Saturday, August 19, 2017
Here Potty training with no downstairs toilet
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Thursday, July 13, 2017
baby boy essentials with Carters
- this post is sponsored by Carter’s; however, all thoughts and opinions expressed are my own.
my absolute favorite go-to when dressing my girls in their first year (and beyond) has been Carter's. when Parker and Jolie were born, there wasn't a whole lot that fit them outside of Carter's brand- they were so teeny tiny at just 4 pounds and 5 pounds! they wore their babysoft sets, sleep and plays, and the original bodysuit well through their first year of life, and Baker followed suit with the sweetest hand-me-downs fitting her like a glove.during a baby's first year, its all about the baby essentials, fit for any occasion, and Carter's always has what I'm looking for. I appreciate the one-stop-shop, and no one does the coordinating outfits better than Carter's.. even with the newest addition being a baby boy!
when we found out we were pregnant with Brady I was clueless on how I wanted to dress him. there were so many options and styles.. and ya'll, I was really good at dressing three girls. what was I going to do with a boy?? building a collection of baby boy clothes was totally new for me! but I knew, without a doubt, that my first go-to would be Carter's.
it has been SO FUN. so, so fun!


Carter's has been along for the ride since the very beginning.

I think, as mom's, we all go through seasons of change. walking into this stage of motherhood, welcoming a fourth baby, is absolutely the most crazy its ever felt for me as a mom. I feel like I'm in survival mode and going through the motions to get through the day. it is true that our life is more like controlled chaos and less like the rainbows and unicorns it might seem to be, but I am counting every single day as part of something that I wouldn't change for the world, will never forget, and I never ever want to take these moments for granted. these babies are the lead characters in 4 years worth of the most colorful memories one can imagine and I couldn't be more thankful for the woman I have evolved to since becoming a mother. these days I find myself seeking grace, patience, and joy in all these little moments that I would have never noticed before having kids.




in the meantime I'll be over here sobbing in my third cup of coffee because Brady has grown out of his newborn size clothes and is fittingly way too well in size 3 months. babies don't keep!
thats the truth!
photos by b faith photography
Monday, July 3, 2017
Something Blue with a Twist Bridal Shower
As soon as she got engaged & her chose her wedding colors, I started planning this shower in my head. I hosted the shower at my house & I was in charge of the invites, the cupcakes, all the "details" and the decorations. You know how I love those little details! My older sister, Mom & Aunt made the food. It was a total group effort!
Our bridesmaids dresses are Aqua "Tiffany" Blue & she is going to have pops of orange, lime green, red & yellow for our flowers. Because of that, I knew I wanted to incorporate that into her Bridal Shower. I am loving the color combo of aqua & orange right now, so I decided that the "theme" for the shower would be:
Something Blue {with a Twist}
The twist was the splashes of orange that I added for the shower.
Here are the shower details!Invites that I made:
{Available in my Etsy shop}Decorations:
Pom Poms!
I love Pom Poms!
On the tables I had flowers along with blue & orange candy:
Nothing says Spring like Tulips! And, on Saturday it was 77 degrees! In February!
At one of the tables, I had dipped pretzels also:
The plates had the favor cookies on them:
I got 2 types of cookies at a local bakery, wedding dresses & wedding cakes:
I made the favor tags with their initials & wedding date:
I also had a bouquet of flowers that will be similar to what our bridesmaids bouquets will look like. The coloras are going to look so pretty with our aqua dresses!
My sisters & I:
And, one with my mom & her girls!
The Menu:Beverages - We offered mimosas, white white, sparkling water & sparkling lemonade.
The future Mrs. Baker:
{with her eliot necklace}Veggies & Hummus:
Banana Bread & Zucchini Bread:
We had 3 types of Quiche:Spinach & Bacon
Ham & Cheese:
Veggie:
Fruit Salad:
Mixed Greens with mandarin oranges, pecans & avocado:
Funny side note, my mother in law brought a sponge to the shower & gave it to my older sister so that they could use it when cleaning the shower dishes.In case you missed it, I am a sponge-a-phobe.
The tables:
We got to meet my cousin's new baby, Brodie for the first time!
We had about 25 women attend.
The Activities:When I got married 8.5 years ago, one of our family friends did this for one of my Wedding Showers & it was so great to have a collection of great recipes. That is where I got my Taco Soup recipe!
She got some really yummy recipes! I am going to borrow some :)The game we played was called 20 Questions.
We came up with 20 Questions about Rebecca & Jason's relationship and future.
We asked Jason the questions the day before the shower.
Then at the shower, we asked each guest to write down how many questions they think Rebecca & Jason will answer the same.
Rebecca was getting a little stressed after she missed a few questions. She needed more wine :)
She answered 14 out of 20 questions the same way Jason answered.Next, it was time for dessert while Rebecca opened presents!
Dessert was 2 types of cupcakes. I made Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough & Funfetti (Rebecca's favorite)

