What Is A Mom To Do

Hey everyone, I just wanted to give a quick update. My goals are falling into place! Yesterday I was able to go out with one of my best friends and her two adorable daughters. Kara was so excited and we got to spend the afternoon swimming and having a good time. Well most of us had a good time, Kara is a little bit water shy so she wasn't too happy when I made her get in. I hope that she can get over that soon. It's no fun being scared, but I do know the feeling. Yesterday was also the first day that I have ever gone off the diving board! I have always been too afraid. I don't like deep water, but yesterday I didn't die and so I think my fear is ebbing just a little. Anyways, I am going to accomplish another goal today. Our church started a mom group for mom's with young children. And today we are all having an outing. We are going to play in the fountains at Crown Center then have a picnic lunch. All of this will be followed up with a trip to Kaleidoscope. I...

Wow! It's been a long time since I posted. So sorry. Have you ever had a period in life where you just feel like you are on auto pilot? I am sure that most of us have. Between our families, work, church, home, and anything else that we do it can feel like everyday we are just going through the motions. We are there but we are not really connecting. This has been me, and I am tired of it. But how do I fix it? Well, first off I admit that I have a problem lol! Isn't that the first step to a lot of things? Secondly, I need to figure out a way to make my time work for me instead of the other way around. No more being lazy! If I keep up a little each day then things don't become so big and get out of hand. I frequently tell myself that I cannot take up a new thing because I do not have he time. This isn't really all together true. Yes, when people look at my schedule they feel a little light-headed but there are a lot of short spaces of time in between that I could u...

Today I feel inspired! I will admit that part of this feeling came from me Needing to be inspired. You see, we are almost at the end of our groceries but not at the end of our week. This isn't a bad thing though! It means that I have been cooking more from home and eating out less, this in turn saves us money! So even when we had to spend $200 on the van this week I didn't panic like a normally do. This did leave me wondering what I was going to cook for today. I hate having to serve PB&J all the time, (even though I am pretty sure Kara can survive on it) so I started digging in the refrigerator. Eureka! I found soome leftover chili. Hmmmmm.... what can I make with chili that was different than burritos. I turned to my books for inspiration. I didn't find anything specific but I did start peicing an idea together. I took the chili and added a can of italian diced tomatoes, I wanted rotel but like I said we are out of just about everything lol. Then I added some ...

Hello Readers! I am here ending my busy day with ice cream and DWTS. Sometimes its the little things in life that make it all worth it. I feel bad for not writing. I guess that I was letting my general bad mood take over. You know how it is, job pressures (I am training for a management position yay!!!) and homelife can sometimes leave you feeling overwhelmed. And last week we added another thing, POTTY TRAINING!!!!! Kara has been telling me every time she potties in her diaper so I thought that it was time to start the fun. So we went and got the big girl panties and she even got some in her Easter basket and we set to work.  Day one: We started the day with our big girl panties and high hopes. We were very consistent, going to the potty every 30 minutes to try. We had many accidents but we stayed patient. Day two: After going all day with panties and just staying focused we rose to the challenge again on the second day. Same rules, but I will admit that it was a littl...

I know that I haven't written like I should. It seems that I have hit a bit of a dry patch. I was going through a really inspired phase. And like all phases it was just that, a phase. I am sure that it will be back. Even if I have to drag it back kicking and screaming! This little post is just the beginning of many thought that I have, thoughts that need to be aired out. I apologize if in the next few days this seems to be more like a public journal that a place to get cool mommy ideas. I promise that the fun and entertaining posts will return soon. I feel a season of change on the horizon. It is both exciting and terrifying. Now that I am beginning to see some light at the end of this tunnel I will begin writing again to tell the tale. Tonight though I think that i just need to rest. Don't think that I am all gloomy! I will leave you with some super cute pictures of miss Kara to brighten up the page a little! Kara got some very interesting glasses in her Easter baske...

Who loves to get up early on a Sunday morning and make cinnamon rolls for their family or church group? Well, I think that we all would like to deep down but in all reality it isn't very likely to happen. A couple of weeks ago I was feeling a little more zealous. I wanted to make something special for my Sunday School class. I had heard of making cinnamon rolls in the waffle iron. The idea intrigued me and so I set forth to experiment! First, I went to my local HyVee and got two rolls of my favorite quick cinnamon rolls with cream cheese icing. I just got the cheap kind. I'm sure any other brand will work too.  Then, I preheated my waffle iron. I also lightly sprayed it with PAM. I only did this once it didn't need it.  Next, I started putting one roll for each waffle square. I put the top down and cooked them until the steam stopped coming from the sides. This is what they look like fresh out of the iron. I put butter on mine and ate them plain. They wer...

