Playing with Templates

Since I started digital scrapbooking, I have been hesitant to use templates. I feel like it's almost like cheating in that the template has taken all the creativity out of placement of certain features like the picture (s) and other elements.  But recently I have had a couple of fun opportunities to play with some templates and they can actually be quite fun.  Check out this template that The Urban Fairy created for the Digital Scrapbooking Studio's 4 year anniversary challenge:

I still needed to scrap up some ofthe picts of the kids from when we went to pick strawberries the other day so here is what I came up with:

I am not one for much journaling but it was fun to capture the memories of the kids. Other elements used in this layout are from The Urban Fairy's Little Bunny Love.

Another opportunity I came acros to use a template is for the Digital Scrapbooking Studio's Layout Artist Challenge Week 2.
Here is what the template started out as:

And here is my layout, in remembrance of my huband's great uncle Ron Schwenke, who passed away recently. Elements by Templation Lil Dude by Scrappy Cocoa, The Urban Fairy (A Little Moment, Flutter Fields, Butterfly Kisses) and ADB Designs (Enchantment).

Refilling GoGo Squeez Applesauce packets

Anyyone with toddlers knows about squeezies.  Basically they are the newfangled way of feeding toddlers soupy stuff like yogurt and applesauce with less mess than feeding from a bowl.  They are usually foil packets with some sort of spout or valve and they are, of course, disposable. Great for on-the-go but a lot of waste.  Well how about refilling them?  I have seen some refillable squeeze pouches on the internet that are designed for this purpose, like Sili, Squooshi, Yummi, and Beaba Babypote.

Sili

Squooshi

Yummi

Babypote

These are all very cute and I have not tried them because I thought, why can't I just refill the squeezie packets? They are foil and plastic so they clean up easily ( I just rinse with water and then pop in the dishwasher on the top rack with the spout over a tine of the dishwasher rack. I opened one up to check and it came out very clean) and the caps in the silverware holder.  I bought a cheapo condiment dispenser at the grocery store and filled it up with applesauce.  Then just squeeze to refill, cap and refrigerate.

refilling go go squeez

chewed spout

So that brings up a couple of the drawbacks of this method. 1. once the applesauce or yogurt is opened it probably should be refrigerated, so not ideal for on-the-go situations. 2. my kids sometimes chew on the spouts so the caps don't fit tightly. Again, not great for on-the-go but I think this method is great for refilling them to keep at home.  I am sure this is much cheaper than buying new ones over and over again or even using the refillable ones, but I haven't done the cost breakdown.

Note: I did try to use a pastry bag to do the refilling but apple sauce is so runny that it made a huge mess.  not worth it.

Easter Egg hunt pictures and my first real scraplift

Hey all. Do you know what a scraplift is?  Well, basically it is replicating someone else's layout with your own spin and pictures.  I would call it "copying" but since the scrapping community accepts this practice I will call it scraplifting. I wasn't overly inspired in laying out some pictures of the kids from this past weekend's easter egg hunt so I went on a hunt of my own - to find a layout that I liked that would showcase a few of the pictures. On DigiShopTalk's gallery, I found this cute layout by Celeste.  Her credits are as follows:

Mye De Leon & The Ardent Sparrow Sew Happy kits

Sketch template from Simple Scrapper's Premium Membership

Now here is my spin:

The idea is not to copy it exactly but to use it as inspiration for your own layout. I thought it came out cute.  I love The Urban Fairy's Butterfly Kisses purples patterned papers and they are perfect for easter scrapping!!

Here are the credits for the page:

The Urban Fairy elements from – RandomIt, PLifeJournalCards, FizzlePop, ButterflyKisses, JustLove

Veronica Spriggs Straight and Narrow, Erika Zane Grow, SugarPlum Paperie EveryDay Memories, Tracey Stroud PocketFullAddon, Serendipity ScrapDesign, Gennifer Bursett from An Innocent Heart collection.

Kids' Room Jungle Decor - Update

So I have been working on the kids' room for a couple of months now and I thought this was a good time to give an update. We decided on a Jungle theme as I already had some crib sheets in the Zoo Menagerie pattern that I made before the kids were born.  You'll recall from my Inspiration Board post that I had assembled a few ideas for adding some mix and match giraffe and elephants to the room.  So here is what we have done so far.

