its beginning to look a lot like....spring?

oooooo VA....You never cease to amaze me! It is December right? The last two days have been BEAUTIFUL!!! Im so glad that even though today started out really rough cause I didnt feel good that I got to feeling better and got to enjoy my kiddos and some park time.

I made a decision today that I am going to be spending a lot more time OFF of facebook. It is such a time suck...and for what? How many people on my friends list can I say are actually friends? How many people would I call to just say hi? Why do I sit there and wonder about all these peoples thoughts every second of the day? And I mean no offense to anyone cause I post some stupid stuff too no doubt but it hit me today how much time I waste on there. Time I could be spending with the kids or just myself. Time to think about which direction I want life to go and where I want my family to be in a few years.....time that I will NEVER get back to see someone post another picture of their lunch? (again no offense I do it too and I will be posting pics of food in this blog lol) so its time to focus on me. My goals. My wants. My kids. its time to be a little selfish and quit giving my time to others who dont even know im giving my time to them lol

so today.....started out rough cause I was feeling like cacapoopoo (its a word look it up.....I really hope you didnt cause obviously thats not a word lol) but when I started to feel better it got better. I got some time with my z man while lily was at school and aura was sleeping. He was making funny faces for the camera lol

and when sissy got out of school I made us some fruit salad for a snack. My kids drive me nuts with food.....they will love something for ever and then one day decide no I dont want that. In the fruit salad was apple,tangerine, strawberries,bananas and grapes all fruit my kids normally love and they took a few bites and walked away. I on the other hand inhaled it. mmmmmmmmm fruit salad (insert food picture here)

That entire bowl was full....and I will most likely finish it off tomorrow....I love me some fruit! after that since it was like 70 out we decided to go to the park. Anyone who knows me knows I hate messes....I hate the kids making them...I hate them being messy....I hate cleaning messes....im a little ocd when it comes to it....and part of this life change that im slowly making is to learn to let messes go. Im letting the kiddos help me cook more....im letting them do more crafts inside and trying not to stress about it.....its slow but im learning. so while at the park I of course was taking pics cause im obsessed with my new camera but there was some amazing piles of leaves so we decided that playing in them was a great idea. I loved the shots that I got of my minions and would have gotten better ones if there hadnt been a baby strapped to me but it was so much fun to watch there faces light up and the sweet expressions they were making having so much fun! dirty, nasty, germy filled fun lol. heres a few of my favs

ok so it was more then a few but there were so many great ones!!!! we eventually had to leave the park after one black eye....zaiden got in a fight with the swing....the swing won lol and a fussy baby it was time to head home for the promised "make your pizza" and have popcorn and hot chocolate movie night.  zaiden at this point was exhausted so it was somewhat of a challenge but we did have fun anyway. more pics from that :)


OMG THE BLOG THAT I HAD LOST SAVED ITSELF!!!!!!!!! I dont remember what I was writing though lol

Natural Minded momma on a mission

anyone who knows me know what an advocate for natural birth I am...and ive always like the idea of living natural and "clean eating" but never knew how or why or when to take the steps into that road. lately....and I dont know if its the holidays, or the move to VA or the isolation of the last few months but I feel like something is missing. im tired all the time!!!! I have no energy to play with the kids, I feel boring and run down and I just dont like it. I have 3 (yikes that still feels weird to say) active kiddos who need their momma at their best so I started thiking about what I can do to fix this. I have my friend (I call her hippie Katie and you can find her blog here- http://gypsymothsol.blogspot.com/2012_12_01_archive.html ) that I turned to for help and advice on this because she did a life change and ive never seen her more happy in her life....im envious of that hapiness. Im envious of her ability to really see this world and live life without fear of judgement and to just BE. im so jealous of that. Anyway...im not saying I will ever be totally like her or even go in that direction but I know im not happy where im at ( and no I dont mean in my marriage or anything....fear not me and mr bundty buns are great!) so here is to a new start in life....a new journey to get healthy and to be true to myself instead of feeling like im just floating around above my body. I dont know if that makes any sense to any of you but it makes sense to me. blog later when I have more time.



until tonight........

suuuuuuuuuuuper mom.....with a side of caffeine

so as most of you know (considering my blog is not popular and only my friends read it :-/) I have my mini gummi bear. she is going to be 4 months old on the 27th and she had decided lately  that mom doesnt need sleep. what is sleeeeeeeeeeeeeep....oh wait she sleeps alll damn day and then keeps my butt awake lol anywho she has been sleeping from like 9-11:30 and then wants to wake up and eat for 30-40 min...totally fine....I love that shes getting all chunkyfied. but she goes to bed at 9 and I cannot because of other kids and well im 26 and not 60 (no offense lol) so I want to stay up and have some adult time. in any case the last few days I have been going to bed at midnight or midnight 30 and she has decided 4:30 is a good time to wake up....eat for 30-40 min....and not go back to sleep til 6:30....well by then im wide awake so yesterday I decided I cant fight it so im just going to get stuff done. thus began the suze homemaker day......

