Today my first-born babe lost his first tooth. It's been loose & "wigg-i-ly" for several weeks but our dentist told me it would probably be several months before it fell out. And now my baby big boy will be starting kindergarten in less than two weeks and he will have a cute gap-toothed smile. And he's only four! I'm beginning to feel a little old. He will be five soon though, and I'm sure that will make all the difference in how I feel, right?
In the meantime we are woefully unprepared for the process of losing baby teeth and all the toothfairy legends that it involves. He seems to know all about it, but I want to find some cute tooth pillow type vehicle for him to transform that teeny tooth into cold hard cash (but not too much of it). So I turned to my favorite online shop: etsy. Love that place! A quick search revealed 50+ pages of listings, but here are a few of my favorites. What do you think? Remember that I will use this for all three of my boys and zero girls. I like the ones that we can hang on the doorknob because my kids are light sleepers and there's no possibility of the toothfairy sneaking in successfully.
Last month I received a sample of All Small & Mighty 96 Loads laundry detergent, thanks to Mom Select. I also received a fabulous bag/laptop tote from Hayden Harnett which I love very much. I took it on vacation with me, packed with all the magazine issues I needed to catch up on. Needless to say, it was much heavier than a laptop.
I've been using the laundry detergent and loving that with every load, I feel my wallet lightened a tiny bit. All Free Clear has long been my favorite detergent. I used it in place of Dreft for my 2nd baby, and have continued with it ever since. It cleans beautifully without any perfumes or dyes. My free sample was the Stainlifter variety, and it seems to work well too. I go through a lot of Shout stain spray with three little boys, and inevitably still end up with some set-in stains. Take this for what you will - since I've been using All Stainlifter I haven't seen any stains not come out. I don't know if it's the detergent for sure, but I like the results. If you have a sensitive nose though, the Stainlifter formula might not be for you. Being used to a fragrance free, it's been an adjustment for me and I plan to go back to the All Free Clear.
While I can't offer any help on physically washing your clothes, I can help you save a little money in the process. I have 2 coupons for a free bottle of All Small and Mighty 3x Concentrate (4 varieties). To be eligible, please leave a comment by Friday detailing how many loads of laundry you do per week. I've been discussing this with friends lately. I do 5-7, but some people with the same size family as mine purport to running 10-12 loads. We should all keep track for a month. These are important things to know! I'll randomly choose 2 commenters and drop the coupons in the mail.
Despite my best intentions, I didn't run the Lavender 5K. After a two week vacation, we were ready to head home and decided to leave a day early. Although I missed the race, I was so grateful to have an entire non-Sabbath day to put my home and family back in order. Don't worry, I will find a local 5K to run in the fall.
Thanks again to Jane, of Seagull Fountain, for lodging my family for sooooo looong. Our friendship seems to have survived, but I guarantee she believes me now when I talk about how hard my middle son is. Here are a few highlights:
At left: my handsome husband and three equally handsome sons bowling at the Wilkinson Center at BYU. This is a tradition for us, and I know Roley can't wait to join in on the fun. Next trip.
Below: Aaron & I, and Jane & Dick in front of the Salt Lake City temple. We got 2 babysitters and drove up, planning to attend the temple and do lunch. Our plans were sadly changed once we arrived and found the temple closed. That's the 3rd trip to UT that I've tried to go to the SL temple and failed. Next trip.
Thanksgiving Point Dinosaur Museum: me & my three blond boys, and Sally & Spot. Thanksgiving Point Farm: my favorite guys riding a plastic cow - they also rode horses and petted a lot of goats, and other fabulous farm animals.
This is what tired looks like. This is what's left on the living room floor after spending an evening with my friend, Jane, who is graciously hosting my entire family for two weeks. Yes, two weeks. She's a generous soul, my friend.
