Fantastic Find Friday! Yankee Candle Fragrance Fans

I love to try new things whether it be a cool new website, food, brand of clothing, book, you name it so I thought that I would start posting about my fantastic finds on Fridays.  If you would like to do the same I invite you to post a link here so we can all get in on the fun! Btw, I am not being paid to advertise so please don't think I am spamming, I'm just a mom that loves to find new and interesting things and like to pass them along. 
The other day husband had a rare day off work so we went to do some shopping.  I wanted to go by Bed, Bath, and Beyond which was perfect for him because it gave him an excuse to go into his Will Ferrell routine from Old School (hey, I never said I married the most mature guy on the block!).  Now anyone that knows me well will not be surprised that the first spot I ran calmly walked to was the Yankee Candle section.  Sadly we do not have a Yankee Candle store here (which may be a good thing or I would be totally broke) so I get my Yankee Candle fix where I can.  After the great candle exploding experience earlier in the month I've kind of been laying off the candles which stinks because I love to have a super great smelling house.  Was that an unintentional pun?  I think maybe so.  Anyway, I was super excited to find this:

  It's a battery operated fan that spreads the fragrance around the room!  How ingenious is that?  Of course I had to get the buttercream scent and super bonus, it was on sale!  So naturally I stocked up on scent refills.  I will say that it smells good, but not as good as the candles so I won't be completely giving those up.  So what fun finds have you found lately?
 

Mean Kids

I know everyone is sick to death about hearing about mean kids, the big bullies that tease and pick on other kids (usually to make themselves feel better).  It's a subject that has been talked to death the past few years and even Kylie rolls her eyes when she hears it brought up.  However,  I am not happy so I'm going to talk about it today.  There is a child at the bus stop that is just seriously irritating me to no end.  She is mean and nasty to all the kids, is always in trouble at school and for some reason has decided to pick on my Audrey.  My sweet little girl that would never say boo to anyone is who she decided to target.  Audrey is a tiny little thing, shy and kind of timid.  Her biggest fear for reasons we haven't been able to figure out is dogs.  Occasionally someone will leave their dog out and it will wander up to the kids at the bus stop and this scares the heck out of her.  She'll start clinging to me and cry.  I've been working on her about this and telling her to just stand still and the dog will go away, but just like a swimmer that panics when they get in too deep she doesn't comprehend and panics.  The mean kid naturally has picked up on this.  She has been taunting and teasing her for months and it just keeps getting worse.  The really bad thing?  This child is in KINDERGARTEN!  I mean, what is a parent to do?  You can't just walk up to them and say, "do not speak to my child again or I will end you." even if that's what you are thinking. I have talked and talked and talked to my kids about speaking up and telling people to leave them alone, but Audrey just won't do it.   She is not only scared of getting in trouble, but she doesn't want to hurt anyone's feelings.  I'm sure it doesn't help matters much that the child is bigger than my second grader.  So now I am frustrated.  We have three more full months of school this year  which I'm sure means that I've got three more months of tongue biting to do. 

Wordless Wednesday-What are you looking at?

What are you looking at?

 

Angry Julie Monday 

 

What was I thinking?

The one thought that has been running through my brain all morning was "What were you thinking?!?"  I signed Sophie up for another round of gymnastics.  This means that I have to get a shower for myself and get her up, fed, dressed and out the door by 9:00.  It's almost 8:00 and she's still in bed and I'm just now sitting down to a bowl of cereal.  As I'm sitting here (not getting myself ready) I look down at a box of clothes that I'm supposed to be listing on ebay.  I started working on auctions last night that are *supposed* to begin tonight.  I have about 75+ auctions and I've only done about 25 so far.  Yeah, it's a "what were you thinking" kind of moment isn't it?  Then I think about the pictures I need to get enlarged to frame for the living room.  About a month or so ago I decided I could not take another minute of looking at my living room the way it was.  So I made husband paint it and I asked my dad to build us a new corner unit for the television and other assorted crap stuff.  As of now I'm still waiting to get the trim work done on my entertainment shelving and for husband to go back and do touch up work on the paint.  I finally got some picture frames for the big, blank wall above the couch yesterday, but now I need to fill them.  My former coffee table which is round looks ridiculous with the new furniture layout so now I'm probably going to spend money that I shouldn't on a new one.  Once again, what was I thinking?  ARGH!  I'm thinking maybe I should get my rear off the computer and get to work.  Have a great day everyone!

