One Long Weekend

I'm a little late on my weekend post. We ended up having a four-day weekend, thanks to some ridiculous, never-ending Houston rain. Fortunately, we had no issues at our house. So, to make the best of this extra long weekend, we did some shopping, snuggling, (lots of) grubbing and took a trip out to visit my parents and brother who was in town. Over there we celebrated Memorial Day with some really good BBQ, a game of spades, and just hanging out.

I also decided to try and make homemade baby food over the weekend. From what I've been reading, it's super easy and cheaper than buying jars. Since baby B is only eating a little bit to get used to the flavors and textures right now, I only used 1/3 of the bag. So, all I did was purchase frozen organic peas, steam them for 3 to 4 minutes, and puree them, adding the water from the steamer to help thin them out completely. Once it was fully pureed, I filled my ice-cube tray and popped them in the freezer until frozen. I popped them out into a large zip-lock bag and dated it. My big boy totally approved! :)

Brunch & Bubbly with the Bride

This past Saturday, one of my oldest friends had her bridal shower! Now, when I say "oldest" friend, I don't mean age-wise. She and I have been friends for about 20 years, so when she asked ME to decorate her bridal shower I was super excited! However, underneath all the excitement was a little bit of fear. I wanted to do a really good job for her, and have never been given full responsibility to decorate someone else's event -- especially an event with 40 people.

I spent a lot of time looking for ideas, and tried my hardest to not be overwhelmed - Pinterest can do that to you. Then, I came across a Kate Spade theme with pink, black, white, and gold, and I just loved it... So, that's what we went with! I tried to make a lot of the decor myself or save some money by shopping on eBay or at the Dollar Store and Wal-Mart. Overall, I'm really pleased with the way everything turned out - and Jessica was too, but let's be honest, she had no choice but to love it. :)

30 days until she's a Mrs.!

Thrifty Thursday

We're almost through the week - yay! I'm so looking forward to the three day weekend ahead of us, even though it looks like we'll be getting even more rain - boo. I'm hoping the sun comes out for a little bit so we can take the baby to the pool & this mamma can get a little sun.

I've always loved the idea of saving money and using what you have to make something great. Not only is it a little bit of a creativity challenge (who doesn't love a good challenge), but it also feels good to not pay top dollar for something when you know you can make it yourself. I'm really big into crafting and I wish I had more time in the day to do more crafts, so when I get the chance to craft, I jump on it. 

About a month or so ago, I was going through the baby's room and packing up all his newborn clothes. I was in total denial that he couldn't fit into them anymore, but the time came to box them up. I came across his hospital tags, hospital onesie and hat (cue tears). I didn't want to just box these items up and put them in the attic for ever, so I decided that these items were perfect shadowbox material! We received a really nice pale blue square shadowbox from one of my baby showers, so I used what I had around the house, not having to purchase anything, to put this together. 

I took the sweet baby items and simply placed them where I wanted them in the shadowbox, pinned them down, and taa-daa! Masterpiece. 

This is just the sweetest thing ever and makes me smile every time I look at it. Right now it's in his room on display in his nightstand, but once we finish getting our master bedroom together (will be posting about that soon) I'm sure this will get moved into our room so I can look at it and reminisce all. the. time. 

What are some keepsakes that you guys like to make shadowboxes out of? I could probably make a shadowbox for every occasion! 

Happy Thursday, everyone!

Friday Favorites

Happy Friday everyone!

We've been bombarded with so much rain lately, so we are in desperate need of some summertime sunshine! I'm looking forward to this summer more than ever because I cannot wait to get my little babe into the pool for some fun. Baby B has these sunglasses, which are perfect when out in the sun. And I think this pineapple knit Henley would look perfect on him at the beach!

Swimsuit | Gap 

Lately, I've been completely obsessed with a recipe I found on - you guessed it - Pinterest. We seem to make it once a week because we can't get enough of how tasty it is. We (and as always, by "we" I mean the hubs) made it for dinner last night and he was oh-so-kind to take pictures while he cooked. So, here is my latest and greatest, delicious dinner recipe!

Mustard and Brown Sugar Pork Loin

Pork Loin
Brown Sugar
Grey Poupon Mustard
Salt
Pepper
Garlic Powder
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Butter

Preheat oven to 425.

Seasoning: Begin by seasoning the pork by adding some salt, pepper, and garlic powder to each side after leaving it in room temperature for 20-30 minutes.

Searing: Get the pan searing hot and add extra virgin olive oil and then add the seasoned pork to the pan. Turn down the heat to medium/high, and add a little butter so the oil does not burn. Sear each side for about 4 to 7 minutes to get a crust on the pork (do this so all the juices stay in) - sear even the ends of the loin. After searing all sides, put it in the oven for 10 minutes. You do not want it to cook all the way.

Resting: After in the oven for 10 minutes, take the pork out and let it rest for about 5 minutes to allow the pork to cool before putting the mustard and brown sugar on. You do not want it too hot to where the mustard slides off, but you want it just warm enough to where the brown sugar will melt onto the pork.

Coating: Put brown sugar on saran wrap, then coat the whole pork with mustard. After its coated, put the mustard coated pork on the brown sugar and wrap the saran wrap around the pork so the brown sugar is coated nicely around the pork.

Finish: After the pork is coated, put the pork on a baking pan and throw it in the oven for about 5 more minutes, just long enough to let the brown sugar melt on the pork. Take the pork out and rest for another 5 minutes before cutting.

Serve with fresh veggies and rice, and enjoy!

Here's to hopefully some sunshine this weekend. Have a great one!

