Drive

Wow.

So I have just spent a week in Indianapolis, Indiana learning, growing, and discovering at the Scentsy Family Reunion!

I absolutely love my business. I don't think that that's a secret to anyone that knows me! But after reunion (the warm fuzzy name we Scentsy sisters have for our annual convention), I always feel rejuvenated and more ready than ever to work my business and share the Scentsy brands with everyone. Honestly, we have something for every person... It's unreal.

Aaaaanyway, I wanted to share my experience at reunion here, and slowly unveil some of the pictures that I took of new product that's coming out in the fall. I'm particularly fond of these guys...

Me and my new friend Barnaby the Owl!
He is so soft and snuggly....
and will clearly be living with me.

and, if you love Whoot - like I do! - you're going to love this little egg that hatched at the reunion!

Whoot and Whoot jr!
Our fine feathered friend looks great as a plug in!

Who doesn't love an owlet? I know I do...

Keep checking back as I reveal more everyday about what I saw and smelled while I was away. There are some incredible new things coming your way, and I can't wait to share with all of you!

The Little Birds Nest

I'm really proud of what we did with the nursery for Little Bird, and since everyone loves nursery photos, I thought that I would share them here with all of you! I'll do my best to remember where we got everything!

crib; target

  bedding; target/amazon

 lamp; kirklands (no longer for sale on the website)

 paint colors: ballet pink and fairytale pink (both from valspar); 

decal; zulily

warmer on the nightstand; scentsy

[Please disregard the lamps on the floor... they're still there and still homeless. Whoops.]

Amazing artwork inspired by pinterest

but made especially for the little bird by our dear friend EM

who should soon be opening her own Etsy Shop!!

(She makes excellent burp cloths too!)

glider and ottoman; babies 'r us

[which caused us much grief... the glider is/was discontinued AFTER we got the ottoman as a gift. 

Really Babies R Us? Really?]

lamp; ikea (about 5 years ago. I don't think they carry it anymore)

curtains and sheers; ikea

little rug; lenox

yeah... I think I went over all of this already...

changing table/dresser; storkcraft (though we scored it on craigslist!)

lenny the lamb; scentsy

prints; zulily

frames; ikea

shelving; lowes

diaper pail; amazon 

(we cloth diaper and this pail is just the perfect size for one load of laundry in our machine)

diaper pail liner; planetwise (the pink that we have isn't available at the moment)

some other awesome stuff.

bookshelf close up of all of our favorite books!

vases; ikea

custom made shadow box is by our very dear friend SH

who has her own Etsy Shop! 

You can have one of these too at Owl House Designs!

tall dresser; storkcraft

laundry hamper; thirty-one

humidifier; target

polka dot toy bin; babies 'r us

frames; ikea

[They're $2, and we got a trillion of them.]

There is actually an entire wall that I don't have pictures of, with another really cool decal. I would go back and take pictures of it right now, but the Little Bird's room is a disaster mess because I've got some BumGenius all in ones laid out to finish drying... and I haven't picked up since one of the cats had a zoomie overnight and rearranged EVERYTHING. I blame Sookie.

All in all, I love her nursery, and she does too. The best part of her day is when she gets to be naked on her changer. She's all laughs and smiles. This doesn't bode well for her as a teenager, but for now, it's the best part of my day too.

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Dragon Bink Love or Why we love Paci-Plushies!

Holy new favorite thing, batman.

So, we have a love/hate relationship with pacifiers here in the nest. Little Bird loves to work on her binks, and I hate having to put them back into her mouth when they fall out and she immediately screams. I was having to rush back to her during naps (on the rare occasion that she takes one) and more often, stop working or eating every 60 seconds, and when one hasn't eaten for all day, those moments are sacred!

I had been pointed in the direction of Wubanubs by a friend in nursing clinic, but Little Bird doesn't really love the soothie pacifiers - she seems to prefer the shape of the Nuk brand - so it seemed ridiculous to invest in something that she wouldn't really enjoy, no matter how cute and functional.

