Mother's Day Gift Ideas

I can't believe how fast this year is flying by. This weekend is Mother's Day, next month is Father's Day and the start of summer.

When shopping for my mother and mother-in-law, I started browsing things for myself. You know just in case my husband and girls need ideas or even a little treat yourself Tuesday. While there are many things that I need, I settled on things that I want because some of these things I say I am going to buy myself and then I buy something for my girls instead.

ONE | TWO | THREE | FOUR | FIVE | SIX | SEVEN

ONE. Have you ever felt a Wild Fox sweatshirt? They are so cozy and soft. The price tag is a bit much, but if it is a gift, then you don't even have to worry about it. This is just one of the few sweatshirts I have my eye on.

TWO. I love jogger pants and I am loving everything from Mindy Mae's Market, so when I saw blush pink joggers, I knew I had to have them. But I haven't bought them just yet as they ran out of my size when the sale happened a few weeks ago. They are back in stock and I would love to change into these after work each evening.

THREE. I have been carrying around the same black Coach wallet for about 7 years now and I think it is time for a new one. Mine is getting worn out and bulging at the seams. Plus that shade of blue is so pretty and perfect for Spring.

FOUR. I love gladiator sandals and these fit the bill perfectly. They are from Sam Edelman and that line of shoes is pretty comfy and cute.

FIVE. I used to get my nails done every two to three weeks and then my girls were born and I had no time. Plus the cash I spent was crazy, so now I paint my own nails and occasionally (every 6 months or so) get them done if I find a groupon. I love the gel type of polish because it lasts through hundreds of hand washes and stays on for about two weeks. Now that Essie makes a gel polish that doesn't need light to set, I have been wanting a set. The problem is all the stores around me are always out of the top coat, so I haven't gotten it yet. But I still want it.

SIX. This IT CC cream is amazing. Better than foundation, but pretty expensive. I love this stuff and could always use more and always need more. Or a Sephora gift card so I can buy all the make up would do.

SEVEN. I have been dreaming of an iWatch ever since the series 1 came out. Now that the series 2 is out and can go in the water, I am wanting one even more. And then my Garmin is failing and acting up again, so now I REALLY want one. But the price tag. Ugh.

Gift cards to shop or for body treatments (nails, massage, facials, etc.) are always another good idea. Treat your mom this Mother's Day!

Weekending

Another weekend in the books. It was a pretty good one in general, but we definitely are dealing with the terrible twos. My girls are soooo sweet for everyone else, but have been a handful for us lately. Phew. They are giving us a run for our money.

Thursday evening I took the girls to my friends daughters second birthday party. While it was a lot of fun, it was chaotic chasing two toddlers around. When they were not on the swings, they were going down the slide and kept me on my toes all night long.

Friday I worked all day since I was in Las Vegas for work at the start of the week. So once we got off, we grabbed the girls and headed home. After being home for a  bit, we headed out on a walk since it was supposed to be rainy all weekend and we wanted to soak in the sunshine while we still had it.

 Walking through one of our favorite neighborhood park areas

After walks, we made the girls dinner and then I headed out to get salads since we had the biggest Mexican feast for lunch. After dinner and putting the girls to bed, we settled in for some Parenthood (we are almost done with the series) and a glass of wine.

Saturday morning we headed out to breakfast and then to Target for a few things. Our breakfast spot was so close to Target that I couldn't help but stop and get some essentials for the house.

After Target, we stopped at Starbucks for some coffee grounds for our garden and to help with our ant problem. Then we headed home to meet my in-laws so they could help us move our dining room table to their house for my sister-in-law. The girls were almost asleep in the car, but once they heard gaga and papa were coming over, they pepped up.

We moved the table into Rory's truck and then headed up to my in-laws house to drop it off. While we unloaded the table, the girls played in the backyard until the storm started rolling in and it was time to head home for lunch and naps.

