One of the best days of my life was the day that I learned I was going to become a mom. Since then my life has changed, for the better. Some days I’m stressed out and going crazy but most of the time it is one great adventure. Every time I hear the sound of my little ones pitter patter feet running down the hall, I know that whatever we are going to do it will be a joy! Part journal, part recipe book, part craft magazine, this blog is about the craziness that is motherhood.
A couple posts ago, I showed you my Date Night Jar and I got a great response from it. On Sunday, the hubby picked the first date. Spend $10 at a Thrift Store and pick out crazy outfits for each other. Thanks to my SIL watching G, we were able to go today. We went to Deseret Industries. To make it a little more fun we gave each other a time limit. We had 15 minutes to search the endless rack for something the other person would wear. After our allotted 15 minutes, we met up at the register. We had some scary looking outfits. I think the one I picked out for Nate was better than the one he picked out for me but I'll let you decide.
Before the Shopping Spree
Nate- Stripped shirt, Polk-a-dot tie, Blue sweater vest, and floral Hawaiian Hat
Jessica- Hot pink terry cloth jumper (that were shorts), couch looking skirt, and not pictured my lion purse.
After we changed our clothes we decided that we couldn't waste all this attractiveness so we went to the food court in the mall for lunch. School just started so there weren't too many people to stare at us but the people who were there really gave us a double take. This was a really great date and I am so happy that I was able to spend some fun alone time with my honey. I love you babe!
My mom's 50th birthday day was a couple of weeks ago and my siblings and I threw her a party. It was really nice and simple but the one thing she really wanted was a German Chocolate Cake. Like I have said before, I procrastinate so the night before I had to make something. I mixed together a boxed Chocolate Cake mix and decided to make the topping from scratch.
You combine the evaporated milk, brown sugar, egg yolks, butter, and vanillaand cook over low heat stirring constantly. I don't think I added the egg yolks because I was talking to my cousin while I made this so when it didn't thicken I turned the heat to high and boiled it until it was thick so if you miss that part, it will still work. Then remove from the heat and stir in the pecans and coconut. It turned out great and my mom loved it! It just goes to show that if you spend just a little bit of time you can tum a simple box cake mix into something special.
We decided to have a yard sale and raise some money to help pay for some old medical bills. It’s a lot harder than it sounds. For a few months now, I’ve been going through a few things. Clothes, books (I have an obsession with buying them but I end up never reading them), old board game, etc. I guess I hadn’t gone through as much as I thought because I still had a ton of things to do. Unfortunately, I waited until the last minute to do it. I organized my craft draws, bathroom, closet, and garage. After 2 whole days of cleaning, organizing, and throwing things away I had a small trailer and the back of our Jeep full of stuff to sale. That night the hubby and I got to bed at 2 and had to wake up at 5 (luckily my mom and lil G had a sleep over that night and the next day so I didn’t have to stress about him).
We got up and went up to my In Laws (we couldn’t have the yard sale at our house because there is road construction on our road). One of my SILs (sister-in-laws) had brought up some items and another SIL baked a bunch of goodies for us to sale. After setting up and posting the signs, we waited for people to arrive and we didn’t need to wait long. People just kept coming! I was worried that we wouldn't make too much but we did great! We made more money than I thought we would and we only left with 5 boxes in the back of the Jeep. I just want to thank everyone who bought things, sold things, and just sent us good thoughts.
I learned a few things while having our yard sale: 1. Advertise- anywhere you can. On bulletin boards, sign posts, Craig’s List, anywhere! 2. Watch your customer’s and don’t be afraid to mark things down. I would walk around and see how people reacted to prices. If 3 or 4 people picked something up, looked at the price, and then put it down, I would go through and lower the price when things got slow. 3. Rearrange- I know if I go to a store and the shelves are bare or unorganized I don’t stay long to look around. I was constantly moving things around and if I cleared a table I would take it down. I really think that this help to keep people browsing.
Again, Thanks to everyone who helped out and/or came by. You guys helped a lot!
This is a picture of goodies that my SIL made of us. (I took a lot of pictures but only this one turned out.)
As a mom, I hardly get time to myself but on Thursday I was able to spend a whole 5 hours without my little one. My very good friend, CaDee, called me to say that her work was having a party at the water park and she asked if I would go with her. I was really tempted; free admission to the park, free tube rental, free dinner, and 5 whole hours without G. I searched, called, and text my little heart out to find a baby sitter but no luck. Then I thought about my cousin. She has a 10 year old son and G just adores him! She was thrilled to baby sit and for the whole day I was giddy with excitement. After a quick stop to pick up a wayward pair of swim shorts, we arrived at our destination.
CaDee and I in front of the Park
We rented our double tube and ran off to the tube rides. We had so much fun going down slides and jumping in the wave pool. After a few turns jumping waves, we were famished so we took our vouchers to the snack bar for our FREE dinner. We both got a hamburger, chips, and a drink. It would have been better if we could have gotten cheese but it was free so I’m not complaining.
Me and my FREE dinner
Water parks are like fairs, you just have to splurge with greasy, sweets so CaDee bought us a funnel cake and a large Dr. Pepper (the ones with our dinner were tiny). Here are a few picture of us with our delicious funnel cakes.
You can't forget to give love to the DP!
The rest of the night went pretty much the same way. Slides, tubes, and waves until we stopped off at the table after playing in the wave pool. We were just going to grab out tube and hit some more slides but a co worker of Cadee's asked if her husband, Shawn, could go with us. We are very nice people so of course we said yes. We grabbed a 3 man tube and off we went.
I took this picture before we ran off with Shawn. I thought it was gorgeous with the moon and the water!
On the first ride we went on, the life guard told us that Shawn had to be in front because he was heaviest. When we went around the first turn, we got a little high but on the second turn we went way too high and the tube tipped over. Now just so you know there is only about an inch of water in the tube slide so there wasn’t much cushion. Off went Shawn since he was first, I completely stopped because my shorts are made of cotton and not the best for sliding, Cadee there for was caught in the middle with the tube on top of her. She threw the tube off of her and back to me. I grabbed it and went down the slide head first. I caught up to Cadee very quickly and ended up pushing her down the slide but not before we heard the people behind us coming down. We barely made it out before the other tube caught up with us. It was the funniest thing ever.
After that we went down another slide and almost went flipped over again! We went down about 3 other slide after that and the whole time we couldn’t stop laughing. It was So much fun! We ended the day in the wave pool and as we were waiting the waves to start again, we noticed a bat flying around. We watched it for about 5 minutes while we treaded water until it took a sudden turn and dive bombed us. We scram and dove under the water and as we came up me noticed the life guard laughing at us. I guess it is pretty funny when you aren’t the one being attacked by a blood sucking rabid bat (or at least that how he looked in that moment). I haven’t been able to act silly and care free for a while and it was nice not to have to be a mom for a couple of hours (of course I did called my cousin about 4 time to check that everything was going well). I had a great day with a great friend! Thanks CaDee it was a blast!
We took this one as we were leaving. It may have been cold but it was totally worth it!
Jessica- Hot pink terry cloth jumper (that were shorts), couch looking skirt, and not pictured my lion purse.
