Day 1 of LDC (Love Dare Challenge)

The 1st day of the challenge was of course the most difficult for me. The challenge? Resolve to say nothing negative about your spouse today. (Eph. 4:2)

I'm sad to say it, but that's about as challenging for me as placing a bar of chocolate in front of me and telling me not to eat it. It can be completely irresistible and satisfying at times!

As in all relationships, there are differing views about how to do everything. The perfect example of this was the first big argument we had after getting married. The issue? Where to store the bread in the kitchen.

Yes, I'm serious.

How can that be an issue? Let me tell you...

I was raised putting bread in the bread box until that got converted into my mom's catch-all in the kitchen. Then the bread was moved to the microwave to be off the counter so it wasn't in the way of food prep. Brent was raised leaving the bread on the counter.

A few days into our marriage the bread storage became an issue. Brent was tired of taking out the bread every time he wanted to use the microwave, and I didn't like it sitting out on the small countertop. The fight ended with me in tears and us totally shocked and amazed at how the other was raised.

Back to the present now. The challenge for Day #1 was especially hard for me because of our differing views on how to discipline Train Lover.

I had resolved not to say anything negative to Brent that day, so instead of the usual demands from me to 'do it my way' or 'stop!', I kept my mouth shut and bit my tongue often. It was really difficult for me. But I noticed a change throughout the day. Brent's way of handling Train Lover became less mean (what I view his disciplining as) as the day progressed.

God gave me a tender mercy for biting my tongue all day. At the end of the day Brent came up to me looking a little bummed and he told me he didn't like how he had handled getting after Train Lover and said he was going to try and be better.

I was able to sleep that night with a little less sore tongue because of those words.

40 Day Love Dare Challenge

I miss blogging. It was fun and I was doing pretty good this year...till my life turned upside down with me trying to figure out how to juggle 2 kids with 5-6 hours of sleep every night (if I'm lucky). So here's me starting again because you can't start anything (or continue) till you take a step!


Have any of you seen the movie Fireproof? Though the acting is pretty terrible, I love the message the movie is sharing. The husband in the movie is trying to save his marriage with his wife by doing the "40 Day Love Dare Challenge" presented to him by his father. It shows the ups and downs and things he learns along the way while doing this.

I decided to take this challenge upon myself. No, Brent and I aren't struggling in our marriage. Don't worry about that. Pregnancy is long and doesn't leave you much time to be together with your spouse. After having Baby E, I was noticing more and more that Brent and I weren't as close and loving as I would have liked.

I watched the movie at night over the course of a few days while I was up nursing Baby E (watching movies is one of the only things I can do during the night to keep me up for those feedings). I decided to take the challenge on myself.

I didn't tell Brent. He'll find out when he reads the following posts to come in the next few days.

*Confession. I didn't do all 40 days. 40 days is a big commitment to make when you have a newborn. However, I did over half of the challenges and I learned a lot from them. And I haven't given up. I'm working on them when I can and repeating some of the challenges I've already done. I'd encourage anyone to do this to strengthen their marriage and love for their spouse. You can find many versions of it online and they're all great.

Train Lover vs. Baby E

Baby E is 6 weeks old and I'm amazed at the differences between him and his older brother already. I didn't think there would be many differences so soon, but there are.

Train Lover                                                  Baby E
- had lots of dark blond hair                        - has a lot of long, dark brown hair
- weighed 9 lbs. 8 oz.                                  - weighed 7 lbs. 1 oz.
- hated baths                                                - loves baths
- hated tummy time                                     - loves being on his tummy
- needed to be swaddled to sleep                - loves being free and calms himself
  and calm down                                            by touching his face
- would only nurse using a nipple               - nurses great most of the time (still working
  shield                                                           on not pinching me)
- normal tongue                                            - tongue tied and got a frenulectomy
- loved being rocked                                    - likes being still unless he can't calm down

I'm sure there will be more differences as the time passes. As different as these boys are, I love them both tremendously. They have brought me so much joy and happiness. I can't imagine life without them. I'm so glad I get to be a mommy for them!

