Freedom!

Yay! Right after I wrote that last post, I quit Swiss Colony.... like hours after. It was the best decision I've ever made. I had no idea how much that job was bringing me down. I didn't hate the job and I didn't mind the people I worked with, it was just not right for me at this point in my life. I was working too much and my family was paying the price. So, now I'm free to spend more time with the people that matter the most to me. I am very grateful for that.

So now because I have a little free time, I've been finding projects to do. My dear friend Stefanie got me hooked on Pinterest. (If you haven't checked it out... do it... seriously... right now.) I have found sooooo many DIY projects on there that I want to start. Only problem... no money. Hey, I guess that's what happens when you quit a job. But, what's more important: family or money? No brainer. Anywho, I've taught myself how to crochet and I've made a few hats and stuffed animals and scarfs. They're pretty cute. I'm trying to get the motivation to finish up a scarf for my sister-in-law, a fox stuffed animal, and a koala hat. Hopefully today I can get those puppies done. Next on my list to crochet are two slouchy hats for my mother-in-law, a sweater, a hat for a friend's baby, a Winnie the Pooh hat, and a blanket for my daughter. We'll see how far I get before my fingers fall off. :)

We're hoping to remodel our basement within the next year, so I'm getting super excited about getting my teacher/craft room all set up and ready to use. I can't wait! I *might* be getting it as a Christmas present... fingers crossed! I was on Pinterest (surprise surprise) and I found this blog that showed this woman's sewing room. I think my jaw hit the floor and drool flooded out of my mouth. You can see what her craft room looks like here. If only my house were HUGE and could accommodate a room that size. I am perfectly happy having a teeny tiny room as my craft room. <Enter huge grin>... SOOOOO EXCITED!

*If you want to join Pinterest, let me know your email address and I'll send you an invite.

Back to the Holiday Bustle

Well after a looooooooong busy summer, it is now fall and with fall comes the holiday season. Last year, I started working a temporary seasonal job at The Swiss Colony to help pay for Christmas presents. Against my better judgment (why is there no 'e' after the g in judgment?!), I decided to go back for year number two. Let me first preface this rant with why my summer was so busy.

Early this summer I started working for a photographer that owns photobooths. Dan and I are able to work together attending the photobooths at weddings and other occasions. I like this job, and my boss is awesome, but summer is wedding season, so the weekends were pretty much jam packed with photobooth jobs. And when we had a weekend off, we filled it quickly with family events and other things. During the summer, it wasn't so bad because I wasn't working during the week. Now, since school has started, I can't breathe.

I am a substitute teacher for 6 different schools (and love it), I work at Swiss Colony at night, we do photobooths on Saturdays, and then Dan and I clean a hair salon for a friend on the weekends (usually Sundays) as well. The weeks start running together when there isn't any time off. Many days, I work from 7:30am -10pm and that means that I'm away from my house from 6:30am to 10:45pm and that's just the days that I only have to work until 10. Soon, I'll be getting home after midnight. That is stressful enough, but that also means I don't get to see Bella or Dan. I think the only time I see Dan is when we're working together, and then we're usually fighting because the week has been so hard on us both. I need a part time stay at home job where I can work a couple hours a night and get paid like $150 a week. If you know of one, let me know.

I'm super stressed right now because of everything going on. I don't really like my SC job at all, and have thought about just quitting multiple times, but 1. I would feel bad leaving them hanging like this and 2. I need that extra cash. It's just such a pain. I have to work every night during the week (and soon, I'll have to start working weekends), if I want to take a night off for something, I get penalized for it (I got penalized last year for going to a meeting for Bella's baptism... awesome), and I have to work on Halloween (Bella's second) and the day after Thanksgiving. I know a lot of you may not know, but my holidays are so incredibly busy it's ridiculous. We will have probably about 7 Thanksgivings to go to. In a what, 3 or 4 day period? That's going to be just about impossible this year. Dan and Bella will have to go without me, which is unfair for both sides. I keep telling myself that SC is only until the middle of December, I can do it. But then I look at a calendar and realize that is 11 weeks away. That's 77 days. That seems like eternity. I don't know if I can do it. 

