My 5am-9pm & routine change

Saturday

We had a slight change to our routine on Saturday, Nan came to watch Sami swim!  I think she definitely saw progress since the last time she joined us.  As new kids join Sami's class, I'm so amazed to see how far she's come when I see little ones doing things for the first time.  And she's so much bigger.  When did this happen?

Picked-up my groceries again, yay!  Received my Blue Apron box, more yays!  And we had Chicago dogs for lunch - you can view our creations here (bottom of the page).

Later on we went to the park and then had a somewhat quiet evening.

Sunday

We took a trip to Target on Sunday.  I forget what we were going there for, but you can never leave Target without buying anything... or I generally can't.  Hubby tagged along this time, and we ended up spending way more than I usually do (makes me feel better about my shopping habits, lol).  We bought a PS4 for my hubby whose missing gaming, but doesn't have a whole lot of time to dedicate to it and who is frustrated with World of Warcraft at this point anyway.  Legacy servers where are you?

After Sami's nap, we went to visit our friends who have an almost 3 and almost 5 year old.  Sami had loads of fun with those boys, and we had a nice time catching up with our friends who we hadn't seen much of since the Superbowl.    We had a nice spaghetti dinner and hung out until it was almost time for Sami's bedtime.

Monday-Friday

Early last week, Sami started complaining that her front teeth were hurting.  She'd mentioned it maybe once last week too, so I made a dentist appointment which she had just this past Monday.  I'll talk more about the appointment next week, but she's fine.  Dentist said that sometimes that little flap of skin on top of you gums can easily get irritated and it did look like there was a little bump on it.  However, her bottom molars have pierced through and my guess is that's what has been bothering her.  She could have been pointing to her front teeth because tooth pain radiates, or she could have just been pointing to her mouth in general.

Monday night and most of Tuesday, we had horrific winds.  As I was heading out to lunch, I saw emails from Nextdoor.com which detailed a fire near my house.  It wasn't clear where it was so I called my husband to make sure he was ok - which he was.  Turns out the fire was about 3 blocks away from our house and the winds were so terrible that the fire jumped to other houses.  2 homes are completely destroyed - we went by this past weekend.  Devastating to see.  Another 5 homes had damage.  As far as I know, they haven't disclosed or found the cause of the fire.

As far as I can remember, I've been terrified of my house catching fire.  I had a few recurring nightmares as a child about it.  The only thing I can think of that would have caused me to have that nightmare in the first place is this cartoon that would play around Christmas time and there's a scene where someone leaves the iron on the ironing board, plugged in, and someone trips over the cord, or the cat does, and it falls on the ironing board and the whole place catches on fire with the cat stuck inside.  I'm assuming the cat is rescued because that'd be a horrible cartoon for kids, but I think that's where my fear stems from.  I feel so terrible for these families who have lost everything :(

On Wednesday, I had my Remicade treatment.  For the first time in what I feel is 3 years, it really got to me.  I was tired and I feel like I just started feeling less tired yesterday.

On Thursday, my husband had a genius idea after I got home from working late.  Sami had started falling asleep later like around 8:30, sometimes a little later which meant that I was finishing cleaning up closer to 9:30 than 9:00.  Starting last Thursday, I clean up before I start her bedtime routine.  Her bedtime routine has been moved back to 7:30 and she doesn't take over an hour to put to bed.  And when I'm done with the bedtime routine, I'm done for the night and can relax. :)  It's been great and totally worth it!

Stickers, stickers everywhere (that's our bedroom door)

It started with Mickey being in time-out for not listening, and then Minnie and the crab joined him too.  This is all her doing, after going to timeout earlier that evening for not listening..

Love this dress.  So cute, but her hair looks messy after daycare and sunscreen! 

#MealPlanMonday April 21-27 & random thoughts about meal planning

Happy Monday!  Another new week, another meal plan.

