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real food.

So lately I’ve been thinking a lot about food. I’ve been trying to assess how I feel about my diet, my children’s diet and my overall health. To put it mildly, it’s at best average, not good but not great either.

I knew something had to change, but I just didn’t know what. We eat fairly good around here, I always have fresh fruits and veggies in the house, I cook a balanced dinner almost every night, we drink water, we get exercise and for the most part are a healthy family. But what I’ve noticed is the amount of packaged food I’m buying at the store. I know every family has their convenience stuff, me included.  A frozen pizza here, a box of fruit snacks there, crackers, cereal and cookies too. But what exactly are in those and is it okay to feed to my family?

So I decided to try an experiment.

A Real Food plan for 2 weeks.

First thing I had to do was get the family on board. We discussed how long we were willing to try it for. I suggested a month, the kids compromised at 2 weeks. The kids were excited to give it a try. Of course they know that they will have to sacrifice but were thrilled at the idea that I asked them to participate. I figured by asking their permission they are accountable for making their own decisions and in supporting the family over the next 2 weeks.

So what is real food? It means no boxed food, no packaged food, no frozen dinners, no takeout, no McDonalds, no juice, nothing that can be bought in a bag, box or can. (with some small exceptions, of course)

So let me lay out the whole plan for you here. I’ll be posting hopefully everyday with the different meals we ate, how we feel, what’s been the hardest, what’s been the easiest and so forth. So that maybe you might like to try it with your family too. I’m pretty sure it’s going to be a worthwhile exercise.

To Start. Research. I started with Google. No processed food diet.

A bunch of different sites came up, but the one that had me most intrigued was the 100 Days of Real Food. This lady and her family ate only real foods for 100 days. A great website with lots of recipes, articles and fantastic support/advice to get you started.

She said the best place to start was to decide what your rules would be. So here are mine.

• No boxed, bagged, canned or processed foods
• If it is coming from a bag or box, it cannot have more than 5 ingredients.
• If you cannot pronounce any ingredient listed on the bag or box it’s a no go.
• If you do not have the ingredients in your cupboard at home or cannot easily purchase them at the store than you cannot eat it.

You would be AMAZED at how little in your cupboard right now falls into these rules.

This is all that is left in mine after I cleaned it out.

The little container on the shelf has nuts, raisins and dried fruit.

I really thought it was important to only have foods in the cupboards that are allowed to be eaten, for both myself and the kids.

So that’s it for my snack cupboard. I will have to make all the snacks over the next 2 weeks which will include things like crackers, muffins, granola bars, cookies etc.

So after a good cupboard clean (we’ve been planning this for awhile, so I’ve let all my cereals, breads, snacks etc. run out on purpose) I moved onto the fridge. This before picture is actually pretty sad, cause this was seriously what my fridge looked like before I left for the grocery store this morning. Some jam, mayo and ground beef for tonight's supper. Sad.

But after a trip to the store I filled my counter and bins with fresh fruits and veggies.

The counters are full of color!

On this particular trip I bought,

Fruits:

apples, oranges, grapes, bananas, strawberries, blueberries, watermelon, pineapple, pears, lemons, limes, mangos, avocados and tomato's.

Veggies:

lettuce (2 kinds), jalapeno, onions (3 kinds), cucumber, zucchini, carrots, red/green peppers, asparagus, sweet potato's, cauliflower and potatoes.

Misc:

fresh cilantro, garlic and ginger.

Extra stuff I had to buy to get started were 3 water bottles for the kids (no more juice boxes at school!) and a case of flavored water for the little boys.

My little guys drink juice. Mostly Grey, he refuses to drink anything else, including water. Finn will drink water no problem. We know that Grey’s juice addiction is totally out of control, but we just didn’t want to have to deal with it yet. (Lazy parents!) But the time has come. We will wean him off his juices with flavored water for the next 2 weeks and then slowly start to water it down until he is drinking only water. It’s the plan, it’s going to be hard, but it has to be done.