Enter Nookums Paci-Plushies!

I stumbled on these guys completely by accident (Thank you, Amazon for playing matchmaker!) when I was looking for something completely unrelated, and was SO EXCITED when I saw that they were Nuk compatible, and even better than the pacifier could be removed to be sanitized. I paged through the website and settled on....

Dimples the Dragon!

Every single little cutie is adorable, however, we have a special nickname for Little Bird here at home that makes her having a dragon with her all the time pretty cute. I definitely also love the elephant though!

I promptly ordered, through Amazon since we have an AmazonMom account and live for the free shipping, and got the shipping confirmation email very shortly after. I was stoked that it would be here so quickly! It arrived two days after I ordered, which was awesome. I loved the packaging when it arrived also. Very very cute.

I opened it immediately, and found that poor Dimples was damaged!! Poor fellow looked like he had had his throat cut - shanked in plushie jail! I was disappointed and prepared to pack him back up and return him to Amazon, but something stopped me and told me that I needed to contact the company and let them know that there was a problem. So I did. I emailed them through Amazon, and they wrote me back within minutes. I sent photographs of the damaged item, and was told promptly that a replacement would be shipped out that day after a sincere apology (which I totally didn't need... I just wanted them to know that there was a quality control slip up. I would appreciate someone telling me that if it was my business!). Impressive! We received the replacement within two days, attached our favorite Nuk pacifier, and the love affair began!

We started calling it the "Dragon Bink", mostly just for ease of asking each other where it was. M loves to hold onto the legs and wings (which have two different textures, so she gets to do a little exploring.), and I love that her bink is held in place even if she spits it out and immediately wants it back - the dragon holds it right there for her to grab back into her mouth!

It's gone on many a trip in the car with us, and definitely keeps the bink from falling (being thrown) on the floor of the car or onto the floor at Target, and has definitely saved it from a toss to the ground when we are out for walks in the stroller.

It's so cute that we get comments all the time when we're out. I (literally) ran into a gal (with the shopping cart) in the baby section of Target, and she (stared daggers at me until she saw M and) started cooing over her and asked where I got "such a cute paci clip"! Apparently, she has the same problem as I with a bink tosser, so I told her the website, we both agreed it was a genius idea, and went our merry ways.

We absolutely love it. I even got a picture of it with the bink in her mouth! Little Bird moves very quickly when she wants to.

Thanks for an excellent product. WE LOVE IT!

Oh, and just to be clear, I wasn't paid for this review nor did I get anything for free - although I do love free things! - this is a completely honest and unsolicited review of something we couldn't live without!

It seems like naptime is over... the Little Bird is chirping!

the great return of friday letters.

The last couple of days have been interesting. My mom left on Wednesday morning, after being here for a week. It was a tough transition back to just me and the little bird. It was so nice to be able to hand her to someone when I had to pee and walk the dogs without having her strapped to my chest, but we're back in the swing of things now. I'll shut up now and get to the letters...

Friday Letters... oh how I have missed you.

Dear Ameda, While I appreciate getting the Purely Yours double electric pump for free with my health insurance (see below letter), I hate it. It doesn't drain me well and I end up with more milk on my hand than I do in the bottles, especially when I double pump. I've been doing single side recently, and having more success, but it takes FOREVER. I'm thinking of just sucking it up and buying the Medela to see if it works better.

Dear President Obama, Thanks for the free pump, bro. Good work on being the leader of the free world and still thinking of the breastfeeding mama. You're no President Bartlet, but hey... no one is.

Dear Netflix and Aaron Sorkin, Thank you for The West Wing. There are no words for my gratitude.

Dear Mary Louise Parker, Your performance in Weeds is to die for. I love you as Amy on West Wing. I love you in general. Remember that one time we met and I panicked and hid from you? *sigh* Its probably better this way. I only would've embarrassed myself more if I'd allowed myself to speak.