I'm rethinking the whole proposition now, since Jane took me out walking last night. It's true that we only walked. And it's true that our pace was very moderate. But it's also true that the most exercise I've had for the past 6 months is looking at the elliptical machine my sister-in-law is storing at my house. So I am tired. And sore. Not only from the walk, but from carrying my baby up and down hundreds of flights of stairs at the Oquirrh Mountain Temple Open House yesterday.
I soaked my legs in a hot bath for as long as I could last night, but didn't make it very long as I was in danger of falling asleep and drowning. Did I mention we walked for and hour and a half! I was shocked. And I am insisting that our route was three miles, but Jane says it's not. We will measure it today and I hope I'm right. We're planning to do this every night (mostly) in preparation for a 5K run/walk on my final day here in Utah. The Lavender Festival is supposed to be very pretty and fun for the whole family. I don't know how much fun that 5K will be for me, but at least I'll be able to cross #21 off my list. And let's hope that all this exercise contributes to a new look for my body.
Do you have pets? Do your kids want them? My family is currently without a dog, and until recently our only pet was a beta fish named Sharkbait HooHaaHaa. But now we are happily infested with furry little rodents, thanks to Mom Select.
These new toy hamsters, touted as just like the real thing, but mess-free, are sure to be the "it" gift for the holidays this year. From the ad copy: Go Go Pets are fun, interactive hamsters that talk, move and even navigate their way around their own habitat. There are dozens of add-on sets so your child can create a custom world for their new friend. We're sure you'll be as amazed as we were at the sheer cuteness of GoGo Pets! Watch this adorable video to see for yourself.
Go Go Pets will be released nationwide in the fall, but are offered in the Phoenix market only right now (you can buy at Walmart or Toys R Us). As a marketing promotion, party kits were offered to local mom bloggers. We received a huge box full of Go Go Pets on our doorstep one Saturday morning. And since my boys had been watching the video twelve times a day they could barely contain the joy. We opened the box to find 11 hamsters and one box of each habitrail set they make. Very generous! The individual boxes stayed closed until a few days before the party, but we let the boys pick a color and pet them through the hole in the box. It was love at first sight between my Emmett and his NumNums.
We planned the party, sent out invitations, and talked non-stop about how much fun it would be. And no one was disappointed! We put the habitrails together the day before without any trouble and let the boys play with everything for a bit so they could show their friends. Initially, I wasn't impressed with the quality of the sets - the plastic seemed a little flimsy and didn't stay together as well as I expected while we were playing with it. But, as I watched, I could see how hard the kids were on everything. It's all on the ground and things got stepped on and kicked a lot. And that flexible plastic allowed for bending in the pieces. Even if things came apart, nothing ever broke. And a more rigid plastic certainly would have cracked and broken under kid-pressure. So even though it was sometimes annoying to have to reconnect the habitrail tunnels, it's preferable to kids crying over a broken toy. Teach them to put it back together themselves!
Another worry for me was that the entire set, once put together, is only about 4 foot square, which doesn't fit 11 kids around it. Four or five or six fit well, but the party worked out perfectly because plenty of people were late or left early, and we had food and other breaks. I was surprised at how well the kids took turns. And of course, the kids could put their hamsters down anywhere and just watch them run around alone. The games suggested in the party pack would not have worked for our young crowd (no way do ten 3-year-olds wait while one hamster at a time races through the tunnels). But we improvised and had a whole dance segment during the party. The kids just held their hamsters while we did the hokey pokey, chicken dance, bunny hop, and wild hamster dancing.
My pictures turned out horribly (I hate my camera) but you can see how much fun the kids had. I know of at least two parents who have purchased more Go Go Pets hamsters or habitrails. The hamsters are only about $8 and so cute and fun, even if you don't have accesories. They make over 40 sounds, which will endear them to your child, but the volume is low, which will endear them to you. Keep these in mind for birthday and Christmas presents.
Life is like a pie; everybody wants a piece of your time and resources. Make room for everything, even yourself, and become a Well-Rounded Woman. Balance is another story.
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