Cute Website
Wednesday, March 10th, 2010I came across this cute website that is perfect for moms. I will share it here but only if you promise to keep visiting my website as well. 
It’s called Confessions of a Mean Mommy.
Archive for the ‘Favorite Things’ Category
Mommy Websites
Monday, March 1st, 2010Confessions of a Mean Mommy is my new daily read!
Pregnancy and Infants
Wednesday, September 30th, 2009I really will be more brief on this one…promise.
Pregnancy
My Pregnancy Week by Week was recommended to be when I was pregnant with Max. It tells you how your baby is growing and what is changing in your body each week. There are other books with similar titles but this one is by Glade B. Curtis.
I think this is the website I used once until cravings and nausea got the best of me. It gives tips on healthy eating and exercise while pregnant. Like I said, if you are feeling up for keeping your weight gain where it should be and exercising then this is a great place to start.
Infants
Your Babies First Year Week by Week is also written by Glade B. Curtis and tells you weekly how your baby should be developing and gives you games you can play with them. I really enjoy the way these books are set up because you can just read one week at a time and don’t have to search the index to find what you are worried about…in most cases if you just look at the applicable week you will find what you are looking for.
Secrets of a Baby Whisperer has been recommended to me but I have to say I haven’t read it. My cousins swear by it and one of them even refers to it as her “Baby Bible”.
Mayo Clinic Complete Book of Pregnancy & Baby’s First Year My MIL works for State Farm Insurance and they just mail these books out to people when they have babies. I’m not sure if every agent does it or just ours. I liked this book but I loaned it to a friend after her son was born and she LOVED it!
Parenting
Wednesday, September 30th, 2009Books
I hear a lot of people say that they don’t need a book to tell them how to be a parent but I COMPLETELY disagree. Why wouldn’t you want to benefit from an experts knowledge?
Love and Logic is the philosophy my mom used with me and my brothers. I try to use this in raising my kids but sometimes I fall short. My favorite thing is the “Uh-Oh” song. Basically rather than yelling out your kids you sing, “Uh-Oh, that’s so sad now you (name your punishment here). It keeps you from yelling. After a while all you have to do is sing “Uh-Oh” and they will stop their misbehavior even before they start. What could be more logical than Love and Logic.
1-2-3 Magic I’ve never read this book but my friend found it helpful with her son.
So you Want to Raise a Boy is no longer in print (as far as I know) but you could probably get it from the library. If you have a boy I recommend it. You know how you have those days when you feel like there is something wrong with you child? Well this book will help. The chapters are put together by age from 0-18 (maybe 21). Each chapter tells you what MOST boys are doing at that age. So if you have a seven year old who seems to be intentionally irritating you then you will find comfort in knowing that that is just what 7 year olds do. I just wish a So You Want to Raise a Girl book existed.
Websites
The Love and Logic link (given above) was recommended by our reader (and my cousin who is the mother of 7!) Cathy. Apparently they will send you a monthly email with parenting tips…as I write I am opening up a new search window and signing up for that!
Honestly I haven’t looked much into parenting websites however I did come across this article on the top parenting websites, some of them seemed interesting. I think if you take the time to look through it you will be able to find ANYTHING you are looking for.
Couponing
Wednesday, September 30th, 2009I’m getting a little long winded on these favorite things aren’t I?
I got started couponing when my friend told me about My Food Storage Deals which I guess is now Deals to Meals. With the help of this website I was able to build up some food storage. She also gives you ideas for meals the coincide with that weeks sales…actually this website does not include coupons (at least it didn’t before) it just gives you the best deals. Also there is a monthly fee but this did work wonders to get me started on the path to saving money.
Then I moved on to my cousins FREE website Fabulessly Frugal. This helped me get an even better understanding of couponing so I was ready to use the FREE Pinching Your Pennies website. It took me a while to figure it out though. Once you are there go the State Forums and select the state you live in and then the stores that you frequently shop at. Couponing can be VERY time consuming but fortunately there are websites, like the ones I mentioned above, that do just about everything but go to the store for you.
House Cleaning
Wednesday, September 30th, 2009Fly Babies UNITE! Up until after my daughter was born my husband would go to work, come home, cook dinner, and clean the house. I’m not really sure why, I wasn’t depressed or anything, I think maybe I just was so tired from waking up with a sleepless child (click here to read more about that) that I had no desire to do anything. In my aunts desperate attempt to help my mom change her ways and have a clean house she gave my mom the Fly Lady book. Honestly, it didn’t help her much but it did help me. One day in my aunts desperate attempt to help my mom change her ways and have a clean house she gave my mom the Fly Lady book. Honestly, it didn’t help her much but it did help me. I did however prefer the website. You can sign up for daily emails that tell you what to do. The main idea is that you can do ANYTHING in 15 minutes. My house is WAY more organized than it used to be and all my husband has to worry about is taking out the trash and doing the dishes when I ask for a little help. When you have kids your house will get messy so why spend hours a day keeping it clean? A couple 15 minute cleaning sessions will work wonders!