While the girls napped, we started putting together our table that has been in the garage for months. It is from Restoration Hardware and we got the new chairs to match it at Christmas time. Yes it has been that long. While trying to put the table together, we figured out that we were missing all the bolts and nuts to the table. We searched our garage and house while the girls napped and found nothing. So Rory headed to Home Depot to get replacements since RH wanted $30 plus shipping to send us new ones.

 Restoration Hardware Flat Iron Table

Restoration Hardware Madeleine Fabric Chair

Rory got home and part of the bolts worked, but the other ones did not. Ugh. Since I was heading out to grocery shop, I stopped at Lowes and got the right bolts (super short ones at that).

Once I got home, and we unloaded the groceries, we finished putting the table together and set everything up. I LOVE this table and chairs and so happy it is finally put together.

I prepped everything for dinner and then we fed the girl, bathed them and cuddled while watching some tv by the fire. Once the girls were in bed, we fired up the grill and made salmon. Since I had prepped the strawberry avocado salsa, I only had to make some rice while the salmon grilled. Dinner was a success and we finished the evening with an episode of The Americans.

Sunday morning we got to sleep in a little later than normal which was glorious. Once we were up, I made pancakes and bacon for the family before getting ready for the day. My mother in law came over at 9 am and Rory and I headed off at 9:30 to California for the day. Originally we were going to take the girls with us, but their grandparents wanted to spend time with them, so they offered to watch them for the day. So we had an impromptu day date.

We grabbed coffees and headed out for our two and a half hour drive. We wanted to go to California to shop....mainly at Kate Spade, J Crew, Restoration Hardware and North Face. Once we got to the shops, we walked around and spent entirely too much money, but treat yourself, right?

After shopping, we went to Thai food for lunch and this place was packed, even at 2 pm. We had the best Thai food and amazing people watching. After a late lunch, we headed to Restoration Hardware for some towels and to search for furniture. We picked up a few things and then headed out to more stores.

We finished around 4 pm and headed back to Reno shortly after. We only made one stop for gas and got home at 6:30.

While we were out, the girls went on a couple walks with their grandparents. They sat by the river and had snacks, they fed the ducks and splashed in the puddles.

Hanging out at the middle school

Once we got home, we talked about our day with my in-laws, talked about our daycare dilemma and showed the girls the new jackets we bought them while out. 

We played with the girls, got them ready for bed and got everything ready for the week ahead. Once the girls were down, Rory took Walter for a walk and then we settled in for Fargo before Sutton woke up and wouldn't go back to sleep. It was a rough evening of sleep, but we are here on Monday and surviving with lots of coffee.

How was your weekend?

I am linking up with Biana from B Loved Boston.

Friday Favorites

It has been a long week. Between going to Vegas for work for the first part of this week and another stressful event (details below), I am hoping for a free and happy weekend. And for the forecast to be wrong and bring us sunshine instead of rain. Is that too much to ask?

Happy Cinco de Mayo friends! I hope to dine on Mexican and margs tonight. What about you?

Let's get down to Friday Favorites.

ONE. Remember how I said my stress levels could ease up a bit now that my first of two huge meetings was over? Well, we got a bombshell yesterday and it SUCKS.

The girls' daycare is closing. And they gave us a 3 week notice. Eff. I want to shout all the cuss words I can or drown my stress out in wine.

We have been looking at new daycares for awhile now and settled on one. We put our names on the wait list and paid a deposit. The girls are set to start August 7th. My MIL was set to watch the girls the first week of August and everything was just fine. Until it wasn't and we got notice that our daycare is closing on May 31st.

So we have been struggling, searching and figuring out what to do in the last 24 hours. My in-laws have said they can watch the girls most of the time for the next two months, but they have vacation in there and either we will have to take that time off (I don't have a lot of extra time off), hope my dad will want to watch them or hope a miracle happens.

The only thing I know is my stress level shot up high yesterday and I am one very sad and upset mom. I love the teachers they have and was sad we would be leaving them, but now we are forced to go and go now. Ugh.

Thanks for letting me vent.

TWO. The good side this whole situation? Saving two months of daycare. That means we can get a new tv or couch which is the only good side of things right now.