My house is a mess and I have absolutely no motivation to do anything about it. When I get home at night, it's not like I can just fall aleep right away. It takes time for me to unwind. I fell asleep last night around 1 and Bella was up at 6 this morning. I have no energy and I'm grumpy all the time. Not good for the family. You're probably thinking, well why don't you just take a nap when Bella does? Well, I have to get in the shower (because I can't trust her alone and awake), and I have to *try to straighten things up as best I can, and get laundry done, and everything else before I have to leave for work at night. Boo. I don't mean to be having a pity party right now, and I know a lot of people have it a lot worse than I do, but I just needed to get it out there, and I just want one person to tell me it's ok, and that I should just quit and it will all be ok.

I do still have things that make me happy:

*Crocheting... I just recently taught myself how to crochet, and I'm LOVING it

* Baking... I will be starting a blog January 1, 2012 that has a different dessert recipe every day for 365 days. I love the blog crockpot365.blogspot.com and her wonderful idea to use her crockpot every day for a year. I can't cook to save my life. My friend Jeremy can vouch for me when I say I should not be allowed near the stove with ideas in my head of deep frying ravioli. It's just bad. I, however, CAN bake. Pretty well some times. I love to try new yummy recipes that involve sweet ooey gooey stuff, so that's my blog. Be ready 2012!

* Friends... I have awesome friends. You guys are great. I love my "mom friends" and my high school and college friends. One of our friends *may be moving into Chateau Purcell for a little while if all things work according to plan. That is exciting and scary at the same time. More on that later if it happens.

* Family... I seriously couldn't do all these jobs if I didn't have such a supporting family that helps me take care of Bella (at no charge) ALL THE TIME. I love that if Bella is not with Dan or I that she is with grandparents, great grandparents, or aunts that love her. We are blessed to have a large loving family.

And of course Bella and Dan. I love having such a supportive husband that can handle me when I lose my mind and freak out about stupid little things that don't matter. He's always there for me, and he's got my back, even when I'm not aware. Bella keeps me on my toes and makes me laugh. She is going through a tough stage right now, but she's growing up and finding herself. I don't know what I'd do without her.

Long Time No Talk

It's been a while since I've written, and I guess I'll just update everyone to what's going on in our world...

Summer school has started and I am loving it. It's a lot of prep work but I really enjoy teaching my classes this year. I'm teaching both a one hour Dr. Seuss class and a one hour Eric Carle class twice a day. So from 8-9 am it's Dr. Seuss, 9-10am Eric Carle, 10-11 back to Dr. Seuss, and 11-12am finishing off with Eric Carle. I'm teaching these classes in two sessions and the first session ends next Thursday. It's a lot of fun and it's a nice way for me to still keep me fresh with teaching.

Bella: Whoa man is this little girl growing and learning and getting into EVERYTHING. Her new favorite thing is going over door thresholds and crawling up and down stairs. I don't love the whole stair thing because she doesn't really have all the balance (or coordination) she needs to keep herself from falling down the stairs... so it's pretty scary for us. She's got 4 teeth and a few more up top are just teasing us. She eats anything and everything we eat, but she doesn't eat meat... her choice, not ours. We gave her some peanut butter a couple weeks ago and (whew) no allergic reaction so we're pretty stoked about that. She walks along anything that she can grab a hold of. She'll use our gliding ottoman as a walker and walk around the room with it. She can't walk by herself yet, but it's going to happen soon. She also can't stand up by herself for more than 5 seconds, but again, that's coming soon too. We are going to be taking the bottle away soon and I think she'll do pretty good without it. She can sign "more", "please", "milk", and will blow kisses. We're working on "thank you". She can say please and more, mommy, daddy, kitty, Zoey, Kya, puppy, hi, thank you, and just today she said "Hi Tim". That was completely unexpected, but pretty cool.