Okay these are the few exceptions I am going to allow for now

• I couldn’t find any cheese that fit my criteria, so I bought my regular brand which has about 7 ingredients. (I will keep looking for something better)
• I’m going to allow store bought Mayonnaise for the first week
• I will make white bread products for the first week
• The second week I will switch to strictly whole grain products to make my breads, baking etc.
• Sugar will only be permitted in my baking and in main meals as an ingredient for the first week.
• The second week I will be using natural sweeteners such as honey and maple syrup.

I think that’s it. I’m excited to get started. I think the hardest part will be Grey. He is quite attached to his specific foods and will only eat those few things. Cereal is a big one around here. My kids love cereal but since it comes in a box and has way more than 5 ingredients it doesn’t qualify.

I know this will be a sacrifice for myself because I will be the one preparing real food meals and making sure everyone is fed, happy and full. I’m lucky in the fact that my kids love fruits and veggies. But scared that lunches will be difficult. A typical school lunch around here is a sandwich, juice box, piece of fruit and 2 snacks (usually packaged and processed)

Doing all the bread making, meal planning, chopping and prep for 3 meals a day all the while keeping up with my family, work and church obligations is going to be tough. (poor little bunny) LOL!

I know it will be all worthwhile. Check back again and see how we’re doing. Day one starts tomorrow!

australia-day 7.

I should mention some of the best benefits of travel/vacation without children, obligations or responsibility. Sleeping until you feel like getting out of bed, worrying about you and only you. Never needing to be anywhere at anytime for any reason other than you feel like it. That to me was some of the best parts about getting away and relaxing from everyday life.

So after a lovely sleep in on Saturday morning me and the sissies (ha-ha!) went to Parklea Markets, to get some souvenirs and check out all the venders.

I didn’t take any pictures of the inside, mostly because I didn’t want to take my camera out of my bag. It’s not that I didn’t feel safe necessarily, but I just didn’t want to draw attention to myself. There.

It was like a big giant flee market with food stands, cheap souvenirs Whohoo!! and lots and lots of people looking for bargains. We got everything we needed at a fraction of the cost, so it was worth it.

When we got back home we walked in on this adorable scene. Wes had taken the kids for a swim and was brushing Lena’s hair afterwards. Too cute! Even better, he had no idea I took the picture.

For supper that night we had SUPER yummy pizza. Even 2 gourmet kinds, one was a chicken pizza with a yogurt sauce and the other one was like an Indian tandoori. They were both great! We sure are getting spoiled here!

After supper us girls headed upstairs to the master bedroom (where Nicola and I were staying) and we ended up talking until early in the morning hours. It was such a wonderful fun time. I love talking to my sisters, it is probably my fondest memory of being there with Amanda and her family.

Oh, and the pavlova. ♥

australia-day 6.

(I know I skipped day 5, but I will come back to that later I promise)

On our last morning at our luxury getaway in the city, we headed down to Café Rio for one more delicious breakfast, lets just say we Pigged out with a capital P. That food (which I never took any pictures of, strange) was so, so, so, so good. So good in fact that we actually had 2 breakfasts that morning. One at the Café, and then we headed back upstairs to the Horizon club for round 2 of breakfast. Needless to say we were stuffed to the gills.

So when Wes and the kids came to pick us up and take us to lunch at the Sydney Tower, we we still quite full, but very excited to go and see all of downtown Sydney from their revolving restaurant.

(picture from the internet)

Once we got upstairs to the restaurant, and got our seats they told us it would take 70 minutes for the restaurant to complete one full circle of the city. It was a buffet style lunch, and so we started with tasting a few different dishes before settling on our favorites. Pictured below… kangaroo meat. I ate it. I felt weird, but it didn’t really taste bad, just really chewy. My nephew Reid is really adventurous and he was eating crocodile, kangaroo and all these weird types of fish. Maybe he’ll serve a foreign mission since weird foods don’t seem to bother him at all.

Some of the majestic views while we dined.

And the best part was not the crazy elevator ride, or the views from the top, but definitely was the dessert.