Crispy Sheet Pan Lemon Parmesan Garlic Chicken
Bowtie pasta
Snow peas & beef stir-fry
Beef burritos (ground beef with Old Del Paso mix + green pepper/onion with fixings of your choice)

I tend to sometimes forget if I need to thaw meat overnight on Friday for Saturday and my four meals this week require me to thaw meat.  This happened Friday night, so I improvised and we had spaghetti with meatballs - frozen meatballs and sauce in a jar.  Saturday night I remembered to thaw some ground beef so that I could make beef burritos.  I knew Sunday would be a busy day having been to a birthday party so it was just perfect.  Last night I took out the chicken for the sheet pan dinner tonight.  And I just took out the steak to thaw for tomorrow's dinner.  I'm on a roll! 

Online grocery ordering & pick-up at the store continues to go well.  On week 3, I was $10.00 below budget again.  Woohoo!  I'm rather surprised that the majority of what I'm spending my budget on isn't what's actually needed for each meal.  The weekly staples (milk, juice, fruits, yogurt, etc.) tend to bring me to about a quarter of my budget.  Then household goods like paper-towels, laundry detergent, diapers, will eat up another good quarter to half of my budget.  The rest is lunch fillers, things I need to restock on, etc.

The more I meal plan, the more I'm thrilled that I've introduced this to my life.  It's been a great time saver, even if I haven't quite figured out how to consistently meal prep.  I need to meal prep the slow cooker meal tomorrow.  I thought for sure that I'd have time to meal prep this weekend, but I was feeling tired.  It's the first time in a long time that my Remicade treatment made me feel pretty tired - or perhaps you are just exhausted after going to a 2 year old's birthday party trying to keep track of your child who does not sit still.  I had some lunch while she napped and was planning on meal prepping but she napped for about 30 minutes... so... yeah.

I'm getting ready to meal plan another month.  I should do it next week, but I'm anticipating that I may not have time during my lunch breaks so I may do it one evening this week.  I took a short lunch today and will again for a couple days because I have a couple appointments this week.  I'm starting to think I need to downsize my recipes again because I keep skipping over recipes I thought looked good.  I've certainly found some that I like a lot - and when I do I insert them every month or so.

Have you been meal planning?

Have a great night!!

One of the Blue Apron meals from last week - I split the recipe in two because I didn't want beans in my portion.

The pasta dish was the best.  I'd totally make that again.

Cooking the broccoli for the pasta dish

The ingredients for the pasta dish still packaged

My 5am-9pm: April 7-13 & Mickey Mouse

I haven't been blogging as much as I would like.  It's been another week with a slew of appointments which means short lunches, which means less time to write.

Here's a recap of last week:

Saturday

It's become the norm - we go to the pool and later in the day, we go to the park.  On Saturday, I picked up Click List from King Soopers for the first time.  I wrote a bit about it last week's recap but really I'm hooked.  An hour, at least, of time back to me.  Totally worth it the $5 that it will eventually cost me.  I think it's also going to solve my issue of overspending because I know how much it's going to cost me prior to my coupons being deducted.  And if I'm over budget, something's gotta go!

Sunday

On Sunday we ventured to BabiesRUs.  I'm so saddened that they are going out of business alongside ToysRUs.  I have so many fond memories of ToysRUs as a child, and BabiesRUs is where I got the majority of what I needed for Preston and Samantha.  It was a great one stop shop for babies.  The staff was always helpful.  So sad :(

I thought we might find a good deal on some items, but the going out of business sales weren't as good as I'd imagined they would be.  We then went to the mall and bought Sami some new shoes.  And then we took a trip to the park.  However, Sami missed a nap this day and was a little cranky.

My Facebook feed last week reminded me that we bought Sami's first Mickey a year ago.  It's been one year of Sami loving Mickey.  She can't get enough.  Like seriously....  There's a character on Mickey Mouse Clubhouse called Martian Mickey.  It's basically Mickey but he's green and lives on Mars.  Every day, she asks to watch "Martian Mickey, two Mickeys".  There's only 3 or 4 episodes with Martian Mickey and let me tell you, we adults are getting a little tired of Martian Mickey... but the joy it brings her...