My family room looked like a Crate & Barrel show room after she finished opening all her presents!
The Bride to Be with her ribbon bouquet:
We had so much fun celebrating Rebecca this weekend!Next up is the Bachelorette party in March & then the wedding in April!
And, today just so happens to be Rebecca's 27th Birthday!
Happy Birthday to the Future Mrs. Baker!
Thursday, June 29, 2017
Helping those with Beautiful Minds
Anger. Fury. Frustration.
Just a few words to describe my viewpoint towards the nature of care that the mentally ill receive in this country. While in some ways America has made progress in the civil rights and treatment of our mentally ill (we are no longer locking them up in scary, sub-standard facilities with a minimum of three signatures to be subjected to heavy medication and electro-shock therapy), however I feel that we have now allowed the pendulum to swing too far the other way. In my opinion, the mentally ill are now quite literally suffering and dying from their own freedoms and with it, so suffer the people and families around them.
While the movie "A Beautiful Mind," starring Russel Crowe, which tells the true story of an academic suffering from schizophrenia, ended in a more or less happy ending with the character coming to terms with his affliction and living a productive life, not all individuals suffering from mental illness in America will be so lucky.
This blog is supposed to be about issues affecting families and in my opinion this is a major one. Not to mention it is highly personal at this exact moment considering the drama that is currently unfolding on the street that I live on. At the end of my street a very nice gentleman about my same age is living alone with only his pets for company. This same man, when we moved in, was very kind and always stopped when walking his dogs past our house and chatted whenever we were in the front yard. I knew him to be a bit quirky, but never anything but rational and considerate. Then about a year and a half to two years ago he lost his job. People stopped coming to the house not long after that. I still saw him walk his dogs and we talked about him looking for work. Then, within the last six months I started seeing him less and less until one day I realized I hadn't seen him out in quite a while. That is about the time the reports from neighbors started coming in. Strange sightings of him in his front yard arguing with no one. Knocks on peoples doors asking them who he was and why the government was trying to trick him about his identity with false and illegal birth certificates.
Then the police started coming.
The police have been to our street many, many, many times. Sometimes they come in unmarked cars with one or two officers. Sometimes they come with four or five marked SUVs. One particularly alarming day I arrived home to find our street blocked off, no one could come in or out. There were police, fire trucks, ambulances, and animal control vehicles. The result, they knocked on his door, checked that he seemed lucid and left. Another fun weekend night I looked out my living room window to see police in my front yard using bushes and cars on our street as cover and aiming rifles at the house in question. My friend called just then to ask if we were still having dinner since she was stuck at the end of our street unable to get through. Again, nothing happened. They were "just checking on him and there is nothing to worry about." Umm...if there is nothing to worry about, then why do you have multiple rifles trained on the house?
In all fairness, I think they are most likely correct. I had a visit one night shortly after dark. I heard a knock at my door and it was my neighbor. I greeted him and asked if he was ok. He was standing there with a bucket and he asked if he could borrow some water from our front faucet, his had been shut off. He was so polite and lucid I thought maybe he was back on his meds (he told another neighbor he was off of them because he could no longer afford them since he lost his insurance). No such luck though. I told him to please help himself whenever he needed it and that he didn't need to ask each time. He seemed fine right up until I said I was sorry his water was shut off and he started raving about government conspiracies, mind control devices, illegal birth certificates and how his family was behind it all. At no time did I ever get the sense that I was in any danger, but it made me profoundly sad. Then he came by a week or so later and he seemed much more agitated, and much more delusional. He was seemingly unaware of me after a moment and instead was heatedly arguing with the moon. I found it to be unsettling and made me feel a little more uneasy.
WHY, when he so clearly needs assistance are the police doing nothing? I thought, if they are here every other day checking on him, why can't they do something to help?
Being the person that I am, I immediately took to the Internet and began a full-scale search of mental health laws and services in this country, hoping I could find some way to help my neighbor who has never been anything but nice to us. What I found was highly alarming. There have been recent stories in the news, horrifying stories about similar issues with individuals suffering from mental illness. These stories have one thing in common, which is that the family was trying to get the individuals help, but were hand-cuffed by civil rights laws protecting the freedoms of the individual. I found an article here, that discusses neighbors unable to get help for a woman down the street who was holding the entire neighborhood hostage. I found examples just recently in my home state where we have had a 24 year old man who is suspected of killing his mother who tried to get help for him and feared for her life, or the largest mass shooting in American history this year when James Eagan Holmes opened fire in the premiere of the new Batman movie and who apparently had seen a psychiatrist on the CU campus where he attended school who specialized in schizophrenia. There are many more across the United States.
In researching what I might be able to do, I stumbled on to a wonderful article on the history of mental illness treatment in America, "Law Creates Barriers to Getting Care For Mentally Ill", which referenced a database, started in Virginia, called the "Preventable Tragedies Database." (you can search it's contents here) It is compiled by Dr. E. Fuller Torrey. The purpose of this collection is to record and track all tragic events that might have been avoided if only the laws existed to allow for state intervention for mentally ill individuals who are refusing treatment. The importance of this lies in the fact that until an individual shows the potential for imminent harm, or has committed a crime, they cannot be the subject of any state intervention with out their expressed consent and compliance. The downside of this law is that with many mentally ill individuals, there appears to be no identifiable escalation but merely a moment when they finally snap in some fashion.
So, in a horrifying Catch-22, my neighbor who lost his job in a crappy economy and was quirky enough not to immediately get re-hired, is now off of his meds and most likely unable to secure employment at this point. He can not get the assistance he needs because he is refusing to comply and is over 18. As a result of his job loss he has no money to get help, even if he wanted to, and is so far gone that it is doubtful he even understands he needs help. The authorities can do nothing because as long as he seems lucid enough, and has not done harm or is in imminent danger of doing harm, they cannot intervene if he is refusing treatment. Now he is living in a house where he has no water, and possibly no heat or electricity (although I thought I saw his lights on yesterday) with winter coming. It doesn't take a brain scientist to see how this story is going to end. It is going to end one of a few ways. He is finally going to commit harm to others resulting in his getting help through the criminal system, or help will be rendered unnecessary because he commits harm to himself. The other possibility is that he is going end up homeless with nowhere to go and will only be taken in by the state if he commits grievous harm (see previous statement). Either way I think it is deplorable that this story doesn't seem like it has any chance of a happy ending. He is a kind-hearted soul who is devoted to his furry (and scaly) friends and deserves a chance to get back on his feet.
In my opinion, which is hardly an island, America desperately needs to revise the laws to provide law enforcement a greater latitude to intervene when it becomes clear that the individual needs to be forced to continue treatment. In my opinion we need some sort of stepping stone system. It needs to be something that allows someone to maintain their freedoms as much as possible while still allowing the state more latitude in intervention in order to protect its citizens. It should be allowed, if enough community members or family members file complaints or concerns, that the court could issue a mandate of evaluation. It could be sort of a, "Hey your neighbors think you might be mentally unstable, please report to a shrink immediately and let's find out." The psychiatrist could evaluate the patient and decide if treatment is warranted. If it is found to be unjustified, or the neighbors are found to be making baseless accusations, there could be consequences for malicious reporting. But, if the individual is found needing medication, such as in the case of clear-cut hallucinations and they refuse to comply with treatment after three warnings, or if they never report to the initial visit, it could be mandated that they be taken in for a 72 hour treatment and evaluation. If the individual refuses at that point to follow a treatment program, they could then be taken into state custody unless a family member steps up to take responsibility for maintaining their required treatment. We mandate treatment for drug addicts and alcoholics who drive under the influence whether or not they commit harm to someone else. Couldn't we extend the same courtesy to mentally ill patients who desperately need help if they are disturbing the peace or threatening neighbors?
I am praying that I will have a blog post coming sometime in the future where we can celebrate the recovery and assistance that peacefully resolves the situation, but I am far from optimistic. His neighbors are helping as best we can when he will let us (one even offered to pay his water bill if he paid to have it turned back on), but we are a poor offering compared to what he needs; medication, psychiatric care and a social worker/family member who can check up on him.
Update:
You can read the outcome in my post "Failed to Death"
Wednesday, June 28, 2017
PODCAST Large Families Living in Small Houses with Tom Keri Lamar of A Happy Home Media