Maybe next weekend?

This weekend was just not so great.  Friday night Sophie woke up during the night crying and the only thing she wanted was mommy.  She still had a bit of a cold and since she wouldn't take anything for it she was feeling bad.  I ended up falling asleep holding her on the couch only to be awakened by her about once every thirty minutes or so until morning.  Saturday was supposed to be 'run errands, get a lot accomplished day', but as usual that didn't work out so well.  The kids were whiny because they wanted to stay home so we only did about half of what we needed to.  Then yesterday I had plans to take Kylie to see a movie.  Just the two of us.  We were all set to go see the Tooth Fairy movie and then Sophie started crying because she wanted to go.  Kylie did not want her sister to come because she wanted it to be just the two of us.  Sophie was screaming and crying which made me feel horrible, but at the same time I completely got what Kylie was saying.  Sometimes it's hard having more than one child and trying to be fair.  Then Audrey asked if she could go too.  Finally we decided to compromise.  The whole family would go, but Audrey and Sophie would sit with dad, while Kylie and I sat together.  We rushed to the theater, practically ran to the ticket counter because as usual we were running late, only to be told they weren't showing the movie.  Technical difficulties.  *Sigh* We told the kids we would take them to blockbuster instead.  When we get to blockbuster they don't have the game the kids wanted so they finally settled on one they hadn't played before.  I take Kylie and Sophie to the car while dad and Audrey check out.  We wait and we wait and we wait some more.  Finally they get to the car empty handed.  The game the kids were going to rent?  They didn't have it.  Someone put the wrong game in the box.  I just had to laugh because it seemed like no matter what we did something was going to screw up.  When I tucked the girls in last night Kylie told me, "Well we didn't really get to do anything we wanted this weekend, but at least we were all together."   Sometimes she just melts my heart.

Fantastic Find Friday! Lunchbox love

I love to try new things whether it be a cool new website, food, brand of clothing, book, you name it so I thought that I would start posting about my fantastic finds on Fridays.  If you would like to do the same I invite you to post a link here so we can all get in on the fun!  
Today I would like to share with you a cool little product someone told me about a few weeks ago called lunch box love.   They are cards that you slip into your childs lunch box with wonderful sayings on the front and with a cool bit of trivia on the back.  I ordered some and have been putting them in Kylie's lunch box for the past few weeks and she loves them.  I'm not doing them for Audrey just yet since she is just learning to read, but next year she'll definitely be getting them as well.  

I ordered my cards, but I have since been told that you can buy them from Michael's craft store in the dollar section so if you have a Michaels nearby you might want to try that first.  If your child purchases their lunch at school you could always slip a card into their backpack or folder. 

I want a do-over

I feel so incredibly 'off' this week.  For starters Kylie and Audrey had no school on Monday or Tuesday making this a five, yes five day weekend!  They were out Friday for that tiny bit of snow, then Monday for Presidents day and Tuesday for Mardi Gras day. I honestly can't complain though.  I enjoyed having them home and they were pretty much well behaved minus a few fights over the wii.   I thought that perhaps yesterday I could get back into the groove of things and reclaim my house, but with the husband home it didn't happen.  We spent a large portion of the day running errands and then Sophie started to feel bad.  By nighttime last night she was really feeling awful.  It's pretty rare for my children to get sick (knock on wood!) so when they do get sick I feel terrible for them.  It's nothing serious, just a cold, but she is so pitiful.  I tried to give her some medicine, but she spit it all out.  I think I traumatized her fairly well with it because she kept waking up throughout the night saying, "No medicine, mommy mean" :( then when she woke up this morning she asked, "No medicine mommy? Please?"  She really knows how to make a mommy feel bad.  I'm hoping that she'll start to feel better soon because she has a speech evaluation at the school tomorrow at 8:00.  Eek!  No idea what I was thinking scheduling anything so early in the day.  Hopefully next week we'll get back on schedule.  Hopefully.