For anyone that knows me (or has been to my house) I HATE putting away laundry. there is always a stack of laundry somewhere in the house cause im to lazy to walk it upstairs and put it away. therefore my husbands and my clothing was pretty much everywhere in our room. so I decided yesterday morning I was going to tackle that because he wanted to move my eliptical up to our room for me so I could actually work off this baby weight...yes im still chunky....no you cant judge me.  so anyway I thought to myself" fine God.....I will finally go and put away the laundry that has been staring at me for like a month" but then the thought occurred to me......2 of 3 children are asleep.....said non sleeping child will fall asleep if I stick a paci in her mouth (by the way im typing this and she just fell back asleep.....its 6:38 lol) so I decided to take a shower by myself, uninterrupted, as hot as I want and it was glorious!!!!! no mommy mommy mommy whatcha doin....mommy mommy mommy your belly is big are you having another baby (yes lily said this to me...more then once....ouch) and although aura cried for the first 10 min after several very cold trips over to her chair to replace the paci and shush shush shush her she went to sleep. it was AMAZING to get to take a shower alone....any mom knows what im talking about. so after the amazing shower I walked out in our room and thought "well crap I still need to put all this away" so onto my wifely duties of cleaning our room. I got 95% of the stuff put away before gummi bear woke up again....thanks gummi!!!!!! but then her crying woke up lily hahahahahaha by that time it was like 9:30am...I had been up since 4:30 with only coffee in my system and thought maybe eating would be a good idea. downstairs we go.

i was going somewhere with that story but I forgot where hahahahaa anyway I know most of my friends have pinterest (evil addicting amazing website) and I have been pinning like crazy on there. if you dont follow me you should its jenny jolley bundt I think...or jenny bundt.....im not sure...damn now I will have to look. but either way I have been on there like crazy looking for fun stuffs for me and the minions to do and bake. we loooove to bake!!!! I decided the project yesterday was going to be mini apple pies...well sort of. Here is the recipe that was the inspiration
http://cookinupnorth.blogspot.com/2011/09/bite-size-apple-pies-from-taste-of-home.html

but I tweaked it a bit to match us. one I didnt have pie crust and didnt feel like making pie crust so we used reduced fat crescent rolls instead. I cut up an apple after laying out all the dough and I let the kids go crazy sprinkling cinnamon and sugar all over the insides....yes it was as messy as it sounds. then we layed the apples in and wrapped them up. I put on the top melted butter with a little bit of vanilla extract in it and then sprinkled more cinnamon and sugar. followed the baking instructions on the package of crescents and just added a few min til it looked down. This was the promised treat after dinner!

now I had the bright idea to also make my laundry detergent while making this. oh I didnt say I was making laundry detergent. OK I decided to make laundry detergent. I am by no means this perfect 50's housewife that keeps a perfect house and dinner on the table every night but im trying to get better. one of my missions is to save our family of 5 some moneys and feel productive. I like experimenting and making things and it makes me feel all sorts of special when it comes out right. but anyway I decided to make the detergent. I pretty much used this recipe

http://www.themakeyourownzone.com/2010/10/homemade-laundry-soap-what-you-need-to-know-plus-2-recipes.html

except I used dove instead of ivory because....well I like dove and thats what the hubs picked out. ok so making detergent is really easy and the only time consuming/annoying part was grating the soap. That is a labor of love let me tell you. my hand hurt.....my soul hurt a little from it but it got done. I had to put it in 2 batches cause Ididnt have a pot big enough to hold all liquid but it still came out great! im happy to report it is sitting in a tub in my sink still geling up but it looks great! and smells so clean! I cant wait to use it and figure out if it works great or if I need to tweak it.