Monday-Friday

I really need to start jotting down notes during my week.  I did it one week and it was so helpful.  We played poker on Friday night, and Sami's grandparents came over to watch her so we could go out.  I finished 4th, which isn't bad but not great.  The cards are certainly not smiling for me this year ;)

I don't have much to add this week.  I will go back to the drawing board and start planning my blogs better again.  I was doing good for a while...

Have a nice weekend!


Mickey's early days....

#MealPlanMonday: April 14-20 & Contribution

I can't fathom that it's already mid-April.  Where is the time going?  Down a sinkhole, it just has to be! Am I right??

So far I'm liking my new meal planning template.  I don't feel so tied down to trying to get a dish done on a specific day.  My template made it easy to make a last minute edit for my meal plane.  My husband asked for Chicago Dogs for Saturday when his parents were going to be over.  I switched out what I was planning for my "cheap" meal and voila!  I was able to get it done before ordering my groceries - even better.

I received my second Blue Apron order on Saturday.  I'm super excited to try this again.  Hopefully the experience is just as enjoyable as it was the first time.  I wrote "N/A" for the cost per serving because I'm still riding the gift card and credits I received.  #ThatRideIsAboutToEnd

Meals for this week:

Oregano Chicken & Creamy Mashed Potatoes - Blue Apron
Mexican Beef & Rice Casserole with Tortilla Strips - Blue Apron
Spicy Fusilli Pasta & Broccoli with Mascarpone - Blue Apron
Pizza - homemade for the 19th
Chicago Hot Dogs

Anything sounds appetizing to you?  Scroll down to vote on the best Chicago dog!


I've stated before that I'm a terrible housekeeper.  As hard as I try, or think I try - things get cluttered so quickly and it drives me insane.  I don't know where to begin to get it straightened out.  Doing a good job with the meal planning, prepping, groceries and cooking, makes me feel like I'm offering valuable contributions to the family.  I'm not always home so there are many things that I don't get around to doing consistently.

The meal planning and everything involved all the way to the cooking of the meal, gives me purpose.  Trying to find ways to make it even better and streamlining the process, and succeeding makes me feel so valuable.  And I know that I am valued, but it's also nice to feel valuable without being told.  I often feel like I need to be validated, but I'm starting to figure out that I can validate myself. #SayWhat

Long story short, when you are out of the house or basically otherwise occupied for 16 hours out of every day not including sleep, it's hard to find time to contribute and feel valuable.  There's only so much time to do chores and it's important to also find some me time.  I've heard some pod-casters state that you always have time, you just choose to use it a certain way.  To which I respond - sorry when you have very young children, you don't have a choice but to take care of them.  And by 9-10pm, you are wiped out - it's not time to declutter your junk drawer.  We all need balance so choosing 30 minutes of TV over decluttering when you're brain is fried from a tough day, is not much of a choice, if you ask me.  It's a need.

What you do to contribute outside of work, which work is already a huge and valuable contribution - it is valuable.  Whether it be the laundry, or dusting once a week/month.  Do what you can.  Control what you can.  The rest, it'll fall into place at some point -like when your kids get older ;)

I noticed this weekend that Sami is starting to have more independent play sessions.  She does however often come grab my finger and state "come with me Mama" because she wants me to play with her.  And I feel no guilt doing it.  I love spending time with her and I cherish those moments.

These independent play session are going to be my opening for de-cluttering.  I think my next goal is to build a list of things that need to be de-cluttered and then do them in order.  When I get to the bottom of the list, go back to the top and do it all over again until it becomes routine and doesn't feel so unmanageable.  You have to start somewhere and right now, I'm a deer in headlights not knowing where to start, so I'm just going to pick something and go! Stay tuned...

Which Chicago dog looks best to you?? Pink, red, yellow or orange plate?

My Blue Apron box - I'll try to take pictures of the meals and items as I'm making them this week.

