Not Dreading School Shopping

With school quickly approaching for my girls I was dreading the thought of going shopping plus the added expense of school shopping is never fun.  Last year I shopped sales all summer to save time and money when it came time to go school shopping.  This year the lack of time to shop had left me wondering what we were going to do for school shopping.  I think I hoping that their clothes would just magically appear....

...And they did.  Just look at this drawer full of school clothes!  The best part is they didn't cost us a penny that and they are new with only a few "almost" new hand me downs.  This left me smiling and relieved at the same time. 

With two children going to school both girls and my little guy still too young for school all needing clothes I was dreading going shopping.  They needed clothes not only for school but for the coming colder weather and some that were bigger sizes too it was not going to be cheap this year.  With some great luck we wont be spending quite so much time or money shopping.  Here is the story of our great fortune and how it didn't cost us a fortune!

My oldest daughter also my neatest had a birthday in the spring and got a nice combination of warm and cool weather clothes.  Thankfully this summer has been HOT and she didn't need to wear any of her new warm clothes so they were packed away in storage still new.  The few outfits that she did wear are still in nice shape as she rarely ruins her clothes and any that wont work for school are in good enough shape that she can still wear when she changes out of her school clothes.  Her downside on birthday clothes has always been that she has grown every year and never really reused her clothes after they were stored away so they were always handed down to my other daughter sometimes with tags still on them.  This year she will be lucky enough to keep those clothes because when everyone asked her size I would tell them a size bigger thinking ahead so to speak.  That and I always felt bad that she didn't get wear some of them before.  So although we will need to buy her a few things as she doesn't get hand me downs from a bigger sibling we will not be replenishing her complete wardrobe this year.  Yes I am smiling again just typing this :)
My younger daughter's clothes "magically" appeared from hand me downs (some still new) and her most recent birthday.  The clothes we stored that her bigger sister outgrew two years ago are a perfect fit for her this year.  This year instead of adding to our toy supply I asked everyone to get her clothes and some school supplies for her birthday.  She still got toys enough to make her happy and the clothes made me happy and saved us tripping over even more toys.  It was a win, win!
My little guys clothes were the issue.  We could hold off buying him clothes as he wouldn't be going to school but he needed clothes the more then the girls going to school as he has grown so much this summer.  We have already started cooling down here and he need sweaters and pants that fit as his that were left from last year are now two sizes too small, literally.  He had even already out grown some of his summer clothes.  Believe it or not like "magic" his clothes appeared too.  A friend of a family member was looking for someone who would like some boys summer clothes their son had out grown so they took them thinking of our son, not even knowing we were looking for some too.  As for the need for warm weather clothes that was quickly solved too.  Someone who works with the hubby said he had some smaller boys clothes from his son who is much older then ours but figured we could just hold them till we needed them.  Well apparently they have been storing them longer then he knew as the clothes are the perfect size.  Plus we will have some that are both warm and cool clothes in bigger sizes we will store till needed.

Yes we will still need to buy shoes for everyone, some supplies for school and a NEW outfit or two for the girls we were so lucky for all that we were given.  Now I cant wait to take the kids shopping as they will have fun trying on shoes and clothes and I will be able to share in their excitement knowing it won't be a three day process and we wont be breaking the bank to buy them clothes.

The Real Reason For The Garden

We have had some sort of garden since the first year Thad and I were married.  Our first year was just cucumbers and tomatoes and we holy smokes we had tons of them that year.  It was pure joy keeping track of how many of each we would harvest each day.  We had over 200 cucumbers that year but every time we would pick one it was like we were picking our first.  Seven years later, we have moved to our home and have three great children.  Every year we make an effort to have some sort of garden to share that same joy with our children.  They have had lots of fun in the garden since they have been babies from eating dirt to picking their first ripe vegetable but this year was the first year I have noticed so much excitement in them.  Maybe it is because they are all older now and they all could help with every aspect of the garden this year.
The kids have been fascinated with the garden this year right from the beginning and putting the manure in to planting the seed and even picking the occasional ripe pea.  Last night however was the first time I we were actually in the garden all to once harvesting anything that was ripe.  Just listening to the kids excitement was worth all the time and effort we put into the garden.  They were picking everything they could get their hands on, smiling and giggling the whole time.  It was so much joy for me to be listening to them so excited.  The most exciting moment however other then picking the only ripe tomato was that they were just as thrilled to be eating the same things they picked in the garden for dinner.  As a mom it was just as rewarding to know that they were happy eating food that was not only healthy for them but also safe from all chemicals.
Even though it can be a lot of work especially this year with the dry spell we have a garden filled with fun and laughter but most of all love.  I wish the world could share in the same joy we shared last night.

