Category: Homemaking

Holiday treats for neighbors, teachers

Inspired by my “Mason Jar” gift win from the open house, I found a recipe for a dry apple cider mix recipe and a stove-top spiced pecan recipe. 

I started a little early on this project, so I ordered 4-ounce jars and plastic bags to package everything. 

I assembled the jars and printed a label; I toasted the pecans with the sugar and spices, then let them cool on a mat. I spooned the pecans into small bags after I added a sticker with the ingredients printed on them. Then, in a slightly larger bag, I nestled the apple-cider jar in the bottom and placed the tied bag of pecans on top. Then, I sealed the outer bag. 

I decided this was a great neighbor gift, but for the teachers, I wanted to jazz it up a tiny bit more. I found an Etsy page with hand-sewn pocket, rice hand warmers for $1! I ordered two for each teacher. I also stumbled on ceramic travel mugs with a single serving of hot chocolate and marshmallows included. These extra items fit my “comfort” and “warmth” theme, so I packaged all of it together in gift bags.

Here’s hoping these go over well… still a few days before I’ll be able to deliver them.

As always, these didn’t take forever to assemble, but I feel showing a little time in my gift idea helps show the teachers how much they are appreciated for hanging out with my little one all day!

Happy Holidays!

I finally remembered to snap a pic… 🙂  

 

“Back to school” Teacher gifts

You’ve probably seen elaborate teacher gifts all over the web or in your classroom? 

Well, I saw a note when I picked up my little one that the child center was having their “back to school” open house and figured I needed to not show up empty handed! However, I seriously had a grand sum of five minutes to put something together while Dad distracted the baby, and I had zero time to shop.

Fortunately, I try to stay stocked up on small things that can build a variety of spectacular-looking or sounding things in a snap. 

So… What did I make?

5-minute hand scrub: Coconut oil, raw sugar and lavender oil… That’s it. I used roughly equal parts sugar and coconut oil until I liked the consistency. I evenly portioned the scrub into 4-ounce canning jars, printed a quick label, tied it on… and voila. 

As it turns out, one of my son’s guest teachers is British and loved the lavender. Who knew? 🙂 

My thoughts… These ladies wash their hands a million times a day and might appreciate a luxurious and moisturizing scrub to pamper themselves with. Bonus: I had enough to keep some on my own sink counter!

Reading list

I read a variety of books, magazine and blogs. I take a little from each to try in my daily life, and I leave some information behind because it doesn’t always fit perfectly. I enjoy reading different perspectives, and I appreciate hearing about the trials and triumphs of other mothers.

This is a non-exhaustive list of some of my favorite sites, books and more. Take a look and share some of your favorites in the comments. I’ll update this as I find new resources Along my journey.

Some of these are also “me” books or ones I read just because I wanted to tackle something for entertainment or historical (vs. parental) learning purposes. 

P.S. As someone who commutes roughly half an hour one way to work daily, I 100% consider audiobooks as “reading.” 🙂 Without audiobooks, I might not be able to consume as much literature! 

Scientific secrets for raising kids who thrive (Great Courses audio series of lectures; affiliate link): http://amzn.to/1NUI31n 

Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg (affiliate link): http://amzn.to/1EeMSIe

Undaunted by Tanya Biank (affiliate link): http://amzn.to/18LAbff

The Humbled Homemaker blog: http://thehumbledhomemaker.com/

Six Sister Stuff blog: http://mm.sixsistersstuff.com

Parent Effectiveness Training by Thomas Gordon (affiliate Link): http://amzn.to/1FfUi1P 

Liar, temptress, soldier, spy: Four women undercover in the Civil War by Karen Abbott (affiliate link): http://amzn.to/1HhxEY0 

Homemaking?

Hubby and I were talking the other day and decided that in the months leading up to welcoming our little one, and the initial weeks of his arrival, we managed more “life hacks” than we could’ve imagined.

I felt like my/our best hacks involved learning how to embrace the domestic side–a side we previously claimed didn’t exist. Early in the year, as part of my idea to embrace homemaking for frugal reasons (more on that in another post), I decided to visit Pinterest for some ideas. I mean, Pinterest is full of homemaking life hacks, right?

I decided to use the year to make some handmade Christmas gifts. I found recipes for soap (too involved), lip balm (big win overall), fabric coffee sleeves and a few other ideas.

By the end of the year, and after an early arrival by our little one, I ended up using another site (Etsy) to buy handmade soaps and the coffee sleeves after breaking too many needles on my sewing machine trying to make the sleeves myself. However, I made foot/bath salts, effervescent shower pucks, alcohol-free hand sanitizer and lip balm to share with my family. 

All that said, it is super easy to make some of these things, and I was able to support homemaking entrepreneurs when my time and patience ran thin.