Welcome Baby E!

Contractions started on April 1st around 10pm, only a few short hours after Brent had given me a blessing and told the baby to vacate the premises. I started timing the contractions using an app on the phone and called the birthing center after a few hours of consistent contractions to see if I needed to come in. They recommended I come in, so around 2am we drove the 20 minutes to get to the hospital. Thankfully my mom had flown in to help out so she stayed to watch Train Lover.

Once there a nurse checked me out and I was dilated to a 4. After determining I was still going to have a c-section, the nurses started getting me ready with an IV and taking some blood. A couple hours later I was wheeled to the OR while Brent stayed in the hall till they were ready to operate. I expected problems to happen like they did with the last delivery, and they did. The anesthesiologist giving me the spinal tap messed up and only half the drugs went in me. She had to give me an epidural as well, which I didn't find out about until after having the baby.

I was then strapped down to the table, my numb belly was prepped to be cut open, and the uncontrollable shaking started to happen. What a way to remember that would happen. You really do forget about the pain and unpleasantness of giving birth - the only reason people keep having babies.

The anesthesiologist started poking my arm and then my belly asking if I felt the same kind of poke/pain. I did. She was surprised and upped the drugs. This same thing repeated 3 or 4 more times. So I was very heavily drugged.

Once Brent joined me they started the operation. Thank goodness I was drugged and couldn't see anything with the curtain up. After a lot of  tugging and pressure...Baby E was born! Everyone in the OR commented on how much hair he had first. Then they held him up near me so I could see him before they took him to get checked. Brent went with to take pics and be with him.

The surgeon started putting my insides that were on my outsides back into my insides, haha. After a few minutes, pain started. I mean, PAIN. I felt them stitching me up. I said 'ouch' and once a nurse heard me and I told them I felt pain all hands working on me froze. I was then given a ton more drugs and then some meds in the IV to forget everything that was happening to me. Yeah...didn't work and I still felt a lot of pain. Again...I know I'll forget and want another baby again. Crazy huh?

After that I was taken to the recovery room where Brent was holding our little guy. I got to hold him and feed him and it was just amazing. Words can't describe the feelings moms have when holding their new baby in their arms.

I stayed in the hospital for 3 1/2 days where a lot of things happened. Recovery, breastfeeding, and trying to get some sleep when I could. Overall it was a good stay in the hospital, but I was sure glad to go home and be in my own environment again. We're doing good and I'm figuring out this having 2 kids thing one day at a time. I just have to say, I love being a mom.

Mr. Potato Head Quiet Book Page

I just got this awesome laminator in the mail yesterday. I love it! I've already laminated about 5 pages and the machine is doing great. Everything looks great and I can't wait to do more with it! This quiet book is going to come along quickly now.

I made a Mr. Potato Head quiet book page using the printable found on this website. You need to download the zip file and when you open it you'll see the 2 pages used for the potato head.

I put the printed head in a page protector. Then I cut and attached the sticky magnets using this magnetic strip. I chose to use magnets instead of velcro because I didn't want it to make too much noise during sacrament meeting. The magnets work great and hardly make any noise. I'm also using a 1/2" binder because I want to take it places. I think 1" would be too big. I'm going to rotate the pages I make to keep things interesting.

I printed the pieces for the head and then cut out each piece. Then I put the pieces in a laminator pouch and laminated the sheet. After that I cut around all the pieces. I left some space around each piece so the laminating doesn't come off. Once cut, I attached some sticky magnets to the back of each piece.

I am making many pages that have a lot of pieces, so I put all the pieces in a ziploc.

I found this 3 hole pouch sleeve at Target for 60 cents on sale. I put the pieces in there.

Train Lover loves this new activity! He did it all on his own and knew where all the pieces went without me telling him where to put them.

Tongue sticking out means he's concentrating. He had fun switching out the hats, noses, and mouths. I can't wait to get all the other pages for this book done before baby comes. It'll be a great activity book to keep Train Lover entertained at church, home, and in the car.

