Don’t worry that children never listen to you;

worry that they are always watching you.

~Robert Fulghum

I never knew before becoming a parent that some of the most important lessons I would teach my children would not be learned in those quiet, nurturing moments when I’m feeling rested and intentional. But in the daily interactions and reactions,  stresses and vices, day in and day out of me modeling life for my children.

I didn’t know that I would constantly have little eyes watching my every move as if I had sat them down one day and said “Do what I do…say what I say.”

Well, we never had that chat, yet even so, I feel those little eyes on me watching, learning about their world and their worth.

I can feel two sets of eyes on mine as I impatiently rush their very sweet, very slow buns into the car, late to an appointment; when I am tired and feeling sorry for myself because I have to clean the kitchen for the umpteenth time today; when I tune them out in need of a few minutes of peace or search the pantry for chocolate to calm frazzled nerves…

Two sweet little girl eyes peer back at me in the bathroom mirror most mornings watching, wondering if I mean what I say that it is truly more important to have a beautiful heart and love Jesus then to simply be beautiful. 

They don’t miss much.

In all of this, I know that there is good and there is grace.

Good being built each time I kiss their daddy and invest in our marriage. Good laid down for every “I was wrong to use that tone of voice with you.” “I was impatient, will you forgive me?”

Grace in the hours spent cuddled in my lap reading book after book, bible story after bible story, snuggling, praying, giggling.

Grace in the crafting, play time, park outings, egg dying, rice crispy treat making…

Grace in knowing that my role is not to be perfect, but to be in relationship with the one who is. If I am close to him, than I pray I will reflect him more than me to those little eyes and hearts that are watching.

Emma and Ash are at a super sweet (and busy!!) stage right now. And there is a whole lot of love in this house…

and lots of cuddles .

I did have the chance to get away for a couple hours from the family chaos for a little shopping and coffee with Margie Lou…I only wished it could have lasted longer!! After some Ross shopping and Starbucks, all felt right in the world.

I’ve been trying to really fill up on veggies and protein this weekend since I’ve been lacking in the produce department (no pun intended) over the last few weeks. I’ll probably try to blog some meals and workouts this week to keep me motivated.

I also made a yummy cookie dough dip from addapinch.com (found on Pinterest). It was a little cream cheesy for me, so I lessened the cream cheese, added a bit more brown sugar, vanilla, and a little flour to make it thicker like an actual cookie dough…Steve LOVED it!! Mine didn’t look nearly as beautiful as hers does….

…but it was tasty all the same! Have a wonderful start to your week!!!

from the Pioneer Woman last night…you have to try it! It looks amazing . I’m going to give it a go this weekend (hopefuly!!!). I’m LOVING the Pioneer Woman!! …Ree is so great…down-to-earth, very witty, and it’s pretty darn cool that she is on the Food Network now!! Her food always looks incredibly delicious.

I’ve been feeling  a little on the sick side the last couple days, so today turned out to be a great day to do some sewing (key words “a little” )…while the kids danced to the Nutcracker in the kitchen. Yes, you have to see Ashton dance…it is a sight to behold and always makes me crack up!!! My mom-in-law dropped by and taught me how to hem my jeans with a super quick whip-stitch. It is easy peasy. Really. Even I can do it super fast, which says a lot. After hemming two pairs of jeans, I practiced making throw pillow covers on my sewing machine with some spare fabric; that way when I buy my good fabric, I won’t waste any of it on mistakes…well that is the goal anyway. I’m very thankful that she came over because I couldn’t get my darn machine to move (note to self: take the sewing machine out of ‘bobbin threading’ mode before you try to sew). The good news is that I feel amazingly more competent after just one mini-lesson with my mom-in-law. She is wonderful.

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It’s funny, I’ve really been trying to cut back on sugar lately, not that I eat a lot these days anyway, but more than my body needs (right, as if it is even a food group!!). BUT, taking chocolate away during you-know-what-time-of-the-month is enough to about make me panic and feel the urge to feast on any and all carby, soft, whitey-looking things I can find (probably because it turns straight into sugar!!). So after 3 days of no sweets in the house (and eating lots of graham cracker, enchiladas, and other not so exciting white ‘”goodies"), we bought a brownie mix and bag of chocolate chips at Fred Meyer when we went to get a movie from their Redbox. Wow. I completely relaxed after having a few chocolate chips and then I was like ”whatever, moving on” and proceeded to snack on fresh pineapple and a veggie patty. So what in the world? I guess it just goes to show that sometimes restricting “too much” isn’t such a good thing . Am I right?

Mmmmmmmm. I do love my chocolate.

