CrAzY Working Mom

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Achoo!

Spring has spring!!!

This is pollen lined on the sidewalk. That yellow stuff is everywhere. It's a nuisance. It has my family and I battling sore throats, swollen eyes, and snotty noses. I was glad to see rain today to sort of wash things down. We were under the threat of tornadoes last night. Today it's a flooding risk! I guess that pollen will all go somewhere rather than changing the color of my car, porch, and outdoor furniture. Buh-bye, dear pollen...see ya next year!!!

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Going through the big D...

It's been over a week now, I am ready to blog about the life changing event that occurred in our family on Friday, March 9, 2012.

First I should probably give you a little bit of background info. My husband has sleep apnea. He wears a CPAP machine at night when he sleeps due to the fact that he frequently quits breathing for short amounts of time as well as snoring LOUDLY. The "mask" as we call it in our family helps him to sleep, and as an added bonus, I sleep also...most nights. Sometimes he'll spring a leak in the seal between the mask and his face when he rolls around, causing an array of crazy noises that can sound anything like a squealing pig or an exploding geyser! Before he was diagnosed, he was constantly tired and felt like even after a full night's sleep he was still exhausted. Obviously this was due to the fact that his body was not sleeping because when he'd stop breathing, he would wake up, even he didn't remember it.

Once he was diagnosed and got this CPAP machine, he began to be less tired during the day and also got more sleep at night. He was diagnosed with this condition 7 years ago. Up until recently he has had no issues with exhaustion unless there were physical reasons such as being up late, getting up early, or just physical exhaustion from work. Recently, Brien has not only been overly exhausted, but also his vision has been blurry and he's been making frequent trips to the restroom, especially in the middle of the night...which obviously only add to his exhaustion.

It was bad enough that he decided on his own accord that he needed to to the doctor. For those of you reading this that don't know my husband, that's a big deal. I knew when he said that he needed to go to the doctor, it was serious.

Brien's father is a diabetic and he'd borrowed his glucose meter to test his sugar and the first time he tested his numbers were in the high 300s. He tested after eating a late breakfast which consisted of many high carb foods at IHOP. This time the meter just said "HI". This of course means that at this point his sugar was over 600! YOWZA!!! Against advise for him to go to the ER, he decided to just wait for the office visit scheduled for the next day due mostly to the fact that we have no health insurance.

As suspected, Brien was told by his doctor that not only is he type 1 diabetic but his cholesterol is also high, so now in addition to his once a day blood pressure pill, he's added a once a day cholesterol pill as well as a twice a day glucose pill. The doctor gave Brien a few valuable pieces of information as to how to get control of this. He told him to not eat anything white: flour, sugar, potatoes, rice, etc. This will make his life much easier. He also told him to walk three miles a day. With these two things, Brien could quite possibly get rid of the pills and take back control of his health.

At first I was upset with this news. Brien is only 34 years old, but there is a history of diabetes on both sides of his family. I guess, it is inevitable that he eventually has to deal with this health issue. At the age of 34, though I do not want my husband to be having to take 4 pills a day.

The more I have thought about this and prayed about it, I have realized what a blessing this has been for our family. My husband quit smoking two years ago (April 11, 2010). This was the first step toward a healthy lifestyle. I believe that God helped him accomplish this task in preparation for this journey that we are now facing. The day after Brien was diagnosed, he went to a nearby park with a walking trail and put in his first three miles! I can happily say that I did as well. He would have never been able to complete a three mile walk if he was still smoking two packs of cigarettes a day!

Since that day, I have not missed a walk. We've both decided that we want to get healthy and fit. We're changing our eating habits as well. I realized that although we received some very devastating news that day it could have been a lot worse. We are truly a blessed family and each and every day is a gift from God. Our bodies are a temple and we should always treat them as such. This was a wake up call to our family. I pray that our story can in some way do the same for you.

Saturday, March 17, 2012

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Today is St. Patrick's Day.

To celebrate we had a unique breakfast at home.

We had green leprechaun pee to drink.