Wow. I must say I ate two of the best desserts I’ve ever eaten. In the cup was this creamy honey custard, infused with some sort of flower (I can’t remember can you Amanda or Nic?) It was divine! And then I ate a pavlova. Oh my goodness. Heaven on earth. Like a baked meringue with whipped cream, fresh fruit and passion fruit puree.

What a really awesome experience. And I’ll always remember it for being the first time I ate pavlova. My new favorite thing about Australia. LOL!

Oh, and much to my surprise, we managed to do the full rotation, 70 minutes, It went by so quickly.

After eating so much food and being so wiped from 2 full days in the city, when we got home we just crashed and all enjoyed a wonderful afternoon nap. I ♥ naps!

That evening we had the opportunity to go the the Sydney temple. What a beautiful chance to spend time with my sisters in such a wonderful, special place.

In this next picture it’s kind of cool because right in the doorway at the bottom you can just see the picture of the Savior through the entryway. Sweet shot!

You can read more about LDS temples here.

happy birthday grey.

This past week we celebrated Grey’s 3rd birthday. I’d like to say that I can’t believe it’s been 3 whole years, but trust me, with this child it feels like at least 16. He’s our crazy little trouble maker, but despite his endless supply of energy we love him something fierce.

The theme I picked this year was a pirate party, and my original idea was to do a Jake and the Never Land Pirate theme (a new Disney cartoon for kids). But like most things in my life I’m ahead of the crowd and there is no party supplies out there to support that party. I really didn’t want to use skulls and dark colors, but it ended up that way anyway. Grey of course didn’t mind, and I think it turned out cute despite it being a little more mature than I wanted it to be.

Timbits (or donut hole) cannon balls.

I found this adorable little treasure chest at Hobby Lobby and filled it with some inexpensive “gold doubloons”.

I found an old piece of wood in the basement cut it in half, made the kids paint it red and I hammered it together to use as our “X marks the spot” cupcake stand.

I strung a net in the back window with a little pirate flag banner that matched the plates and napkins.

Darren got so tired of me taking pictures, that he actually expired before the party even started.

The kids each had their own hook, pirate eye patch, fun foam sword and telescope. (all from birthdayexpress.com)

Pirate gold cheese cubes.

I love using scrapbook paper as placemats, so cheap and easy!

I bought these little red cups in Australia, and it made me think of my sister and her family. Sigh, I miss them terribly.

Twix bar, pirate planks.

Hot dog pirate ships for supper. (Grey LOVES hotdogs!)

I had these little plastic swords and I wanted to use them so bad, so I stuck them in our strawberries last minute.

The whole table put together. Some other little details, like a little cup with chocolate gold coins and a glass bottle with a rolled up piece of paper I burned to make it look old, you can kind of see it at the back of the table. And that was it. Super fun!

I’m happy to say that he did much better this year blowing out his candles than last.

After dinner we headed outside to this little pirate play area I made on the back deck. The sandbox was full of pirate treasures for them to dig out, like necklaces, rings, marbles, bones and rubber bouncy balls.

The water table was a birthday surprise, and he loved it!

I made a little walk the plank board for the kids to walk across. Picked up an old piece of wood at the Habitat for Humanity for $3 and painted, ‘walk the plank’ across it. Paving stones borrowed from my awesome neighbor worked perfectly to hold it up.

Digging for gold!

We have been having beautiful weather here, and it was so nice to just play outside and do some fun stuff with the kids.

After we were done, it was inside to open presents!

And with the magic of the internet here they are all unwrapped before your very eyes.

Thanks so much for the card Grandma Workman, I have video of him dancing his little heart out. He loved it! ♥

australia-day 4.

These next couple days were so jam packed full of awesomeness, I get a little giddy looking at the pictures and remembering all the fun I had.

Except this first part, when I had to go to see the dentist, who also happens to be my brother in law. This is one of the 3 offices he works at. It’s about 5 minutes from his house, so really convenient for them.

This is Wes’s office space. Each dentist has their own room and the walls, chairs and tools are one color so it doesn’t get confusing for the poor people that work or go there. Purple goes with purple.