Wordless Wednesday-The new glasses

Wordless Wednesday~ New Glasses

 

Angry Julie Monday 

 

The latest sewing project........

So I saw this really cool project on Lil Blue Boo's blog and thought I would give it a shot.  Sophie is having a tough time learning her alphabet and I thought the beanbags with the letters on them would be something cute and fun to do.  So with her help I went to Hobby Lobby and picked up some fabrics.

I suppose I should have tried to at least coordinate fabrics, but these were the ones she wanted so these are the ones she got.  I kind of cheated on the letters though and bought iron-ons instead.  Hey, anything to make life a little easier right?  So today I started.  And made only two of them.  For some reason everytime I tried to sew those little buggers together my needle would keep coming unthreaded.  So now she can play with Y and Z until mommy finds her patience again.  

A

And yes, I do realize they are two completely different sizes. 

The old green eyed monster

I have a love/hate relationship with facebook.  I love being able to catch up and keep up with my friends, but at the same time I sometimes feel inadequate after seeing all the accomplishments some of them have made.  One case in point, the friend that I had in high school that went on to get her law degree and publish countless papers.  She has the huge house, the cutest little girl imaginable, the awesome husband, and she travels all of the time.  Not work travel, but the fun kind.  You know the Bahamas, Martha's Vineyard, Italy and so on. Places that I will most likely never be able to see. Or the friend that just added an 'addition' to her home that is bigger than my house.  It's not just those with the great material things either.  Yesterday I reconnected with an old friend that has been teaching in Thailand for the past five years and helped build a new school over there.  I think that one actually got to me more than the others because she did something really good ya know?  It made me wonder what have I accomplished with my life.  When I went to bed last night I actually dreamed that my life was different.  I dreamed that I had the body that I had when I was oh, about 18 and that basically my life was perfect.  Then I woke up.  I woke up to two of my children fighting over the wii, and a house that looked like a tornado hit it really hard.  As I looked down at my out of shape body and got out of bed to face the day I was depressed.  I began to clean the house and as I did I realized something.  The clutter I was picking up was from the special valentine celebration my kids planned yesterday.  I was ashamed of myself.  How could I ever think that my life was bad?  Sure, we outgrew our house about six years ago, but we have one.  And yes, my kids argue, but they love each other so much it makes me want to cry with happiness.  As far as what have I accomplished?  That's easy.  I've brought three of the smartest, sweetest, funniest, cutest little girls into the world and one day they are going to grow up to become awesome women.  So for now as I play catch up with my friends I'll be happy for them and what they have done with their lives, but at the same time keep in mind that I have a pretty great one myself.  

Yippy, snow!

For those of you north of us (which would literally be pretty much everyone) don't laugh and roll your eyes.  There have been rumors all week that we might get snow and the kids have been so excited and hopeful. When we woke up this morning we were all a bit disappointed to see nothing but rain still.  I know many of you have been snowed in for weeks and are sick of it already, but for us this is a big deal.  When I say finally I don't mean the first snow of the season, I mean the first snow in years.  My kids have never even seen snow before.  Well technically Sophie did when we took her to Cincinnati for her surgery, but she was only three months old so she doesn't remember.  The schools were canceled because we are not equipped for cold weather so when it started I bundled the kids up and we went outside to play.  They had a blast! 

 

 

 

We didn't really get very much, definitely not enough for a snowman, but we did get in a few snowballs.

 

The kids had fun throwing snowballs with one of their little friends that lives in the neighborhood.  I think it's safe to say that he won the snowball fight though.

 

You may notice that Audrey isn't in many of the pictures.  She didn't care for the cold (smart girl!) and went inside to wait on us.  Sadly as I'm sitting her writing this the majority of it has already melted.  Oh well, it was fun while it lasted!

 

A few room updates

I realized this morning that I had not updated a few things that I bought for the girls rooms so I thought I would update with some pictures.  First in Kylie and Audrey's room I changed out the bedding:

 

I also changed the curtains too.  I bought the valance and made some cheapy pink curtains that are too short, but the girls like them so they'll stay awhile.   Oh and by the way, did you know how hard it is to find a white curtain rod anymore?  I looked everywhere for one.  The girls had one, but it was too short for their valance so I wanted to get them a new one, but had no luck.  I finally remembered this shelf one that I  had stuck away in the attic so we are using it.  Moving right along now.  Here is the tree I put  on the wall, also from Target.   Audrey decided to sneak in a quick tea party with her dolls before school this morning, lol.