LARGE Families
Blessings on your efforts to fit beautifully where the Lord has you,

Some of my related posts you might also enjoy:
Our Home: A Virtual Tour Of Our Favorite Place To Be
De-Cluttering: First Steps to Organization
Organizing a Home: Principles & Tips for Organization, Part 1 of 2
Siblings Sharing Bedrooms: "You have *how* many per room?!"
Friday, June 23, 2017
Fall Harvest Salad with Bacon Apples Glazed Pecans
We hosted the Salad portion at our house.
I served 3 salads and wanted one of them to have flavors of Fall.
I decided to make a Fall Harvest Salad and I threw together a bunch of ingredients & hoped that it would taste good....and it did! It is one of my new favorite salads, so I thought I would share it here!

-Romaine Lettuce
- Apples ( I use Honey Crisp)
- 8 slices of bacon ( I use Hormel Thick Cut)
Cook your bacon & chop it up
I cook my bacon in the oven at 450 degrees for about 15-18 minutes
- Blue Cheese (optional, if you don't like blue cheese omit it or use another type of cheese)
- Dried Cranberries
- Glazed Pecans (Recipe below)

Put ingredients in a microwave safe bowl:
They are perfect to put in salads, like this one!
Back to the salad....
Once your bacon is cooled & chopped up, it's time to put the salad together.
Layer the lettuce, then the apples, blue cheese, cranberries & glazed pecans.
I toss this salad with a balsamic vinaigrette!
Yum.
I had everything prepped in the afternoon, so when the guests arrived at our house for the salad portion of the progressive dinner, I just tossed it with Balsamic Vinaigrette.
The other 2 salads I served at the Progressive Dinner were a Greek Salad & my Beet Salad:


Hope you enjoy my Fall Harvest Blue Cheese, Bacon & Apple Salad as much as we do!
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Hope you have a great weekend!
This is one of our first weekends with NO plans!!!
Soccer season is officially over, so no more soccer Saturdays until next August.
So excited to have a mellow weekend getting things done around the house & watching football!