 

 

Overwhelmed With Summer Fun?

As it is not even August and summer is basically just started I already wish summer was over?!?  Is summer fun too much sometimes???  We all remember summer as kids and how fun it was to have summer vacation.  There was no school, we played outside, swam in creeks, played with friends, had the occasional family picnic and played and played till school started again.   However as a children I also remember spending most of our summer home and how my siblings and I enjoyed everyday of summer vacation.  We would be home for weeks in a row and we enjoyed it.  That is the same summer fun I wanted my children to grow up remembering.  Yet the farther we progress into summer the less it seem to be happening and I have yet to come up with a solution for resolving this problem.
This time of year is very hectic for us here and everyone else as well I'm sure.  I come from a very large family that all basically lives in the same area.  The last few years it seems every week something is happening and when its not my family having a gathering Thad's family has something.  Our chaos started back in May with My niece's birthday and our anniversary the same day followed by a holiday/party/gathering every weekend since then and will not end till the kids return to school (I hope).  Some how in between all this celebrating we have had animals to raise, gardens to tend and try to squeeze in some family time.  We have had to enjoy most of our family time in the garden and with the animals which makes me happy we have them but still that time has been limited this year by one thing our another.  Is this the normal???  Is this how my kids should remember summer???  Were we the lucky ones growing up that we were able to enjoy our every day of summer vacation???
Every year we say the that next year we are not going to go to everything but every year its the same chaos.  Are we overwhelming our children with all this chaos?  They are so busy every day I feel they do not get to enjoy their summer vacation.  On the few days that we are home they are bored?  We have plenty for our kids to enjoy here but they are just used to everyday chaos and running around that they don't know how to react to being home.  Makes me wonder what memories they will have of summer when they are grown?
I have tried to think of a way to calm down our summer chaos and miss a party/celebration or two but it never seems to work.  I have had this discussion a lot with my Mom on how they managed to escape the summer chaos when we were little and she simply says to stop doing all the parties.  How can I tell my niece/nephew we can not come to your birthday party or tell our family we can not come to their picnic even though we went to the other family's party the week before?  How do I ask that same family to come to a birthday party for my kids when I didn't go to their party?  How can I tell my kids even though you cousin just had a HUGE party you can not?  If we just stopped doing everything would everyone understand that it is just too much sometimes?
I am typing all this knowing that in less then a week my daughter is having her 5th birthday party.  We have been so busy this year I'm actually dreading having this party.  If I had not already planned and invited family to this party I would change the whole thing.  I feel bad that again we are going to have to ask family to change plans and come celebrate my daughters special day.  But at the same time how can I not make her birthday a special day for her?  We used to have huge parties for our kids and invite the whole family on both sides (aunts, uncles, grandparents, cousins, friends and all their kids too) but it was getting to the point that we could barely afford to have a party and still get our child a birthday present.  I have scaled down the invite list tremendously since then.  I know my daughter may feel a little sad that she wont have the huge party she is used to but I also know she will be happy just to have the party as well.  Unfortunately this party also means another week with a party and less time to enjoy summer/life.  I will be starting a new tradition for my kids birthdays after this party.  They will do as I did when I was little.  We will celebrate their birthday the actual day of their birth even if its a school day.  They will have a cake and who ever wants to come is welcome to come but we will no longer have big parties that take a week of planning.  This is just my first step in taking back our life and the next will be saying NO we can not make it to your party/celebration.
I really don't quite know how to end this blog so I will end it by saying I hope everyone who reads this knows it is okay to say "sorry we cant make it this time".  It has taken me a few years of chaos to understand this myself but this is going to be my motto not only for summer but forever.  We are letting our years pass us by and cant even remember the fun we had last week because were are already celebrating something else.  We have a great family (on both sides) and I'm hoping that they actually read this.  I also hope they can understand when we all of a sudden stop going to everything.  I will also understand if they read this and decide the same.  I know if its this crazy for me it has to be just as crazy for them.
Here's to enjoying the rest of my summer the simple way---> with my kids and husband!