did I mention the amazing dinner I made? my daughter has become the pickiest eater ever...im not kidding...unless its mac and cheese or cereal she doesnt want it lately.....ive tried to add chicken and veggies to the mac and cheese and thats a no go...and dont get me wrong if she wants cereal for dinner one night a week and its been a hard day im totally ok with it but when I make dinner she better eat it!!!! so yesterday I was planning on pot roast, green beans and mashed potatoes. I had bought the green beans, had the potatoes and the roast was in the crock pot already. because of my soap making and apple pie baking I did not have time to do what I wanted to do and switched the plans up a little.  first the pot roast. it was just a small roast that I put in the crock pot with french onion soup, rosemary, herbs de provence, and some crushed mint.....yes crushed mint....amazing!!!!! the potatoes I had planned on making I ended up cutting into small pieces, boiling them first and them baking them at 350 for about 30 min with herbs de provence on them as well and then just did some mixed veggies. it was amazing.....soooo good and of course who refused to eat it. the lily girl. I had to remind her several times we had mini apple pie waiting and she would get none of it unless she ate her dinner. I HATE that dinner is such a pain in the butt but I know its just a phase. its just a phase...its just a phase....ok back to the happy place.

all in all yesterday was a great day...I love baking with the kiddos and showing them new recipes and ways to save money...like making your own detergent! hahahah can you tell im excited?  I dont know what projects will be done today or if any crafty magic will take place but at least I know it will be full of fun and im sure fighting with the munchies.

Until next time.....

Looking back.....

so im not normally such a debbie downer ( its been super bad since we had to move to va lol) but looking at all of the old pics from our life I cant help but be sad. I mean of course im happy cause I love seeing old pics and remembering those times good and bad but I am just thinking how different would life be if one thing had changed. theres a dr.who episode where one small seemingly unimportant decision changed her entire life and therefore everyone around her.

I wonder if that is how it is in real life. I know that doesnt really make sense. But lilys birth for example...anyone who knows me knows im a huge advocate for natural birth. Birth as God or nature intended. no interventions (unless totally medically necessary) and just go with the flow. But her birth I had so many interventions. im not saying they were done against my will. at the time I didnt know any better and trusted every word out of my doctors mouth. but its like could one decision have changed my entire life?

the saying is once a c section always a c section and with zaiden i so badly wanted to have a vbac but the closest midwife that would take me was well over an hour away and in the end we decided that was to risky. so we decided to go with the repeat c section. Zaiden ended up having fluid trapped in his lungs and he had to spend 4 days in the nicu. I didnt get to hold him til he was 4 days old....could that have been prevented by a vaginal birth???

With Auralynn...yes I went into labor at 29 weeks but I had to have her because my uterus ruptured.....I 100% dont think my uterus would have ruptured without my prior c sections.
I understand everything happens for a reason and there is a plan for everything so I am not questions Gods plan but its just a depressing thought that LIly was the only child I got to hold within hours...she is the only one we left the hospital with....she is the only one that didnt have problems when she was born.

in other news it was a great sunday....my hubby took the kiddos(minus the gummi) out to go play at the mall play place so I could get some much needed cleaning done. Its fantastic to have a clean downstairs!!! we then went to the park as a family with one of my besties aluria and another great lady named reyka. The only things that make va not suck as much is my family is here obviously but some of the women I have met restore my faith in humanity. Gummi even got to come out for a bit!! it was a beautiful day so that was really nice.

I also made an amazing dinner and dessert!!!!! 
dessert was a "cobbler" I found on pinterest and seriously its amazing and pretty low in points.
you take mixed berries (frozen) or any kind of frozen fruit and then sprinke a cake mix over the entire thing and then pour a can of sprite zero over the top of that and bake at 350 for 45-50 min. it was sooooo good!!!! I had to keep myself from eating the entire thing. ,mmmmmmm ok im making myself hungry again lol

until next time.......

First day of a new life....

or something like it :)

Today was the first day that we did our new schedule. and I will say the kids were super excited when I was explaining to them how the new day was going to go and even respected mommys one hour of cleaning. in the morning we had our breakfast and then did lilys homework and then we did a simple project of tracing their hands and looking at the difference in sizes and coloring them. they were both so proud of their hands and it made me so happy :)

I made sure my kitchen stayed clean, laundry got done, play time was done and even relax time. Made a great dinner and had a great fmaily dinner and some dr who time after. yes my kids love dr who dont judge us.