THREE. If you follow me on Instagram, then you saw one of these photos. On Tuesday morning I got a text message right before I went into my Board meeting (you know the one I have been stressing about for weeks) saying that Sutton went down the slide headfirst and face planted into the dirt. She has a nasty scrap on her chin and her teeth cut her lip up.

The teacher's cleaned her up, iced her mouth and gave her love before she ran right back out to the slide again. She is fearless. She loves adventure. I gotta watch out for Sutton as she gets older.

FOUR. Don't forget, next week is our Girl Chat link up on Thursday May 11th. This month's topic is your favorite make up/beauty products. I can't wait to share mine and hear from you all on your favorite products. I am always looking for new things to try.

FIVE. We are looking at buying the girls a slide for outside. They love going down the slide....see #3 to realize how much they love it. But I want some suggestions from you ladies on what your kids love. I don't want a baby slide, but would I have to get one with a swing set or as some sort of combo? Or what about the roller coaster slide thing?

roller coaster

I am linking up with April, A Little Bit of Everything, Karli, Meet @ the Barre and Cup of Tea.

Thoughts on Thursday

It's time for some confessions and thoughts on Thursday, so grab the button and link up.

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- I am soooo glad the first out of two work stresses is out of the way. I had been worried about this case for a long time and it finally came to be. I made it through and have a bit of time before my next case comes to be.

- It is finally feeling like Spring here. We have been having weather in the 70s and 80s all week and it has been soooo welcomed. And when I was in Vegas, we had some 90 degree weather. Wow was that hot.

- I still can't believe we took this much dg and turned it into this.

- My coworkers went to Japan for two weeks and one of them brought me back some treats. Well let me back up a bit, one of our other coworkers wife is from that area and told us about these things called Tokyo Bananas. They said they were like Twinkies, but fresh and didn't last forever. We looked up the different flavors and said we wanted to try them. So my coworker brought us back the original flavor and the strawberry ones.

I busted out the strawberry ones right away and it was really good. Way better than a Twinkie. I had the banana one later and it was even better than the strawberry one.

- We have gotten reports from daycare that one or both of the girls has been sassy all week. Basically they are saying no a lot and being a typical two year old, but I don't want it to progress where they are causing problems. Usually they are overall good, but maybe this missed me this week? Maybe they are just going through a phase?

Toddler Spring and Summer Wear

Today I am sharing with you one of our favorite stores, Hanna Andersson. This post isn't sponsored. I just love this store and the quality of their clothing.

My girls have a lot of clothes from Hanna Andersson now and I have my eye on many more items, but here are the ones we love and the ones we want.

LOVE:

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9

WANT:

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10

And when it comes time for Christmas, I really want to get us all matching pjs. Yes, I want to be THAT family and have the cute pictures. 

Have you ever bought or received anything from Hanna Andersson?

I am linking up with Jenn and Jessi today. And Jenn recently had her baby girl and I couldn't be more excited for them!! Congrats Jenn!

Blistered Green Beans Side Dish

A few weeks ago we had dinner at my parents house and my mom made green beans with a simple sauce and the girls gobbled it up. Avery didn't stop eating the green beans. This is huge for the girls since they are soooo picky when it comes to fruits and veggies.

I called my mom up and asked her for the recipe, so I could recreate it at home for the girls and when I found out how easy it was, I made it that evening.

You need four ingredients and that includes the water used. Seriously so simple and delicious.

BLISTERED GREEN BEANS
Serves 4

NEED:

12 oz. Green Beans
Better Than Bouillon Vegetable Base
Olive Oil
Water

MAKE IT:

1. Drizzle a bit of olive oil in your pan (a couple swirls) and heat to medium high.
2. Once hot, add in your washed and cut green beans. Saute them until they blister (get a bit of char on them).

3. Add in 1/4 to 1/2 tablespoon of Better than Bouillon Vegetable Base and a couple tablespoons of water. Stir in and only let it cook for a minute or two as you don't want your green beans to go limp. You want them to still be crisp tender.