Dishpans are the key to getting your kids to help clean (at least for me).
Are you tired of tripping over toys all day? This is what I did to resolve that problem in our home. Each of my kids have a dishpan (we call it a “bin”) that they attempted to decorate (I need better craft materials). At the end of the day or moments before we have visitors coming the kids (or I, depending on if they are home etc.) grab their bins and walk around the house filling them up with ANYTHING they have left laying around the house. Then they put them next to my hope chest…it is out of the way so no one can see them unless they look for them. At the end of each day they clean their room and put away everything in their bin.
After dinner clean up
I recently got sick of cleaning up after dinner while my husband and the kids either play together or read books so I put my foot down. Now everyday after dinner everyone has a job to do.
Me: Dishes
Steven: Sweep the floor
Max: Wipe off the table
Elese: Clean the chairs
I am much happier and the kids LOVE having their very own job to do.
Chores
Elese (2 yo) doesn’t really have chores yet, just her bin and cleaning her room. Max (5 yo) cleans his room, does the bin, makes his bed, and puts away the silverware when the dishwasher needs to be emptied.
Sleep Habits
Wednesday, September 30th, 2009I have only one recommendation for this because it has worked wonders for our family! If you have any additional suggestions please pass them along!
The book Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Baby saved me from imprisonment and my son from major injury.
Somehow many of us have idea that having a baby should not effect our social life. You know how they say sleep when the baby does? Well we thought he should just sleep when we do…By the time Max was 2 I was done with his finicky sleep habits. He would wake up several times a night and I would only put him down for naps after he collapsed from exhaustion. Once he was in a toddler bed he thought he could just pick and choose when to sleep because he had no routine. When I got pregnant with Elese I was hormonal, tired and on partial bed rest (only for about 2 weeks right in the middle of my pregnancy) and he REFUSED to take a nap! In comes Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Baby (recommended by a friend who didn’t have children at the time but worked at a day care). I went from having a crabby & bratty boy that would sleep from midnight to 7am and MAYBE get a nap 3-4 times a week to a sweet little prince who would sleep from 7pm-7am and have a 2-3 hour nap around noon EVERYday. Oh, and if for some reason he didn’t get a nap that day he would go to sleep at 6pm and still sleep until 7am!!! The benefits of good sleep are countless so if you are struggling with sleep deprived children I not only recommend but I DEMAND you read this book for the sanity of you and the safety of your child!
Finances
Wednesday, September 30th, 2009Dave Ramsey…The end.
OK…not really the end. I have lived in my moms basement for 5 years working on getting out of debt. When I got married I quit my job because I was a live in nanny and that was NOT the ideal job for a newlywed…and of course we didn’t want to live in my moms basement as newly weds! It took me 2 years to find a full time (non-temp)job and with my husband working on commission we lived our lives on credit cards. Once Max was born we decided that I could quit…well for the first time in 5 years my husband stopped hitting his commission bonus’ at work and was making minimum wage working part time. So out came the credit carts…Steven took on two side jobs and an internship and then we moved in with my mom TRYING to become debt free and get a house.
It seemed like we weren’t going anywhere until my friend recommended the book Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey. First we set a budget. Then it took us 1 month to get our $1000.00 savings (thanks to some extra work my hubby got) and the very next day we got almost $1000.00 in medical bills for an ankle injury I had gotten the month before. If it hadn’t been for Dave’s recommended savings (BEFORE paying off debt) that would have gone on the credit card. Then we built up our savings again. Then we paid off our new carpet (thanks to my son and his cousin flooding the basement/our home) got paid off. Now we are working on my car which will be paid off January 11th. Then to the credit card and the student loans…these will be paid off by December 2010. We will be debt free! It seems like a ways off but at least the end is in site and we can dream of living a debt free life (except for a mortgage).
Recomendation
I used to be SO bad about balancing my check book…I would do it about every 6 months and then realize I had a bunch of bank fees or that I forgot to write something down. Now I balance it every pay day, so 2 times a month. It is SO much better and sometimes I even find extra money that I wrote down twice, or checks that are over 6 months old that were never cashed. So don’t be afraid to balance your check book it’s better to know you are poorer than you thought before you spend money you don’t have, and who knows maybe you are richer then you thought.
Affliliates