My 5am-9pm & seeing the light

Saturday

On Saturday, aside from the usual trip to the pool, we went to the park for an Easter Egg Hunt.  I use the work Hunt very loosely because it was basically a field of plastic eggs ready for the grabbing as soon as the organizers said "go".  Different sections of the park were for different age groups so that the littles didn't get trampled by older kids.

Sami had a good time and was really excited to show me when she first got one.  I had to remind her to put it in her bucket and keep filling it.  She filled her bucket in no time.

Since this event occurred basically at naptime, we didn't stay too long for the other festivities but I did take her on a little train that went around the basketball court.  She loved it and waived to everyone.  She's a little socialite this one.

We walked home, with her in her little umbrella stroller and she fell asleep as we were exiting the parking lot - all the while holding on to her bucket with her dear life.  She didn't let one drop the whole way home.

Sunday

Saturday night I had hidden Sami's Easter basket and some Easter Eggs for her to find on the main floor of the house.  I hid her basket in her favorite hiding spot which I thought she would go for right away.  The Easter basket and eggs must have put a foil into her hide-and-go-seek thoughts because she didn't even look in the pantry until we prompted her.

She found all her eggs and had a jolly good time.

Later that morning, we went to Nan's house, which is my husband's parents house.  Nan is the name Brett's mom wanted since that's the name her mother had.  His dad is PopPop to Sami.  They currently live in the mountains and we have to go up a winding pass to get there.  She seemed to have fun as we were zigzagging into the mountains, but when we got to the top - she got sick.  It was everywhere and of course that was the day I forgot the wipes on the kitchen counter...

Luckily we were about 15-20 minutes away by then.  When we got there, we got all her clothes, and our sweaters and whatever clothes of ours needed to be washed into the washing machine and Sami got into a nice bath that PopPop was already getting ready.

This isn't the first time Sami is sick in the car.  It's happened a couple other times, and only after really winding roads... I want to say that means it's motion sickness... but it could also be altitude sickness...  I just don't know for sure.  I'm leaning toward motion sickness because she wasn't sick when we've been on a plane.

Once the whole cleaning up ordeal was done with, we had fun hunting for Easter baskets, and munching on snacks and then Sami and her cousin went hunting for eggs outside.  This time they were actually hidden, unlike at the park.

Monday-Friday

On Monday during dinner, which she was being very fussy about, Sami said one of the funniest things she's said to date.  She was just soooo literal!  She was under the table as I was trying to get her to take a couple more bites and had let her down since being in the chair was causing all kinds of tantrums.  She uttered: "Mama, where's your face?".  Hubby and I both thought it was hilarious.. and it's probably mostly because she's our kid.  I know she was trying to say something along the lines of look at me but man... that was a good one!

On Thursday, I finally took the advice of several friends.  I ordered my groceries online for pick-up.  And you know what?  It was as fabulous as they raved about.  I picked up my groceries this past Saturday and I saved a whole hour if not more of time.  Plus, I wasn't tempted to buy things because I was shopping while hungry which inevitably happens every time.  Thank you friends for the suggestion, and thank you Kassy for finally getting me to see the light!

Friday was opening day for the Rockies.  I've been to one and it's definitely fun and exciting but I don't feel like it's something I want to do every year.  And especially not this year because it snowed.  The snow starting falling downtown around 10ish and I want to say it stopped just before 2:00 and first pitch was scheduled for 2:10.  I'm certainly glad they didn't reschedule because I had several co-workers that attended but I was happy the game was delayed by an hour because that meant that I wouldn't be dealing with the additional traffic come quittin' time ;)

I feel for those who spent a pretty penny to attend such a lousy day to call opening day.  The Rockies on top of everything.  I just can't imagine being at a baseball game when it's not at least 65 degrees outside.  I will watch from the comfort of my living room, thank you very much!

Hope you all enjoyed family time for Easter.  Have a great weekend!

Product/Service Review: Blue Apron

I'm finally getting to my review of Blue Apron!  Thanks for your patience if you've been curious and waiting for this

It seems that we've been receiving advertisements for Blue Apron and similar meal delivery kit services for years now.  I've been intrigued but never looked into it too much because it seemed expensive to me.  For Christmas we received a gift card for Blue Apron which got me really excited because I was finally going to be able to give this service a try.

