My family always goes camping for Thanksgiving at this cool, secluded, but not impossible to get to beach about four hours from our house. This year we (Hubby, Munchkin and me) decided to skip the overnight part and just go up for the day on Friday, which also happened to be my mom’s birthday.

Of course, we just had to take some pictures since you never know when you’ll get a really great one… or two… or three…

I found this in my archives and I just had to re-post it!

1. Spread the diaper in the position of the diamond with you at bat.
2. Then fold second base down to home and set the baby on the pitcher’s mound.
3. Put first base and third together, bring up home plate and pin the three together.
4. Of course, in case of rain, you gotta call the game and start all over again.

ROTFLOL!

I don’t think I ever posted the reasons I love prefolds… nope, just searched and it’s not there. So here goes!

1. They are versatile — if one fold stops working for you, there’s always another to try! (And you can go back to where you started if you want to too!)

2. They always fit — When you use pockets or AIOs (all-in-ones) you have to worry about how the legs and waist fit and you will often end up trying a gazillion diapers. With prefolds, you just try a different fold. (see #1)

3. They are cheap — If you try them and hate them, you are not out very much money. Likewise, if you wreck them, you’re not out that much money either! Finally, you can try every one under the sun and not be broke. LOL. (I’ve tried three or four brands of three kinds.) You really do save money with this method.

4. You can sterilize them — If the little one gets a nasty rash that won’t go away (ie: yeast) you can boil, bleach and sun (lay them out in the sun) to sterilize them. You can’t boil anything with snaps because they’ll melt, you can’t bleach anything that is fancy (ie: minkee) and sunning doesn’t address the insides of the AIOs.

5. They get really clean — At the thickest point of the thickest diaper there is, at most, 8 layers of birdseye or twill or whatever the prefold is made of. This means that they wash out really well and they dry thoroughly.

6. They look cute — they are simple and almost boring, but they are cute in their own way.

7. You can dye them — and if you hate the dye job, you can buy new ones to start over.

8. Snappis are fun — no more pins if you don’t want them! (Although pins are so fun after you get the hang of it!)

9. Simple wash routine — cold rinse, hot wash, cold wash, then into dryer for 60-90 minutes.

10. If you get sick of using them, they can become stuffin’s for pockets or a handy-dandy cleaning rag.

I love my prefolds!

Suzie posted this survey on her blog last week and I thought it would be fun to put it up here to kick off the Christmas season!

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? I would do cloth bags, but storage is not very plentiful around here so we do wrapping paper. (I buy a roll at the start of the season and everyone gets the same paper…)

2. Real tree or Artificial? Artificial.

3. When do you put up the tree? When the LeMasters put up theirs. (We gave them our large tree and they gave us the “top” of their old one because it was still perfectly good and perfect for our tabletop and we didn’t have room for the large one in our apartment… they store our little tree with their big one, you know the ones that we swapped. Clear as mud?)

4. When do you take the tree down? The week after Christmas

5. Do you like eggnog? Never tried it… probably should.

6. Favorite gift received as a child? Cabbage Patch Doll

7. Hardest person to buy for? Hubby; he knows just what he wants, but it’s all expensive. (Ditto Susannah!)

8. Easiest person to buy for? Bean… he’s getting diapers. LOL.

9. Do you have a nativity scene? Not yet, but one day when we have the space to keep it the rest of the year. I want to get one that Munchkin and Bean can play with!

10. Mail or email Christmas cards? Mail, either by USPS or by our church’s exchange box.

11. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? One year my dad got us kids a vacuum cleaner. It wasn’t so much that we got a vacuum cleaner as much as he saved it for last saying it was the best thing ever. (We were not amused.) I’m going to have to harass him about that! LOL.

12. Favorite Christmas Movie? Miracle on 34th Street (classic) or Santa Clause (modern).

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? A lot sooner than I am this year. (I have my list but haven’t bought anything yet!)

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Yes, but it was something that I knew the person would absolutely love… in fact I loved it too, but we were short on money at that moment. And no I’m not telling what it was or too whom. I did end up buying the item for ourselves a few months later when we had the $$.

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? My mom’s green beans.

16. Lights on the tree? Yup!

17. Favorite Christmas song? Silver Bells or Carol of the Bells. (Notice the theme?)

18. Travel at Christmas or stay home? We’ve always been within an hour of our house… can’t imagine having to travel very far, but I probably will have to one day.

