Baby Room Readiness

 Rachel has been so kind to allow her brother to have 1/4 of her closet space =) She is so generous =)

 Everything in here has been given to me second hand from friends or bought at a yard sale or consignment store.  

 My moby wrap and little bitty baby socks and hats are in the corner. =)

 I got this wire storage bin in the kitchen section at Walmart. It is supposed to be a freezer organizer. I am using it to store newborn outfits =)

 The wire shelf also from the kitchen section at Walmart it is supposed to help stack your pots and pans.

 Almost all of the clothes and bibs were given to me a couple of things were purchased at Other Mothers with existing store credit I had. I also traded some of Rachel's girl clothes on craigslist for a few boy things =).

 This boppy pillow was purchased from a yard sale for $5.

Now to find some time to paint so baby boy won't live in a pink room!

We have been truly blessed and our church is going to have a baby shower in January and I am having a hard time thinking of anything we truly need =) 

Home Birth Essentials

At 32 weeks time is ticking down to meet our new little miracle!

 My sweet midwife put together a home birth kit for me to use so I wouldn't have to order one myself.

 Lot's of stuff you would see in a labor and delivery room in a hospital like chuck pads, iodine, umbilical cord clamp, peri bottle, bulb syringe...etc..

I also picked up an extra set of sheets, mattress protector and 4 flannel backed table clothes to put on the carpet around the bed =).....A little excited now and praying for a safe and complication free birth!

Our Christmas 2012

Well Christmas has come and gone again! I am not really big on getting my kids a bunch of toys for Christmas just because I think it causes them to lose sight of the true meaning of the holiday. Especially this year since Chris' insurance business has been really slow. Christmas was not going to be on a credit card either! I was able to do a little shopping on black friday with a gift card I had from last Christmas that I never used all of. I only spent $15 out of pocket on all 4 children! Plus I got that back in Kohls cash so I could send a little gift to my sister and nieces. So I thought we would have about 6 presents under the tree for the kids; some pajamas and a shared toy for the boys and a purse for Rachel. Boy was I wrong!

About a week before Christmas we started getting boxes in the mail!

and more boxes....

The presents came all wrapped up from my mom and step dad.

The presents were bigger than the tree.....

They all woke up on Christmas morning and thought for some reason that it could only really be Christmas if it had snowed outside....lol =)

The kids were very excited!

Their favorite was the batman cave.

Rachel got 2 new baby dolls one of them is motion sensored and laughs every time you walk by or turn on a light. Sure glad it has an off switch on the back....lol!

We also got lots of gift cards and several checks from family! We are so blessed!  Lord willing we will be able to go home and visit family for Christmas =)

My Husband the Handy Man in Training!

We have had a high water bill since August! Over $100 a month for the last 5 months is quite alarming. I first thought it was from our pool. But then the fall came and still the water bill was high! I told my husband it was probably our toilet that had been making noise. He said no probably not from the toilet ( I was right of course...lol)....so we called our home warranty and they sent some guy from Elite Home Renovations out to check for leaks and we paid a $75 deductible for him to tell us the pump in our toilet had broken and he put in a new pump. Then the toilet still ran and so he came back and put in a new plug. The toilet still ran and the Home warranty informed me on the phone that if the problem was different than the original diagnosis we would be charge an additional $75.  We figured if they sent the guy out again and he fixed something else on the toilet only to have it run again we would be out of luck and another $75. Since toilets are only $90 at Lowes we decided to just go ahead and buy a new toilet. Installation was another $90 and so then Chris decided he would install the toilet himself......and after about 2 hours he did! So proud of him!

He needed the hacksaw because the bolts on the old toilet were so rusted they would not unscrew.

TADA!

Organization Inspiration: Cricut Creation

Since our laundry baskets are in between the dryer and the wall pretty tightly it was hard to label the baskets to be seen. So I used my cricut and some vinyl to make these signs on the wall =). 

Jr. Church Christmas Crafts

Chris and I have had the priveledge to teach jr. Church for the month of December. I was pretty excited about all the fun Christmas crafts that would help teach the children a lesson they could apply to their hearts =)

The First Week was making a wreath with the childrens cut out hand prints.

The next week we talked about how to make your sins white as snow and decorated snowflake cookies and cut out snowflakes!

We talked about how no 2 snowflakes are the same just like God makes all people differently. Then we had a contest on different categories of snowflakes like most beautiful, most creative etc...This snowflake from one of the sweet bus riders won "most beautiful snowflake"

The third week we talked about how the candy cane has many different symbols for Christ.  We made Christmas Cards with the poem of the candy cane inside 

                                                                Candy Cane Poem
                                                Look at the Candy Cane

What do you see?

Stripes that are red

Like the blood shed for me

White is for my Savior

Who’s sinless and pure!

“J” is for Jesus My Lord, that’s for sure!

Turn it around

And a staff you will see

Jesus my shepherd

Was born for Me!

Similar to the candy cane craft from week 3 today we used Candy to remind us of Christ =)

 So thankful for the birth of our savior and the honor to share the old old story with little ones!

Merry Christmas!!!

Potty Trained Finally!!!!!

