excited for a night out and a meal without kids. He thought about taking the girls but when I reminded him how messy, long and not very fun dinnertime is lately at our house he agreed we should leave them home.
Other than date night tonight, we are in search of a pumpkin patch tomorrow to take some 1 year pics of M. Then my college (University of Michigan) and my husband's college (Michigan State) have their big football game on Saturday so we will have to watch and root for our teams. At least now we each can dress one of the girls.
Happy Friday!