But I also love this…

photo credit

So this weekend, load up on the fresh stuff (I’m sure going to try to!!)…fresh fruit, lovely salads topped with crisp veggies and flavorful protein (yum!! I love feeling light and energetic after a meal!)…but definitely fit a little chocolate in there too!! And perhaps a white mocha Americano…ooops, did I say that? Well, I plan to. Tomorrow morning to be exact…and it’s gonna be free (thanks to my Starbucks survey prowess!).

TGIF!!!

- 1 -

A thoughtful Husband on Valentine’s Day and a very romantic date night!!

- 2 -

My brand new LAPTOP!!! I am head-over-heels in LOVE!!!

Awww yes, now it feels like mine!!

- 3 -

Fresh fruit and veggies from Bountiful Baskets: Blackberries, oranges, squash, cukes, lettuce, spinach, mangoes, bananas, tomatoes…even Jerusalem artichokes…whatever those are?!!

- 4 -

Smooth, caramelly Iced Coffee on a gorgeous spring-like morning.

- 5 -

My new Starbucks Mug . I loved my other one so much I got a second (thanks for the gift cards mom!!!). Since I drink so much iced coffee these days, I mostly use this for my morning oatmeal!

(Like the disaster in the background…welcome to my life with a toddler and preschooler!!!)

Happy Thursday…it’s almost the weekend!!!

I can hardly believe it’s the end of January!!! But I LOVE that that means February and Valentine’s Day are that much closer!! Steve and I are going to see “The Vow” with Channing Tatum and Rachel McAdams for Vday!! I’m a real big fan of both of them and can hardly wait!!! No really, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve watched the trailers!!!

We’ve also been doing a little of this…

I must say, I HEART VALENTINE’s DAY. The red, the pink, the chocolatey goodness…a great excuse to steal away for a night out with your sweetheart…what’s not to like?!!!

At the same time, it feels like it was just yesterday that Ashton and Sammi were “helping” me pack up our Christmas decorations for storage.

And a really short time ago that Emma’s cousins Ethan and Bella were over for a slumber party decorating a gingerbread house all decked out in their Sugarplum Fairy Costumes.

Ethan was my best little helper. He was so excited, he stayed through the whole house-making…even watching and waiting while the icing dried (he helped me “hold it all together” while it dried .)

And it wasn’t long ago that we were gathered around our dining room table savoring Christmas dinner.

Waiting patiently for Christmas gifts from Paper Coterie to be delivered…

And now Christmas is just a memory. Here we are in a brand new, beautiful year.

This year I’ve thought a lot about the habits that make for a smoothly running household. Not a perfect home, but an efficient, happy home where there is room to relax, play, craft, and cuddle without all the stress that clutter brings. Here are my top tidy home habits set up in three streamlined routines. Each simple routine builds from the previous one, and when used together, work to make life a lot less crazy with kids. We’ll start with the p.m. routines.

Post-Dinner

1. Clear the table, shake tablecloth/wipe placemats, put leftovers and condiments away
2. Fill dishwasher
3. Wash and put away pots and pans
4. Wipe counters

Evening Routine
(this should only take 15-20 minutes before bed if you did your post-dinner clean-up)

1. Run the dishwasher
2. Rinse out coffee pot and dump old filter
3. Pull items needed for tomorrow’s dinner from freezer
4. Take out garbage (kitchen, bathrooms, desk)
5. Tidy living room, gathering clothes and toys in a basket and putting them back where they belong

(Really finish off the kitchen so that counters are wiped and it is ready for action in the morning!)

Morning Routine
(this should be a breeze if you completed your evening routine!)

1. Make bed
2. Tidy up bathroom, put away toiletries, wipe counters
3. Start a load of laundry.
4. Empty dishwasher
5. Eat Breakfast/Bible Time
6. Clean up breakfast dishes and put in dishwasher
7. Clear table, clean highchair/tray

(Put all those last breakfast dishes away so that the kitchen is ready for lunch-making.)

These routines all sound pretty easy, right? But if you are a busy mom or working woman, you know how tired you can be at the end of the day and how hard it can be to “finish” your kitchen work and take care of business. But, the payoff to maintaining simple routines like these is HUGE. I love waking up to a crisp, clean kitchen beckoning me to make a cup of coffee and bask in the morning stillness, instead of being welcomed by last night’s spaghetti mess (I think we’ve all had those mornings!!); I love having more time for my kids to start right in on the day’s fun activities, instead of spending 45 minutes waiting for mom to clean up last nights glued-on mess of dishes and pots n’ pans (yuck!!)—I hate it when my kids have to wait for me to clean up what I should have taken care of the night before (but was too tired or lazy to do!!), I feel like we both miss out on precious time together! I also love that you can find things easier, accomplish more, feel more productive, and get to enjoy the look of a clean house at least a couple times a day…instead of playing catch-up all day long!!!