Since Wes always knew that he wanted to be a purple marshmallow when he grew up, so he picked the purple space without any hesitation. ;)

Nicola getting her teeth checked, they’re so low key here in Aussie, the dentists wear Ghost Buster shirts as uniforms.

Just kidding, it was his day off, and I think I recall him saying something about not taking pictures of him in his Ghostbusters shirt… hmmm.

After a quick check we were on our way back home with appointments set for next week to fill a couple of cavities.

Did I mention that the dentist also bought us Krispy Kreme donuts to eat. Guess that’s how he stays in business. Also since I LOVE KK donuts and haven’t had one in years!

After we got home we popped out to the Mall to pick up a few things before we headed into the City for a couple days.

The mall we went to was an outdoor mall. With some places having no covering at all. It was nice to be able to walk outside in the sunshine and shop at Target and all the other cool stores.

Trying on fascinators at Target.

When we got back from the mall, it was time to head into the city. Which I think is so fancy to say. “Just going into the city for a few days.”

Our generous hosts had come up with this fantastic plan that we would stay at the Shangri-La hotel and go to the Sydney Opera House that night.

We knew that this hotel was posh, because we sufficiently worried ourselves to death the night before looking it up online. And we were a little nervous, since we had an executive check in at the Horizon Club. The instructions on the website told us to go up to the 30th floor and announce our arrival to the hotel staff.

Let me tell you, I think that if I showed up on a white stallion with real gold hair I still wouldn’t have been fancy enough for this place.

IT WAS AWESOME!! So I just pretended that I had a gazillion dollars and stuck my nose in the air and announced our arrival.

After we got our keys, we headed down to our room. It was through a double set of doors, and it even had it’s own doorbell.

Once inside we were like a bunch of kids, so giddy, excited and happy to be there. The only difference is that we didn’t tear the place apart and jump on the beds like our kids would have.

The view from our living room.

Running across the bottom of the TV’s was a personalized message.

Heading into the bedroom.

Our suite was on a corner, so the windows wrapped all the way around. We had a perfect view of the bridge and the Opera House.

The suite also had 2 bathrooms (one of them was looked bigger than my kitchen at home!) with a shower, tub and make-up area. And again wall to wall windows.

It was such a fantastic room. Like a little slice of luxury tucked away just for us.

After we got acquainted with the room we headed back up to the Horizon club for tea time and canapés. (fancy desserts and stuff) I wished I had taken a picture of the club, because it was gorgeous. Like a 5 story room with grand ceilings, fancy tables and a view of downtown Sydney to die for! We had access to unlimited pop (glass bottles chilling in a glass cooler) fancy food, and a wait staff.

After we hung out there for a bit, we headed back down to the suite to get ready for the Opera that night.

After a hilarious attempt to get a picture of the 3 of us together, which involved stacking books and garbage cans to get the camera up high enough.

We finally settled for a reflective mirror picture,

And then the fun posing really began!

So. Much. FUN!

Wes had told us it was about a 10 minute walk to the Opera House, so we assumed it would probably be more like 20. We left early, got directions from the Hotel Staff and headed off in our pretty clothes and pretty shoes to the Opera.

20 minutes later when we all agreed we were officially lost; we unintentionally took the scenic route to get there, which involved about 40 minutes of walking around downtown Sydney. When we were about 5 blocks away from the Opera House I couldn’t take it anymore. Our feet had bleeding blisters, toe cramps and swelling beyond the point of return.

So I took my shoes off, and walked barefoot around downtown Sydney, Amanda took hers off too. At least I wasn’t alone. Nicola would have taken hers off, but she was afraid she wouldn't get them back on again. haha!

Once at the Opera House we took a few pictures and then headed off to eat dinner.

Our restaurant of choice, GuyLian, Belgian Chocolate Café.

And we ate waffles with ice cream, fresh fruit and GuyLian chocolate dipping sauce. Heaven, that’s what that was.