GARDEN PROGRESS 7/20/12

Well I have been meaning to keep everyone updated with our garden as we were growing it but we have spent so much time with just weeding and watering it, tending to animals and just enjoying our summer that we haven't had time to blog about it.  I will try my best to get everyone up to date as we just ate our first food from it two days ago here are some photos of our progress so far this year.

Above is two months worth of growth in our garden we are finally starting to get to crops other then the leafy greens.  

We have already harvested all our our spinach.  We did the new popular pallet planting for our spinach and it worked out great.  There were no weeds to pull at all.  We had spinach in so many salads that we were actually sick of eating spinach.  I could bare the thought of wasting what we had left growing still so for the first time ever I canned some.  We waited over a week before I let Thad try it.  He said it was delicious so we are planting more to harvest again before fall comes as I only ended up the 3 small jars after we had already eaten so much of it.

Below are some of our firsts of the year.  Our first of many cucumbers we had grow.  Oh and we had this guy for dinner tonight so this pictures is from last week.  The first peas we picked and ate the same night.  Or first time growing zucchini and they are growing like crazy.

Aside from the garden by the house we also have a patch of sweet corn and two potato patches.  The corn was mostly eaten by crows as soon as it started growing but the potatoes are growing nicely.

One of our two potato patches.  Last year we only had this one and had enough potatoes to last through Jan.  We also saved all the small potatoes that started growing and used them as seed potatoes this year. 

A small row of corn we planted along the driveway with the seeds that wouldn't fit in the big patch.  We were lucky we did as most of the corn we planted in the big patch was eaten by crows before it had time to grow.

What is left of the corn we planted in the corn patch.   It is growing nicely but unfortunately there is not a lot of it left.

We planted pumpkins last year where we planted the corn this year and surprise, surprise one pumpkin plant decided to grow this year.  We had planted more pumpkins but the chickens decided they needed to eat them the day after we planted them so this is a welcome freebie this year.

Chicken Napkins Save Money

One of the few things I have always hated was that we were always running out of paper towels.  That and the fact that we were using way too many of them!!!  Seemed like it was just easier to use them in our busy lives then it was to do something out of our normal routine.  I had decided this is the year we would cut back on our use of paper towels but I didn't have any idea how it was going to happen or when.  I was also looking forward to the money we would be saving not buying as many too.  
Over a month ago I was shopping and found a stack of 8 cloth napkins in the clearance bin.   They were brightly colored and not anything that would match our home but I bought them hoping we could start using them instead of the piece of paper towel we have been using (5 per dinner plus what we used at lunch).  The first few nights we used them off and on but then we started using them all the time.  Still it seemed like we were still having to resort back to paper towels as I could not clean them fast enough.  Lately it seems we have not used hardly any paper towels as when we didn't have clean napkins the kids were using some of our 30+ washcloths as a napkins which the kids thought was just great.
A roll of paper towels started lasting longer and longer.  It was so nice not seeing an empty roll there all the time.  Surprising myself as even I had cut back on using paper towels to clean up spills or drying my hands by using dish towels.  I have tons of dishtowels but never seem to use them.  I was surprised how such a small change in our every day routine made such a big difference.  We actually had a roll of paper towels last us more then a week!!!  And we were going through 1 every few days!!
I did feel bad for the kids using wash cloths as napkins so today I decided to make some napkins out of some of my material.  While I was searching for a good material I came across my chicken material.  This is material I have had for a few years.  Thad bought it for me because it matched my chicken themed kitchen.  I loved it but never used it because I didn't want to have to give it away which seems to happen with most of the things I make. I hadn't been able to find a use for it till now.  I folded it till I had the size napkin I wanted and then sewed the edges.  The whole process took me less then 30 minutes and we ended up with 16 napkins.  I haven't done the math but I'm sure we will be saving loads of money not using all those paper towels.  Plus I finally got to use my chicken material for something for us.  It was a win, win all around.