Ordering

Signing up and ordering has been very simple.  The website is easy to navigate.  While it's a subscription based service, it's easy to skip a week or two or three.  Making changes to the meals you want or the type of plan you want is also a simple task.

I opted for the 2-person plan since Sami is in such a picky phase.  I may try the family plan in the future to see what type of options they have versus the 2-person meal plan.  I opted for 3 meals a week, because it gave me free shipping.  It comes out to about $66.00 which is $11.00/portion.  I'm aiming to always be under $5.00/portion for my meal plans, so this is definitely pricey to me.  But with the gift card - not so pricey! :)

Packaging

Prior to receiving my first delivery, I wondered if it would be an issue if the box stayed on my front porch for a couple hours in case we aren't home when it's delivered.  My only other thought was that I'd have to make sure to cook the beef recipe early in the week to ensure it stayed fresh.

The pictures below aren't the best so I will try to paint a picture.  The box was pretty heavy and when I opened it, the recipes were on top and there was a thermal bag below it, taking up 90% of the box.  I opened the box and all the ingredients were individually packaged and labelled.  The meats were vacuum sealed in between 2 sheets of ice.  I no longer worried that I'd have to cook the beef that same night!

I kept the ice packages - they'll be great to put in our cooler for picnics!  I also kept the thermal bag, you never know when those can come in handy - road trip anyone?

Quality

The produce and meats were of better quality than what I usually get at the grocery store.  The meat for the stew was pre-cut as was the chicken which I'll be honest, prepping meat is my least favorite part of cooking.  I even prefer cleaning up afterwards and that's saying a lot.  I was very pleased!

Everything you need in order to prepare each meal is provided with the exception of olive oil, salt and pepper.  All other seasonings and items like soy sauce/glaze and tomato paste are included.

Recipes

One of the things I've struggled with when it comes to Blue Apron is that their recipe options aren't usually meals that speak to me.  Either they are something I know my husband and/or I wouldn't eat, or the meals appear to be more geared toward foodies.  That was my perception anyway.  You have 8 options to pick from and I'll usually see 1 or maybe 2 that seems appetizing, but I don't want to pay for shipping when I can basically get another meal for the price of shipping.

When I found a week that had meals I thought we might go for, I ordered the following:

Beef & Mushroom Stew with Roasted Potatoes
Quick Bucatini with Broccoli & Pecorino Cheese
Pan-Fried Chicken with Zucchini & Pickled Peppers

The recipes were so easy to follow.  The instructions are clear, and detailed in step-by-step format.  The instructions are accompanied with pictures which is something I personally love.  A cookbook with no pictures does not inspire me whatsoever.

With the ingredients being all packaged individually, there was not a lot of meal prep aside - all I had to do what chop the vegetables.  No recipe took longer than 45 minutes to make from start to finish which is a bonus for a busy working mama.

Taste

In choosing the recipes, I thought for sure that we would like the recipes in the order they are listed above (stew then pasta then chicken).  I was happily surprised that our favorite was the Pan-Fried Chicken dinner because it included some veggies we don't usually eat.  Hubby gobbled it up!  It's also the meal that was the most fragrant - the house smelled heavenly as soon as the red wine vinegar hit the pan.  The rice was just the right touch for the meal.

The stew was my next favorite even if I burnt half the potatoes (oops!).  Roasted crispy potatoes on top of the stew was a twist I'd never thought of.  And now and I have an easy recipe for roasted potato slices assuming I don't burn them all... ;)

The pasta was my least favorite - I'm just not a big fan of thick pasta - I buy angel hair pasta for spaghetti nights.  That being said, it was pretty darn delicious.  The sauce tasted like a parma rosa sauce with it's mix of mascarpone and tomato paste.  The broccoli made me feel better about eating all those carbs and made me feel good because I sometimes add broccoli to my mac & cheese making it a good choice on my part!

All in all my palate was pleased! And I had fun.

