Thirty-One

I am obsessed!!

I love to organize things and have little containers and bins for things so I would, of course, love the company Thirty-One. Have you heard of it? I got their Thermal Tote at the 2011 HPE Silent Auction. I love it so I decided to get a their Soft Wallet about a year ago. I love that too!! I've been toying with the idea of going into the Thirty-One business, but I am not a sales person so I am not sure how it would go!!


Anyway, I have been looking for a great bag for work and have been considering the Organizing Utility Tote.

I have seen MANY posts about this bag, but the three that really sold me on it are from Tiffany at The Nest Effect, Jen at i heart organizing, and Tiffany at Teaching 2 Many Diligently. These ladies, among others, talked of how they fell in love with this bag because of how useful and stylish it is.

I am also getting the All-In-One Organizer, the Mini Zipper Pouch, and the Wristlet Key Fob for school. I am planning on putting things in the Organizer for {parent} volunteers and will keep the Mini in it with pencils, highlighters, etc. I am SUPER excited to see these items in use and think it will help the {parent} volunteers when they come in.

The last item I am getting is the Littles Carry-All Caddy for home. I think we're going to try to hold our crazy amount of remotes in it, but I'm not sure! We'll figure something out!!

One of the best things about getting all of this, two of the items were Customer Specials for the month of July!! The Mini and Little were $5 each! Plus, I got a few of the items personalized for $5 each, another Customer Special! Oh my goodness, I am SO excited!!

2 Years Ago...

2 years ago it was 2010. 2 years ago we got  phone call saying my older sister was in the hospital. I packed up my Sweet Girl and my Hubby and went to visit. While we waited, not so patiently, in the waiting room, Angie was in her room... in labor.

2 years ago we met Lila Ann!

We were all excited to meet her, and my Sweet Girl just wanted to play with her cousin! Every day since then it has been heartwarming to hear stories of how Lila is growing up. It is awesome to watch the 2 cousins playing together. It is wonderful to think that Adelle will grow up with Lila as her cousin and her friend.

Happy Birthday, Lila! You are getting to be such a big girl! We love you very much and are blessed to be able to celebrate this happy day with you!!

I Love Summer!

Summer is the time for grilling! The only thing I am good at grilling are potatoes in tinfoil and s'mores. However, I am married to a grilling God! The steaks Brian made tonight were phenomenal!! They were juicy, seasoned and cooked perfectly! In fact, I told him I would like to buy a cow so we would be able to have amazing steaks like that any night we wanted!! How crazy is that?!

Doesn't this look amazing?!

Along with the steaks I made a little sauteed mixture of onion, mushroom and green beans. I seasoned them with garlic, salt and pepper. The dish was really great, but I felt it was missing something. I think next time I will try adding some balsamic and some cheese. That sounds delish!

Two pictures of the side dish!

We also had strawberries to round things out. Adelle grabbed a bunch and took off the stems. She picked them off one leaf at a time, gave them to me and said, "ishy, Mommy!"

One of the perfect summer meals!

Happy Anniversary!

5 years ago today, I married my best friend and someone I was excited to spend the rest of my life with. Well, it has been 5 years and am more in love with him and am more excited to see what the rest of our lives will bring.

I already know Brian is a wonderful man, loving husband and doting father to our beautiful little girl. I can wait to experience life with a teenager, life in our middle ages, and then life as retirees.

Challenges, surprises. Happy times, sad times. Sickness, health.

All that matters is that we love each other, communicate and work through everything with the other by our side.

Happy Five Year Anniversary, Brian. I love you!!

Dear God, We're Done, Right?!

Dear God,

Today I went to a funeral.

Today I went to a funeral for a 14 month-old child.

Today was the second funeral I've been to for a child in my family. The second! Another member of my family had their child pass away, but had a private service. That makes 3. Well the saying is that things happen in 3's, right? So my family is done, God, right?

My family is done having to feel this heartache. My family is done having to deal with all of the trauma. My family is done having to see little tiny caskets. My family is done having to feel the emptiness left behind by an innocent child who was taken from us.