19. Can you name all of Santa’s reindeer’s? Rudolph and his pals.

20. Angel on the tree top or a star? Hmmm… I don’t know. I like them both.

21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or Christmas morning? Christmas morning.

22. Most annoying thing about this time of the year? Buying for difficult people.

23. Favorite ornament theme or color? Ones that mean something special.

24. Favorite for Christmas dinner? Ham and turkey

25. What do you want for Christmas this year? Nursing clothes

26. Who is most likely to respond to this? No idea. People never do what I tell them. LOL.

A very smart mama posted this in the thrifty forum on diaper swappers today. She graciously agreed to let me re-post it here on my blog. If she ever starts a blog, I’ll make sure to link to her! So without further ado, be inspired by her creative way of conquering this daunting task!

I’ve just started mine, and I LOVE the organization and I did NOT do it in the store. It required some at home with the computer time, but that’s easier than in Kroger with the boys!

I went to Hot Coupon World and found the stores I use most often. Then, I looked at the sale ads listed in those sections for the past 3 months.

*Note – they usually link directly to the store to see a copy of the ad, but usually someone will type out a list of the items and prices directly into the forum. Use this list, because the stores will only show you current ads!

As I looked at the list, if there were any products that I buy semi-regularly, I put that item, date, and price in an Excel spreadsheet. Once I finished at Hot Coupon World, I sorted my spreadsheet into categories (produce, dairy, H&B, etc). Actually, it was the same categories as my coupons! I left space under each category so I can add information later. I printed out the pages and put them with my coupons of each category.

Now when my sale papers come, I look at the sale ads and write pertinent information in my price book.

Now, when I go to Wal-Mart and see that their Crest is on sale (unadvertised), I can pull out my coupons and see if I have any coupons, and also see what kind of sale prices have been in my area in the past. Then I can determine if its something I should buy or wait for a better sale. I can also jot a note on the paper about Wal-Mart’s current sale price for future reference. I end up writing down 2 or 3 prices in my notes for each trip to the store, so it’s not really overwhelming, but the ammount of information I was able to get from the ads… Wow! I was able to see some of the sale cycles, so instead of lamenting about not stocking my freezer on that last chicken sale, I can look forward to the SAME sale next month. I can see from my pricebook that they’ve done the chicken sale during the first week of every month for the past three months! Now that is useful information to have.

I hope this helps. No one gave me much help in my pricebook, so I pretty much just made up my own thing. But it’s worked well for me for the past two weeks. HTH, and good luck!

Thanks, Mamarae, for sharing your knowledge!

This is what I put in my freezer in preparation for Munchkin…

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I’m starting to think about meals for after Mr. Bean is here and found this post in the archives. It’s from almost two years ago…

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For some reason I got it into my had that Cynthia shared a pumpkin waffle recipe. I didn’t realize my mistake (it was for pumpkin pie OATMEAL) until after I’d promised my hubby pumpkin waffles and I decided that going back on my word was probably not what I wanted to do, especially since we just had oatmeal yesterday. LOL.

So…

You know what’s coming next right?

Yeah for Google! Well lots actually, and among them I found a recipe for pumpkin waffles that was with ingredients I had on hand! I made a few adaptions based upon reading comments and seeing what other recipes had done and this is what I came up with. (What follows is what I actually did; the variations on the original recipe are already spelled out.)

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoon cinnamon
2 teaspoon nutmeg
1-1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon cloves
1 pinch salt
2 eggs, separated
1/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1 cup canned pumpkin puree
1 2/3 cups milk
4 tablespoons butter, melted and cooled
2 handfuls finely chopped walnuts

Directions
1. Start waffle irons heating
2. Beat egg white until stiff and set aside. (I used my kitchen aid to do this while I was getting everything else ready)
3. Mix together flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, and salt in large bowl.
4. In another bowl, add egg yolks, sugar, pumpkin, milk, and butter; beat well.
5. Mix wet and dry ingredients. (Same rules about not having to wash your kitchen aid apply as to my other waffle recipe)
6. Gently fold in egg whites
7. Cook according to your waffle iron directions. (It took about 5-7 minutes per batch, a couple minutes longer than the recipe says, which was plenty of time to whip some heavy whipping cream for a DELICIOUS topping. The waffles are not extremely sweet so you may want to put a little extra sugar in the whipped cream.

They were a big hit with Hubby and the Munchkin… and Mommy too of course.