The kids were a bit skeptical until they realized that it tasted a lot like milk.

Green eggs are a common thing around our house, so they were not surprised to see them this morning.

They did not believe me when I pulled the leprechaun poop business on them with the eggs!

So, do you do anything different or unique on St. Patty's Day? Are you wearing green today? What sort of celebrations do you have planned for your day?

Happy St. Patrick's Day from our family to yours!!

Friday, March 09, 2012

Stunning!

Yesterday brought a day full of rain to most of the state. We have lots of standing water around our place. Fortunately, this posed a great opportunity to snap a few pics of nature this evening. There were 4 beautiful geese honking at a couple of dogs that were getting a bit too close to them across from my house. When I saw them I grabbed my zoom lens and headed out to see if I could get a good shot. Since it was dusk, I couldn't get a very good shot of them.


The Geese liked all of the rain!!

As I traipsed through the water and got the bottom of my pants legs wet as well as a new pair of my favorite Toms, I noticed a stunning sight in the horizon...

Stunning Sky!

Thursday, March 01, 2012

It's Time Again For Rhea Lana's of Searcy

It is getting close to my favorite time of the year. I LOVE spring! Although generally I suffer through the first few weeks when things begin to bloom, I love the thought of renewal of all things! Spring weather is beautiful, minus the tornadoes that often spring up around here during Springtime.

Another one of my favorite parts of Spring is Rhea Lana!! If you don't know about Rhea Lana and you spend ANYTHING on kids clothing, or will in the near future, you are going to want to read this post! Rhea Lana's as we know it today began modestly in 1997 with 11 consignors and 3 racks of clothes in the living room of Mrs. Rhea Lana Riner. She wrote all the tags by hand and even rewashed and ironed many of the clothes! In 2011, they had 47 locations in 16 states. Now being a consignor is so easy. Everything is computerized. As a consignor you choose your prices!!

We've all organized yard sales. They are a quick way to put our belongings out in the yard and let the neighbors pilfer through them and offer dirt cheap prices for name brand clothing that cost us a lot of hard earned money! In the end, we might make a dollar or two, but it is also a lot of work, and then if things don't sell we're left trying to bag it all up and take it to a local charity. If you've found yourself in this situation, then may I suggest Rhea Lana's as an alternative?

Now let me tell you first off, it is a bit of work getting all of your things on hangers and putting string tags on them. There will also be some items that you won't be able to consign. They won't take anything that is out of date, stained, torn, missing zippers, etc. But, those things you can feel okay about selling for a quarter in your yard sale, right? The name brand, like new clothes are consignor worthy. Those are the things that you want to get back a portion of what you paid for it in order to buy new clothes for your kiddos that have outgrown last spring's clothes!!!

Tyler's consignor worthy clothes.

When the seasons change, we have to go through our kiddos' closets and clear out all of the things that they can no longer wear, most of the time they are already going to be on hangers, so in this case all you have to do is add a string tag. Grouping things by size makes things a lot easier. You just go to the Rhea Lana website and get a consignor number and begin entering your items. YOU choose the price you want for the item! The items are guaranteed, so if something is lost, they will make good on the items. Having three kids means that I have a LOT of consignor worthy clothes. Last year, I used the money I made at Rhea Lana's to SPEND at Rhea Lana's restocking the kids' empty closets!!!

A closet full of consignable clothes!!

It is almost time for the sale here in my town, drop off begins on Saturday, and I am still entering items. I have over 200 items to enter between all three of my kiddos!! If you have the opportunity to consign with Rhea Lana's I would strongly encourage you to do so.

Here are a few things to remember if you are consigning or trying to decide if consigning is right for you:

- You make 70% of the price that YOU choose for your item. Keep this in mind when pricing. Also, remember that when you are pricing things, that other moms on a budget will be shopping this sale. My general rule of thumb is to price things for what I would be willing to give for it. Rhea Lana's suggest you set the price at 30% of the retail value. Baby Equipment, Furniture and Large Indoor/Outdoor Toys usually sell for more and are in high demand. There is generally an abundance of 0-6 month sizes, so they must be priced competitively in order to sell. Maternity and Junior clothing are not shopped as heavily, so price these competitively, also.