After dinner we hobbled back to the Opera (1 minute walk away) and settled down to watch the Magic Flute. It was incredible. Our seats were right up close and center and it’s just an experience you can’t explain.

A real life Opera. So fantastic!

After the show we called a cab to get up back to the hotel, lesson learned.

At the hotel we stopped to grab some drinks from the Horizon Club and once we got back to our room saw that they had turn down service.

We took a picture of our feet, but it really doesn’t do it any justice, but we all had sores and blisters.

Even though we desperately wanted chocolate, we couldn’t stand the thought of walking around looking for a convenience store, and we sure weren’t going to pay $9 for a bar of chocolate from the mini fridge in the room. So we headed to bed, we had another big day in the city ahead of us tomorrow.

australia-day 3.

Valentines Day!

We headed out to the grocery store this morning to pick up a few things we needed for dinner that night, and when we came home Wes was there with a big surprise for all of us girls… flowers!

A dozen for his lovely wife.

An arrangement of tiny pink roses for his little girl.

And roses for us too!

But much to my surprise they were actually from Darren, even though his hand writing looks suspiciously like Wes’s. Thanks Bunny Fluff, love you too! (wink)

Lena was thrilled with her flowers and gave her Dad a great big hug, while showing him her card.

After all that romance and excitement, it was time to go swimming!

After swimming we started getting ready for our Valentines party that night for the kids.

Making a robot rocket ship for a table centerpiece.

Decorating cupcakes.

It was so, so much fun to do for them. They were so appreciative of everything we did. It made all the effort worth it.

australia-day 2.

We all loaded up in the car and headed out to the beach today! One thing that I thought would freak me out was the fact that they drive on the other side of the road. But it really wasn’t that scary after all. They don’t have 4 way stops here (well I didn’t see any) but they use traffic circles or round-a-bouts instead. They’re everywhere.

Just getting a view of the beach (tiny blue part in the middle of the picture)

While we were driving to the beach, Wes got a phone call from his friend saying that Bethany Hamilton the girl from the Soul Surfer movie was in Sydney that day and going to be surfing at Manly beach. Not the same beach we were heading to, but still swimming in the same ocean at the same time as her, so that counts as pretty cool right?

Coogee beach.

The seaweed was different than I thought it would be, it feels a bit like plastic, and was really thick and spiky. Strange stuff.

I was taking a picture of the pink building in the background, but the guy in the green striped shorts is an added bonus for all you ladies out there. You’re welcome.

After we spent some time soaking up the sun Wes asked if we were going to go swimming, I guess if you just flew half way around the world, you’d better at least dip your toes in.

Me and my nephew Reid were splashing around in the waves, when all of a sudden he says, “Whoa, Aunty Amy this is a big one”. I didn’t even turn to look at it, but just started to run back to shore. Guess who moves faster… big furious waves, that’s who.

It went right over my head, knocked me down and swirled me around with it, then slid me across the sand scraping up my legs and spit me out on shore.

Nice hey. I was picking sand out of my hair for days. Later that night after I had showered, I felt something fall in my ear and out came a teeny tiny little seashell. I’ll admit, I was kind of grossed out by that. LOL!

Wes and the boys walked to Oporto and picked up lunch for us. Oh my goodness, it was SO yummy. The fries were coated in chicken salt and the chicken burgers were grilled with a slice of fresh pineapple and bacon.

One brave seagull got a yummy treat that day when Reid showed us his fry trick.

After lunch we decided that we were pretty tired, I mean laying around at the beach all day is hard work. The boys were covered in sand, so we walked down the beach to wash off in a little tide pool that has a rock bottom, but the catch was you had to walk along this rock wall to get to it.

I hadn’t intended on going to the tide pool, I was just taking pictures of the scenery, when last minute I decided to join them. The tide was really high at that point in the day, so our climb along the wall was slow and scary at some points. Especially since I had my camera with me, I really didn’t want to fall in.