 

 

And just in case anyone cares what the rest of the messy cramped room looks like I added pics of that too.  Keep in mind that my house is extremely tiny and we have no basement (can't have them here) and no playroom so what you see is what you get.  

 

Yeah, the dresser is a mess and Audrey's looking at me like I'm crazy now.  I didn't get a very good pic, but the three pictures above the mirror are ones the girls have made over the years using their handprints.  The small one on the bottom we made when Sophie was a baby.  It has Kylie and Audrey's handprints as flowers and Sophie's footprints as flowers.  The one above it and to the right Kylie and Audrey made before we had Sophie.  Both girls handprints are butterflies and you can't see it, but the butterfly's head is made with their thumbprints and so are the flowers in the grass.  The larger picture to the left is Audrey's handprints for the butterflies, Sophie's for the flowers and Kylie's arms made the tree, her fingers were the branches and she used her fingertips to make the leaves.  

 

 

Then we have messy desk area.  For whatever reason Kylie did not want to put the CPU in the desk behind the door so now we've got this big, ugly black and grey thing sticking out.  

 

And finally we have tiny closet, art area and other assorted junk.  My dad made the girls the house on the wall for Christmas.  The little tins underneath hold crayons and such.  In Sophie's room I finally put up the wallies.  I couldn't decide what to do with the alphabet so I finally put them on her wall.  Yes, her room is now extremely busy, but she's four.  

 

 

And since I showed Kylie and Audrey's full room, I figured I would show Sophie's as well.  So here ya go:

 Notice the bedskirt I made?  Yeah, it's too long.  One day I'll figure out how to measure things and get them right.  The colors on the wall are much softer than they appear in my photos.  I am definitely not a photographer.  

 

This is probably the most used area in all of our home.  I bought Kylie this table and chair set when she was about two or three and it has to be the best investment I have ever made.  

 

 And last we have the closet.  Exciting isn't it?  

 

 

Wordless Wednesday-Game Day!

  

Game Day!  Go Blue Devils!

Angry Julie Monday

What's wrong with this picture?

 

 

See it?  Yeah, it's kind of hard to miss isn't it?  I adore candles and constantly have either a candle or a tart melting somewhere in my house all the time.  I just love walking into my home and smelling the yummy goodness of them.  I used to just light the candles and one day someone asked me why didn't I use a candle warmer.  Hmm, a candle warmer, never thought about that.  So I went out and bought a couple and have never looked back.  Until today.  I was walking by and for some reason something caught my eye.  I peered at the candle jar because it looked like it had a crack near the neck of it.  On both sides.  I started to pick it up and realized it had no bottom!   Lovely.  Then Sophie pointed out the waxy mess under the table (don't laugh.  I know it's a crappy table and I'm hoping to get something new soon) so now I get to spend some time scraping up candle wax.  At least it smells good.

Monday already?

Wow, that was one fast weekend wasn't it?  On Friday I had planned to run all of my errands so I could spend the weekend just staying home with my family.  Well you know what they say about the best made plans right?  As soon as I got in the car and started down my street my cell phone rang.  My phone rarely rings because I am not a big phone person so I knew it had to be important.  It was the school calling me to come pick up Audrey.  She was still crying when she got to school and the nurse said that her ear looked a little pink.  So off I went to get her and take her to the doctor.  Her ear had a nasty infection so I stopped and picked up some medicine for her and brought her home to rest.  Poor baby, I hate when something is wrong with one of my children and I either miss it altogether or just blow it off.  Out of all three of my children we've only experienced three ear infections in eight years (knock on wood!) so I really don't know any signs to look for.  The first two there weren't any signs.  The pediatrician just noticed them during routine well visits.  So anyway, that was the end of my plans for the day which meant everything would have to wait until the weekend.  This means that the kids would stay home with dad which also means that now my house looks like a mad hurricane rushed through it.  Which means that I now have to clean.  And I don't want to.  At all.  I just want to go crawl back into bed with Sophie and snuggle for awhile.  Hmm, might just do that.....