All in all it was a great day :) im so glad this schedule is going to help. I feel like we will finally be able to fit everything in that we want to and we can all find a balance. made zaidens 3yr well check and even filled out my absentee ballot so I can vote.

by the way my dinner was seriously awesome. pot roast, home made mashed potatoes and mixed veggies. sorry this is somewhat boring im holding a gummi bear so I cant type much. now if I could get her to fall back asleep I could get some sleep too :)

Until next time....

some changes must be made

this is most likely going to be another all over the place blog...and there is a reason all my thoughts are all over the place. I have ADHD. most people grow out of it by the time they are adults and I wish I could say I was one of those people...but alas I am not. Anyone who is close with me also knows I suffer with ...well I dont want to say severe anxiety but it is. I am managing it now without meds but some days are way harder than others. anyway im very much a I need a schedule and I need clear goals to accomplish anything and on the other side of that I hate having a schedule and hate being told what to do....lol so im damned if I do and damned if I dont. but I feel like things in my life are getting out of control and chaos and bad parenting are taking over.  to much stress, to much to do, not enough patience, not enough time ...im getting overwhelmed and anxious thinking about it. onto something else for now

my kids.....I love love love my kids more then anything in the world and would do anything for them. that being said I must put this into play. to be the best mom I can be I need to make changes. both of my kids have adhd...no they have not been formally diagnosed yet but I wouldnt throw that around just to say it. have it...my husband had it and both of my older kids show all the signs. and im not saying this is a bad thing....just not something I really know how to handle. (God bless you mom for dealing with me and eric) im trying really hard to change my way of parenting because yelling at them, time outs getting angry its not working. I need to find a different way to deal with it while keeping their sanity and trust in me and keeping my sanity.  Ive read lots of different things and gotten lots of different opinions on what to do and tonight I came to some conclusions. From now on there will be no more yelling. this is going to be the hardest thing for me because my first reaction is to yell when im angry.  its a horrible horrible habit I need to work on because I dont want to spend my life yelling. Also there will be a schedule. starting tomorrow we will be on a full day schedule with of course flexibility to an extent but on a schedule. I think it will help me and them. ive read that routine can help deal with adhd and make them more comfortable.

I know their lives totally changed when Auralynn came early. not only was/is mommy an emotional mess but we were gone every single day even though some days they didnt go with us. they didnt understand why they couldnt see baby sissy and why mommy cried all the time. and now that gummi is home and we cant go anywhere because she cant get sick I know that its hard on the kids and I wish I could change that. since we cant go anywere im going to make sure that staying home is fun. more crafts and more play time and less tv. I have a horrible habit that the tv has to be on all the time. I hate silence and need noise to focus. as weird as that sounds. instead we are going to switch to music. that way we can have dance parties and I get my noise its a win win.

diet changes in the house too. I dont know if we can totally follow the goldfein diet becuase it is really really restricted but I mean what harm can come from eating as naturally as possible? if it doesnt help with the adhd at least it will help with the health :)

the one who is affected the most is my sweet z man. I know that I call him demon boy cause he totally can be....and he can work my every last nerve alllll day but he is really sweet. he likes to share as hard as that is to believe, he is compassionate, he loves his family and friends and asks for them all the time. he just doesnt follow rules or directions and does everything he knows hes not supposed to and is so sad when he gets in trouble. I hate punishing him. I hate seeing his sad little face when he says im sorry mommy...I hate losing my patience with him. I hate being frustrated cause I know he is to. so changes must me made. I dont like the mommy I am becoming and I know they dont either.

I hope all these changes will help....I hope we can all find some fun staying inside. RSV and flu season is about until basically april so we have a looong road ahead of us. but anything to keep gummi bear ssafe and I know next year will be better......im not sure if this blog made any sense or not. its been a tough day. thats all for now

until next time......

phew! a loooong monday!!!

I know I always hear everyone say "yep I got a case of the mondays" but when you are a stay at home mom I feel like all your days mesh together and monday can suck just as much as thursday....and friday doesnt really mean much cause you are still on call saturday and sunday so I guess that saying doesnt really apply to me. not important or relevant to the post I just thought about that

anywho it was a GREAT monday!!!! I got to spend alllllll day with one bad ass chick who I adore and who has a pretty kick ass name....Jen :) lol its is so rare to find someone that you can spend hours and hours with and not get sick of or run out of things to talk about but I have found that in a few people in my life. Anyway we got to hang out all day watch the kids play, yell at the kids to stop hitting eachother, make fun of her husband (mine was at work so he didnt get the joy of being made fun of) and then jen and I got to break free of the children and go.....wait for it.....its really good.....GROCERY SHOPPING!!!! Yes tis a sad day folks when a woman gets excited to go grocery shopping hahahahhaha but I actually love grocery shopping. I love seeing how much im going to save at the end....its the little things people learn to appreciate them!
oooooooo one thing that was really cool is they were having like clearance on bakery items because they were getting a big shipment so like everything was .99!!!! seriously you have no idea how happy I was. Got lots of rolls and some sweet stuff for my hubby and some treats for the kids. I bought a lot so im going to freeze some...which brings me to another point....I bought a food saver for hubby last year...I think Christmas and seriously that thing is the best investment ever!!!!  If you like to bargain shop or are a hunter (which I am actually totally against by the way) you should get one!