Customer Service

The customer service at Blue Apron has been great.  They helped me apply a $30.00 off coupon that I was having trouble applying to my account.  They fixed it all for me all through email correspondence and even helped me get an extra $10.00 off when I received a $40.00 off coupon a month later and I hadn't received my first delivery yet.  I've since then received a $10.00 gift card from them.


Overall it was a great experience and I'm looking forward to my next delivery (this Saturday!).  I don't know that I'll keep doing it once I'm paying full price, but I might try other similar services.  Home Chef seems appealing because you have a lot more options to choose from every week and the meals seem more up my alley.  If I go for it, I'll be sure to let you know!

Have you tried any meal delivery services?  What was your experience?

#MealPlanMonday: April 7-13 & More on Toddler Eating

I have to admit that we finally had a weekend with no plans and I had plenty of time to meal prep... but I didn't.  It would have been so easy too because 2 of the meals require no real prep.

I'll prep the Beef Bourguignon tonight and will probably meal prep the Chicken Francese Tuesday night.

Chicken Francese
Beef Bourguignon
Cat's Mac & Cheese
Jarred spaghetti sauce w/meatballs

You'll notice that my jarred spaghetti sauce with meatballs cost me nothing this week - I already had sauce in a jar, as well as frozen meatballs and I always have angel hair pasta on hand.  Pantry dinners can be the best for that reason.  I don't get that fun feeling of trying something new, but I save money which is always a plus.  My mac & cheese is also low in cost.  It'll probably cost a little more next time because I used the last of some of my pantry items to make it; No more tomato juice, and no more Cheez Whiz (I put just a tablespoon or two).

Sami's eating habits still aren't where I wish they were.  I put "new" foods on her plate every week and she hardly ever touches them.  If she takes a bite of something she doesn't like, or doesn't think she likes, she'll gag.  She's even made herself throw up a couple times which makes getting her to try new foods all that much more challenging.

I read something interesting over the weekend.  How it might be beneficial to have your children explore new foods rather than stressing about them trying it.  If they "explore" they'll eventually taste.  So I'm giving that a shot.  I made a cucumber salad this weekend, so I placed 1 slice of cucumber on her plate.  I didn't pressure her to try it, just left it there.  A few minutes into the meal I asked her if anything on her plate was red.  I asked if anything was green and she pointed to the cucumber.  We asked her how it felt.  Next time, I might ask her what it smells like.  This food exploration seems worthy of a trial anyway!

I made mac & cheese last night and Sami's had it before, but has also refused it.  I showed it to her as I was making it.  She seemed interested at first but when it was ready she said she didn't want any.  I warmed up some chicken, placed that on her plate with bbq sauce, a slice of cucumber, some raspberries and some mac & cheese.  At first she didn't want any, but she asked for help taking a bite and after that she ate the whole portion I had on her plate and even asked for more.  Woohoo!  There's another one for the win column!

Also, she loved her chocolate Easter bunny.

My 5am-9pm & Potty Training

Saturday

We went to swim lessons but our usual instructor was out.  The replacement instructor did most of the things we usually do, although a bit varied.  It was a little more casual, but Sami still managed to do all her usual drills.

Sunday

Sunday I went for a massage.  My neck has been bothering me for the past month to the point that sometimes it's hard to change lanes on the highway.  I figured that meant I needed help.  The massage was good.  Not relaxing, not that this is why I went.  Having a desk job will do a number on your back.  I enjoyed the massage because I feel much better now, but yeah - not relaxing ;)

That afternoon my husband and I joined some friends at a bar in Denver for a fantasy baseball draft.  My husband has been the commissioner of fantasy baseball and football drafts for many years.  I played fantasy baseball for maybe 5-6 years but haven't played in a couple years.  My husband stopped being the commissioner for baseball and the league switched to head-to-head which I don't enjoy (versus a points league).  However, whenever my husband has been commissioner, we've hosted the draft at our house and I handled updating the draft board online as the draft went along.  Our friend asked if I could do the same this year even though we weren't hosting and I wasn't participating.