Walls: My mother-in-law gave us these really cute wall decals called Jungle Adventure from RoomMates that we absolutely love. In fact, we loved them so much we shared some picts of the decorated room and they wrote a very cute blog post about our nursery. I'd like to thank Nicole at RoomMates for the awesome articles that you can find here.  (PS Full disclosure: I was awarded a small gift certificate to use in a later purchase for submitting pictures of the room but I wasn't given any of the products by the company to test out or give my opinions about beforehand.)  They are so easy to use, repositionable, reusable and Made in the USA in York PA as well as being very affordable.  Here are some picts of how we used the various animals....

Here you'll see my decorated wooden letters (purchased from Michaels) that I then painted navy and Mod Podged cutouts from the Zoo Menagerie fabric to each letter. The letters are hanging on the wall with command hook poster tabs. Here is a close up of the letter Y.

 You'll also notice that I bought two of the Etsy art pieces of the elephants on the navy chevrons and mounted them with double sided tape to canvases and hung them up over the changing table.

Cheeky Monkey

The green lanterns that you'll recall that I used for the Very Hungry Caterpillar birthday have been repurposed and decorated with fabric cutouts of navy elephants. They are hanging by fishing line on command hooks from the shelf.  You can see here as well that the RoomMates can also be used on furniture (see that alligator on top of the bookshelf?)

Here are the adorable Growth Charts and Matching 8x10 print from Eric Sturtevant adorning the entry of the room.  We decided to get the Growth charts laminated (at Kinkos for like 4$ each) because we knew the kids would just pick at them and destroy them otherwise.  They are hanging my command hook poster tabs.

Furniture and lighting:
We haven't changed much in terms of furniture although I did reupholster the two miniature rocking chairs that I got from my paternal grandparents in a green chevron material.

We also added this very cute Barnslig Ringdans rug and the Skojig Pendant Lamp (plug-in) from Ikea.  At some point I think I'll get the matching table lamp now that we are not using the changing table as a changing table any longer and maybe even some of the Barnslig sheets and duvet covers in the chartreuse color.

Curtains - work in progress
I started making some curtains for the big window but I haven't hemmed them up yet.  Here is what they will look like eventually.

The next big thing other than finishing up the curtains is to decorate the very plain sliding closets doors.  RoomMates is coming out with a large scale tall giraffe and tree branch with toucan (seen here in their 2013 sneak peeks blog post) which I think will be awesome for decorating the large plain white closet doors

as well adding a peel and stick Wall clock if they come out with a kids version (or maybe I'll use this colorful one..)

SO that about sums it up. I am pretty happy with it so far and the kids love to do elephant, lion and snake noises.  Too adorable!!

Rainy Day Craft - Building Blocks

Here's a pretty simple and fun craft that you and the toddlers can do together.  To make some fun and durable stacking blocks from cardboard boxes, you'll need:

Sturdy cardboard boxes - I used 2 cleaned and dried 1/2 gallon milk containers and doubled them (i'll show you how below) and some sturdy larger boxes from products from Costco, like the Goldfish cracker box and the 4lbs of raisins outer box. I figure they have to be able to withstand the sitting and standing from my 24ish lb toddlers to not be immediately crushed and worthless for stacking.

Sharp knife if using 1/2 gallon milk containers

Colored tape - I used Scotch Decorative Packing Tape and colored Duck brand duct tape

Scissors (if decorating without the kids)

So basically you tape up the boxes and decorate with tape.  Pretty simple.  In order to make a more sturdy 1/2 gallon box, cut the spout portion off the tops of your milk jugs with a sharp knife and insert one box into the other.  Push together until you have one box completely inside the other.  Then decorate as you see fit.

I decorated a couple of the boxes while the kids were sleeping. I tried to make nice straight diagonal lines and found that the packing tape is very see-through and some of the colored duct tapes are also kinda see-through.  But who really cares?  I also let the kids decorate some of the boxes.  Well, they tried anyways. They mostly just got tape stuck to their hands.