but back to the point.....ok I didnt really have a point so back to grocery shopping....Jen helped me with my weight watchers goals and pointed out food that were low in points and good for me so I feel like I can tackle this weight watchers thing and not starve. Today was pretty easy. Here is is 11:30 at night and I think I still have  or so points left and I dont feel hungry. Made an AWESOME turkey burger for din din (seriously jen those burgers and the non bun bun thingys we bought were amazing!!!) and even had a piece of fudge.....yes I had a piece of fudge and it cost me 3 points but guess what it was WORTH IT!!!! lol

I got some diapers in the mail today which was another fun highlight of my day.....so I cloth diaper and I am obsessed with it!!!! There are so many cutee prints and styles to try its so hard not to buy them all! I feel like I need to get a job to support this habit.....but I guess its better then being addicted to crack hahahahaha

anytime I get something in the mail thats not bills makes me so excited!!! I wish I could be a pen pal to someone or had money to send all my friends packages cause seriously I love getting stuff in the mail and im sure other people do to. its like your birthday or Christmas you just cant help but be excited! especially if you arent expecting it then that is the best!!!!

I realize this post also doesnt really have apoint and hopefully as I get more into the blog I will have more to talk about or post but really this is to help me have a schedule, be accountable and just document what life is like because it is so easy to forget.

If anyone has any good weight watchers recipes they want to share then share them on here!!!

Until next time.....

heres a window to my day

Today was a pretty good day. Didnt get a whole lot of sleep last night cause of Gummi but last night we did family movie night.
I love our family movie nights because it is all of us snuggled in the living room on an air mattress with popcorn and drinks and cuddles. Last night we didnt really watch a movie we caught up on Dr.Who....yes our kids like Dr.Who cause they are awesome!!!!!
But back to today..we all slept in (thank you black out curtains) and then mommy cleaned for most of the day....The kiddos and hubby helped but they made a fun trip to wal mart while I stayed home.
Its so weird that with a baby you would really think they didnt take up that much time....yes im aware that sounds horrible but hear me out....they eat, sleep, poop and pee......thats it. they dont talk, walk or make a mess so you would think the job was fairly easy.....well ms Aura today decided she was going to fight every single nap lol so what should have only taken me a couple hours to clean took alllllll day. I dont mind cause she is adorable and if she wants me to nurse her to sleep well im totally ok with that. After not having her home for 7 weeks I think its safe to say I would do anything that little girl wants. Right now as im typing this she is nursing and looking up at me like "Thanks Mom.....this is awesome milk"  or maybe something sweeter like "Mom youre the bestest ever and I love you so much" either way she looks at me and my heart melts.

I made the decision today that I am starting weight watchers tomorrow. Little known fact but I have always had major body image issues....I have always thought I was huge and over weight even when I was skin and bones and way to tiny. Its something that I deal with everyday and even though I have tried dieting and losing weight I always get discouraged easily and give up leaving me in the same hole I was in before. its a vicious cycle. I eat because im sad and im sad because I eat. so i amde the decision today that I am starting weight watchers tomorrow. and im aware you can pretty much eat whatever you want on weight watchers as long as you count the points but I dont want to just skate by on points I want to make a lifestyle change. so I had to have one last pig out...I tried to talk myself out of it but I just couldnt....now I feel guilty (see vicious cycle) but im going to use that motivation tomorrow when i want to eat something bad.

I have a HORRIBLE sweet tooth...seriously I crave sugar....its a big issue. so im going to be looking for and trying out tasty recipes that are healthy and of course im going to blog about them.
Why am I going on and on about me starting weight watchers like you all care???? well  mostly because if I announce it on this blog and on my facebook then I sort of have to stick to it....accountability......so if you see me eating crap or hear about it I expect someone to say something to me. It takes a village to raise a child....well it takes a village to talk the fat kid down from the cake...so help a fat kid out k?

anyway we are about to put our kiddos into bed and me and the hubs and little gummi bear are going to watch the season premier of the walking dead.....yes our 11 week old is going to watch the walking dead...she aint scared of no zombies!!!!! Have a pleasant evening everyone!!!

Until next time.......

This is the first blog....its not interesting...its not philosophical....it was really just to see the layout and if I liked it. But since im writing this anyway here is the link to the blog. save it if you wanna read it. if you dont then I will pretend I care :)