Mom's Night Away

Hello! I have a love/hate relationship with Day Light Savings Time. Love that it's lighter later, but hate the first few days that we switch. It took me forever to fall asleep last night, and now I'm tired.

This weekend was great, Friday we went to my best friends daughter's Show Choir performance. It was super cute, and they won 1st place in their category AND they won best overall performance for the whole night, considering they are 4th grade-8th grade kids competing against high school kids for the overall, that's pretty awesome. I couldn't find my phone to take pictures of the performance, darn.

Them getting their after performance pep talk? Not sure what they were talking about.

Baby Fox's Nino

The kids playing while we were waiting. Mini Fox thought she was big time

The girls are 4 months apart

The girl on the left is my friends daughter and Baby Fox wanted an encore performance, so she's getting ready.

They kids were fantastic, we didn't end up leaving till 10pm! But it was super fun, and Baby Fox asked when we could go back.

Saturday my bestie and I were up and early to get our eyebrows done. Then where else would we go? Target...without kids, awesome. But what did we do while we were there? Shopped for our families, lol.

Then we headed to bestie's cousin's house to meet her baby.

They look like sisters right?

We hadn't eaten yet, so we went here for lunch, can you tell where we are?

Then we headed to the Hyatt in Huntington Beach, the hotel was SOOO nice! Our view...

When standing up...gorgeous right?! Definitely worth it to pay for the ocean view!

We sat on the patio and drank and chatted until our massage appointments. Which by the way was my first massage. Usually I don't like people touching me, so I've just stayed away from them. But I got peer pressured into it, and I actually liked it. I would definitely do one again. :) We did the steam room, sauna, spa and just chatted it up...Bestie got a facial, so Nina (Baby Fox's Godmother, Nina is godmother in spanish) and I headed back to the room. Perfect way to watch the sunset.

We decided to just go to the hotel restaurant and then decide what to do from there.

The girls decided to get bone marrow since it was on the menu and neither had had it.

Consensus was, they liked it, and nothing was left at the end. Then we got some dinner and dessert, which the waiter gave to us for free! He was the most awesome waiter, if you ever go to Watertable in HB then ask for Bu, he was pretty awesome. Should have taken a picture of him.

Their dessert

My dessert, since I'm allergic to everything. But I hear theirs was super good, it was a 6 layer fudge mousse something...???

By the time dinner ended it was almost 11pm, so we decided to just hit up the hotel bar, there were some interesting characters there.

Meanwhile....Mr. had the kids. I had just bought these hair ties for Mini Fox, but Baby Fox said that they were Power Rings, love kid imaginations.

Mini Fox wanted some power too.

Mr. said that she was adament about wearing these shoes...

Some backyard play

The perfect spot for swords, according to Baby Fox

Then they planted some flower bulbs in the front yard.

Love how they are in the exact same position.

I can guess who picked this outfit out :)

Then they headed out to meet up with some friends. Some K-BBQ

Baby Fox not so sure about the food

But eventually ate some of it.

Sunday we were reunited again! The kids were so excited to see me and came running out of the house and I got huge amounts of hugs. Loved it! Then we did a family outing to the grocery store.

First stop Stater Brother's, they have Corned Beef on sale for $2.99 a pound...in case you were wondering or wanted some. Mini Fox's first time in the car, she LOVED it.

Then we decided we really do need to go to our usual store (Sprouts) for the regular stuff we buy that they don't sell at the Stater Brother's. Best way to ride.

 Mini Fox helped get some groceries.

Just before she slammed it into the basket.

Then we had some lunch and headed out to swim lessons. Mini Fox didn't have a swim lesson, but we thought no one would notice if we just got her in the pool to splash around. No one did, so while Baby Fox had his lesson, Mini Fox got a Daddy swim lesson.

When we got home I actually fell asleep when the kids did, the kids took a great nap, then we did dinner and bed time. We did let them go to bed a little later, since it was daylight savings time, to help transition them...and it seemed to work, they both went right to sleep.