Dear M, Thank you for being such a good sleeper today! You've been a doll so far today... I hope it sticks! 

Dear Cotton Babies, I am in love with you. Flip Diapers are my fave. BumGenius ain't too shabby either. Please give me free diapers to review here on the blog.

Dear Lexi and Conrad, My beautiful, fabulous dogs... thank you for not barking at the roofers and allowing M, and in turn mama, to get some rest. I promise you a nice long walk this afternoon.

Dear Laundry, I'm gonna crush you today.

I think that's all for me today folks. I hope everyone has a fantastic weekend!!!

a visit with great-grandma and "have I always been cross eyed?"

Happy Tuesday!

Yesterday, my mom (who is visiting from Pennsylvania) and I took the Little Bird on an adventure! We drove two hours to southern NJ to meet my Nana, who will be 93 in August. It's not the longest road trip we've made with her, but it wasn't long enough for her to really settle in and sleep - too much stop and go traffic and not long enough to really nap. So, it was a very screamy trip, but well worth it so that my Nana could meet her 4th great-grandchild!

We snapped a few pictures of the oldest and the youngest member of our clan! (for now anyway, K and D are due to have their third little boy any day now!)

2 months and 92 years!
Both in fancy outfits.

I just can't deal with M's face here.
or her hair.

Me, the Little Bird, my Mom, and Nana
Also, my Uncle B photobombing in the background.

I need to know...
Have I always been cross eyed?
I don't think so. I feel like this is just a fluke.
But I'm definitely cross eyed here.

I also took the opportunity while in suburbia to stop at WalMart (keeping is classy, as always) and pick up a few sewing notions that I needed to start my next project! I'll be posting the progress of my project here, but it should be a good one. Here's a hint: It's a functional thing for baby!

The car trip back was a little better. M didn't scream as much, until we got about a mile from home in intense Brooklyn traffic - that is to say that there was a premium amount of honking and insane delivery bikes weaving between cars. I am not the most composed driver, in fact as soon as Little Bird can start mimicking language or repeating things that I say, I probably shouldn't be allowed to drive with her in the car, or her first words will have four letters.

We were both annoyed and tired, my mom seemed fine though.

In completely unrelated news, I have a lot of really great stuff coming up. I have a feature in a HUGE giveaway, I'm making some fun stuff for M, and we're working on our plans for summer. Exciting!

And now, a bonus for all of you that made it to the bottom of the page.

I'm so cool.

Who am I?

Let me start this by saying that I haven't eaten breakfast, had tea, or drank water yet today. I really can't be held responsible for anything I say.

Since my fantastical comeback to the bloggerverse, I've been struggling with what my new angle will be now that I don't really see the outside world anymore. Seriously, I can count on one hand the amount of times I've been outside of my apartment in the last week. I spend my days bouncing, feeding, changing and generally pacifying the Little Bird, grabbing strange handfuls of random foods that are laying around my kitchen, and watching Criminal Minds on three different channels.

So I have a crush on Dr. Reid. So what?
Genius is hot.

Some days, I speak less than 100 words before B gets home, and the things I do say out loud are more, "LA LA LA" than actual words. When people call, I don't screen based on whether or not I want to talk to them anymore (apologies to anyone that has been screened in the last 10 years), I screen based on whether or not I think the Little Bird will scream while we are talking. I usually let everything go to voicemail, just to be safe.

She just made a sound, and I started bargaining with the universe to give me 15 more minutes of silence. It's not sounding very promising.

So I wonder, what is there to say? I am still me... I think. I still feel like myself, despite not having gotten really "dressed" in several days. I might not wash my hair on the regular like I used to, but that doesn't matter because you can't see me! Muahahaha! 

I suppose this is a question for the mommies out there: 

How do you stay at home and not get bored with the sameness of the days?

How do you spend all day worrying about your littles and not lose yourself in the process?