The duck brand duct tape doesn't rip as nicely as regular silver duct tape, so the edges aren't very clean (and i didn't want to have any sort of scissors with the kids..)

 My kids love to stack and as a bonus the colorful rings of duct tape are fun for stacking AND fun for wearing as bracelets...

Traveling with Toddlers!

So this past December we took on the foreboding challenge of traveling across country with our twin 16month old toddlers.  Most parents I talked to said "Good luck - hahaha!!"  and as a result I was a tad terrified.  I consulted friends, blogs, mom's groups etc. for tips and tricks for traveling with kids and all their stuff.  Prechildren, my husband and I were used to traveling light and efficiently; we usually packed for a week in our carry-on, and got through security in a flash by wearing slip-on shoes, no belts or jewelery or coats, only the minimum of toiletries etc.  With kids, not so much.  Car Seats, winter gear (heading from sunny southern CA to wintery Western PA, in December...), diapers, snacks, toys, books, that sleeping turtle that projects stars so the kids can sleep etc etc etc....I knew that in order to assuage my anxiety I had to get organized. So I've assembled a few tips that worked for us..and THEN I'll relate our NIGHTMARE traveling home story...stay tuned.

1. Ditch the stroller.  We have a huge double CityMini stroller that is great for the malls and walking in the parks but in reality we knew we would only be using the stroller in the airports, if at all.  The kids are 16 months so don't even want to ride in the stroller and we like to let them walk to tire them out if it is convenient and safe to do so.  We also were heading to Western PA where it probably would be snowy and cold so we weren't planning on going out for a nice family stroll around the block and we also were planning on visiting a lot of relatives, all of which live on hills with gobs of steps or hills to mount to get to their houses.  Not stroller friendly anyways!!  So instead of the stroller, we heard about theses gadgets called Travelmates from GoGoBabyz. GENIUS!!  These are little wheeled carts that you attach with a couple of straps to your carseat and the kicker is that the kids can actually ride in them!!  Basically you turn your kid into wheeled luggage!!  This worked out brilliantly for us.  We had to bring the carseats anyways because we would be getting a rental car at our destination and even though the kids were riding on our laps on the plane we just gate checked the seat with the cart attached and voila they were always waiting for us on the jetway by the time we gathered all our stuff and actually disembarked. The kids though it was great fun to be wheeled around and it saved our necks and backs from hauling around the toddlers when they decided they didn't want to walk anymore.  During our layovers, we used the seats to haul our carryons while the kids ran all over the terminals checking out christmas decorations and looking out the windows at the planes on the tarmac.
Here are some picts of my hubby and the kids in the carseats with the Travelmates attached...

Luckily we have a mommy network through which I was able to borrow two of these gadgets instead of having to buy them but if you travel often with kids and carseats, I HIGHLY recommend these!!!  Just as a sidenote, we always asked for the carseat/travelmate to be hand-checked through security so we didn't have to take them apart but they were pretty easy to take apart  and put back together once you watch the video on their website on how to do it. It's simple, I promise!!

2. Make diaper/changing kits before you go.  So you all probably know that I have been cloth diapering the kids since they were born, but when we travel I have personally found it easier to use disposables.  I decided that I would try to make traveling a tad more efficient by making up 8-10 diaper changing kits (for the two kids, traveling for an estimated 6-8 hours). I HATE fumbling around in the diaper bag for a diaper and the wipes package while trying to wrangle a squirmy toddler on a plane, so I made these kits consisting of three disposable wet wipes in a small sandwich ziplock and a diaper, both packed inside a sandwich-sized ziplock.  So this might seem like a bit of overkill on the ziplock front, but the outer ziplock serves as a containment bag for that inevitably super-stinky diaper you will be changing on a plane-full of people.  Believe me, your flightmates will thank you for bagging up that dipey before you leave it in the restroom.  Extra unused wipes can stay in their own ziplock for future use (and small enough to stick in your pocket unlike a giant pack of wipes) and you are done.
Here are a couple picts of my kits:

My husband especially really liked these little kits which were easy grab-and-go so he didn't have to haul a big diaper bag into the restroom.   One little trick to making these kits is to make sure you squeeze out all the air of both ziplocks before you seal them.  That way they will take up as little space as possible in the diaper bag.  These are also great if you don't want to haul your whole giant diaper bag into, say, a relative's house, you can just throw one or two kits in your pocketbook.