If routines are new to you, then just pick one routine or a couple tasks and work on doing them each night or morning for a week or two. When you feel like they are starting to get easier, add another task or routine.

Now, all that said, I need to clarify that my home is working towards these routines, but we are sooooo not there yet. Many mornings you would think a hair care bomb went off in our bathroom for all the spritzes, sprays, and irons I have strewn about the counters or a dinner bomb in the kitchen, you name it, our house has seen it. It’s a journey folks and we have our good days and our bad days.

And remember: there is GRACE in being a Wife and/or Mom. Both are high callings and at the heart of keeping a clean home is to bless your children and husband, not only for yourself or for the sake of CLEAN. It can be easy to go to one extreme or the other…either throw in the towel and let the chaos close in, or become the Cleanliness Nazi. And who wants to live with one of those?!!! I sure don’t and I KNOW my husband doesn’t!! Kids grow best when they aren’t being hovered after and scolded constantly about leaving toys out, so there has to be a happy balance…and moms function best when there is time to put their feet up and just enjoy their home and family! There will be mornings when you only have an hour till you start work, a messy home, and children who need some mommy time…that is when you just need to plop that sweet baby on your lap, hunker down by your toddler and let the good times roll.

Even though my kiddos aren’t in school yet, mornings are still very busy around our house. We have lots to get done (i.e., eat breakfast, brush hair, change diaper/pull-up, get clean clothes on, start laundry, brush teeth, make beds, tidy room, clean up kitchen, empty dishwasher), before we can move on to the fun stuff (i.e., reading books, crafts, abc’s and 123’s, bible time, play dates, outings, etc.). So I LOOOOOOOOOVE a quick, easy breakfast that will fill bellies and provide excellent fuel and nutrition to start the day (minus lots of prep and dishes to clean up). This is my “go-to” recipe. I can make it in 5 minutes flat the night before and have a delicious hot breakfast waiting in the morning…oh, and the benefits of steel-cut oats vs. boxed cereal are incredible, since oats are nutritional superstars boasting B-vitamins, protein, fiber, and calcium—to name a few of the benefits!! As Bob Harper says “The only cereal I eat is oatmeal.”

Here is how I make my oats. The ratio of steel-cut oats to liquid is 1 cup of oats to 4 cups of liquid, so around 9:30 p.m. I pull out my slow cooker, coat the inside with Pam and measure in the following:

Slow Cooker Oatmeal

• 2 cups of Steel-cut Oats
• 1 cup of Milk
• 7 cups of Water
• 2 tsp. each of Vanilla and Cinnamon

More milk, say 2 cups of milk and 6 cups of water will produce an even creamier oatmeal. Give it a quick stir and turn it on Low. Cook for 7 to 8 hours.

I usually make this on the days I’m getting up early to work out so that I can turn it off about 5:30 a.m. If you let it cook too long it will keep cooking down till it disintegrates or gets super sticky on the side of the slow cooker and impossible to get off. Basically, if it sticks too heavily to the sides or not grainy enough for you, then you cooked it too long. Scrape sides gently with a spatula and turn off when you wake up…it will still be nice and warm when you return to eat! This oatmeal reminds me of thick, tapioca pudding. Feel free to add pumpkin, nuts, raisins, chopped fruit, banana…experiment with all kinds of ingredients to see what you enjoy and to up the nutrition.

Here is my new oatmeal mug…it was a Christmas gift from my hubbie. Isn’t the bird cute on the back?! Gotta love those Starbucks mugs!!

Buddy says good morning!!! He is enjoying some Pumpkin Yogurt. Hope you have a wonderful start to your last week of December and 2011!!!

If you missed some of the holiday savings, no worries!! Papercoterie.com runs deals all the time and for pretty much every holiday, so just Google coupon codes to get some great savings!!

Here is how Ashton’s memory keeper turned out.

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I’m excited to stash baby booties, ultrasound pics, cards, favorite onesies, and all those fun things inside.

I can’t wait to get this little gem in the mail!!! So sweet.

Hope your holidays are going smoothly!! Just a few days left till

 Christmas .

Overstock.com

Overstock.com

Martha Stewart

As well as these super cute, durable totes for corralling everything from rolled towels in the bathroom to scarves and socks in the closet, to scrapbooking supplies and paper goods in the office. They would also be perfect by the front door or in the hallway closet for returns, warm weather gear, the options are endless!!!

I especially like these two:

Rugby Tote: Container Store

Jute Tote: Container Store

Currently, our closet is in desperate need of some proper storage containers to help us maximize the space, so I’m planning on snatching up a couple of the striped totes come January to get our closet organized.

Okay, that was completely un-holiday!!! Back to Christmas…