Colds

So, remember a couple of weeks ago when I got all that medicine for cold season?
Well, now I have a nasty cold & I can't take any of it! Grrrrr. Tylenol, hot tea, and occasional naps are my weapons of necessity. That and ignoring it so I can go about the normal life of a mom. Bleck. I dislike being sick. But now you know why I haven't posted a whole lot this week.

Wow. I must be sick. My grammar in this post sucks!

Sunday Shout Outs

Picture
Today's Sunday Shout Outs are going to be about food. Because right now I am getting hungry :)

Taste Of Home - This is my #1 resource to go to when I need a recipe for something. I especially like it when I have a few ingredients I need to use because you can search for recipes by ingredients. I have never had a bad-tasting recipe from this site & since I have used over 100 recipes from here that is saying a lot!

The Thrifty Food Plan Challenge - This is an article from the website "Get Rich Slowly". I found it quite interesting and challenging to look at my food budget and see how much I could whittle it down and also how much other people spend on food.

Since it is getting cold outside, I am using my crockpot again about once a week. The Hillbilly Housewife blog has some great looking crockpot recipes HERE. I am hoping to try out a bunch of them this winter. Until then, my all-time favorite crockpot recipe is a lasagna recipe from my Aunt Pam :)

Clothes

Photo from Girl Talk

I am getting tired of clothes.

This week is the clothing exchange at church and I have been there every day. While I have found some nice stuff for every person in my family, I am tired of washing clothes, folding clothes, putting away clothes, and doing it all over again.

Interestingly enough, clothing was one of the things mentioned in the devotional a good friend of mine recently gave at Evan's baby shower. I have thought of her words a LOT this week.

Here is what she said:

Proverbs 31:25, "She is clothed with strength and dignity, she can laugh at the days to come."

"So much of our lives as moms revolves around clothing - mending, purchasing, cleaning, storing, growing out of, growing into, clothing exchanges - the list goes on and on. But you can laugh at the days to come if you'll only keep in focus that the things to "put on" aren't measured by size or neatness or matching print or designer label. Choose strength and dignity. They'll always be in fashion."

So as I go to switch the laundry (again) and fold yet another load of clothes I can laugh and be thankful that my children have lots of great condition clothing to wear this winter. I am thankful that I found a pair of jeans that fit (even if they are two sizes larger than I want to be). I am thankful for all the clothes I was able to bless others with. And I am thankful for my friend and the reminder of what is really important.

Sunday Shout Outs

This week our Sunday shout outs all revolve around romance <3.
The Marriage Bed - this is my all-time favorite website to go to for ideas for our marriage! I love in particular how they really encourage you to check everything you read against Scripture. Great articles from a Christian perspective about all kinds of marriage related topics. It's got EVERYTHING in the forums - from discussions of the best places to get lingerie to easy date nights at home after your kids go to bed to well, stuff directly related to bed. Plus, you can sign up for "the generous wife" or "generous husband" tips. They are daily and really good! I would definitely recommend this site to any engaged/married couple looking for Christian advice/ideas on marriage!!!!





Family Life - Not nearly as good as the marriage bed, but still a solid, Christian website with great ideas for marriages. We enjoy their "Simply Romantic Tips".





Book22 - A Christian, no nudity site with intimacy enhances for married couples.

A Recent Picture

Sometimes it takes 15-20 minutes, 100+ pictures, and holding the toddler still while taking the shot, but it's worth it to get such a cute picture of my sweet boys :)

(Will - 20 months & Evan - 2 months)

SCORE!

Here is the info about this deal over at MoneySavingMom.

