Getting Organized in January

One of my goals to get better at in 2019 was to get rid of the clutter.  I wasn't too sure how I would tackle such a task, because it's daunting.  After I was digging in my linen closet for something and knocked my nail stuff all over the floor.  It motivated me to get it started, and it frustrated me that we had so much crap shoved in a closet.

I've watched all the episodes of Tidying Up, read the book, but decided that I wouldn't go that extreme.  I'm not that ready.  

Remember the kids and I skipped school on a Friday to go shopping two weeks ago?  Well we hit up The Container Store as well and picked up some goods to help make things easier to tidy.

This little bin was the culprit that activated "clean the closets" mode.  

I snapped some before picture of the closets to take with me to The Container Store.

I also measured the space of how I wanted the bins to layout on the shelves.  The kids loved getting the tape measure out in the store, lining up the bins, and seeing if the number was more or less than our goal number.

I emptied out the pantry and laid it all out on the counters.

I ended up tossing a garbage bag full.

After.  I've actually added 4 more OXO containers and removed the popcorn maker.

The linen closet was actually fun to do.  I laid everything out on my bed and sorted the bins by face, body, hair, feminine, oral, medicine, first aid, travel, and misc.  What a difference having everything have a space.  I'm not knocking anything over and my bathroom counter is cleaned off.  When I need a hair product, I use it and put it right back.  So much nicer.

The culprit after.  No more little bin overflowing.

I tossed 2 bags of garbage from the linen closet as well.

I dropped off all our donations from January on Tuesday.  I went through my closet and Sterling's drawers.  8 bags + two store bags and bins.  I'm still not done organizing in my closet.  That is a work in progress that will hopefully get done in February.  I'm just not sure what I want to do in there yet.  I am loving the open floor space right now!

It's so freeing getting rid of things that we're not using and they're just taking up space.

In February I will tackle our storage room.  I think if I can get this ginormous task done, the rest of the house will be a breeze!  Not joking, at all.

Have a great day!

Selfie hater

What a title to a post, huh?!  It's true though, I really hate selfies.  They're just awkward.  And these were the only pictures I took yesterday.  Sigh.  I love our Tuesday's though.  While Xander's at gymnastics for 2 hours, Sterling and I run errands and pick up groceries.  Go home, unload and pack us all a quick lunch.  Grab Xander, run to Walmart or the library to kill 45 minutes (so we don't have to come back into town), then take Sterling to her gymnastics lesson.

Typically the kids will play outside for an hour after activities, but yesterday it was raining when we got home.  Because I washed my car just an hour prior.  Of course.  It wasn't supposed to rain until after 5.  So we did school earlier than normal for a Tuesday.  

Onto those awkward selfies...

Two straight hair girlie's

And one with my favorite boy

So, the color is still darker than I'd like, but hopefully on the next appointment it will get lighter.  This is only my third time with this beautician, so she has to figure out my hair and the chemical balance I suppose.

Have a great day!

Haircuts

Good morning.  We had a pretty busy day yesterday.  We started our day dropping off some things at the post office.  Then I'd planned to go to the gym.  But then I tried talking myself out of why I shouldn't go.  Why must I do that to myself!?  But then we did end up going.  It always feels good when I get my workouts in, but the mental convincing it takes some days is torture.  I've been going to the gym on and off since October and last week it seemed like all the vampires showed up and took my favorite machine.  #newyearnewbies They weren't there yesterday, so I had my good workout.  

I should really just do a day in the life.  I've never done one before, but I think it might be fun to do Monday through Friday.

School went fantastic yesterday.  I don't get a smooth running day this nicely often, so I was soaking it up!

We have a goal to get Sterling fluently reading chapter books.  She's reading them now, just really slowly and not confident.  She's loving the Junie B. Jones and Billie B. Brown books.  But, she wants to start reading Magic Tree House.  We started going through her sounds activities and she didn't want to stop yesterday.  She doesn't need help with her beginning sounds, but we're doing them as a refresher.  Once she's done with segmenting and blending, I think she'll be a more confident reader.

This boy rocked school.  He independently took on his core subjects as I was working with Sterling.  When he needed help (which was only twice) I explained and then his light bulb moment went off.  He's a smart cookie.

After school, we headed to Raleigh and had our hair done.  I normally drop the kids off at the play place, but, when you have an evening appointment, you take them with you.  Sigh.  They were actually really well behaved.

So, I ended up having Sterling get a trim as well.

She's not a fan of the blow dryer

But, she loves straight hair so she'll put up with it.  Beauty is pain, right?

My hair didn't get straightened.  It was closing and I told my beautician that she didn't need to completely blow dry my hair.  I just wanted to see some of the color.  I don't think it's as blonde as I wanted, but it'll work for now.  I'm not usually too picky on the outcome of my hair.  It grows out or I can get it done sooner than normal if I really don't like it.  I'll snap a picture later today.

Today is the kids' Opa's birthday, so Happy Birthday, Opa!

Have a great day!