The green mushy stuff in the picture above was quite possibly the grossest thing I have ever touched in my life. It was thick and slimy and squishy and disgusting. I knew I had to cross it and Wes was saying encouraging things to me like, “just pretend it’s Darren’s back”. Such a nice brother in law. (he’s always joking around with us)

That wasn’t even the worst part, all along the rock wall in the cracks and crevices were crabs. They would run along the wall and hide in all the places that we were putting our hands to hold on. Shudder.

Still it was really cool and by the end I was glad I went along. Plus it gave me the chance to take some pictures of the whole beach from up high. So beautiful.

Just a perfect day all around.

Except when I got home and realized I had missed a strip of my forehead, a stripe down my leg and patches of my chest with sunscreen. Patchy sunburn 1. Amy 0.

australia-day 1.

As some of you may know or not, I just got back from a once in a lifetime trip to Australia! Can you believe it? Myself and my sister Nicola were able to go and see my other sister Amanda and her family who have been living there for 7 years now.  I really wanted to post about my trip right away before I forget any important details or special memories from our amazing experience.

Starting with getting there.

It was an exhausting way to start our arrival to beautiful Sydney. I was up at 4:00am on Friday morning in time to pack my last minute stuff, shower and drive the hour to the airport for my 7:00am flight. After flying into Calgary I met up with Nicola (sister #1) We ran a few errands around Calgary, met up with my parents for supper and then once again off to the airport for flight number 2.

It was 9:00pm Alberta time, which is 11:00pm Ontario time for me. I had been up so early that day I was exhausted, and we hadn’t even begun our journey yet.

After a quick flight to Vancouver we prepared ourselves for the 14 hour journey to Australia.

Not ever having the experience of flying for 14 straight hours before, I couldn’t even explain it to you if I tried. Somewhere around hour 10, you start to get delirious, wondering if you’ll ever touch ground again, and then when you’re at hour 12 it feels like you’ve been flying for at least 2 weeks.

The strangest part, once you land and get off the plane it’s like it never happened. Sort of like forgetting the pain of having a baby. And let me tell you, were we so excited to see our family waiting for us. Worth every minute.

We loaded up in the car and headed out to Amanda’s house. It felt strange to have lost an entire day in time difference, and even though we were exhausted it was amazing to drive through Sydney, soak up the sun and take in all the sights.

Once we arrived at their house, the kids were so excited to show us around and take our luggage up to our room. Amanda’s boys are so helpful and kind, they carried our bags in from the car and took them to our room, such sweet little guys!

After lunch, we got the chance to sit around and chat, and Lena the only girl in the family took the time to show us her dancing skills. She is just too adorable for words!

Lena Dancing

For supper Wes made us waffles with whipping cream and syrup. I mean, who doesn’t like breakfast for dinner? It’s my favorite!

After dinner we were pretty much wiped. The time difference was really starting to take it toll, and I’m pretty sure we headed off to bed around 8:30pm. And of course, woke up all bright eyed and bushy tailed at 3:30am. But it only took us one more day to adjust which was sooner than I thought it would. Good thing, since the next day we were heading to the beach!!

valentines party 2012.

It’s hard to believe that we’re already into February, it feels like Christmas was yesterday, and now we’re moving onto Valentines stuff. I’m posting my party earlier this year, because I’m leaving on a jet plane this Friday for Australia! So exciting!! (I’ll share more about that later)

So anyways, every year I like to throw a little party for my kids and it gives me the chance to pull out my hundreds of pink dishes, bowls and heart shaped knick knacks to celebrate.

(You can check out my Valentines post from last year and my other Valentines stuff HERE!)

It was actually quite similar to last year, but instead of making pizza we ordered in. We had the Missionaries over for supper, played a fun game and had a wonderful time together.

Red velvet cupcakes with a cream cheese frosting.

Of course the standard salad with cheese X’s and O’s (using a cookie cutter) and heart shaped cucumber and red peppers.

For these little pudding cups, I dipped the rim in melted chocolate and then rolled them in pink and red sprinkles. They turned out really cute.

 

We played Valentines Minute to Win it. And it was tricky, only one person managed to make it at exactly a minute. Phew!

