Saturday Satire....

I got a spiffy new hair cut on Friday and one of my male co-workers comments on how nice it is and then continues to chat about work and how I am liking being back full time after having my child and blah, blah, blah. Then he says, "wow, you are back to you regular size" and I say how it took a bit longer than I thought and we get out and try to get lots of exercise and more blah, blah, blah. Then he says, so, he's using a sippy cup now? Is this code for "are you still letting him drink boobie milk? Does this mean he thinks the only reason I nursed is because he wasn't able hold his own sippy cup? Not that he can, am I supposed to stop?
 Augh.... my child uses a sippy cup quite effectively and is feeding himself on most occasions as well.

I just thought this was kinda funny....

Coupons..where do you get them?

I see all these posts on the frugal blogs from couponers who save $20, $30, $40 bucks per week by using coupons at the grocery store and I want to know where everyone get their coupons? We use about $10 bucks worth, maybe $15 on a really good trip and I think we are pretty savvy with about $400 to date, but $50 bucks each week? Seriously, we are on the save.ca websites, smartcanucks.ca getting all of our freebies and we collect lots of coupons in store. We find the occasional one in weekly fliers or mail outs and we've even emailed and called companies for products we love. Any other tips out there for fellow coupon moms and dads?

Are people counting the regular price as well as the discount in the total? I purchased two bottles of dove body wash on sale for $2.99 (reg. $4.99) and had a coupon for $2 when you buy two so I did. So I consider this a $2 saving...not a $6 dollar saving.

We don't have double coupon days at our grocery store or coupons printed on the back of receipts here like many places in the US, I'd love to hear some more tips and tricks.

Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to everyone! Hopefully, the Daddy's out shopping for something this evening choose something wonderful. It doesn't have to be big or expensive, just thoughtful. Favorite cookies, a great book and maybe fresh strawberries for my favorite breakfast; waffles and bacon.
Enjoy!

Oh Sleep Where Art Thou?

I am so tired...my son finally sleeps though the night but I am still pooped...and cranky. Does it ever get better? Please tell me it does. Cranky I may be able to handle but tired and cranky? Did I mention my muffin top? I am back to my pre birth weight but still fight the roundness of a once mostly firm belly. I hate sit ups, crunches and all that other crap but I have to do something.....maybe belly dancing. HA

Tired, cranky and still kinda fat. Thank God my child is amazing....my husband is pretty groovy too.

I love the Internet, seriously I do. I spend more time on the Internet that I do watching the television, movies or even reading a good book. I can remember when we first had Internet hooked up and I was introduced to Google and oddly enough I could not fathom why anybody would need to or want to look up stuff, I mean really, we have books for that sort of thing. Ha Ha Ha. I think I "google something" everyday. It's great because I am in information junkie and I love to learn about people, our environment and this little planet we call home.

I love that we have so much information at out fingertips and hopefully this information will lead to better choices. As an example I've done a bit of research into why organic cotton is better, why Eco-friendly cleaners are the best choice and now that I have a child I want to make environmentally friendly choices for the products we choose for him to eat, wear, sleep and play with. As with any parent, I don't always make the right choices but we are trying to shop with an informed voice. I love to support companies who choose to make a difference and I love when companies make decisions that are good for the planet and not just the bottom line.

Don't get me wrong, I love a good deal as well but is it possible to be Eco-friendly and reasonably priced?

Books We Love

As a new parent there are so many resources; sometimes you know where to look, sometimes you go searching and sometimes it falls in your lap. We were given The Baby Book by William Sears and Martha Sears the day after our darling dude arrived in the hospital and it's been a life saver for us. I've learned so many things from this book and I would highly, highly recommend it. The things we like are the easy to follow chapters and everything is subdivided so that you can read from cover to cover or you can just pick it up and read the section you need when you need it. As anyone who reads this blog knows, we are big fans of attachment parenting....in a nut shell,  "The essence of Attachment Parenting is about forming and nurturing strong connections between parents and their children" as taken from the attachment parenting website. (www.attachmentparenting.org)
 
As a family we believe in extended breastfeeding, cloth diapering (most of the time), we co-slept for many months and we use a variety of slings and support baby wearing. I like this book because it supports many of our principles as mentioned above but gives a mostly balanced picture of raising a baby and some of the issues one may face. I say mostly balanced because the authors do support extended breastfeeding, baby wearing etc so if that's part of your parenting plan, this book would be great be for you. Even if you don't do all those things, this is still a great book for you. We've referred to this book at least once a week; there are baby care basics, common concerns the early weeks, an extensive section on breastfeeding and bottle feeding, feeding the toddler, parenting the colicky baby and a really great section of how to play with baby, stages of development from infants to toddlers and lastly keeping baby safe and healthy. We've only read The Baby Book, however, Dr. Sears has several books to choose from and I am hoping Daddy picks up a copy of the The Family Nutrition Book as a surprise for mommy. To get your copy, you can click on the links and go to Amazon or pick one up at your local bookstore. Well worth every cent. It's on the BuzzWorthy List.

One Down...

These days the mail comes in with little excitement, it's rare I receive anything other than bills or crap from local politicians who want my vote. Yesterday was an exception, we received something worth framing! A letter from students loans saying "congratulations your student loan is paid in full" Hooray....as this was addressed to my husband we have one down and one to go!