Number Worksheet Pages

As the previous post for Alphabet Worksheet Pages, here are some number pages I created.

You can download and print the numbers 1-10 by clicking on this link.

Alphabet Worksheet Pages

I'm working on a paper quiet book for Train lover. I have an unfinished felt quiet book I've done, but I want something I can give him soon. Especially since my time for crafting is winding down with baby #2 coming in just over 2 weeks. Yikes!

This quiet book will be great to take to church. The pages are from the Friend magazine and other resources online. There are coloring pages, mazes, and other pages that have pieces to add on with magnets. I'm going to laminate some pages and put others in page protectors. He can then color on the pages with dry erase crayons or markers.

I used the coloring pages from Crayola's website and cropped out all the stuff I didn't want. I then added some lines of each letter to practice writing. I found these great worksheets at the Twisty Noodle website. I love it because it's all customizable and you can write anything you want.

Here's a sample of what they look like

And because I'm super nice, you can print all these pages out for FREE by following this link. All the pages are in a zip file. so you will need to extract them in order to print them out.

Hope you enjoy these pages!

Role of Parents FHE

In continuing to talk about families for FHE this month, we focused on what daddies and mommies do in a family. Train lover started FHE with a prayer, and then we sang The Dearest Names.

We first talked about Daddies. Train lover asked the questions, with some help, and Brent answered them.

Then we watched the video "Earthly Father, Heavenly Father".

Next we talked about Mommies and I answered the questions.

Then we watched the video "Motherhood: An Eternal Partnership with God".

That was the end of the lesson, but Train lover wanted to play a game. We weren't really wanting to, so instead I pulled out a page of a quiet book I'm working on for him and let him color on it. We were really impressed when he drew 2 eyes, a mouth, and some hair on the face outline. I've never seen him do that before - proud mommy right here!

Family Proclamation FHE

This month's topic for FHE is the family. Baby #2 is coming less than a month from now, and we're trying to prepare Train Lover as best we can. This past Monday for FHE we focused on The Family: A Proclamation to the World.

We started by singing A Happy Family from the Children's songbook. Then Brent said the opening prayer.

We then watched this video by Elder Ballard. Afterwards, we took turns reading a line from the Family Proclamation summary.

http://mormonmomplanner.blogspot.com/2013/07/family-proclamation-summary.html

Then we made our craft project. I found this at A Year of FHE blog. It's a great resource with tons of printables. With each strip of paper we created 3 goals to work on in the different areas. I liked doing it because it helped us see how we can apply the Proclamation to our lives, and it's a great visual so we can all remember. It's hanging on our fridge and a great thing to see everyday.

$6.12 for $28.47 worth of product!

Target deals of the week:

4 Herbal Essences shampoo
  Buy 3 at $2.54 each, get 1 free.
  Used 2 $1 off/1 coupons and 1 $2 off/2 coupons.
  Final price: .91¢ each

Huggies baby wipes
  Usually $3.99, on clearance for $1.44
  Used .50¢ off/1 coupon.
  Final price: .94¢

5 index cards packs
  Normal price .50¢ each
  Used $1.50 off/5 up and up office supplies
  Final price: .20¢ each

Covergirl eyeshadow
  Usually $3.94 each, on clearance for $1.18 each
  Used $2 off/2 coupon and $1 off/1 coupon.
  Final price: .18¢ each

$6.12 for $28.47 worth of product!

Valentine's Day + Love Languages

Valentine's Day turned out differently then I thought it. But I'm grateful for it.

Brent and I made brunch together: pancake muffins and a breakfast casserole. Yummy!

While we cooked breakfast this little dude watched Cars, while holding all his cars.

Stopping to smell the roses carnations before eating.

We ended up going to a baptism late afternoon. It was announced last minute, so we weren't sure anyone from the branch would be there and we wanted to show our support. There was actually a good turn out since family from out of town was there.