Mother's Day Weekend

Sunday was my very first (official) Mother's Day, and it was perfect. My boys made me feel so very special. :)

The hubs let me sleep in while he took care of the baby (YESS! Sleep!). I woke up to beautiful, bright flowers on my nightstand with two of the sweetest cards. He then made one of my favorite breakfasts - pancakes & berries, the way to my heart - and coffee. We played with the baby for a little bit then got ready and headed to Pottery Land, where I painted the most adorable coffee cup.

After painting, the hub's sister came into town and we met his parent's for dinner. His sister surprised their mom by being in town for Mother's Day, so it was really fun seeing her reaction! Dinner was great, and baby B even enjoyed hanging out. 

Needless to say, I had the best day spent with some of my favorite people!

I hope you all had a wonderful Mother's Day with the ones you love.

Have a great week!

Teacher Appreciation Day

It's Teacher Appreciation Week, so be sure to thank those wonderful teachers of yours!

We wanted to gift our teachers with a little something to show our appreciation, so like always, off to Pinterest-land. Warning: Pinterest has so many ridiculously easy, fun ideas... you'll want to make ALL. Of. Them.

I originally wanted to make a "Thanks for Helping Me Grow" chalkboard flower pot, but then I saw just about a million adorable tumbler ideas and so I wanted to do that... and then there was the basket full of supplies (teacher survival kit) idea, which was too fun to pass up. I had total idea-overflow, so I ended up combining all of my favorite ideas into one. Problem solved! Until next year. :)

I purchased a few fun, bright items, like notepads, pencils, pens, crayons, tumbler, stickers, rulers, summer flower seeds, and a small bucket/planter for everything to go in. I dotted some yellow paint in the middle of the flowers on the planters, just to add some pop.

I found this adorable tag that reads, "It takes a big heart to shape little minds," which was perfect (and free)!

Assemble everything, add some ribbon, and you're done. Simple, easy and cheap project that your teachers are sure to enjoy and get some use out of.

I'm dying to see some of the things you've made to show appreciation for your teachers! Please share - I promise I won't steal your awesome ideas for next year (that's probably a lie). :)

Have an A+ Teacher Appreciation Day!

It's Baby's World... We're Just Living In It

Here we are... Week 15 of living in baby B's world, and we have definitely learned a LOT in the last few months.

So far we've learned that: This is hard. This is amazing. This is scary. This is humbling. Did I mention this is hard? And most importantly, I will never, ever judge other mothers and/or fathers ever again.

We've all done it... From judging parents for allowing their child to co-sleep with them to sticking a pacifier in their mouth. It's so much easier to just judge someone instead of actually dealing with the situation. I had a plan (because I'm a huge planner) as to what type of mother I was going to be. But that went out the window as soon as he was born. Now, don't get me wrong, I still know what type of mother I want to be to my son, but I've done things I never thought I'd do as a parent. In my 15 weeks of parenthood we've stuck to the motto: If it works & baby is happy, then just do it!

When baby B was just a few days old, we had to take him back to the hospital for observations. His temperature was lower than normal and he wasn't gaining sufficient weight. This had me in tears and all I could do was blame myself - thank goodness my husband is the strong one and was able to reassure me everything would be fine. We were doing everything the doctor told us to do - waking him up every 2 hours to feed him, but my milk supply was just too low to keep up with the feedings. We only stayed in the hospital overnight, and everything ended up being OK. The doctor and nurses recommend that we continue the schedule feeing and to supplement with formula. Well, we ended up supplementing with formula (I was devastated - this wasn't part of my plan!). Even though several people are against feeding formula to their infants and I was brainwashed into thinking the same thing, I had to teach myself that it was OK because this is what's best for my son right now. Now, don't get me wrong... I'm all for breastmilk, but if your baby isn't getting enough, then there is absolutely nothing wrong with supplementing. As for the schedule feedings - who ever said to wake a sleeping baby is crazy. We switched to on-demand feeding, and that worked so much better for us! We had a well rested, full baby which is much more pleasant than a tired & cranky, yet full baby. Take your pick. :)

Another hurdle we came across was colic (I still cringe when I hear that word). Luckily, baby B only had a mild case of colic, but it was still horrible none the less. He also was very gassy, which made the colic worse.  Because of his colic, we wanted to try anything to help soothe our little guy. I was the type of parent that was against medications (not vaccines, let's just get that straight) unless they were dying and I was totally against co-sleeping. There's not much you can give an infant, so we tried gripe water and gas relief drops, but sometimes that didn't work. On to the next remedy: cuddling & sucking. I never wanted to co-sleep, but he seemed to enjoy it... and I learned that I did too. We also introduced the pacifier to him, which really helped soothe him. We rode out the colic with him - right before he turned 3 months, like a miracle, it just stopped. Out of no where! It's heartbreaking to see your little babe cry and there's nothing you can do to soothe him. A lot of babies deal with colic, I just never thought mine would... Boy were we wrong!

I recently received the most bizarre advice to date. I was at the grocery store shopping with baby B, and a lady came by because she saw "little baby feet." She asked the usual questions, then proceeded to ask, "How is he?" I told her that he's really good, but has his fussy moments - like any baby does. She let out a loud laugh and told me her advice. When she was younger (she mentioned that she was 53) they would blow cigarette smoke on the soft spot of the baby's head, which would fix the baby right up! She also suggested putting baking soda on the baby's tongue and massaging the baby's back to help them belch. I cannot make this stuff up...

So the conclusion is: Being a parent is hard work, but it's worth it. Everyone is going to offer you some type of advice or way to raise your child, but do what you know is best and stick to it if it works. I had a plan of how I wanted to care for my baby, but things don't always go according to plan. Every single baby and parent is different! At the end of the day, we may be exhausted, our kitchen may be a mess, the trash may need to be taken out and laundry folded, but none of that really matters when you have the most precious gift to care for and play with.