These were my inspiration pages or vendors’ pages for homemade goods:

Homemade hand sanitizer: http://pinterest.com/pin/429671620670958577/

Homemade shower pucks: http://pinterest.com/pin/429671620673585884/

Homemade lip balm: http://pinterest.com/pin/429671620671834024/

Coffee sleeves: https://www.etsy.com/listing/191469692/reversible-coffee-cozycoffee-sleeve

Handmade soaps: https://www.etsy.com/listing/198645481/homemade-soap-soap-loaf-ends-natural

I chose these items to try my homemaking hand at since they seemed simple enough. As you can see, some worked, and some just didn’t fit my schedule or patience. This helped me gain some confidence in knowing Pinterest isn’t off limits for a working mom, but understanding that it won’t always go as I want it to when I start a project.

Sleep? 

Admittedly, at the six-week point, I was no where near ready to go back to work…

…so, I didn’t. I had enough vacation time banked to take another four weeks. 

The last day of my authorized paid leave (the first six weeks) of absence was probably the longest of all. Hubby was finally succumbing to the sleeplessness and coming down with a cold, which left me to tackle every single baby task on my own. I know many moms probably do this day in and day out, but hubby and I had a pretty good shared system, and having to take his turns was a lot more overwhelming than I anticipated. Our little one was entering a growth spurt, and his feedings we’re advancing from once every few hours to about every hour and half. Since I was also caring for a terminally ill pet and pumping around the clock to stockpile for my eventual return to work, this left only a minute or two between feedings to sit still and recover. I needed a nap!

Everyone says you don’t get sleep with a new baby or they say sleep when baby sleeps, but seriously… Who ever tells you what really happens between feedings that WILL consume your day? No one, really. One doesn’t just snap her fingers and change a diaper, warm a bottle, kick the laundry behind the laundry room door, load the dishwasher, wash the endless bottles, express a new round of milk or anything else… It all adds up, and it all pulls you away from any semblance of restful sleep.

As another example, lunch one afternoon consisted only of a plate full of cucumbers, bell peppers and broccoli because we certainly didn’t have the time or energy to cook anything, and prepping the vegetables was all we could muster. Delicious? Yes. Protein-packed and filling? Not as much as we might’ve needed. But, eating at all? That made it into the “win” column.

So… Sleep? It’ll most likely happen when you literally can’t move another muscle. Now, to throw in work to that mix. I haven’t decided if work helps more or hurts more, yet.

When I wasn’t getting sleep, I became reacquainted with late-night TV until my mind felt numb. It was about this point my fellow mom friends mentioned some of their tips and tricks for staying sane during the wee hours of nursing and baby care. I completely forgot about my access to streaming content via my Amazon Prime account until this time. Once I realized I could binge watch several seasons of TV shows I’d been meaning to see or catch a movie, my empty DVR queue didn’t seem so grim. 

Amazon Prime streaming content affiliate link; access the Amazon catalog for 30 days for only $3: <a target=”_blank”href=”http://www.amazon.com/gp/video/primesignup/?ref_=assoc_tag_ph_1402131641212&ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=pf4&tag=homeforworkmo-20&linkId=HCT3O5V2HUERUMCA”>Join Amazon Prime – Watch Over 40,000 Movies & TV Shows Anytime – Start Free Trial Now</a><img src=”http://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?t=homeforworkmo-20&l=pf4&o=1&#8243; width=”1″ height=”1″ border=”0″ alt=”” style=”border:none !important; margin:0px !important;” />


Surprise! ‘Baby’s coming’

Preparing to have a baby also including significant planning at work in order to be out of the office for 6-10 weeks. {A paid six weeks is standard for my organization, but I was hoping for 10 weeks to maximize my time settling into my new role after properly healing from the ordeal of child birth.}

I kept telling everyone my little one was going to arrive early. I had in mind he’d arrive a month early (since I was about that early for my mom). Otherwise, I had no real reason for anticipating an early birth outside of IVF statistics (more on that another time).

Regardless, after a particularly long day of preparing a few Thanksgiving turkeys for two shifts of workers at my husband’s job, I apparently pushed myself into an even earlier labor than I expected at 33 weeks and 3 days. (I had a fantastic holiday with his team, but three days later we welcomed a preemie!)

So the preparation? I spent the months prior to my delivery divvying up certain subjects and accounts among my staff, but asked them to each take ownership beginning in December (the month prior to my due date). This was to allow us time to overlap before my personally anticipated early delivery… Haha… We didn’t get the overlap, but at least they were fairly prepared to take over the tasks. 🙂

They were all surprised to arrive at work with a message the baby had arrived, and then a few hours later see me in the office. I had to update my email message to those contacting me and file the personnel paperwork to be out for six weeks. Don’t worry, I didn’t stay long… after all, my preemie was in the NICU, and I desperately needed more time with him.