How did you/your kids do with the time change?

 Linking up with Faith, Sarah and Heather for Mommy Moments, Bella & Lisa for Weekend Link-up,  Meg for Mingle Monday and Erin for Weekend Snapshot4

5 Steps to Throwing an Awesome Party

We're baaaaack! Another link up with my favorite ladies! This weeks topic, Look What I Can Do: Something I Made

I always see all these blogs with people who do DIY around their house, and it always looks so good. They refurbished that dresser and made a headboard out of nothing...so amazing, but I don't have one decorating bone in my body. I wish I did though! I try...but mostly I have my mom come over and tell me what to do :)  Then I copy it year after year and do the same thing every year.

That being said I do love crafting. I won't even go into the hundreds of pages of scrapbooking, one day I'll have to show you my collection. Unfortunately all scrapbooking has pretty much stopped since having kids...:( But I have discovered online books, and I'll have to do a post on that too...okay I digress. I'm going to show you what I do know how to do, how to throw a party :)

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Let's just assume you have a reason to celebrate and you've picked a date.

Step 1:

Think of the person you're throwing the party for and then chose a theme. I almost always have a theme, it's what makes a party fun right?

Baby Fox's 1st Birthday

Mini Fox's 1st Birthday

Chose whether you're going to buy invitations and send them out, or do an Evite or Paperless Post (I like this one because it's a little fancier than evite, and it's mostly free). If you do go with the snail mail route, I like using Vista Print. The prices are super reasonable, and every card is really customizable. You can take what they have and move words around, add more words, it's awesome. Granted they don't have the fancy choices that some of the other sites have, but the price more then makes up the differnce. For Mini Fox's birthday I had someone do the graphics on Etsy and then I used Vista print to print them out.

Step 2:

Once your theme is chosen, run with it. I always try to think of what decorations I want. With birthday parties, I always want a Happy Birthday Sign, so whether you buy it or make it, I almost always start there, that way I can base my decorations off of that. I heavily use my Cricut to make all of the decorations.

Baby Fox's 2.5 Birthday Party

Baby Fox's 3.5 Birthday Party

Mini Fox's 1st Birthday

Step 3:

Decorations: Try to buy as much as you can. I always try Oriental Trading Company first, then I hit up Party City. Occasionally I'll hit up Dollar Tree just to see what they have. I actually found cute wheel barrel at Big Lots of all places, only $5. Plus the kids played with it for the next 2 years, until the gardener decimated it, oops!

A great place is Facebook. We have several after party FB groups that people try to sell their party stuff. It's how I usually sell everything I've done. Throw an ISO (In Search Of) post out there and see if anyone can help you out. It's how I got a lot of the ladybug stuff.

The lady bug month by month was bought from someone else, so was that container holding the flowers, saved me so much time not having to make that stuff myself, which I probably would have done.

If you're doing party favors, you can really make them look fancy buy buying those candy bags and then printing your own top part, and stapling everything in it, looks fancy, but in reality it's all you!

Another easy way to make things "fancy" is do something fun with the plasticware.

This was for the Bridal Shower I threw for my Best Friend

Something else that brings a big pop to the party, things hanging from the ceiling. Seriously...how boring would this EZ-UP be if there weren't some Tissue Pompoms?

Just remember this: It's also okay to buy everything! For my sister's surprise party, I bought almost everything! The only thing I made were the "flower" poofs, using a modification of my PomPom Tissue DIY.

Step 4:

The food, duh. You have to have good food. I try to come up with something that matches the theme of the party. Like for Baby Fox's 3.5 birthday party we had BBQ food from Lucille's. I thought getting ribs = dinosaurs bones...hey good enough for me :) For Mini Fox's Lady Bug party, we did sort of a sweet picnic theme, chicken salad sandwiches, fruit, a few different salads.

A great place to really spruce up the decorations is the food. Create little signs for everything, it's a really nice touch and even though it's super obvious that it's fruit, a cute sign helps make it look so much more complete.