Brent and I were going to cook our fancy dinner we got from Hyvee (which was disappointing when we cooked it the next day), but we were lazy and starving. So a heart shaped pizza and cookie dough from Papa Murphey's it was instead.

The pizza tasted amazing!

Our 'tent'

After putting the little one down for the night, we set up our campground! We decided to do an indoor camping thing for our Valentine date since 1) we didn't have money to go out and 2) we didn't have money to go out AND pay for a babysitter. Geesh. So expensive.

We set up our air mattress and sleeping bags and pillows. Then we created a fort using our kitchen chair and a quilt. Yes, this big pregnant woman managed to get that close to the ground and sleep through the night. I actually slept better on the air mattress and woke up only twice that night - a record as of the last month or so!

Brent and I were both tired and decided we were too lazy to make smores and play card games. So instead we did a few quizzes I had printed out a few weeks before. The first was a love language quiz. Our favorite marriage talk is from this guy, Dr. John L. Lund, called "For All Eternity". We've listened to it many times since being married and it is amazing! It has great advice on communication and how to better understand your spouse. We took the love language quiz when we were first married, but as we discovered taking it again, things have changed.

The different love languages are touch, verbal, and visual. I am a 12, 11, 4, which means I feel loved by touch (hugs, kisses, etc.) and verbal (talking, talking about plans and schedules, etc.) Brent on the other hand is a 5, 7, 15, which means he feels loved by visual (cleaning, acts of service, etc.). We both struggle feeling like the other one doesn't love us sometimes because I don't feel like I'm getting enough 'huggie-wuggie' and 'talkie-walkie', and Brent doesn't feel like he's getting enough 'doey-wooey'. We both talked about ways we can help each other and have resolved to think about the other's Love Language more.

We also took the Love Quest survey to remember what the other person's favorite things are. It should come in handy when trying to think about gifts!

Overall it was a good valentine's day. I'm glad I got to spend it with my loved ones :)

Family Tree FHE

Our theme for this month's FHE lessons is Family History. We focused on the family tree tonight.

We started by singing 'Family History - I Am Doing It' from the Children's songbook. Then Brent said the opening prayer. Afterwards we read this poem:

Oh so many branches

Are on my family tree.

Each one tells a name from

My family history.

Grandma’s there and Grandpa,

And lots and lots of greats.

Each of these fine folks gave

Me all my many traits.

Branches that are empty

Show names we haven’t found.

But I’m sure to find them

If I just look around.

Filling in the branches

Sure makes my tree look neat.

When I know them all, then

My tree will be complete.

Then came the lesson and activity part. I found the idea for it here and used the tree template they had.

Train Lover was excited for this part!

I found pictures around the house and traced circles around all the faces. Brent cut them out and Train Lover and I glued them to the tree. I just used construction paper and scrapbook paper for the background. Once we completed the tree we talked about our family and had the little guy point to family members when we asked where they were. We also asked to point out where his 2 grandpas and 2 grandmas were, and he did it no problem! He seemed to think it was cool he had 2 of them.

Here's the finished product! 

I think I'm going to hang the original in a frame and then print out a smaller copy to put in the little guys Sunday bag. Such a fun and simple lesson that everyone enjoyed!

January Goals I Completed

At the beginning of the year I made a post of the goals I plan to achieve this year. It was a busy month, but I'm happy to say that I did accomplish some of the goals for myself. I hope to get better and better with each new month.

Marriage Goals: Brent and I finally had a date together! Granted it was at home, and Train Lover was still awake, but it was a date nonetheless. Thanks to a sale from Hy-Vee, we both got a lot of Chinese food for less than $7. We love their Chinese food - who knew a grocery store could make good food? After we ate dinner we had a YouTube Karaoke night! Using my hairbrush as a microphone we took turns singing songs. We've done this date before and had a great time doing it and we got to enjoy it again.