We had a nice time and everyone seems to have pretty decent teams.  Good luck honey! Brizzo FTW!

That being said, I didn't get around to doing meal prep on Sunday because I had too much going on.  That made me realize that I need to do groceries earlier on Saturday and not wait until after Sami's nap.  My goal is to go right after swim lessons.

Monday-Friday

On Monday night I meal prepped after Sami went to bed.  It made for a bit of a late evening, but whatcha gonna do?

Tuesday night, I prepared Sami's Easter basket, filled the eggs for her little Easter Egg hunt in the house and prepared some Easter treat bags and buckets for her classmates and teachers.

Wednesday I had to work late and it felt like an extremely long day because Sami was being difficult at bedtime and didn't want to fall asleep.  I eventually put her down and I think she stayed awake for another hour.  In retrospect, her throat was probably bothering her because she ended up being sick over Easter weekend.

Friday, Sami had her "spring break".  A one day daycare break.  I took her to the zoo - lesson learned: on one of the first nice days of Spring, be there before they open so you can find a parking spot.  It took me 45 minutes to find a spot (and it's a good 40 minute drive to the zoo in the first place).  Sami had fun though.  She loved the lions, and the tiger.  She liked the bears - brown and polar.  She also was excited about the elephants and giraffes.  Everything else didn't seem to phase her too much.  We'll go again this Spring and Summer.  I ended up getting a membership at the zoo for the year.  It'll be a good activity for nice days and for getting her out of the house without having to spend too much money.


I've been meaning to write about Potty Training since we started with Sami a couple months ago.  We tried a little bit when she moved up classrooms but she wasn't really into it.  I started trying to motivate her using stickers and it worked pretty well.  We started putting a sticker on the calendar whenever she would go potty before her bath.  Some would call it bribing... I call it motivating.

It worked well enough, and they started doing a similar sticker chart at daycare for her.  I also created a potty chart which I stuck to a cabinet in the bathroom with columns for asking to go, sitting on the potty and going potty.  She really liked it at first but is starting to not be so enchanted by the idea.  She knows how to pee the potty but she doesn't always want to.  She doesn't often want to.

She graduated to Pull-Ups a couple weeks ago.  The Pull-Ups come with either a Minnie Mouse design or a Doc McStuffins design.  Sami refused to wear the Doc McStuffins ones for me... What did I do?  I had her watch Doc McStuffins and now she even sometimes requests to wear the Doc McStuffins Pull-Ups.  #MomOutsmartsToddler #MomWin

Recently though, she wants to choose which Pull-Up to wear and 90% of the time she picks Minnie - big surprise! :)

So, potty training is coming along, but not as quickly as I would have hoped.  I know I should probably try the intense 3 day potty training method... maybe one of these days.

#MealPlanMonday: Mar 31-Apr 6

Happy Monday everyone!  I hope you had a nice Easter.  Our little one was under the weather but managed to have some enjoyable activities thanks to Tylenol and Advil.

On this first Monday or April, I am happy to introduce my new meal plan template!  It has a column for the meal (which I will continue to plan 4 meals/week), a column for meal themes to help me offer variety within the week, and columns for the number of servings and the cost per serving to help me ensure I'm planning enough for the week and to ensure I'm not planning recipes that cost $10/serving every meal!

Meals for this week:

Raspberry-Chipotle Chicken Breasts with Cucumber Salad
Shepherd's pie
Taco salad and tacos for those who don't like salads (wink wink hubby)
Egg rolls with rice (I buy the Pagoda Express Egg Rolls and Jasmine rice)

Unfortunately I didn't get to do any meal prep this weekend.  We had a lot of activities planned the little one needed a little more TLC than usual.



PS. My picture of my meal plan has been updated.  I also added the link to the Taco salad recipe.  Thanks for your patience.

PSS. Short post this week - I took a short lunch because I had to bring my daughter to daycare this morning.  Almost kept her home, but she finally didn't have a fever.  And now, I'm coming down with it.  It's the last cold of the season right??