I did something dumb when I made chili last week. I used the last of the chili powder and then promptly put it back in the drawer and didn’t mark it on the shopping list. **rolls eyes** So much for being the Queen of Spice.

So this morning I went to put BBQ beef sandwiches in the crockpot. Would you like to guess what ingredient number four is? You got it. Chili powder.

Problem #1: Munchkin is napping… the whole point of assembling it right now

Problem #2: I am not dressed yet and Hubby has already left for work.

Problem #3: Even if I did wait until #1 and #2 were resolved, how am I supposed to get around the “no enclosed spaces while on ACTH” rule?

Hmmm… I wonder if google can give me a chili powder recipe that only contains spices I have in my spice drawer. (Side note: I moved my spices off a cupboard shelf using a nifty little doo-dad I found at my favorite store in the world. I will never, ever go back to a shelf again. It’s so easy to find stuff, except for when you put empty bottles away instead of tossing them…)

Bingo. Not only was I feeling lucky, but I was lucky! The first hit for “homemade chili powder” was this recipe:

Mild Chili Powder

Ingredients:
3 Tbsp. paprika
1 Tbsp. ground cumin
2 Tbsp. dried oregano
1 tsp. red or cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp. garlic powder

Mix well. Place in an airtight container. This makes 2/3 cup.

Not wanting to use all the rest of my individual spices I did a third of the recipe which made enough for BBQ sandwiches today with about 1-1/2 Tbsp left over in case I need more before I can get to the store again.

And dinner is safely in the crockpot before 10am! WOOHOO!

Yesterday, I said:

Sometimes I feel like all I do is get her food and drink and clean diapers and then clean up from the above.

Three of the side effects of ACTH is increased appetite, increased thirst and weight gain. So far all of that has been true for Miss Munchkin:

She’s eating three big (for a two year old) meals a day plus two decent size snacks. For comparison, she used to eat two larger than average toddler meals, two good snacks and one small snack.

She’s drinking 3-4 ounces of water every 1-2 hours a day and has gotten up every 1-2 hours the last two nights for 3-4 ounces of water and then goes back to sleep. So in the last 24 hours she’s drunk about 48 ounces of liquids!!!! She used to average about 20-24 ounces.

On Monday (13 days into treatment) she’d gained three pounds… gone from 24 pounds to 26 pounds, 14 ounces. Most of it is water retention caused by the ACTH, but some is probably increased caloric intake, even if she hardly stops moving while awake.

So what does all this mean for Mommy?

I have to plan three meals a day for us, which is not all bad since I need to be eating balanced meals as a pregnant mama. There’s something about having to plan an official lunch every day that’s really throwing me for a loop. (She used to nap from 11-3 so she’d have breakfast, a mid-morning snack, a large afternoon snack, supper, then an evening snack.)

I’m the drink re-filler. I’ve finally gotten smart and started re-filling the cup as soon as it empties so it’s ready for the next time. (This is an especially good idea at midnight!)

I’m changing diapers every 90 minutes during the day. I’m not one of those crazies who thinks you have to change the diaper every time they wet, but I don’t like sopping. So really nothing has changed except for now I *have* to change every 60-90 minutes or else she’s completely soaked through the diaper and drenched her clothes and whatever she was sitting/laying/playing on.

I have to change diapers during the night! I have *never* had to do that with this child in her 21-1/2 months of life even while nursing through the night! Last night when I put her to bed at about 9:30 (we had to pick Hubby up from the airport) she was in a toddler GMD prefold with a night stay dry doubler and a prorap cover. She was soaking through the cover by 2am (after cups of water at bedtime and 11 and 12:30) so I put her in a two GMD brown edges stacked on top of each other with a microfiber insert (from a fuzzi bunz) between the brown edges and the prorap. She was pretty sopping when she got up at 6:30 (no water breaks between 2am and 6:30… yeah for sleep) but fortunately her sleeper was still dry both times!

(For those who think I should do sposie dipe… tried that. She’s through that in even less time!)

I’m changing her outfits several times a day and sometimes at night. She’s just soaking right through them!

I am running at least two laundry loads per day, one of diapers and another of clothes. (I usually do diapers every other day and clothes once a week, with a load of whites and a load of colors on Fridays.)

I am sooooo thankful for my potty pail. Miralax is helping with the constipation side effects but I cannot imagine having to dunk those dipes. Blech. Related to that, I have decided that I need more cloth wipes. I think some of the 24 have disappeared…

So yeah, it’s been interesting.