We just remodeled our upstairs bathroom and I must say I love it. It took a lot of blood sweat and tears, but it's done and looks nice, so we're very happy with that. Other than that, nothing else is too different here, we're just super busy. Summertime is always a very busy time for us. I can dig it. :)

Couponing

So recently I watched an episode of Extreme Couponing on TLC. I became HOOKED. I feel like I am a highly organized person and I love saving money, so I thought I could give it a shot. It's been about two weeks since I watched that episode and I am now obsessed. I figure if I can get 50% savings or more on my grocery and every day needs then I'm going to try.

Here are a few of the places I've looked for information and for coupons...

• Coupons.com
• Coupon Dad
• Red Plum
• Moms Need to Know
• Groupon

If you want to give this a try and see if you can save yourself some money, please do! If you have any questions or want more information, let me know, and I'll do what I can to help. Happy Couponing!

Birthday Parties!

We had Bella's two family birthday parties the past couple of weeks. I'm not going to write too much about them, other than they were super fun! Here are a few pics from her two special days. :)

Rainbow cupcakes from B-Day Party 1

 

          

 

 

Rainbow cupcakes from B-Day Party 2

Daddy playing with her cell phone from Uncle Joshy

Enjoying her Winnie the Pooh gift bag and her Angry Birds piggy

Chewing on her toy from Aunt Britty

Checking herself out in the mirror

She sure loved those cupcakes!

Cake smash!

She's such a big girl!

Bike helmet from Grandma Silly

Isn't she a sweetie?!

Bumpa got her this plaque. It's hanging right above the door to her room. :)

Happy 1st Birthday!

It was one year ago today, in the early morning hours, that little baby Bella came into this world. I was trying to remember what I was doing a year from last night, but I couldn't remember. Well I shouldn't say that, I know I was in labor, but I don't remember what stage I was in at that particular time. Maybe that's for the best. Isabella Anne was born at 2:20 am two days after her due date. She was beautiful. From the first second she came into this world she had her daddy wrapped around her little tiny finger.
This past year has been quite the eye opener for me. Being a mom is a lot of work! I give kudos to all those moms out there that are super moms and can juggle everything in their lives but still have all the time in the world to spend with their kids. I definitely have a new appreciation for my own mother. On Mother's Day, I think I am going to list some moms I know that have inspired me to become a better mother.
So, what has Bella learned in her year of life? Well she rolled over, sat up by herself, took a bottle, then solids, and then table foods and a sippy cup, she hasn't crawled yet, but she scoots like a maniac, she gets into everything, and she has a small vocabulary. She points at everything and asks "what's that?" It sounds more like "sssswwwaazzzzaaa" but her voice goes up at the end so you know she's asking a question ;) She also says dada, mama, and hi and she fake laughs at all our jokes to makes us feel like we're funny. She loves to read books and do puzzles. She just read Dan and I an excerpt from a magazine yesterday. What a genius. :)

Today, Bella and I met Daddy at Culvers for lunch. We ordered Bella her own meal for the first time (grilled cheese) and she got her own birthday frozen custard. Then she got to go back to work with Daddy for a little bit so he could show off his big birthday girl. Daddy took the rest of the day off to spend with us. Although it is a dreary day, it's been a happy day at the Purcell house. Right now, Bella is fighting off sleep because she wants to enjoy more birthday time. Tonight, the three of us are having a pizza party with homemade pizza and a Disney movie. It's a good day.

I've been doing a lot of reflecting these past couple of days. It's been really hard for me to come to terms with the fact that my little girl is growing up, and although she's not running off to college tomorrow, I know that I have to cherish the time that she's little because it's going to go by too fast. Bella was only a couple weeks old when I broke down in tears because she was growing up too fast. (That also could have had a little something to do with postpartum but the reality of it all hit me like a ton of bricks.)