I went to Rite Aid yesterday and got:
1 Little Cold' n Cough
1 Children's Throat Cooler Pops
1 Theraflu Warming Rub
1 Triaminic Daytime Cold & Cough Syrup
1 Children's Advil
1 Chloraseptic Lozenges
1 Comtrex Day/Night Cold Capsules
1 Sucrets Complete Lozenges (the Sucrets had a 1.50 rebate form attached to them)
1 Mentholatum Cherry Chest Rub
1 2 pk. of Softlips Raspberry chapstick
1 Lypsyl Honey Rose chapstick

Total spent after rebates - Rite Aid paid me $1.00 to take all of that medicine out of the store :)

I LOVE CATCHING DEALS LIKE THIS AND SAVING MONEY!!!

Cold/Flu/Sick season, bring it on - I'm ready for you!

Sunday Shout Outs

For this week's Sunday shout outs, I thought I would give you three of the blogs that I follow on a regular basis and my reasons for doing so:

www.moneysavingmom.com - Great site for a head's up on all kinds of freebies and deals. Crystal Paine shares all her tips on coupons, groceries, and saving more in general. If you have never seen this site, you should definitely check it out!

www.thesimpledollar.com - This site has comprehensible articles on financial topics. I like it because it has practical ideas for saving money and budgeting. I also like the straight-talk approach in the articles about our current economy.

www.chic-critique.com - This is a rather smallish blog of a few women who try out and review different beauty products. I like it because I always like to read reviews of stuff before I try it and I like the positive attitude of the blog.

As I looked through the blogs I follow in an attempt to pick out three for this list, I realized that I don't really have any blogs on parenting. Do you know of a good blog about parenting?

10 of Will's Favorite Books

Will LOVES it when I read books to him! Here are 10 of his favorites in no particular order:

1. Spot's Big Book of Words by Eric Hill - Will likes to look for the monkey on each page & name the objects he knows.

2. My Little People Farm, a lift-the-flap playbook - Will practices all his animal sounds when he looks at this book. He loves to lift the flaps ALL BY HIMSELF!

3. Babybug Magazine - I love how the publishers of Ladybug created this simpler version of their magazine for little ones. Will loves the stories and abundance of pictures!

4. Just Me and My Dad by Mercer Mayer - Will loves to look for the mouse in Mercer Mayer's books.

5. Carl's Summer Vacation by Alexandra Day - Gorgeous pictures & always a fun story. Will loves dogs and babies so this is definitely a favorite.

6. Do You Want To Be My Friend? by Eric Carle - This is another book we practice animal sounds to.

7. DK Touch and Feel Tractors - Will loves all of the touch and feel books, but ever since he and his daddy started mowing the grass on the tractor together, this is his favorite.

8. Doggies by Sandra Boynton - I love all the Sandra Boynton books 'cause they are such fun to read! This is a great book to practice all kinds of fun doggie sounds :)





9. Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes by Helen Oxenbury - Another classic author/illustrator, Helen Oxenbury draws really cute babies. Will loves to look at her pictures.

10. Richard Scarry's Chipmunk's ABC - This book was published in 1963. In fact, my family has a video of my dad reading this to my younger brother! It's a classic, fun book and Will loves it.

Sunday Shout Outs

http://www.coolest-birthday-cakes.com/ - This website is SO great for ideas for birthday cakes! Plus, they are by real people so they are possible to do :)

Wellness360 - I like how this site has a nutrition/fitness tracker so I can keep track of what I eat in my feeble attempts to lose weight leftover from Evan. Plus, they pay you! How cool is that?

http://www.youdata.com/ - This is a site that pays you for your attention. Really. I have been a member now for 3 days & I 've spent about 30 minutes on their website twice. How much have I made? So far: $5. Not a full-time income, but hey, not half bad either! They also don't have a minimum amount you have to make before they mail you a check - every Friday they transfer your earnings to your paypal account. Very cool & well-worth checking out!!!!

Bugs and Boys

Will has 4 huge bug bites on him. Poor little guy has been itching like crazy. I tried putting bandaids over the bites to keep him from scratching at them, but he took the bandaids off.
*Sigh* it was inevitable I suppose. I still feel bad for him though :(
How do you treat bug bites at your house?