This is from Mini Fox's Baptism, the theme obviously was baptism, but I made these little cards using the logo from the invitation. This was the invitation, I went into Vista Print, pretending I wanted to buy the coordinating Thank You cards, then screen shot that, put it in Paint saved the picture, put that picture in Word added some words...and there you go.

Looks like I had these made right? Nope just at home on my computer.

From Baby Fox's 2.5 Birthday Party

Step 5:

Know where you want stuff the night before, drink table, cake, food, gifts, etc.  Usually we try (we're getting better at this), to set up as much as we can the night before, as most people probably do. We literally put the bowls and serving trays that we want, and I put labels on them, chicken salad sandwiches go here, crockpot of meatballs goes here, etc. That way when you're running late the next day, the people helping you know where everything goes because you've labeled it.

Don't forget the music. Even if it's just softly playing in the background, it just changes the mood of the party when there is music.

There you have it, click here to see the parties that I've thrown. Mostly they revolve around kids...but hey you can use the same principles to throw just about any party!

Now go check out some of the other ladies, and see what they've made.

Shoes to Shiraz | Two Teens and their Mama | A Lovely Little Wardrobe | R Squared 

Confessions of a Frumpy Mommy | Family Love Inspiration Education  

The Mishaps and Mayhem of Solitary Life | The Blondissima | Positively Learning | Quilty Joy Joy

 Daily Style Finds | Making The Most of Everyday | Puppies and Pretties | She Thought She Could 
 Foxy's Domestic Side | Once Upon a Time & Happily Ever After | Sprinkled Just Right

An InLinkz Link-up

Linking up with Faith, Sarah and Heather for Mommy Moment, Angel at Sew Crafty Angel and Shelly, Abby, Arien and Katie for Hit Me With Your Best Shot, And all the girls over at Tuesday Talk

I Can't Live Without...Trader Joe's

Katie and Lindsay are hosting the first every I Can't Live Without... Fun topic right? So let's get started.

I can't live without...Trader Joe's. Do you have one near you? It's the best thing ever! If you haven't gone, you're going to LOVE it!

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Some of my favorite/staples at my house:

Sun Flower Seed Butter

If you have not had this, you have no lived. Do not try any other brands, this is the best one by far. It's so good! Since I can't have peanuts this is a very nice alternative. Actually some of my friends who can eat peanuts like this better too. I do have to say that you have to give it a more then once try. Your brain plays tricks on you because it will think it should taste like peanutbutter, but it doesn't, so that's a bit weird. But once you get past that, the 3rd or 4th time eating it, it's all good, and you just taste sweetness and the overwhelming taste of sunflower seeds is barely there.

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 Ketchup

Did you know most ketchup has corn syrup...what doesn't now and days? Anyway, this one is SOO good. It has hardly any sugar so you're really just getting that tomato taste, so delicious. If you've tried any other brand and didn't like it and have sworn off organic ketchup, just try this one, it will change your mind.

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Pasta...

It's simple, it's easy and good. What more can you ask for.The pasta is so good, and only has 1 ingredient.

 

We've tried all of the TJ pasta sauces and this is the best one, best bang for your buck. I think it's $1.99 and it's SOO good, plus you can add veggies to it and it tastes even better. But it's pretty darn good on it's own. No sugar added, just tomatoes and a few spices.

 

Another favorite their pizza dough and sauce:

Easy, everyone gets to pick their toppings and everyone is happy. Win-win. And so affordable, I think the pizza dough and sauce is about $2 each.

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So easy, and what is more fun then making your own pizza? So I can't have cheese on it, it still tastes delicious! We usually cut the dough in half, makes it easier to deal with and if Mr. wants cheese on his, he can add it and not affect mine.

Hands down my favorite tuna, random I know. But since we're in the middle of Lent, I tend to eat more tuna, and this one is the best.