MAKING 4th OF JULY DECORATIONS.

MAKING 4th OF JULY DECORATIONS.

Every year at my sisters there is a huge celebration for the 4th of July with food, carnival games, horseshoe tournament and even fireworks.  It is a great time and I usually help her with what I can to get everything ready for the party.  I know from previous years the decorations are starting to dwindle or get shabby looking.  She called me one day and asked where I found all my DIY projects so she could try to make some new decorations with out it costing a fortune.  Myself I just search the Internet till I find what I'm looking for and then try to recreate it with what I have.  But I did tell her to check out Pintrest.  She did and found a few that she liked so I decided to save her a few dollars and make the decorations myself as a birthday present to her since her birthday is the day before her party.  Lets hope she likes them.

Fire crackers!!  Made from scrap wood.

7 firecrackers made from scrap wood, piece of old clothesline, and scrap wood

The scrap lumber was cut into random lengths and painted with Red and Blue paint that I already had from other projects

I arranged them in to different patterns and painted words on them

To add the wick to the top I drilled a hole and hot glued the clothesline in the hole

1 of the 7 different fire crackers I made for almost nothing.

                                                                       

My Pennant Garland.  It was really simple and took less them a half hour.

Here is a small section of the finished garland.

I started with 5 red white and blue colors and cut them into triangles.  The size of the triangle is determined by how big a pennant you want.  Mine were only 6inch.

I took some blue material and cut it into strips about 2inches wide to use as the string.

I folded the string and sewed it.  I also sewed the triangles on at the same time.

The end result is over 100 feet of pennant garland.  You could also sew the triangles next to each other but I chose to separate them so I would end up with a longer garland.

Welcome Summer

With summer only a week away and the temps getting warmer already I was looking for some new pool toys.  Some that are safe and gentle enough for the kids and the pool.  This year we upgraded the pool for the kids as they are no longer babies and the 3 of them didn't fit in the kiddy pool at the same time any longer.  I needed some toys that wouldn't risk popping our inflatable pool because being a single income family we really can not afford to have the expense of getting another pool and actually we probably will have to go back to using the kiddy pool if this one gets damaged.
I searched the internet looking for some inexpensive suitable toys.  Of course they are all too expensive or not something I want to risk popping the pool with.  Then I discover some cute do it yourself pool toys on Pintrest that used 3 sponges cut and tired into sponge balls.  These were just what I needed since they were soft and gentle enough for my kids and my pool.  So I set out to our local dollar store in an attempt to recreate them.  Each ball required 3 colored sponges so I figured I would need to buy 10 sponges (5 of the 2 packs) which would make 1 ball per kid with a left over sponge for me to use for cleaning.  However when I got there the store had no sponges so I searched the shelves looking for an alternative and discovered the automotive sponges and the gears in my head started turning. 
Here is how I turned 3 automotive sponges into 12 pool toys and only spent $3.00 on them.

I started by slicing the automotive sponge in half thus doubling the amount of sponge I had to work with.  If you would prefer a bigger fatter sponge you could probably leave it at is original thickness.

I then cut the sponge into strips across the sponge.  If you wanted a bigger ball you could cut it the long way.  Since my kids are little still I opted for the shorter balls.

I followed the same procedure with all three sponges.  Then took them in groups of 12 to make the sponge ball.

I used a rubber band to hold the sponges together and then trimmed of any longer ends.

My end result was 12 very nice sponge balls for only $3.00 ( my 3yr old helper is holding one so its not in the picture).

These were actually super easy to make and my kids love them.  They do not hurt when they throw them at each other and float so my little guy doesn't have to struggle to reach them at the bottom of the pool.