3. Organize your diaper bag carry-on.  Chaos make me anxious.  So I decided to TRY to organize the diaper bag as much as possible. I knew of course that everything would get all out of whack on the journey but at least it's nice to start from an organized place.  I packed two sets of emergency clothing changes (t-shirts and athletic shorts) laid in the very bottom of the bag, followed by a few books laid flat and a couple of small toy cars in one of the inside pockets.  One side was packed with snacks - goldfish, pretzel goldfish, small 100 calorie packs of snack mixes, raisin and dried cranberry snack boxes, and yes some cookie packs.  When your kid is melting down in the airport, you have to bring out the high value bribes!! I am not a fan of traveling with perishables.  You never know when you are going to be traveling for 18 hours!!  (see my NIGHTMARE travel story...).  Bottles fit in the outside pockets and I generally carry milk (and buy milk at the airport, although we were able to get milk on the plane on one leg of our journey) and bottled water.

4. Put the kids in rubber-soled slipper socks instead of shoes. I really liked the Skidders rubber soled socks or the Rubberoos or Skidders soft rubber bottom shoes.  They are both great for airport and airplane surfaces and just as a note, you don't have to take kids' shoes off to go through security.  The socks are great because you don't have to take them off for dipey changes (I always take their shoes off, easier to get their pants back on). They are also harder to kick off and thus lose under an airplane seat that you can't reach with your diaper bag and kid on your lap.  Just makes things easier and it's two fewer thing to lose.

5. Take liquids!!  When you are traveling with kids, I found that the security guards are pretty lenient about liquids. Now, we were traveling on Christmas Eve (and back on December 29th) through smallish airports (Santa Ana CA and Pittsburgh PA) so maybe the guards are lenient anyways but I was able to pass through sippy cups and bottles with milk and water (just send them through the xray and tell the guard they are formula) and they will probably hand check them once they pass through the xray machine.  I also put through several kids' liquid medications (4oz and larger) packed in quart ziplocks (more for leaking than anything) and didn't get any hassle about them. As long as they are marked for kids you can usually get away with it.

6. Backpack harnesses for safety's sake.  Ok, I know some of you one-child or childless people are saying sarcastically, "so you put your kids on a leash, like a dog" while rolling your eyes. "How about teaching your child to hold your hand and walk nicely beside you"?  Um, yeah I was that person two years ago. But you know what, when you have two toddlers walking running in different directions when your husband is going to get the rental car and they REFUSE to sit in their carseats for one more minute you will be thankful you had them.  This happened to us and though I know I got some weird looks, it was better to be able to hold onto both children than have them run all willy-nilly around the baggage claim area.  We got a couple of the inexpensive Goldbug harnesses that are like stuffed animals and their tails are the leashes and the lids loved to snuggle with them and look over their shoulders at the monkey or puppy face. We also used them at Disneyland this past weekend and it worked for us.  On a side note I will not be taking another under-2 year old to Disneyland - ever!

7. If you travel with multiple lap children, book front to back seats. Did you know that you cannot have two lap children  in a two or three seat row?  This is because there are only enough oxygen masks stored above any row for the number of seats +1. In an emergency (god forbid), if a full 3 seat row had two lap children, one person would be without a mask.  So it makes sense to book back to front (and I prefer the window) seats on the plane.  That way your kids can look over the seats at you and dad and you can pass stuff back and forth easily. And if you have a seat kicker, put him in the back seat so at least you are annoying only your own family.  This all being said, also pack yours and the other adult's carry on with snacks, diaper kits and some toys in case you get separated or you cannot get back to front seats.  This happened to us twice (we ended up in one case back to front but one on the aisle and one in the window and another time across the aisle.) and people were willing to hand stuff back and forth between us, but it was annoying and I hate to annoy people if I can avoid it.