I also read a marriage book this month entitled Becoming One: Intimacy in Marriage. It's a good read for all LDS people that are dating, close to getting married, and even those who have been married for awhile. It explains the differences between men and women, intimacy issues and concerns, and answers general questions most members of the church have before getting married. I read it shortly after we were married 3 years ago and enjoyed reading it again.

Personal Goals: I started two other books this month and will finish in the first week of February (I was close to finishing this month!)

Stand for Something: 10 Neglected Virtues That Will Heal Our Hearts and Homes was the book club book for the month. It is written by late prophet Gordon B. Hinckley. He writes about 10 virtues he feels have been neglected and put aside in our modern world and society, and what we can do to bring them back into our lives. I've enjoyed it so far and have learned a lot from it.

29 Gifts: How a Month of Giving Can Change your Life is a book I cannot put down. I started a few days ago and love it. It is about a woman diagnosed with MS and how she takes the advice of a spiritual leader and friend to give away 29 gifts in 29 days and the impacts it has on her life. I love the book and think it's really inspiring. I'm hoping to start my own 29 Gifts challenge soon. If any of you are feeling down about your life right now, I would encourage you to read this book.

Spiritual Goals: We had FHE every Monday this month! That is such a huge success for us. We have always struggled to have it. It's hard to do when it's just two people, and then you add a toddler and it gets more difficult. But I know it's important; that's why it's one of my goals this year to have FHE every Monday night.

For Christmas I got a planner. I've been using it every day to write down appointments, to do lists, and to keep track of praying and scripture study. I also printed out monthly and weekly FHE charts that I found on Pinterest and just changed the size of the image to fit in my planner. I cannot for the life of me now find where I got them from. I'll try to find them in case you want to use them too. Then I cut out the pages and glued them into the section in the back of my planner labeled 'Notes'. Now it's our year schedule for FHE. Brent and I came up with the following topics to focus on each month:

January - Church
February - Family History
March - Family (since #2 joins us this month)
April - Godhead (to focus on Easter)
May - Service
June - Joseph Smith (because he was martyred in June)
July - Emergency Preparedness
August - Scriptures
September - Prophets (to prepare for General Conference)
October - Prayer
November - Covenants (since we were married that month)
December - Christmas

Anyways, here is a look at our FHE plans for the month of January.

Here is one of the weeks lesson plans we had on Tithing.

I'm so glad I have goals to focus on this year and that I am working towards accomplishing some of them!

Sunday Can

A couple weeks ago for FHE (Family Home Evening, you can learn more about it here) we talked about the Sabbath Day and how important it was. Lessons in our home are short for Train Lover to stay focused the whole time. For this lesson, we created a Sunday Can. It's a can filled with strips of paper that have different ideas of things you can do on Sunday to keep it a holy day. The list can be found here. Some of the ideas included writing letters to family or missionaries, reading about an ancestor, visiting a neighbor, and drawing a picture of what you did for the day.

Each Sunday we choose a strip of paper out of the jar and do the activity. We know he is young, and he doesn't understand what he is doing right now, but that doesn't stop us from teaching. Parents need to teach while their kids are young. As Alma 37:35 says, "O, remember, my son, and learn wisdom in thy youth; yea, learn in thy youth to keep the commandments of God."

Today's activity from the can was to write in our journal. Two year old's can't write, but I knew he could help me do something. I talked to him about his day and asked what he remembered. Then I wrote down what he told me and had him color the paper after.

Here is his first journal page:

I know that it is by "small and simple things are great things brought to pass" (Alma 37:6). I'm grateful for the chance I have to teach my little guy good values here in the home.

Gospel ABC Book

I've been wanting to make a little quiet book of ABC's for our Sunday church bag for awhile, and I finally got around to it and completed it today. I found a great website that had a template of the ABC's and all you had to do was add your own pictures. It was just what I was looking for! You can find the link to the template here.

You open the template in any photo editing program. I used the LibreOffice Draw program (the same one I made our Christmas newsletter on). I love LibreOffice! It's similar to Microsoft Office but it's free. There are a lot of features on it that I love a lot more than Microsoft's programs. If you don't have Microsoft Office, download LibreOffice here and you won't be sad you did.