School at the park

Good morning!  Here I am posting later than normal, but I thought I'd share how much fun it was to take school outside of the classroom and to the great outdoors.  I see a lot more outdoor learning in our future.

On Friday I decided that we would just take one subject to learn.  It was in the low 50s, but it was freezing.  There was a cold wind.  I figured math would be the best option because they are both great in math and stay pretty focused.

First though, we picked up McD's for lunch.

Xander was actually taking a test that day.  He did great!  Maybe it was all the fresh air?!

Sterling had to find the missing addend.  This is one area she hates, but I think she finally figured it out because she zipped right through it.

After their lessons were done, they hit the park and played for an hour.

While they played, I was talking to other homeschooling parents.  They had a meet-up just after we arrived, so we started talking.  

When we got home, I had a package waiting.  I wasn't expecting a big box because I'm waiting on a book that was ordered at the beginning of the month.  So, when I saw a big box, I thought, wow Amazon, you sure are wasting boxes again.  #notthefirsttime To my surprise, there was a Valentines gift.  I can't wait to use it.  It's a foot massage!

On Saturday, while the kids were playing outside all day, I whipped up some cake sandwiches.  Back in the day when I was a kid, my mom had this machine that she'd always make cake in.  I loved them so much that I bought myself this machine last month.

They take only 2.5 minutes

Perfection

Sterling helped frost.  I think she smelled the goodness outside and came in to see what I was up to.

So good!

Yesterday we cleaned hard and worked in Sterling's room.  I got rid of three bags of clothes from her room.  There's still probably more, but for now, it's a start.  I haven't officially started anywhere outside of my room.  2019 is my year to get everything organized and have less.

Have a great day!

Friday Favorites

Hey there!  Did this week fly by or was that just for me?!  We had one crazy, horrible, no good day, but the rest flew right past us.  But, we didn't let that one day ruin the rest of the week.  Every day is a new day to start fresh.  And that's just what we did!

Hanging out at the park while Xander was at practice was a good idea until she flew off that thing behind her.  We're actually heading back today, so it made our favorite spot for the week.  We're taking some of our school work and learning at the park today.  

GoNoodle's our favorite brain break activity during school

We picked up a new game this week.  Headbanz.  So. Much. Fun.  Favorite game of the week!

We laughed so hard, until my headband said I was a fly and that fly was scary looking, ha!

Aw, my favorite view from the week!  She turned 7 months this week.

This boy woke up yesterday and had a spark of creativity in him.

He gathered his supplies and made a robot.  He's been drawing robots a lot lately, so I'm guessing that sparked his interest in building one.

Xander and I finished our abstract art this week.

Mine

Xanders

Free skating is Xanders favorite

I started Girl, Wash Your Face.  So good.  I'm only on chapter 5, but I'm hoping the remainder will be enthralling.   It's so hard to not scroll through instagram and see all the pretty/fun pictures and wish I could do this or that like so and so.  Ugh.  It's so hard putting myself first, but I need to.

Happy Mama = Happy Home

I'd heard a lot of mixed reviews on this book, so I was hesitant to read it.  Did you like it?

This pizza was on everyones favorite list.  The kids wanted it for lunch the other day, but I couldn't bring myself to make the frozen one at lunchtime.  It's a dinner thing!

Xander had his first gymnast rips this week.  He's been officially taken in on the boys team.  Many more taped up hand days are in his future.  He said when the coach told all the boys to come over and look at his first rips, it was his favorite moment.  He was proud!

This weekend we are getting some plans in place for three big trips that are coming up, cleaning out the car, and working on a few chores.

Have a great weekend!

Homemade Pizza

I like to get the kids' input on which meals I should make during the week.  Each kiddo usually gives me two meals.  This makes meal planning easy for me.  I only need to come up with three of the meals.  This week one of Sterling's requests was homemade pizza.  She's never requested it before, so I was pumped!  That morning, Sally from Sally's Baking Addiction posted her Homemade Pizza Crust for Beginners.  So, I decided to give her recipe a try.

While the kids were in day camp, I had the dough rising.  Our house was freezing on Monday.  We woke up to temps in the teens and the house couldn't stay warm.  It was 62 inside, so I was worried the dough wouldn't rise.  But, I propped it in front of a heater and let it rise for 2 hours.  

Sterling loves helping in the kitchen.  We're waiting on her own cookbook to arrive and we can't wait to start trying new recipes together.  

This dough was SO easy to work with.  It stretched so nicely, was not sticky, and kept it's shape.

It made two {roughly} twelve inch pies

Add our sauce

She wasn't going to spread it out, but I convinced her it would taste better if she did.

She was very delicate putting the cheese on.  It took her a good ten minutes.

But man, look at that goodness!

Ta-da.  It's done.  This pizza was amazing.  The crust was so light, thin, and each bite was perfection.

The other pie I partial baked the crust, let cool completely.  Then topped it and tossed it in the freezer overnight.  Our next pizza night is ready to pop in the oven.

This recipe will definitely find it's way in our rotation on pizza night.  Dare I say better than Domino's?!  It was SO good guys!   Mmmm...mmmmm....good!