I used to be obsessed with these things, like I would take out an entire bag in one sitting, so bad right?

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I could eat these by the bagful. But I try not too buy them, because most likely I'll eat them in a day or two and just don't want the calories...but when we're on vacation, all bets are off and I always get these.

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This so really good too, good for a quick meal, it's a little on the expensive side, but it's nice to have this stashed in the freezer for a rainy day. I will cook the meat and then in the same pan cook up some onions (I would do bell peppers but Mr. doesn't care for them) for a quick fajita dinner.

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Love these bran Muffins too. They are actually made by this company, but they are WAY cheaper here :) I personally like the raspberry/blueberry combo. Always store in the fridge as they will go bad within a couple of days just left out.

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We like getting eggs here too, they are cheaper than the regular store.

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Other things that we might not get but is pretty awesome here is all the ready to make food. They have a whole bunch of awesome stuff, if I could eat it, I totally would. TJ's is known for their awesome ready to make food. And that's not even all of it

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There is also a whole isle devoted to different kinds of nuts and snack foods, all totally affordable in my opinion.

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I hope by now you're ready to jump in your car and see what kind of goodies TJ's has to offer you. I wouldn't suggest buying all your groceries here, as the produce and meat is on the expensive side, but the things I pointed out, good value. OH and I forgot to mention the beer, wine and Spirits, super good choices and at very reasonable prices. You've heard of two buck chuck? Yep $2 wine, although I heard it went up to $2.50...it's pretty good, and I use it for cooking all the time.

Linking up with Amanda, for Thinking Out Loud  Katie and Lindsay for I Can't Live without...and Vanessa and Penny for Thinking out loud

Something I've Wanted to Try + Fitness Update

So I've always wanted to wear one of my maxi's with a shirt over it. But all of my maxi's and shirts never seemed to look good. Then I thought, hey what about my denim shirt...that might work, and low and behold I loved it! I thought it needed some sort of statement necklace, so I pulled this out from my brothers wedding, added some ankle boots and bam, I got me a new outfit. In case you were wondering this is the dress I wore for our family photoshoot.

I always try jumping shots, but using a remote and being by myself, didn't really work, but I thought I would show you how funny it turned out...remember to smile while jumping, it's harder than you think.

Onto my heathy/fit initiative:

I have lost about 2 pounds. Woo hoo! We'll see how this week goes. I didn't work out yesterday because I think I might be getting another sinus thing...so annoying. One a month is NOT okay. I think I might actually have to go to the doctors. Boo. We'll see how the rest of the week goes.

Saturday I woke up at 5:30am to go hiking, I know who am I? It was crazy early, but so much fun.

And so pretty. I didn't walk nearly as fast as the other people, so I spent a good chunk of time by myself, and it was great to just be.

I am seriously so lucky where I live. I couldn't live in a better place!

Tonight is R.I.P.P.E.D, and tomorrow is probably a T25 workout. I won't have time Friday or the weekend because we're and when I say we're I really mean I'm because I'm getting away with some friends! I'm so excited I can hardly contain it.

So the diet, it's called the Slow Carb Diet (a way to lose specifically fat), this guy has a great website on it. Anyway by Friday I was just angry...I didn't pack enough food for work, so I was just hungry, all the time. Which you're not supposed to be at all, if you're eating enough protein. So this week, I've ramped up the protein and so far so good. No angry wife/mama here. So far, but we'll see when Friday rolls around again, haha.

I'll report back next week with my results from Saturday. Thinking those first two pounds were probably water weight, but we'll see. Summer here I come! I might actually buy a new bathing suit, something I haven't done in 7 years...well I did buy a speedo one-piece to wear to swim lessons with the kids. My bikini's are not meant to swim in, lol. I spent more time making sure I didn't pop out then enjoying the lesson, LOL.

Linking up with Because Shanna Said So, Get Your Pretty On, The Pleated Poppy, Tucker Up , Shopping my Closet and Molly and Carly for Let it Shine