Add the photo you want for each letter, place it behind the wording, and adjust the size so it's at least 4" by 6". All my pictures were bigger than that. I then added a border around the words to know where the picture would be once I cut it from the sheet of paper. Print the pictures on paper (or real photos from Walgreens) and add it to a 4" by 6" photo album. I got mine at Dollar General for $1. That's it! It's really simple and looks great. I'm excited to see Train Lover's reaction to it tomorrow when he pulls it out of his bag.

Here are some of the completed pages:

$5.57 for 9 products at Target! + Rebate Apps

Another great buy at Target tonight. My favorite store!

Oci Clean Baby was on clearance for $6.45 instead of $7.59. I also had a $2 off manufacturer coupon bringing the price to $4.45.

Ricola was on clearance for $1.14 instead of $2.29. We bought 8 packages bringing the total to $9.12. The Snap by Groupon app had a rebate offer of $1 off Ricola with no limit. I snapped pics of the receipt, sent it in with the total packages I had purchased, and within 15 minutes I received confirmation that I earned back $8!

So my grand total for all 9 products was $5.57, saving me over $20!

If you have a smart phone, download these free rebate apps right now:

Cartwheel

Checkout 51

Ibotta

Snap by Groupon

Jingit

BerryCart

Shopmium

Savings Catcher (if you for some reason still shop at Wal-Mart!)

Shopkick (not a rebate app, but you earn giftcards just for walking into stores like Target and Wal-Mart and scanning items if you want more 'kicks')

All these apps work a little differently. Check them out and see what you like. They each offer different offers, but sometimes they have the same offer so you can have double or triple the savings, and use a coupon! I've been using them less than a month and have already saved over $42 in my groceries, just from these apps alone! My favorite apps are cartwheel (seriously, Target is the BEST!), Checkout 51, Ibotta, Jingit, and Snap.

Once you've downloaded them you just take pics of the receipt from the store showing proof you purchased the item and let the app know which items you're cashing in for. Read the rules to understand each app, but that's how most of them work.

I hope you all download them and use them. I look at them before I go grocery shopping and I usually have at least one item I can redeem cash back for by the time I get home. So go out there and start saving tons!

Couponing at Hyvee + 97¢ for 3 products!

I've been obsessing over rebate apps for smart phones the last few weeks. I have to say - they are amazing! I'll share some pointers throughout the next few weeks but I wanted to share my sweet shopping experience tonight.

Hy-Vee is where I do my grocery shopping here in Iowa. I love it because of their prices, the cleanliness of their store, their weekly sales, and the helpful customer service I receive. I also love to get 'fuel saver' rewards for certain products I buy. Certain items give you 1¢ to 50¢ off of each gallon of gas you buy (up to 20 gallons). There have been times where I have saved $1 and more per gallon of gas at the pump. That's a lot of savings when you drive a van. And I get the rewards for buying things I use anyway! I'm getting off track now. I just love Hy-Vee!

Through Hy-Vee's website, or using their app through your smartphone, you can add digital coupons to your fuel saver card. There are hundreds of coupons you can add to your card that are sent digitally to your specific barcode (similar to Target's cartwheel app). After reviewing Hy-Vee's coupon policy, and verifying with an employee at the store, I found out I could use a Hy-Vee digital coupon along with a manufacturer coupon. What's even better is that most coupons that Hy-Vee provides are the same coupon found from the website coupons.com. That means DOUBLE savings for the same item!

Here's what I bought tonight:

Excedrin is $3.99 originally for a 24 count bottle. I had a digital coupon for $1.50 off, plus a manufacturer coupon for $1.50 off. My final cost was 99¢.

Men's Speed Stick Deodorant was on sale for $3 instead of almost $4. I had a digital coupon for $2 off, plus a manufacturer coupon for $2 off. That means I EARNED $1 for buying that. So it paid for my Excedrin.