Well that was nice, I feel so much better now.  Still don't want to clean though.  I do have a small problem project that I would like to do today that I would love to get some suggestions on.  About two weeks ago wallies  sent me an email that they were having a sale.  Being the sucker  savvy shopper that I am I had to rush over and check it out.  They had this cute little thing under the wall play section and I knew I had to get it.

 

Cute isn't it?  I think I'm going to put it on Sophie's door since her walls are already kind of busy.  I then saw this one and thought I would order it as well.

 
 

Sophie really needs to learn her alphabet and I thought this would help some.  The problem is I don't know where to put it.  I'm toying with the thought of making some big flash cards like the eeboo ones at land of nod , but I don't know where to begin.  So what do you think?  Dumb idea or is there something else cute and creative I can do?  Oh, and I know it's silly, but the thing that really pushed me over the edge and made me add this to my order is the picture next to the letter F.  See it?  It's the frog picture.  I just knew when I saw it that Sophie would get excited because it kind of looks like her Hattie frog.  I was right, she loves it.  Which means I now have to get in gear and do something with it!

 

Mmm, cookies!

I have been wanting something chocolaty all week, but nothing I looked at in the stores appealed to me.  Then yesterday while I was in Target it struck me.  I needed wanted some cookies.  Not just any cookies, but those pain in the rear cookies that cost a stupid amount of money to make because they have a trillion different ingredients and take forever to prepare because they have so many prep steps to do.  Yes, I am talking about those Neiman Marcus/Mrs. Fields cookies that I'm sure you have all received at some point in time an email about.  I know the story about them is an urban legend, however the cookies are awesome!  I always cut the recipe in half and it still makes a ton of cookies, but they are oh so good!  Like I said, they take forever (at least for me anyway) to make because you have to shred candy bars (harder than it sounds), grind up your oatmeal, send hubby to the store to pick up that one ingredient you left out, and chop the nuts.  So, with my trusty helper Kylie on chocolate shredding detail (he he) I got to work and now my craving has been totally satisfied. 

 

Oh, and what do you think of my new shredder?  Cute, huh?  Several months ago I saw one like it in a catalog and just had to have it.  I forgot where I saw it and hoped to find one in-store somewhere and yesterday I lucked out and found one.  I went shopping at what I call the trinity (TJ Maxx, Marshalls, and Ross) and found one in Marshalls for $5.99! 

 

What a week!

This has been one wild week and I am so glad to be seeing the end of it!  On Wednesday I had a conference with Kylie's teacher.  She makes excellent grades (no clue where she gets that!), and is well behaved in class, but I noticed that while many of the kids in her class are in the 100 book club she has only made it to 35.  This child reads every single day.  She loves reading the American girl books and has read them over and over every single one so something just didn't seem right.  Apparently the only books that are being counted are the books that the children take AR tests on and Kylie has not been signing up to take the tests.  I'm not sure if all schools participate in the AR program, but apparently it's a really big deal at our school with our principal.  Personally I hate it.  I feel like the children are rushing through their books so they can take a test on it and not really enjoying the books.  I am a big reader so this kind of annoys me.  Anyway,  her teacher is going to work with her and remind her to take the tests (btw, her teacher feels the same way I do about the tests.).   After I finished talking with her teacher I had to hurry and take Kylie to the eye doctor.  Apparently my child is nearsighted.  I feel so bad, I had no clue.  They had a vision screening at school and Audrey's came back okay so I just assumed Kylie's would as well.  Nope, not the case.  They sent home a note telling me that I should probably take her to get her eyes checked.  My children have rarely ever been sick or had anything wrong with them so I honestly didn't think much of it.  Yes, I know bad mommy moment here.  I waited until I took her to her annual check up and when we were there the nurse did the simple eye chart test.  She kept asking Kylie what letters and shapes did she see and she just stood there.  I had to pick my jaw up off of the floor.  I could not believe she couldn't see these huge letters!  So I came home and made her an appointment and yes, she is going to get glasses.  Very, very expensive glasses.  I actually picked the cheapest frames and they still ended up costing $167!   I'm crossing my fingers that she doesn't lose or break them.  Then this morning around 4:00 Audrey woke up crying and saying her ear hurt.  I went and got into bed with her and she feel asleep and I was hoping she would wake up and be okay.  Nope.  She woke up and was kind of cranky, but didn't act sick so after wavering on whether or not to send her I decided to let her go.  I wrote a note to her teacher to call me if she acted like she wasn't feeling well.  When I walked her to the bus stop I knew things were going to be bad.  There were about five dogs there.  Big dogs.  My child is absolutely terrified of dogs and she immediately went into hysterics.  To make matters worse there is a little girl that is always being mean and teasing Audrey.   She came up to her and began mocking her saying, "oh, I'm so afraid of dogs. I'm going to cry."  Seriously this kid is in kindergarten!  When did kindergartners get so mean?!?  Finally the bus arrived and she was crying, but I figured she would be okay after awhile when she realized the dogs were away from her.  I hurried back inside and got Sophie ready and we were going to run to the grocery store and the minute I put my key in the ignition my cell phone rang.  The school called me to pick her up.  Yep, another mommy guilt moment.  I should have just kept her home from the start.  So today we get to go to yet another doctors appointment.   Ugh, wish us luck! 