I know we will never truly let go of all of the heartache. I know we will never forget our beautiful family members, or the joy they brought to our lives. I know we will never forget.

I know that you have a plan and that we need to have faith in you, but we're done, God, right?!

Sincerely,
Teresa

Memorial Day

It's the soldier, not the reporter who has given us
Freedom of the Press.

It's the soldier, not the poet, who has given us
Freedom of Speech.

It's the soldier, not the campus organizer, who has given us the
Freedom to Demonstrate.

It's the soldier, not the lawyer, who has given us the
Right to a Fair Trial.

It's the soldier who salutes the flag, serves under the flag and
whose coffin is draped by the flag,
Who gives the protestor the right to burn the flag.

THANK YOU to all those who have made the ultimate sacrifice!!

 

Memorial Day Events?

If you are reading this blog, you probably already know that I try to be organized. I don't like it when things aren't in their 'spot' and it buggs me when items of different shapes/colors/sizes are mixed together. Call it whatever you want, but I call it logic! How else would I find my pink sleeveless top in my closet if my closet wasn't sorted from sleeveless to long-sleeved tops, then from light to dark colors? Geepers!  ;)

Anyway, I am looking for a list of activities on Memorial Day and I can't find a good list. The lists I have found are all laden with ads making the information difficult to read. Aside from that, most of the lists I've found are for LAST YEAR! You'd think with Memorial Day being on Monday the newspapers would have that info out already... at least on their websites!

So, if you are in the Twin Cities and have a great Memorial Day event you want to brag about, I would appreciate hearing about it!!

Potty Training

I can't believe we are already posting about this!! Adelle is, roughly, 2 1/2 and she is learning how to use the big girl potty. We followed the advice of the Moes Family, and tried potty training Adelle in one day.

We got a bunch of things ready before we began, which really seemed to help. During the week I started planting ideas of going on the potty in her head by reminding her that some of her friends already do it, that we have big girl undies, and that she herself is a big girl. Here are the other things we got together:

• Snacks to munch on - Salty, sweet and healthy so she would drink lots.
• Juice, milk, pop, water - Anything she wanted to drink, we had!
• Stickers and a sticker chart for a visual reward
• Suckers for instant gratification
• Big girl undies
• Plastic undies for naps and night-time
• Her favorite doll - We used this along with one of her old medicine syringes. I filled the syringe with water and had the doll "go" and then run to the potty with her. I also had her go in the toilet and not have accidents.
• A towel and cleaner for accidents
• Big girl potty chair/toilet cover - We actually have a potty chair and a smaller seat to fit over ours. This worked well because sometimes she couldn't hold it in and HAD to use her little chair. We kept the little chair on a plastic mat where we were, and the smaller seat in the downstairs bathroom.
• A stool so she could get onto the toilet
• An apron for me to keep treats in
• Lots of enthusiasm from Mommy
• A photo album with pictures of special individuals - After going on the potty Adelle would get to call someone to share her news. We would flip through the album, or I would just ask who she wanted to call, and we did.
• Floor games and books - Nothing too distracting.
• A timer - You don't want to go too long in between visits to the bathroom.

We started our day with breakfast and turkey watching. We do this every weekend and Brian and I wanted to keep the majority of our routines. After we got back from breakfast I put undies on her doll and let Adelle "find" her! We talked about what she was wearing and what that meant, and I asked Adelle if she wanted to wear undies too. She said, "Yes, I do!!"  We put them on started the timer. I then started playing with her doll and made her have an accident. I ran from the accident to the bathroom saying, "No, No, No. We have to potty on the potty!" I did that a few times then asked Adelle if she wanted to try to go. She said yes so we put her on the potty and she went! I was really excited, gave her high-5s, a kiss, a sucker and then showed her the chart and the album. She put a sticker on the chart and called Nonna and Papi. They were SO excited!!

We kept this up for the rest of the day!!

We called lots of people and only cleaned up 4 accidents. Two were poo and I am not worried about them at this time - it's a different feeling! The other two were my fault because I don't think I was patient enough or persistent enough to make her stay on the toilet when she wanted to get off. Lesson learned!

She is doing SO well!!