Today is a hard day in our household as the horror still hasn’t left us on what happened years ago on 9-1-1. In honor of all those that have lost their lives and those that are left behind to carry-on without you, we bow our heads in memory. We love you and thank you for everything that you have done.
I won’t bore you with my list of purchases (mainly because I’m too lazy to type it all) but I hit the big score today. It took me 2 hours with 2 kids (2 and 2 mo) in tow but woo-hoo!
I think the best deal I pulled off was using a $3 (or was it $5 I can’t remember now) Huggies diaper coupon (BJs) and $3 Huggies wipe coupon (BJs) w/ the Publix $5 off coupon. Or maybe it was using the Albertson’s B1G2 free on the Spare Ribs…
Saved: $144.76
Spent: $119
The best I’ve ever done and made me really glad I spent a little elbow grease this morning getting all my coupons in order.
Anthony is the lucky recipient of not one but TWO parties this year. We held one last weekend so Nick’s niece could attend (before she went back to college) as well as the rest of his family. It turned out to be rather fun with just a small group of people and everyone got to spend time with Anthony instead of watching him run off with other people. He seemed to enjoy it a lot also all the one-on-one time. He didn’t really understand it was a party until we got out our sticker-decorated party hats (great way to save some $$ btw). And he loved his cake although he was a bit intimidated when everyone started yelling at him to blow out the candle. He gets rather flustered when he receives a lot of instructions, like most kids.
This weekend will be the party with my side of the fam, our friends and all of Ant’s friends. It promises to be a good time for all! I can’t wait for him to blow out his candle again this weekend, hopefully it won’t be such a new experience for him and he’ll blow like crazy 
I asked my mom to get some Winnie the Pooh mylar balloons and since he LOVES balloons I can’t wait to see his face when Granny walks in with 10 balloons. How fun!
The themes of the parties are Winnie the Pooh and adorable just doesn’t describe it! We went to the party store and bought Winnie Pooh napkins and plates for the cake and then just colored napkins, plates and plastic table clothes in cooresponding colors. Believe it or not this did save us quite a bundle doing it that way. And I can use the colored items for other parties at other times. Anthony was really set on having hats but they didn’t have any in stock so we bought plain blue ones (his choice) and some Winnie Pooh stickers and decorated the hats ourselves. He found that to be the greatest of fun and I think I’ll do that from now on. I also got 2 citronella candle pails in pink for Piglet. lol (Mosquitoes are really bad right now around here.) A few more hanging decorations and some Winnie balloons and we are all set.
Not at all related to kids or babies other than the saying “if momma ain’t happy then nobodys happy”. I finally have REAL, grown-up knives 
Nick’s parents went to Macys last weekend and were telling us they had a bunch of J.A. Henkel knives on sale plus some really nice ones by Martha Stewart. I figured the sale would end on that Sunday so I placed an order on Saturday night.
We got the knives yesterday and OMG do they rock! You see, I LOVE cooking, nothing fancy smanchy just good ol’ yummy food. BUT our knives used to stink. Eating a steak was a pain and not enjoyable sawing our way through it, and that was just one complaint. Now at the age of 30 I can proudly say my knife collection has grown-up and I’m one happy mama. LOL
We got my in-laws frequently and I’ve been battling an up-hill battle to leave some toys there for Anthony to play with when we go. I’ve succeeded in leaving behind a horsey that neighs when your press his ear (bought by them so they couldn’t refuse) and a teeny tiny bag of match box cars. It doesn’t entertain him for terribly long so I always wind up bringing toys along with me as well.
Well…now that Vince is here and we’re back to bringing everything and the kitchen sink along with us, (we bring a bouncy chair for him and a portable booster for Ant on top of everything else) I decided that carting toys along too was the last straw.
I hit the Target 75% off summer clearance sale last weekend and bought a bunch of different toys and an under the bed storage box. I filled it up with crayons, coloring books, various toys – both inside and outside ones and even an aquadoodle. We brought it over to his parents house and explained that it was toys for there and they could store it under the bed in the guest room and it would be good for when all the younger grandkids come over. You could tell they weren’t overly excited about it but they couldn’t resist since we covered all the bases. And now, there is one less thing for us to cart over there when we go Thank god.
Wow it’s been a bit since I’ve posted but I bet you’ll forgive me I hope. Life has been a bit out of control recently. Anthony has gotten a cold and has reverted to being ungodly clingy. I feel for my munchkin, I really do, but boy is it hard to deal with a clingy toddler and a newborn. Feeding one, while snuggling the other has brought motherhood to a whole new art form. So far (seriously knocking on wood) I’ve managed to avoid the cold although I do feel like I’m holding it off by a thread.
What do you do to make a (almost) 2 yr old feel better? I really don’t want to dope him up on drugs if I can avoid it and now he knows he can spit them out so I have no option in that.
As of now the onesies under the footie pjs is still working. He is not sleeping as well still as he did before, but I’m not sure if this is more growing pains than anything since he is almost 2 and lots of things are changing. I’ll continue updating you as we go!
Here’s my previous posts on the subject: June: Mattress Covers and July #1: Cloth Diapers
Straight from their newsletter:
“The inside Mamabargains.com scoop…
Uppababy is back, we’ve had overwhelming requests for them to make a return, so they have graciously decided to allow us to feature them again! Thanks Uppababy! Stay tuned, they are coming soon!
We have also gotten tons of requests for Red Castle, which is why you see them often…very soon you will have the opportunity to purchase the seat pads, the courier bags, the classic bags, footmuffs, combizips and topsits all individually. We also have a few of the carrycots leftover, let us know if you are interested…
Coupon codes – here’s the deal with those fun little things – it has come to our attention that there are coupon codes floating around that claim to be of working use on our site – trust us, if we are going to offer you a coupon code, it will be plastered across our home page, you won’t be able to miss it. Please note that there are lots of coupon sites out there that list coupon codes, none of which we have posted on. Please don’t be hurt, upset, or otherwise annoyed with us when they don’t work, cause we didn’t create them!”
I’ve ordered several cloth diapers and covers from Swaddlebees and they just shipped so we’ll see how that goes.
My girlfriend also posted on DiaperSwappers.com asking the women on there for suggestions and lo-and-behold but one of them worked! Thanks mamas!!! We are putting a onesie on underneath his footie all-in-one pjs and so far it is working. This is the 3rd night doing so and he has not wet the bed since. HOWEVER, he is not sleeping as well as he was when he could “comfort” himself to sleep but hopefully things get better.
I will also be purchasing some 100% cotton footie pjs from The Children’s Place (the Monster Sale is currently taking place too – bonus!) per the same GF to try. She says they aren’t super stretchy, like my current ones are.
I recently joined this cool website that allows you to list the books that you have available – paperback and hardcover – and then other members can “order” them from you. The only cost out of pocket is the postage to send the books to the members. Once the book is received by them, they mark it so and you get 1 credit. The credits allow you to order your own books. You can even place books on your wish list that allows you first dibs when it gets listed by another member. I’ve sent out about 15 books so far (including 5 that are going out today lol). This worked really well for when I hit the 3rd trimester and couldn’t do as much, so I’d prop my feet up and read If you do sign up please use my email address (cassie (@) nouturn dot com – no spaces) as a referral so I get 1 credit!