- You can work at the sale and have your (small) consignor fee waived, and even shop early BEFORE the general public and even other consignors. There are lots of options available for volunteering. You can check those out here for the Searcy sale.

- Moms to be can shop early as well. Click here to find out how.

- Following Rhea Lana's on Facebook can be beneficial to you. They often have giveaways where you can win early shopping passes or gift certificates. For my local readers, the SEARCY RHEA LANA'S FB page is here.

- You can choose to donate your clothes to charity at the end of the sale to save you from having to bring home your unsold items (but if you're like me, you won't have too many unsold items!!). All that is left is getting your check!!

There is still time to gather and enter items for the Searcy, Arkansas sale!! If you have any questions, feel free to message, comment, e-mail, text, or call me. If I can't answer them, I can get you to someone who can!! Now, I've gotta get busy entering the rest of my items!

The sale information for Searcy which will be located at the White County Fairgrounds (802 Davis Dr- Searcy, AR):
Drop Off Days:
Saturday, March 3rd 10:00 AM to 8:00 PM
Sunday, March 4th 11:00 AM to 2:30 PM
Last Day to Enter Items Online Saturday, March 3rd {11:59 PM}
Early Worker's Pre-Sale PASS REQUIRED! Monday, March 5th 3:00 PM to 10:00
PM Worker's Pre-Sale PASS REQUIRED! Monday, March 5th 4:00 PM to 10:00 PM
Consignor's Pre-Sale PASS REQUIRED! Monday, March 5th 5:00 PM to 10:00 PM
Moms-to-Be Pre-Sale PASS REQUIRED! Monday, March 5th 6:30 PM to 10:00 PM
Guest Pre-Sale PASS REQUIRED! Monday, March 5th 7:30 PM to 10:00 PM

SALE DAYS:
Tuesday: March 6th 10:00 AM to 7:00 PM
Wednesday: March 7th 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM
Thursday: March 8th 10:00 AM to 3:00

PM WORKER'S HALF PRICE SALE PASS REQUIRED! Thursday, March 8th 5:30 PM to 10:00 PM CONSIGNOR HALF PRICE SALE PASS REQUIRED! Thursday, March 8th 6:30 PM to 10:00 PM GUEST HALF PRICE SALE MOMS-TO-BE MAY ALSO ATTEND PASS REQUIRED! Thursday, March 8th 7:30 PM to 10:00
PM HALF PRICE SALE: Friday, March 9th 10:00 AM to 7:00 PM Saturday, March 10th 10:00 AM to 3:00 PM
Pick-up Day: Sunday, March 11th 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM

Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Valentine's Day Crafts

I promised photos of the Valentine's Day crafts we did at the house of craziness...but as usual, things were so crazy I have yet to post them! I guess it's better late than never, though so here goes!

Shelby's box is a couple of posts down, but just in case you missed it I will post it here so they will all be in one spot for those of you who are exploring from other websites.

Zebra Print Valentine's Day Box with Pink Feather Boa Trim.

We got the idea of a "monster box" from Pintrest for Tyler (who is in Kindergarten). The blogger in this tutorial used yarn to cover the box. I knew that it would take me years to complete the task using yarn, so I opted for a much easier alternative, and since I had already covered Shelby's in fabric, I was a pro by this time! ;) We used some black faux fur fabric from our local fabric store to cover a shoe box with a removable lid. Keep in mind that you have to make these boxes where the children can retrieve their Valentine's Day cards after the party. There were many children in both classes who had to tear, rip, or otherwise disassemble their box in order to get to the goods! The great thing about both boxes is that they will be reusable! Shelby is actually housing hers in her room to hold her lip gloss, jewelry, and miscellaneous items.

Tyler's Monster Box was a HIT! He loved it and so did his classmates.

Since Little Emily is in daycare, she didn't make a box at home. They made bags at school to carry home their Valentine's Day treats. We made home made Valentines this year instead of opting for the pre-boxed kind we normally do. The kids were allowed to browse the options from Pintrest that I knew were doable for our family (mainly me!!!) and this is what they chose:

Shelby chose a Pop Rock Valentine Treat.

Tyler chose superhero suckers.

Emily opted for Pixy Stix

Teacher Gift

The photos were taken via my cell phone. I had every intention of taking blog worthy photos of each item, but I was just lucky that I got them all completed on time. What in the world was I thinking trying to tackle all of this!?! All three of the kiddos took their teachers the chocolate roses in the bottom photo. They were surrounded by Dove chocolate hearts and Hershey's Kisses and Hugs in a Valentine themed cup wrapped in one of those pink party gift bags tied with some of the ribbon used for Tyler's super hero capes for his suckers. We made heart shaped gift tags on them so we'd know which teacher they belonged to. It was a cute, inexpensive gift that we enjoyed making for each teacher.

Friday, February 10, 2012

Social Media Explained

Heh...love this!!!

*photo source

Find me on these Social Networking Sites:
Twitter: http://twitter.com/crazyworkingmom
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/CrAzY-Working-Mom/116728100618
You Tube: http://www.youtube.com/crazyworkingmom
Pintrest: http://pinterest.com/crazyworkingmom

Monday, February 06, 2012

Valentine's Day Craft

This week leading up to Valentine's Day I am going to show you how crafty my family has decided to be this week with our Valentine's Day projects for school! Today we are going to start with Shelby's Valentine's Day box. She is super excited about this one as it can be used in the future for jewelry, etc.

My 3rd grader had to create a collection box for her Valentines from her classmates. She was very excited to come up with a "design" she liked. We had a hard time finding a box that was appropriate for such a task! We have a lot of shoe boxes that don't have removable lids. I dug in the bottom of my closet and finally found one. While a bit large, it will serve it's purpose, and as mentioned above can be used after the party for whatever she chooses in her bedroom.

We started with a plain old shoe box...

Ready to bling this box out!!

After careful consideration, Shelby narrowed down her design to either owls, peace signs, or zebra print. We decided to visit the local fabric store in town and see what sort of fabrics they had that we could possibly cover the box with. This was in lieu of spray painting the box as we've done in the past.

She found some awesome fur like zebra print material that she fell in love with. So, we got enough to cover the box and lid separately so that she can remove the top to retrieve those Valentines from her classmates. She also found a pink feather boa to make it even more awesome!!

After covering the box with the fabric and trimming it with the pink feather boa, this is what we had. I also added her name since her classmates will need to be able to see that easily so they know who the box belongs to.

We had also bought some "bling" for the box when we were at the fabric store. I allowed Shelby to decide the placement of the rest of the decoration. The final product looked as follows:

Shelby is very proud of her design. It fits her personality to perfection.

View of the back.

View of the front.

*Note, clicking on the photos will make them larger.

Check back tomorrow where I will show you Shelby's home made Valentines. We decided to forgo the store bought boxed cards this year and make our own! We found some cute ideas on pintrest. The kids are super excited!!!

Thursday, February 02, 2012

Are you a co-sleeping house?

Here's another funny demonstration for all of you co-sleeping families out there.

Click photo to enlarge.

"Snow Angels" and "H is for Hell" are the two most popular when little Emily makes her way to our bed in the night. Although "Jazz Hands" is common, most of the time she'll sling her arm over your face giving you a good slap most of the time! All three of our kids start out in their own beds during the night, but every so often one (or more) of them will end up in our bed and I must say that more often than not, when they do I am just like the illustration in the photo, "The Dog House". The couch is usually the most comfortable place to be when the bed gets overcrowded!

Thanks to Andy from How to Be A Dad for allowing me to post this here at CrAzY Working Mom! Go check out his blog for a dose of "dadology", although he doesn't claim to be an expert, the posts I read are spot on from this Mommy's perspective!

Image Credit