So I think that wraps up the tips and tricks portion of my traveling posts.  Oh, a lot of people bring ipads, iphones and ipods for kids to use on the plane. That is all well and good once you get in the air, but consider bringing some non-electronic entertainment, especially for the unlikely but extremely aggravating event that you are on the tarmac with electronic restrictions for 3+ hours. Yep, it happened to us...and onward to the fun part..our NIGHTMARE travel story.....(my next blog post when I get a chance to write it!!)

Do you have some tried and true tips and tricks for traveling with kids!!  Would love to hear them!!

Newest business idea: Recipro-Sitters or Sitter Swappers?

Sarah is my reciprositter.  She is a mama of twin girls that I met about 4 months ago and she has become one of my closest friends here in CA.  She gets it. She knows the struggles and joys of raising twins.   Although our educational backgrounds differ, she understands the frustrations of trying to have a career and be the best mom she can be. We have similar styles of parenting and are going through similar milestones with our kids.  We are both not from CA - she is from Canada and we are from the Northeast so neither of us has a lot of family that live close enough to help babysit.  And weirdly, our twins are very similar.  We both have one headstrong, fearless twin and one feeling, observant twin.  She is also my twins' Music Together teacher, a class where we have no fewer than 3 sets of twins each week.

So the other day Sarah suggested we trade babysitting. Of course we should.  We decided to do an evening sitting swap. She came over on Friday after the kids were in bed, and me and the hubby went out to dinner.  For free.  She even washed some dishes out of the kindness of her heart!!  And then on Saturday I went over to her house after her babies were in bed and they went to see the new James Bond movie. It was the first time she and her hubby had been out to a movie in 13 months - since her twins were born!!  It was great because the kids were in bed and all I had to do was pet her cats, have a cup of tea, read my book and eat some of the delicious mint chocolate cookies that she baked me (she is fabulous, BTW).  I thought, wow this could be an awesome buiness: matching up families with similar aged kids and parenting styles for evening babysitting.  The only catch is you have to return the sitting job and pay me (the business owner) a small fee. I mean, if we get a sitter through a service, we pay 16.50$ an hour plus a monthly fee plus gratuity, and the minimum is 4 hours. So that can make for a very expensive date night!  Nowi am not sure how the business model works after you make friends with your recipro-sitter family. I mean, how do you keep collecting a fee?  But anyways I thought it was a neat idea!

What do you think?  Did you ever have any creative ideas for a business ( I also think there should be drive-thru super-markets and craft studios with child-care on-site!)

Time Savers for Toddler Meal Prep...

So this week I posted on Facebok asking how many people put hot food in the freezer to cool it down super quickly for their toddlers.  I find myself always waiting until the last possible minute to make food for the kiddos and I know I should really start planning ahead but I am just not that person.  So today I went to make them some pasta (Annie's wheat mac and cheese) and I was thinking that I should steam them some carrots, but of course I had that thought about halfway through microwaving the pasta. But then I thought that maybe I could jut throw in a few baby carrots into the boiling pasta water and they would be ssoft enough for the kids to eat.  At about 3 minutes left on the microwave I added about 8 baby carrots and then restarted the microwave.  When it was done I drained the pasta and carrots and added a little bit of butter.  I took about a cup of the pasta and carrots and stuck it in the freezer to cool quickly, and with the rest I made the regular version of mac and chesse for myself.  The carrots were nice and tender and easily cut into pieces for the kids, they got a healthy quick meal and I only got one bowl dirty!  How's that for time saving???

What tricks do you use to get food on the table quickly??

more fun Halloween and Fall things

Just wanted to post a few more cute halloween decorations, treats, costumes and fall photos from the past few weeks.

Here is my Tulle-o-ween Wreath

A cute spider hot dog (just slice each end into 4 sections leaving the center uncut and microwave). I added candy eyes because i had them but you could use raisins for eyes...

 my kids at the pumpkin patch

 Halloween -I am Bride of Frankenstein and Greyson is the monster...

 Daddy is Igor and Jack is Dr. Frankenstein (al la Gene Wilder in Young Frankenstein...)