I had some little gift baskets with candy and fun little treats and toys for the kids (and Missionaries!) Theirs had a lint roller and some other more “big kid” stuff. I also did my annual letter to each of the kids, but I’ll give that to them later to read on Valentines day. For the Elders I printed off a copy of a talk given by Elder Richards and just wrote a little note of encouragement and expressed my love and gratitude for them.

We had a great time, and as usual I had so many other ideas/plans and there just never seems to be enough hours in a day. Good thing I have lots of years ahead of me for parties like this!

answering questions.

I never quite know how to get around this. I do get asked questions on my blog and usually I don’t see them until about 1-3 months later. So should I respond in the comments section? Should I respond to the poster via email? Or should I just do a comment update post every few months? Which would you prefer?

I still don’t know what the answer is, and because of pinterest quite a few of my pictures from 2 years ago are getting hits and people have questions and I don’t even think about checking those comments. So, for now I will continue with Q&A posts and hope this helps.

WHAT'S IN A BAG

Q:Great tips! Can you please, please, please tell me who makes the baby's diaper bag and tell me where you got it? It is soooo cute!

A: The diaper bag (grey colored one) is Skip*Hop and the black polka dot one is from a home purse party. I cannot for the life of me remember the name right now.

(Updated with answer in post)

CLEANING GAS STOVE GRATES

Q:Will this also work with cast iron?

A: I have no idea if this will work with cast iron. You might try googling cast iron and ammonia and see what pops up. HTH.

(Updated with answer in comments)

Q:Could you give a list of Chores that you typed up for your kids? I need some ideas.....

A: In October 2011, I posted the complete list in another Q&A post. I will re-post here too!

Here is the list that I came up with

Morning Chores:

• pack your lunch kit and backpack
• get breakfast
• make your bed
• get dressed

Afternoon/Evening Chores":

• help fold laundry
• load dishwasher
• help clean bathroom
• wipe down bathroom
• recycling
• put away your toys
• clean living room
• tidy shoes
• put away backpack, jacket and shoes
• mop kitchen floor
• dust living room
• put away laundry
• do homework
• unload dishwasher
• clean bedroom
• set table
• clear table
• sweep kitchen floor

I tried to add chores that I knew they weren’t old enough to do yet, but needed to learn how to do eventually, like help clean bathroom. Come watch me, learn how to wipe down a sink, toilet etc. and then eventually I can make a new tag that says clean bathroom sucker. ;)

Let me know if you need anymore help. Hope this works for you. ♥

(Updated with answer in post)

MERMAID PARTY

Q:Thanks for the great blog post about your daughter's mermaid party- lots of inspirational ideas. Did you make the cupcake toppers yourself? Did you use a tutorial? Anything pointers would be great. Thx!

A: Yes I did make the toppers myself. I used a picture of a mermaid cake that I found online for some inspiration. If I can find it I will link it in the post. Tips for gum paste? Work fast, make sure your hands are clean (fuzz and EVERYTHING in the world will stick to it) I always look for everyday kitchen stuff that can double as tools for gum paste. I'm sorry this was so long ago, that I can't even remember what I did. LOL

(updated in comments section)

HANDMADE CHRISTMAS

Q:Where did you get the blocks?

A: I got the wooden blocks at Hobby Lobby.

(updated in comments section)

HUNTER'S 9TH BIRTHDAY

Q:I am throwing my son and my niece a mario/princess peach party and I was wondering if could tell me what materials you used to make the piranha plant? It is so cool, you did an amazing job! I loved all your ideas and will be using a few :)

A: The green pipe (spray painted green) is from Home Depot in the plumbing section. The tube pipe that the plant head sits on is PVC pipe spray painted green. The red plant head is a tomato container from the dollar store. I broke it in half and hot glued it together in the plant head shape. The white trim is felt and the polka dots are stickers. The green leaves are felt hot glued on. Inside the pipe I spray painted 2 Styrofoam disks black and put them inside. Hope that helps. Any more questions ask away. ♥

(updated in the comments section)