Wordless Wednesday: Bellingrath Gardens

 

Every Wednesday my friend Julie over at Angry Julie Monday has wordless Wednesday. Usually I post a pic with my kids, but this week I'm posting one of their favorite things instead.  The Asian Garden at Bellingrath Gardens.  This bridge is the one thing that my kids cannot wait to get to when we visit the gardens.  They love to climb to the top and look down at their reflections and the huge fish that swim underneath.  

Houston we have a problem. Maybe.

So this morning I was getting ready to go somewhere and reached into my makeup bag for a tube of lipstick.  Hmm, not that color, or that one, too light, too dark, no, no, no, hey how many of these tubes do I have anyway?!  I pulled out all of the lipsticks and had a grand total of twenty one!  The bad thing?  That is just what was in my make up bag, that's not counting all of the ones in my purses, in my car, or on my desk.  Even worse?  I probably have just as many lip glosses.  I refuse to even attempt to count the nail polish. 

Technology and kids

Back in the fall like clockwork I began having problems with my computer.  Every year without fail this always happens and it is almost always around Aug./Sept./Oct.  Usually it is some strange virus that I pick up from somewhere, however this year it was something different.  My computer would not turn on.  Apparently there was something wrong with a connection.  Very frustrating obviously.  So my dear, sweet husband replaced my computer for me.  I was thrilled, but what I did not know was that he took my old computer to have it fixed so we could pass it down to the kids.  Yes, that's right to my then seven, five, and three year old.   This may sound a bit over the top, but would you believe that Audrey has to do homework on the internet 2-3 times a week?  The child is in kindergarten!  This is on top of the 7+ papers that she has to do each week.  So we gave them the old computer, but then the monitor died.  Just our luck, lol.  We told the kids that they would have to save their money in order to buy a monitor of their own.  Unlike their mommy here they get an allowance each week.  A really nice size allowance.  Unlike me.  They were doing a really great job saving up, but then I decided to surprise them and get them a monitor for Christmas.  They were overjoyed so it was totally worth it.  For whatever reason we kept putting off giving them internet access so basically they were just playing PC games or tux paint.  If you don't have tux paint, I highly recommend it (tux paint).  My kids love it and it is so fun to see the creations they make on there.  This weekend however, I could not take the fighting over the computer any longer and we hooked 'em up.  Kylie was thrilled because now she could use the email address I set up for her ages ago.  She just turned eight in January and so far the only people she emails are me and her dad, but she thinks it's the coolest thing ever.  Last night I thought I would show her how IM worked.  I sent a message to her explaining what it was and she immediately sent back the message, 'cool'.  She kept IM'ing me from her room down the hallway.  Yes, we're dorks.  She sent me a message asking if I could 'figer' out what something meant and I replied and told her that the correct spelling was f-i-g-u-r-e.  To which I received the reply back, "hey, I'm only 8 years old, I'm doing my best!"  Sometimes it's hard to remember.