     

Chris and I have had the most difficult time potty training our youngest son Joshua. He will be 4 in March. He is a big 3 year old weighing the same as his 5 year old brother and wearing the same shoe size. His development seems a little slower than my first 2 boys as far as potty training and speech. This made potty training very hard. As I wasn't sure if he just didn't comprehend that poo-poo needs to go into the potty or if he was being rebellious. I have friends that will tell you to just spank them when they use the bathroom on themselves. Then there are others who say to just wait until they ask to go to the bathroom by themselves.

     Well about 2 and half months ago I put Joshua in underwear full time except for bedtime. I just told myself I would try some potty training boot camp for 2 weeks and see how it went. This helped with pee-pee right away and he even began going independently about 1 month ago. The first month and a half of potty training myself or Chris would rush him to the potty when we saw him grabbing himself and doing the "potty dance". He has had very few pee-pee accidents and even wakes up most of the time with a dry diaper.

     The poo-poo was taking a little longer okay A LOT longer than I had originally anticipated!  We only had 2 times where we got Joshua to the potty in time for poo-poo. The other times which are too many to count happened in his underwear or in the bathtub.We made a bucket in the laundry room especially for the poopy underwear to soak in.

  I felt like I was trying everything I even researched online....lol.  Here are some of the things we tried to motivate our little guy to potty:

1)We rented a potty training movie from the library called "Potty Power".

2)We read "The Potty Train" book to him.

3)We got him a Lightning McQueen soft potty seat to sit on.

4)I played this little piggy with his toes while he sat on the potty.

     Nothing absolutely nothing seemed to be getting through to him! Then finally yesterday he went to the potty all by himself and came back and said "poo-poo in the potty" and was jumping up and down in excitement. I looked in his underwear and no poop! Today he did the same thing! I will tell you that he needs some help wiping his butt....however that is so much better than rinsing out poopy underwear! So I am really excited my 3 year old boy is finally using the potty for both pee-pee and poo-poo!  Has anyone else had a hard time with a little boy not going potty at 3 years old?

Christmas Program @ Bible Baptist 2012

We had our annual Christmas Program at Bible Baptist Church last night and the kids did really well!

I was so glad to see some of the bus riders participate!

There are 4 bus riders up there singing with the rest of the children from our church. 4 of the older bus riders were in the audience as they were "too cool" to sing with the the little kids I guess....lol.  4 adults came as a result of the bus riders participating in the program. So glad our pastor preached a good message on the free gift of salvation for all to hear!

Christian has become quite the song bird. Noah is standing next to him but you can hardly see him or hear him in the video below!

Happy Thanksgiving =)

1 Chronicles 16:34

O give thanks unto the LORD; for he is good; for his mercy endureth for ever.

This Thanksgiving I have so much to be thankful for =)! I am so thankful for my family, church family, and good neighbors =) I love to teach these little ones =) We read about the first Thanksgiving and made turkeys =)

Joshua and Noah working on their turkeys.

Christian and Saige(my little neighbor I am babysitting) cutting their turkeys.

Rachel pretending to cut her pilgrim.

I am also thankful for the opportunity to stock up on some household items at rock bottom prices!

 On my CVS Trip today I spent $26 and got a box of diapers, cereal, 2 lotions, nail polish gift set, batteries, 2 toothbrushes, floss, 2 candy bars, and some head phones.

At Walgreens I got 3 laundry detergents for $2.33 each! 2 girl toys for $3.50 each! 6 packs of batteries for $1.26 each! 3 packs of cough drops for $0.33 each! 3 chapsticks for $0.33 each! 3 scotch tapes for $1.26 each! 3 movie box candies for $0.66 each! 

Then Lot's of Freebies!

Free after Register Rewards deals included:

Herbal essence conditioner

Dr. Teal's Epson Salt

Kids DHA

Women's multivitamins

2 Scuncii ponytail holders

Carmex lip balm

Thermacare Heat pack

2 pack of Gum toothbrushes

Crest 3D white toothpaste

Plus I got 4 coupons for free redbox rentals!!!

Now I am looking forward to eating Thanksgiving Dinner with some sweet friends since our family is 18 hours away!

Happy Harvest =)

I love Fall so much =) cool weather but still nice enough to play outside for hours, pumpkin bread, hot tea, cute sweaters on Rachel, and lower energy bills =)

A friend of mine on facebook posted news that Hobby Lobby was a christian organization standing up against the Godless and unconstitutional healthcare rulings forcing all employers to provide insurance coverage for birth control pills that could kill a baby. http://www.charismanews.com/opinion/34322-hobby-lobby-ceo-christian-companies-cant-bow-to-sinful-mandate
So I knew  that I wanted to support this company the next time I needed some crafts =) So I went out and got some Fall decorations with some of my first babysitting  pay check=)  All of their Holiday decorations were 40% off =)

 This sign actually came from Walmart....before I heard about Hobby Lobby's lawsuit =)

 I planted some mums, they are tiny but hopefully next year they come back bigger =) The scarecrows were only $0.97 at Walmart.

 Can you see Rachel with her cute little crochet hoodie on =)

I put some pumpkins up on top of the cabinets.

I love this little turkey rake that says give thanks from Hobby Lobby.

Then this little flower pot turkey stick also from Hobby Lobby =)

John 4:35 " Say not ye, There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest."