Target

Why does America love Target so much?  I don't know of any other country that has a store that they love more than Americans love Target.  Why do we, as a culture, keep subjecting ourselves to a store where we consistently buy $50 - $100 more stuff than we need literally every time we walk through the door?

 I am a self-admitted Target addict.  I love Target.  We buy Isabella's disposable diapers from Target so we have to make the trip once every two weeks or so and it never fails that we come out of there with an $80 - $100 bill and nothing really important in our cart except diapers.   

Maybe it is the overly bright fluorescent lights. Maybe it is the stimulating site of the 'clearance' and 'sale' signs and items on every aisle. Who doesn't love those little red clearance tags?  They are designed to make you think that you might need a 4 pack of the same deodorant for $.80 less than it was originally priced.   Maybe it is the fact that you can get anything that you want or need in the same store at the same time. With the invention of the 'Super Target' my life got a lot more expensive.

 We have found a lot of interesting food items that are at Target that they don't have other places.  We consistently buy flavored pancake mix here, different flavors of yogurt, and drinks that they don't seem to regularly carry at other stores.  I don't think that it matters what it is - just that something about Target makes a grand scale amount of consumers go there regularly and spend money like it grows on trees. 

My absolute favorite part of Target is the $1 clearance section in the front of the store.  There are three things that we absolutely love to buy from that section:

1. Kid dishes.  They have these super cute colorful character plates, bowls, cups and sometimes silverware for children.  For some reason you can't put this stuff in the dishwasher but it is really convenient for the kid's meals and easy to portion out their food.  Plus it seems fun for the kids to eat off of these colorful animal plates.  They normally have different ones for each season and/or holiday. 
2. Children's books.  We have purchased some super cute cardboard Sesame Street books that are great for the kids.  They are short, very educational and very colorful.  The kids can relate to them because they are regular characters that they know from Sesame Street like Elmo, Grover, Oscar the Grouch, etc.  They are durable and easy for small babies and kids to manipulate. 
3. Educational materials.  They regularly stock items like flash cards, handwriting books, educational games, etc that you can use with any age group.  They have flash cards for letters, numbers, words for beginning readers, and more challenging cards for older kids. 

There are too many other things to name that we love to buy from Target.  Just shopping there is a like a drug to me and many others that I know.  Their maternity section is impressive.  Their baby area is usually well stocked and neatly organized.  Their stores are easy to navigate in and usually there are an appropriate number of cashiers to people waiting in line. 

All in all maybe those pluses are what we pay for with the extra items that they sucker us into buying.  Like maybe the extra money is a surcharge to get into the Target club and the extra clearance items are just bonuses for shopping there.  Whatever it may be we might complain about the extra money that we spend but we are too consumed with it now to ever stop.

-Sara


  

My 2 year old needs help

So over a year ago, before my daughter was a year old, she learned how to unlock an iPhone.  We thought it was funny and super neat... kind of like a cool party trick.  We took videos of this and encouraged her to do it.  If we would have known then what we know now, we might have thought different about teaching her that. 

She started off just wanting to just look at different things on your phone... pictures, videos, your text messages... nothing really big.  She would call random people (ask Lake Worth 911) and sometimes send crazy text messages but on the whole she just wanted to hold the phone.  Then she started wanting to play games and actually do things with your apps.  We started downloading 'baby apps' on our phones to keep her interested.  My mom downloaded this awesome app on her phone (my favorite apps for toddlers is an upcoming blog post) and she loved watching that app.  This was like a gateway drug - she wanted more and more time with your phone and would throw fits if you took it away and didn't distract her.   

When Corry and I got upgrades on our iPhones last year, we decided that we should give Isabella Corry's old iPhone to be 'Isabella's phone'.  It effectively works as an iPod Touch.  She can do all of the normal functions on her phone that you and I can do but she can't make phone calls or send text messages.  We downloaded a bunch of toddler apps, removed all of the important information (in case she lost it) and put a cover on it to make it harder for her to break it or damage it in water.   

A 2 year old with an iPhone... is this the best idea?  Definitely not.  Do I regret it?  Sometimes... there are some days when it is super helpful to have a way to distract her when we are on long car rides, or when she is acting up.  There are other days when I get tired of hearing "where's my shone (phone)?" 

As much as I regret giving her their own phone, there are a lot of pluses that have come from our decision.  We download mostly educational apps on her phone, so while she is playing she is actually learning.  She has apps that reinforce the ABC's, animals, colors, shapes, etc.  She does have a few apps that will stream cartoon shows from Disney Jr, or PBS but the majority of those teach good lessons for children so I don't feel as bad about them - it's not like Spongebob or anything like that. 

She uses her phone, I think, more than I use my phone.  And probably better than I use my phone.  She can put the phone in Airplane mode, she can change the ring tone and turn the sound up or down in settings.  She can change the background picture of the phone, take pictures and videos, play pictures and videos, lock the phone and shut it down.  She tells you when her phone is dead, that it needs to be charged and she can plug it in (supervised). 

Some people are upset by this because she is too involved with electronics.  Most people are amused by it because she is so little and such a good user of a phone.  I think that it's still cute and funny.  We use it as a learning tool now for her.  It has helped her in more ways than hurt her so we are willing to continue to let her have it.  If you think that it's bad just take a look at the cutest picture ever taken by my sister Jessica at our most recent Creecy Christmas - Isabella and her cousins Raquel (left) and Addison (right) and tell me it isn't the cutest thing you have ever seen. 

 

 

- Sara

Inspiration

How is it that I am so uninspired to write some blog posts?

Writing every day (almost every day) is MUCH more difficult than I ever thought that it would be.  There are only so many interesting things that happen in my life.  About once per week I will have a day like today where I have ZERO idea what I am going to write about.  My husband would argue that it was more like one day a week where I do know what I am going to write about.  I will start about 5 different blogs and just leave them pending because I can't figure out how I am going to fill an entire blog post about how my children love milk. 

When I first started this blog I had a million different ideas.  Actually, I had a list of about 30 different ideas for posts that I could actually write about.  I had dreams of sitting down to write inspired blog posts and the words just flowing freely onto the page.  This has rarely happened for me.  I will admit that it is getting easy with the more posts that I write. 

I still don't have a super clean vision of where I want this blog to go.  I would love for this blog to turn into a place to share ideas, recipes, and interesting pages from the web.  I love the things that I have been able to document so far, the experiences that I have had and I appreciate the feedback, comments and love that has been shown so far from this blog. 

Thank you to everyone who reads so far!  Some interesting posts are coming up!!

-Sara

Backyard Garden: Building Raised Beds

So the day is finally here ... drum roll please...

Raised bed building day!! 

My mother definitely deserves much more credit than she gets for helping me bring to life all my crazy ideas.  Mid-afternoon today we left the brats with my father and sister and took off to Lowe's.  With Ana White's blog post in mind about how to cheaply and quickly make a raised bed, we took off towards the cedar fence pickets. 

We found them just as she mentioned for $1.59 a piece which was nice since we knew that we needed 24 of them for the amount of beds that we were looking for.  Without thinking about the exact dimensions of the beds we spoke about wanting to make four raised beds to handle all of the plants that we wanted to experiment with this year.  We found the 1'' and 2'' screws as well and we were on the way. 

Ripping the fence pickets down to 1x2's was a scary time with a table saw.  Too many stories about people with now missing limbs have made me weary of that tool.  I wish that we would have figured out before ripping them that we were going to greatly differ from the plan. 

Her idea of how to make raised beds is a good idea.  Her subsequent blog post and description leave something to be desired.  And her photo of how to put the boards together is sub par at best.  I am going to show an equally lacking photo but I am not expecting anyone to follow my directions to reconstruct these beds. 

We put almost the entire bed together before we realized that her idea works in theory but in practice it probably was best if built another way.  Corry showed up and saved the day.  We ended up removing the braces that she calls for on the outside of the boards and went a new direction using scrap wood that was originally in 2x4 form and ripped it down to 2x2x11. 

This is the basics of how our beds look right now. 

All sides are two fence pickets stacked on top of one another and screwed in with 2'' screws.  It's certainly not the most pretty looking thing but it will definitely be more than functional.  These are the dimensions on the first one.  The two others will be half as wide at 1x6x17.5 which were the original dimensions from Ana's blog post.  I am experimenting with both and will decide which one I like better. 

I haven't been this excited about a household project in awhile.  I don't know what will succeed and what will fail miserably, but I am definitely psyched to try it out.  We are currently growing onions, two different kinds of tomatoes, jalapenos, oregano and parsley in our kitchen window that were already potted.  The oregano so far is the only thing that is just looking sad.  The tomatoes, onions and parsley have taken off and are growing insanely fast.  We also got a seed starter container today so I can start my seeds that we bought a few weeks ago - I am super excited about that part for some reason.  The only item left is a second blueberry bush since we need the cross pollination from two different types of blueberries. 

We are currently building the beds at mom's house since the table saw is there, but my next post will include pictures of the installation of the beds and later the planting. 

-Sara

Surprise date night tonight

Today my mother and my younger sister decided to take the three munchkins to Ikea in Frisco while the rest of us were at work.  Taking three children under 2.5 out in public for several hours is an undertaking and I don't recommend it to the faint of heart.  There are guaranteed meltdowns, countless diaper changes and not enough goldfish crackers in the universe to keep everyone satisfied. 

Luckily it all went well.  Items that were needed from Ikea were purchased and no one had a thermal meltdown in the store.  Naps were had by a few on the way home.  It turned out to be a decent day and an super decent trip outside of the house with the kids. 

Unfortunately, since Frisco is more than an hour away and they are tearing up and working on every freeway in between the two locations it becomes impossible to get over there and get back in a timely fashion.  Mom decided while stuck in traffic that she would take the kids and the Armada over to her house, Corry and I could go to dinner and then later on this evening when we were done she and dad would bring them back.  I like for my father to see the kids at least once every two weeks without intruding too much since mom gets more than her fair share of them during the week. 

Corry and I always have a 'discussion' about what we are going to eat which sounds a lot like this ecard that I read the other day (on the right)and we finally decided upon Torchy's Tacos and a cupcake from Red Jett Sweets.  We then just came home and chilled out - talking and being together until the kids came home.

I am so tired that I am falling asleep while trying to write this blog - not a good idea.  I am going to go to bed and hopefully will have something more interesting to write about tomorrow. 

- Sara

Going to bed angry is ok

So I love my husband all of the time.  100% of the time.  However, there are snippets of time that I want to punch my husband in the face.  There are probably more times than that where he feels the same way about me.  I know that I am a difficult spouse.  I still love him during those times but I might not like him very much.  I think that happens with any marriage, right?  Hopefully, you're saying yes, or else I seem like a jerk. 

Last night was one of those nights.  I will admit that I tend to get crankier and crankier as the week goes on because of lack of sleep and stress of my job.  I won't get into what specifically happened last night because I don't generally like to talk about my marriage problems publicly and partially because it was a stupid fight that didn't  mean anything.  It isn't an ongoing thing and it wasn't major. 

Common marriage advice from a long time ago was to never go to bed angry.  I don't know the exact justification behind this advice but I tend to follow exactly the opposite.  I would rather just go to bed and chill out and talk about it the next day then fight it out while it is happening.  Perhaps you aren't supposed to go to bed angry because you will forget about what happened or have a tendency to bury your emotions or something like that.  I think that you talk the next day or the next few days about the real issues and don't bring dumb emotions into the picture.  Chances are good that by the time that you talk to your partner about the fight that you are done with the initial anger/hurt/etc and you are able to just talk about the issues.  At least, this is what happens with me and Corry. 

Compared to the "average" couple, Corry and I rarely fight.  We have stupid arguments but in general we never fight.  Usually the next day one or both of us are over it and able to move on.  There are things that we both do that agitate the other one but we are able to talk through some of those issues like adults.  I still think that every so often we should be able to use those Sock 'em Bopper toys on each other to resolve fights.   There could be something said for that kind of physical release. 


If I had to give newlyweds one piece of advice it would be to not try to force other couple's relationship advice work for you.  Some couples remain together by being together all the time like these couples from my job.  They drive back and forth to work together, go to lunch together and work in similar departments.  I need a separation from my spouse in order to maintain that closeness.  I don't know if that makes sense but it makes sense to me.  I need a separate work life from my home life.  It's the same logic for why I think that I could never work from home full time.  What works for other couples doesn't have to work for you.  Make your own love rules. 

-Sara

Backyard Gardening: The Real Plan

So a few weeks ago I wrote a blog about my plans for my backyard garden.  At that time we had plans to order a dozen or so varieties of seeds and plant them in one long garden bed.  After a bit of research a few things have changed. 

Our plan to make one long bed has changed to make three small planters.  My mom found this woman's website that has fairly explicit instructions on how people can make $10 raised beds.  We liked the look of these smaller beds and it seemed easier and not nearly as expensive as we originally thought.  Ideally it should be around the same total size but will just be split up. 

I ordered seeds from http://www.seedsnow.com .  I already had two different varieties of tomatoes, jalapeno, oregano, parsley and a blackberry bush from Lowes.  I loved the idea of seedsnow.com because I could get relatively inexpensive non-GMO seeds.  I bought bush beans, butternut squash, spaghetti squash, zucchini, sweet peppers, ancho grande hot peppers, romaine lettuce, cucumber, cauliflower, basil, spinach, and carrots.  We received the seeds within a week.  They arrived in a padded envelope with the seeds in individual little baggies.  They wrote a note that they didn't have the cucumbers that I ordered so they exchanged them for another variety and gave us a second order of romaine and zucchini and an extra order of tomatoes.  I was pleased with that customer service! 

Our plants are all indoors right now, we are starting seeds this weekend and our garden is being built this weekend as well. 

Next: Building the beds