Olay Body Wash was $3.97. I had a digital coupon for $1 off, plus a manufacturer coupon for $1 off. I also had another $1 off by submitting my receipt on the Ibotta rebate app. So it was 97¢ for the body wash.

So for all 3 products that would have cost me $10.96 originally (since the deodorant was on sale), I paid only 97¢!

Baby prep + Bathroom cleanup

I have a few friends that are pregnant and due around the same time as me, or after. Lately they've been posting a lot on Facebook about getting ready for the baby: baby registries, washing baby clothes, arranging furniture, and so on. I haven't done a single thing for this baby yet. I don't know if it's because it's the second one and I'm not too worried, or because I just haven't thought about what I need to be doing. But I realized that the next 3 months are going to fly by and I do have things to do. Last night while watching Lady and the Tramp with the family I made a list of all the things I want to get done around here before the baby comes.

Bathroom

• clean and organize closet
• make inventory list of items we have

Kitchen

• clean and organize the pantry
• clean and organize the cupboards
• prepare 72 hours kits for all family members

Bedroom

• go through closet and get rid of clothes
• organize paperwork
• create office in walk-in closet
• arrange room for baby

Train lover's bedroom

• arrange room for baby #2
• sanitize all toys
• remove books from bookshelf that aren't age appropriate

Living Room

• sell and donate books/organize bookshelf
• arrange room to become playroom

Van

• wash inside and outside
• clean and empty out the inside
• set up carseat
• prepare emergency supplies and kits

Today I tackled the bathroom closet. Here's what it looked like before (sorry for the bad angles).

Here it is after!

• I labeled all the containers on the outside so we now know what's inside. 
• I also created an inventory list of all the items we have. Now I know I need to buy shampoo and deodorant before our current stuff runs out!

 

• The medicine and first aid supplies are now separated. 

 

• I moved a few things under the sink that belonged there, like hand soap refills. 
• I threw away expired things. 
• I took all the towels out of the closet and moved them to our bedroom closet. We never use those towels because we love our Norwex body towels too much!
• I also got a big pile together of things I know we won't use and posted pictures of the items online to sell. I should get about $50 for all the items I posted! 

Best thing about cleaning the closet was figuring out the things we need and making $50!

I also organized Train Lover's bookshelf. It was jam packed with books before. Now all the books on the shelf are perfect for his age. No more red, black, and white books and no more chapter books. Maybe seeing the books he has will get him more interested in reading :)

All the books I took off his shelf. A lot, right?

I tackled 3 things from my list today and it only took a couple hours to do. Going slow and steady each day for the next 3 months should make my list a piece of cake to achieve!

'Better'-ings for a Better Me

I was inspired by Crystal Paine's blog post "Why I Bombed My 2014 Goals". It made me look at my past goals, just as I did last year (I blogged about it here). I couldn't agree more with what she had to say.

This year is going to be busy in just a couple months when we add Baby #2 to the mix. I know it's going to be a challenge adjusting to two children and I'm going to be frazzled and frumpy for a time. But I want to make it a great year nonetheless!

So here is to me trying to better myself and my life this 2015 year!

Marriage Goals:

• Put Brent and our relationship first
• Go on a date at least once a month
• Read 6 marriage books

Mothering Goals:

• Stop yelling at my child(ren)
• Read 1 book a day with kids
• Monthly one-on-one time with my Train Master (little one #1)

Personal Goals:

• Read 3 books every month
• 10 minutes of Facebook per day TOPS
• Get back to pre-pregnancy weight

Spiritual Goals:

• Be prepared for Sunday School and Relief Society lessons each week
• Visit teach all my sisters each month
• Go to the temple at least 4 times
• FHE every week

I'm excited about these goals. I have a plan of action to accomplish all of these and I really hope believe I can do it. I'm grateful I got a planner for Christmas. I've already stamped in spots to mark of some goals and glued in some monthly and weekly FHE charts. Maybe I'll blog about my planner another time. Right now I need to get to work though! The day is almost through and I still need to do some of these things.

Share some of your goals with me down below!