When do you find the balance of being a mom and still being a human, and dare I say it...

a woman?

I'm really struggling with these questions.

I don't want to become a "mom blogger", not that there's anything wrong with mom bloggers - I like a LOT of mom bloggers and did before I was a mom, but I don't feel like that's me. I would be happy to talk about my favorite cloth diapers (which honestly, I probably will, because I'm OBSESSED with my stash), my struggles with breastfeeding, and day to day cuteness that is my daughter, but I don't believe that that's all that I have to say. I don't want to give up Jackie... Jackie is really fun.

In the meantime, Little Bird is waking up, and I need to find something to eat before I can handle any more crying (she's a spirited child [I refuse to call her colicky, even if two doctors and a lactation consultant already have], so I only get brief reprieves from the shrieking). Please hand me any advice that you can. I'll take all of it.

And now, please enjoy a gummy grin...

where and how I've been or... I've been missing you.

You guys.

I am fully aware of how long it's been since I've blogged. I'm the worst. I'm sorry, and I've missed this.

I hate that I've left you out of some really important stuff in my life, like the most important stuff that I'll ever do, but it's been insane and scary and hard... Let me see if I can put it all into words enough to explain it to you.

Once upon a time...
    There was a girl and her husband. They did some really grown up stuff - like adopted pets, bought a condo, bought a car, paid off debt, struggled with many many things, and got stronger than they thought they could be. And then, they had their greatest accomplishment.

I'm really pleased to introduce you to our gorgeous daughter, Matilda. For the purposes of this blog, I will likely call her "M" or Little Bird going forward, but I wanted to give you a proper introduction for her first appearance here.

Anyone reading that knows us in life, apologies for this section, but I know there are people that read here that don't know us, and there's a full story that I feel needs to be told, and explanations about why I didn't blog during the pregnancy. When I first found out that I was pregnant, I was being very cautious and didn't want to announce too quickly - or really, at all. Shockingly, I'm a fairly private person, and it took a lot to convince me that I wanted to share this baby with everyone. B was excited to tell family and friends, but I wanted to wait until we were out of the first trimester and it was "safer". I was feeling terrible - the first trimester was really really hard on me. My back felt broken, I was super nauseous, and I was EXHAUSTED. The only foods I could keep down were watermelon and ice pops (it was the height of summer by then, and summer in NYC is misery). I had never felt so awful. 

So, understandably, I wasn't terribly interested in talking about how happy I was, mostly because I wasn't.

Don't get me wrong, I was excited and happy about the baby, but I wasn't in any mood to talk about it.

In my mind, it was too hard to talk around all the things that were going on in my head and body here on the blog. I didn't want to just complain about how I hurt or felt sick, so I didn't say anything. I tried writing posts about other things, but that baby was all over my mind and heart, and stole all my words from me.

The second trimester was excellent. I was working, feeling so much better, and we shared with our friends and family. We found out she was a girl, and I couldn't have been happier. She was coming! The little girl that I had always dreamed of! And I didn't know how to share it here. There just weren't words for what I was feeling, so I didn't share.

Third trimester was good, but harder than I expected... I worked up until 38 weeks, and then I started to get a little mean - the filter between my brain and my mouth was malfunctioning! So I went on maternity leave, since the filter was pretty important in my line of work, and expected baby girl to show up in those two weeks.

She didn't.

On February 22nd, after 41 weeks and 2 days of waiting for her, and 26 hours of labor, M was born. Things in this nest will never, ever be the same.

So I hope you will join (or rejoin) me in my adventures as a stay at home mom. I promise to still be funny and not talk about poop (unless it's a really funny poop story). Right now, though, I have to go. M is crying (as usual), and I have to go through the checklist of what could possibly be wrong, only to find out that nothing is wrong and she just wanted to hear herself cry. Just like her mommy, she's dramatic and loves the sound of her own voice.

Until the next nap, here's a picture of our little family.

caryn leigh photography