We had one birthday party for her a couple days ago and will be having the other one next Sunday. I asked everyone (Grandma's, Grandpa's, Aunts, Uncles, Godparents, etc) to write her a letter telling her how much she means to them and I am collecting all those letters and saving them until her 18th birthday. On her 18th birthday, I'm going to give her those letters and let her go somewhere and read them alone. I am so excited for her to read the letters. Bella will be the only person to read them so it's between her and the person who wrote the letter. She has made such a difference in the lives around her and I want her to know how we feel. You don't always tell the people you care about most how much you love them, and this is something she can keep forever. I must admit, however, that neither Dan nor I have written our letters yet. It's so hard to put everything I feel into words.  I'll get it done.

Well I'm off to spend the night with my family. Happy March 22! My favorite day of the year! :)

Just one of those days

I'm just laying in bed thinking to myself "Self, you need to get up and moving around!" i have to drive to Monroe to go get a large bookcase I bought for Bella's room. It's supposed to be part of her birthday present but I don't want to wait. I have been rearranging her room like a crazy person lately and with this final piece of the puzzle I think I can finally stop. Bella's changing pad has now been moved to the floor because getting changed is now her most hated thing to do so she flails around and throws herself backwards and really makes me worry about falling off the changing table. She's being a real stinker lately. She's now found out how to throw a pretty wicked tantrum and does so multiple times a day. I've about had it with those tantrums! Yesterday she threw one right after her bath and she wouldn't let me put clothes on her, so I stuck her in her crib and let her scream it out. She calmed down after about a half hour and when I went back in her room she was in the strangest position (in only a diaper) sleeping. I took a picture but I don't know how to get that on here from my phone.
Other than the tantrums, Bella is just Bella. She likes to play this blinking game with you where she blinks a very exaggerated blink and waits for you to do it back. When you do she will blink again. This game can last a good 30 minutes if you let it. She also has learned how to say Hi and she says it all the time. She knows it's cute so she says it when she's doing something wrong. Smart... real smart. :)

Optimism - word of the day

I have been a little stressed out lately because of all the problems Wisconsinites are facing because of the new Governor. Pardon me, but I think he's a real douche. I will not get into politics here, but I do want to say he is making our state-working lives hell. I do not want to argue with people about whether they are pro-Walker or anti-Walker, Republican or Democrat, or whether they prefer brown rice or white rice. I have my opinions, you have yours. I don't go around throwing my opinions on your facebook walls or texting you with my madness - so don't do it to me. I understand that not everyone thinks Scott Walker is a heartless sonofabitch like I do, and I'm ok with that. But, please do not come to me looking for a debate; I will just stop talking to you. Maybe for a really long time.

This is going to be a real tough road for us, but hopefully it will make our family stronger. We are going to have to start being extremely tight with our money and will no longer be able to do "fun things" like going to movies, going out to eat, or having a little retail therapy once in a while. Although that really sucks... REALLY SUCKS... it will force us to spend more time together as a family and do things that don't cost any money. I can't wait for spring and summer... Dan just found a cute little park near our house that we can ride our bikes to. This coming fall we will be participating in "The Tour de Cheese" which is an annual bike ride, and yes, Bella will be coming along for the ride. Last year, Dan's dad bought Bella a trailer of sorts to hook on to the back of an adult bike. We used it a couple times last year, but she'll really be able to enjoy it this year because she can sit up. The only thing we'll have to buy for that is a helmet for her. :)

On another note...

Bella will be turning 1 in 21 days. I can't believe this year has gone by so fast! I'm full of so many emotions. I'm happy, excited, a little sad that my baby is growing up so fast, and nervous.That little girl needs to just SLOW IT DOWN for a second. I need to catch my breath! She is going to be having 2 (1/2) birthday parties - both of which will be Winnie the Pooh themed of course. The half party is her celebrating with her best friend Patrick - they were born 3 days apart. I'll post pictures of the parties at the end of March. We also have both of our dogs birthdays to celebrate. Zoey turns 2 on the 6th and Kya turns 2 on the 20. They will be getting their own doggy birthday cake. March is all about birthdays at our house!