4. Remove from heat and enjoy.

We served this with spicy meatball subs the first time we had them and now it is becoming a regular side dish with all the fresh green beans coming into the grocery stores.

I hope you enjoy.

Weekending

This weekend was full of sunshine and hard labor. I am exhausted and I am frantically prepping to go to Vegas this afternoon, but I wanted to squeeze in a blog post before I go. I had zero energy last night, so I didn't get the chance to write one before bed. So it is coming at you late today.

Friday was pretty stressful at work, so once my half day was over (thank goodness my boss was kind enough to still let me do a half day), we picked up the girls from daycare, headed to grab some sandwiches and came home to eat quickly. Once I finished my sandwich, I changed and headed over to see my friend for a pedicure. My toes were in desperate need and with all the stress at work lately, it was just what the doctor ordered. My toes are now a pretty minty glittery blue.

After my pedicure, I headed over to Trader Joes for some snacks, wine, cheese and cookies. The basics. Once I got home, we headed out for a walk to burn off some energy the girls had since their naps were pretty nonexistent that day.

While on our walk, both girls fell down and scrapped their knees. Avery's was worse than her sisters and broke through her pants.

Sutton also decided that our brick wall needed to be swept.

I wanted the girls to try my spaghetti, so I headed over to the grocery store to pick up the stuff I needed and came home and started dinner. But the girls got hungry while it was simmering (takes over an hour to simmer), so they ate chicken, green beans and cookies for dessert. Rory and I had spaghetti, bread and wine plus some Parenthood to cap off the evening.

Saturday morning we headed out to breakfast and then Target for a few items for the girls. Plus I needed a birthday card for the party we are going to Thursday evening. The girls got new sandals and couldn't stop talking about them. They wanted to wear them everywhere.

Don't mind their messy hair. They need a haircut and a barrette.

I headed out to get a birthday gift for the 2 year olds birthday we have on Thursday and also to pick up some make up that I had recently ran out of. I got home just in time for Rory to head out to the Spring football game and to put the girls down for their naps. They took 2 1/2 hour naps and were very happy once they got up.

While the girls slept, a package arrived for them with some new pjs from Hanna Andersson.

We played and snacked until Rory came home and then headed out for Mexican food. My girls love Mexican food, so it is always a sure bet that they will eat and behave. We were at dinner for quite awhile, but then we took a drive and came home just in time for the girls' bedtime. Then we settled in for more Parenthood and bedtime.

Sunday morning we headed out to breakfast again and to carb load because we had plans to move 7 yards of DG (large pathway pebbles) from the street into the backyard. Rory was going to do this on his own with my help of laying the weed mat, but I ended up helping with the entire thing which was good since it took us 4 1/2 hours to complete and we were soooo tired. He wouldn't have gotten it done yesterday and would have been way more sore.

The girls played with chalk, watched us while we worked and ate some snacks in their chairs, they helped by racking a bit and picking up rocks. I did have a few diaper changes, lunch to prep and putting the girls down for a nap in there, but we successfully moved all 7 yards. But today I am exhausted and sooooo sore from it. What a workout.

 Before

And after...

We need to get one more yard of dg to put under our grape vines and a little touch up here and there, but it turned out very nicely. We also need to put the rocks you see in the above picture out, put in a few stone steps and then we are complete. This will be so much better for our pup and for the girls to play in.

After we finished, we took showers, gave the girls a snack once they got up, and then I had to sweep the kitchen area (dirt was tracked in) and vacuum the house. Once that was all done, I headed to the grocery store. I got to the store and didn't want to get out of the car because I was soooo tired and sitting down felt amazing. Ha. But I got my errands done and headed home in time for my in-laws to arrive with pizza and salad for everyone.

We had dinner (which the girls ate a ton) and then my in-laws took the girls on a walk while we did some laundry and got things ready for the week ahead. Once they got back, it was bath time and then snuggle time until it was the girls' bedtime. We watched some tv, Rory gave Walter a walk and then we ended our evening with a glass of wine after a successful day.

How was your weekend?

I am linking up with Biana from B Loved Boston.