Life has a way of throwing us curve balls. When Josh and I were dating events kept popping up that really tested our relationship. I moved twice and then Josh moved so that he could be with me. This took a lot of faith in God and faith in me. He left a pretty good job and moved to Springfield with no leads. The Lord came through, Josh landed a great job working in a local manufacturing plant. Then came our baby! Oh Kara, the light and joy of my life. She is such a blessing. Each day she teaches me something new. A new and pure way of looking at things. I owe her a lot.  Then in November of 2010 Josh was laid off from that really good job. Boom! We were left completely without an income and no one was hiring in his skill set. This led us to move in with his mom and grandparents. Moving to TN, now that I think about it, was just what we needed. We needed a chance to take a step back and try to listen for the Lord's plan.  We waited for several months for something to...

Yuck! The famous stomach bug has landed at our house. Fortunately, it isn't the kind that makes you want to die, it just clings to you and makes you super tired and icky. Because of this I did not go to work today. I hate calling in! I always feel like my boss will never understand, this is silly because she is actually really good about being understanding.  So if I don't need to feel worried I begin to feel guilty. Guilty that I am taking the day to lay around and recoup. I have a million things to do and Kara needs my attention, I can't just lay in bed I tell myself. Yeah, you know you have done it too! In that case I normally get up and do too much and make myself sicker than I was originally. Thus, the cycle starts over! Today I decided I would be good to my body and try to rest. But I still had so much to do! So to ease my feelings I decided to find things that I could do from either my bed or couch, all the while keeping Kara entertained. I started out working ...

Hello! You are probably wondering why I haven't posted in awhile. To put a long story short, I started a new job. The new job coupled with my already full schedule has pretty much monopolized my time. I am hoping that after the schedules get synced a little better I will have more time to write. We have started to got our apartment looking a little more like a home. This is mostly due to the exciting news that we have finally gotten a couch!!! I have been waiting for 3 years for this couch. (It's a long story!) We have also gotten some new shelves, crates, etc. . I will be posting pictures of our little abode as soon as it all comes together. As far as cooking goes, well..... I haven't gotten much done. We have been living off of some of my freezer cooking and whatever we can throw together at a moments notice. I hope to get back in the kitchen soon. That is an update on my life for now. Tell me what you have been up to! Has anyone started their Spring cleaning a li...

I love oatmeal. I could eat it most mornings for breakfast if I only had the time. Josh is not a fan, he thinks I am a bit old fashioned in some ways. In fact, one day he told me that only old people eat oatmeal! I know why I have grown to like it, growing up in a large family oatmeal was a pretty cheap meal to prepare for the whole family. Of course, mom would always add sugar and cinnamon and other assorted goodies to help spice things up a bit. But I digress.... In an attempt to eat healthier on a budget I began looking for some different ways to prepare oatmeal besides cookies and your typical morning bowl of goodness. I have found several and I am planning to make one or two each week and talk about my results here. None of these recipes are original with me so I will be linking you to their original authors, but I will add my own comments. I hope you enjoy the start to this new series. I would love to hear some of your favorite oatmeal fixins. Or maybe some of your favorite...

When I awoke this morning I felt like a little school girl, it had snowed in the night and it was still coming down! Oh how I had hoped this day would come! Kara has never really been able to play in the snow and so I really wanted to get at least one good snowfall before Spring. With all of the stress of the last couple of months we decided to make it a carefree day and we set out to the best sledding hill around. That hill happens to be at our church, Northwest Bible Church. And we weren't the only ones, there were several other children and parents from the neighborhood who had also come out to play. Kara had so much fun! I thought that she may be a little scared but after her first trip down with her daddy she was ready to tackle the hill by herself. My soon to be 2 year old is fearless! We played and we played until we were frozen and tired. Well, Kara was frozen but she was far from tired! She was not a happy little girl when we packed up to head home. Today is...

1 package Swiss Miss 1 stirring spoon filled with hot fudge hot water a sprinkle of nutmeg mini marshmellows (we like the freeze dried variety) Put all of the ingredients together in you favorite mug. Enjoy in front of a cozy fire, or wrapped in a blanket with a good book. This is pretty good! And although I normally try to make stuff from scratch this is something that my husband likes to make for us and I like being lazy sometimes. And if you by the Swiss Mimss at Sams or Costco its actually pretty cheap! Do you have a favorite hot drink? I love to hear ideas and new recipes!