I spent the weekend rearranging our office to accommodate a twin sized bed. I am very proud of myself. I packed up a bunch of books that I'm planning on selling at a garage sale this summer and now the office looks like a dorm room. :) We still have our computer in it and one bookcase with "office materials" and the bed. I have to do some touch-ups with some paint, but otherwise we're set. Now when someone spends the night, they don't have to sleep on our couch. My goal for this week and next week is to go through boxes in the basement and decide what I can get rid of and how I can neatly store the rest. I like having things organized, so this is going to be fun for me. As odd as that sounds.

Well I hope everyone's March is fantastic, talk to you again at the end... hopefully I'll bring an early spring with me. :)

VCUG Day

Well Bella went in for her VCUG yesterday. We have a history of kidney problems in our family and when Bella had a UTI in January, our pediatrician thought it would be best to make sure she didn't have any issues like her aunts had. When she was about 4 months old, we took her in to see a Gastroenterologist because of her spit up problem. He recommended that we get a renal ultrasound and something else done that I don't remember the name of. Anyway, when she got her renal ultrasound done, her kidneys looked fine - all in tact and no abnormalities. Because she had that done already, she didn't have to do it again... which was good. So, we took our little princess into the xray room yesterday and she had to get catheter #3 inserted. That will never get any easier to watch. :( Her nurse was shaky and tried to jab a bigger catheter in than was necessary just making everything worse, and then finally gave up and put a smaller one in. That made me pretty annoyed. I felt so bad for my little girl, and I wanted to just do it myself. The catheter injected a dye that filled up her bladder and the xrays showed that she does in fact have kidney reflux. The dye was refluxing back up into her kidneys on both sides. The good news is that it is Grade 1 reflux, so it will most likely fix itself. The bad news is she has to be on an oral antibiotic for at least a year for it. The antibiotic is not going to prevent anything from happening (another UTI) or fix the reflux, it just sterilizes her urine in case she does get another UTI so that it won't cause an infection in her kidneys and cause scarring. That's just scary to think about. Hopefully by the time she turns 2, and we have to go in for another VCUG, the reflux will be gone. Fingers crossed.

On another note... the Packers won the Super Bowl. Woopee! We have had Super Bowl highlights on our TV and radio for the past two days now... and I was informed that they will still be on there at least until the week is over. I am so sick of hearing about the Packer's win and how great Aaron Rodgers is and how everyone "knew he could do it" and always had complete faith in him... blah blah blah. Why didn't anyone get as excited about Glee as they did the Super Bowl?! I couldn't wait! And I must say, I thoroughly enjoyed the post Super Bowl episode. As much as I don't want to admit it, I love Quinn, Santana, and Brittany - they make the show for me (oh, and gotta love me some Puck!!!). I really could care less about Rachel and the rest of the original cast... and I cannot stand Mr. Schuester! It will be a sad, sad day when in 2012, this cast graduates. I have a terrible feeling that Rachel will find her way back to teach an acting/singing club. I am hoping that Puck will have to be held back for another year (or 2) because he flunked and wasn't able to graduate. But I think that's just wishful thinking.

I will leave this post with another recipe I found. I made these for Super Bowl party, and I loved them. Well of course I did, they have one of my favorite things in them... OREOS!!!

Oreo Truffles

1 package Oreos (regular - not double stuf)
1 package (8oz) cream cheese
1 package vanilla almond bark

Crush 2 1/2 rows of the Oreos in a food processor (I don't have a food processor, so I used a gallon sized ziploc bag and a hammer). Make sure there aren't any big chunks of Oreos, you want a fairly even texture. Then mix the crushed Oreos with the cream cheese until completely combined - you don't want to take a big bite of just cream cheese. Melt the almond bark in a microwave-safe bowl, first for a minute, then 30 second intervals after that, until smooth. Roll Oreo/cream cheese mixture into 1 inch balls and dip into the melted almond bark. "Fish out" with a fork and let them dry on a piece of wax paper. If you want to add crumbled Oreo garnish on top, do it quickly before they dry. When you have them all dipped and dried, keep in the fridge until ready to eat. I like them fresh out of the fridge, but I know other people like them room temperature. They were super good, and easy to make. In fact, I think I'll go eat one right now! ;) Enjoy!