Okay readers, you may have to hang in there with me tonight. I am not feeling to good I want to go bed but it's one of those things where I can't sleep. So I decided to take some time for myself to write and relax. I lit a candle, changed into my jammies and have slow music on Paandora. See, I am feeling better already! Yesterday was great day and Kara was being so good that I decided we would cook together! Now that is something we had not tried until yesterday so I was taking a big risk. I knew that we would most likely end up in disaster. I was pleasantly surprised though and we only had 2 incidents that involved tears. She doesn't really understand the whole taking turns thing yet. So by now you must be wondering what we made. I started out looking for ingredients for dinner but then I found a can of pumpkin. I turned it around and found that I had all I needed to make a pie! Pumpkin Pie is one of Josh's favorite foods. I don't really like it but because I...

Meet my husband Josh! This picture was taken in St. Louis this past summer on one of those really quick trips when we didn't have Kara with us. By quick I mean we were literally just passing through and wanted to take a few photos. That's one of the great things about Josh, he isn't afraid to go do things on a moments notice. He loves to live life and just go with the flow. It really helps to balance out my semi OCD tendencies. We met in 2007 when I was only 17, just a baby! We became friends then we knew that we were meant to be. We got married on September 20, 2008. The coolest thing about this story is that Josh is my first boyfriend. I had prayed for a long time that I would be able to avoid the whole dating game and all of the drama that comes with it. We do have our moments like every couple does but I have never wished that I had waited. Then along came baby! Our little Kara was born in March of 2010. Josh adapted so fast to being a daddy, much faster tha...

Hello Friends! I do a lot of my menu planning on different websites. I love stumbling across a new recipe. Sometimes I simply google the ingredients that I want to use then PRESTO! Well the dish that I am going to talk about today is one of those good finds. I will give you the original link because I am not claiming this one to be original with me, but I did change it some and after eating it I know there are a few things that I will do differently next time too. So here is the original link:  http://www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/browse-all-recipes/pan-roasted-chicken-lemon-garlic-green-beans-10000000780291/index.html And here are my thoughts, changes, and pictures: I really, really liked this dish! It was pretty easy to put together and cheap too. (Well, the original was a little more but after my substitutions it helped a little.) Instead of chicken breast I used thighs. (They were on sale for like 94 cents a pound whereas the breasts were almost 2 dollars a pound.) ...

This is Kara! She is my beautiful little girl. Born on March 11th, 2010. (Oh my gosh, that means that she is almost 2!) She really is the joy of my life. Before she came along I thought that I was happy in every way. Now I really can't imagine how it felt before, I love being a mom. True, there are days I question my sanity. And days that the housework never ends. But when she comes running up to me just for a hug its all worth it! As I write this it has come to my realization that I need to plan her party! I haven't even started, does anyone have any ideas? She loves Mickey Mouse so we may have something started there... if only we could go to Disney World! That has to be every little kids dream, I think we will wait one or two more years though so that she can fully enjoy it. So this is my entry for tonight. I will have more to come this week. More recipes and I will introduce you to my hubby! I hope that you are all having a good Super Bowl Sunday. -God Bless!

Okay! As promised here is my first recipe. I love grilled cheese sandwiches, I mean REALLY love them! You know how they are one of the main things on the childrens menu in most resturants, sometimes I would steal Kara's or order my own because they are just that good! I hope that all of you have had the simple joy of a perfectly made grilled cheese sandwich growing up. I could eat them everyday. My husband was probably a little tired of my lack of creativity though. So I started trolling the web for a more "grown up" grilled cheese. I tried several different mixes and none seemed to work. It was then that I decided to make up my own, pulling my favorite aspects ffrom different attempts. Let me tell you that I am not a girl who can just pull ingredients out and make a perfect dish. I need a very clear plan! I am hoping that the more I cook the more I can improvise in the future. I took pictures as I worked. Sometimes I get so frustrated when my dishes don't look ...

Hello Ladies and Gentlemen! And by Gentlemen I mean those of you reading over your wives' shoulder to see what she is interested in just before Valentine's Day, because we know that they all important gift is weighing heavily on your mind by now. But I will let that slide and maybe you will find me so witty that you follow me of your own accord! I am starting this blogging journey because I feel like I have something to give. I am a young wife and mother who has no clue what she is doing, I am an avid learner though and I want to share those experiences with you. I hope that you find this blog informative and enjoyable. It is my desire to make this a very open and honest look into my life and the things that seem to make it a little sweeter.  I love to hear thoughts and comments. If you have ideas for me, such as a new recipie or something that you do everyday to cut the clutter etc. please let me know! Maybe we can learn together.  My first recipie will be up...