How adorable is this outfit?! I thought it was very fitting for yesterday since it’s so festive and it was December 1st! It came in a pack of three, the other two are pictured below (and they’re only $15!). I’m so excited to dress Melly up in all three of them this month.
And honestly I just can’t with the bows. Melly will be three months old next week and I haven’t really put too many bows on her because I thought they would fall off all the time but they stay on a lot better than I thought. And they’re too cute that I don’t even care anymore if they do fall off, ha!
t w o
The boys painted these snowmen yesterday and had so much fun doing it. I’m thinking of getting the tree or more snowmen for us all to paint together because I think it would be really fun to do too.
t h r e e
I’m so excited to go through this devotional this season. It’s already been really helpful in setting my heart in the right place and not putting too many expectations on the wrong things that will ultimately leave me unfulfilled.
f o u r
We’ve been using this diaper bag for a few months now and I love it as much as I thought I would. It’s such high quality for the price. It still looks brand new and it functions so well. I can fit my computer and charger, two sound machines, diapers for both babes, wipes, extra clothes, snacks, and their blankets. I’m so impressed. Plus it’s super cute. ☺️
f i v e
How adorable is wrapping paper?! I’m such a sucker for anything with a truck and Christmas tree on it. There’s actually a ton of paper on the roll too which is really nice because I feel like sometimes there’s only enough for a few presents and it’s quite frustrating. I also actually can’t wait to wrap presents this year. I can’t wait to see them all under the tree on Christmas Eve.
s i x
I have been trying to prioritize working out this season because after three babies, my body just isn’t the same. I did this video this week and it was a really good workout. I love the whole channel really and plan to try to squeeze in at least one to two videos a week to start.
Today I’m linking up with Andrea and Erika for Friday Favorites! The links are affiliate, thanks for supporting my little blog!
It’s rainy and cold today so I’m thinking that I need to get ingredients to make our favorite quick chicken soup. This recipe has been our favorite for a while now. We love the creaminess of it because the orzos are cooked in the soup. So so good!
What I’m reminiscing about:
About this time last year we found out that sweet Melanie was in my belly so I’ve been thinking about that this week. I’m so thankful for the gift that she is to our family. Things have been so busy with adding a baby to our family and doing homeschool for the first time this season but it’s all been so worth it and has brought so much joy to my life. Sounds a little cheesy but I’m just so thankful.
What I’m loving:
I’ve been really enjoying this holiday blend every morning. It’s so much fun to have a special coffee to make this season extra special. I especially love it in my special Christmas mug. I totally forgot that I have three Christmas mugs and was really excited when I took them out of our Christmas bin the other day!
What we’ve been up to:
Preparing for Christmas! I have been ordering lots of gifts. We also got our tree last weekend! It’s one of my favorite traditions we do as a family.
What I’m dreading:
The weather getting even colder. I’m so not ready for the cold weather this year. I wish it was so much shorter of a season. But for us up here in New Jersey, it feels never ending. It won’t get warm again until about April. 😑
What I’m working on:
Adding some new t-shirts to my Etsy shop! I actually made my first sale this week and it was so exciting! I want to work on adding even more designs soon.
I’m also working on vlogmas this year! I want to upload a new video every Monday for the month of December. We’ll see how that goes. 😉
What I’m excited about:
I’m so excited to enjoy this season with three sweet kiddies this year. Adding another baby to our family just brings so much joy and it’s going to be so much fun to experience this season with our newest addition. ❤️
What I’m watching/reading:
We’ve been watching a lot of How I Met Your Mother this month but just recently went back to another one of our old favorites, Gilmore Girls. Something about this time of year just makes me want to cozy up after a long day and enter into the perfect world of Gilmore Girls. 😌
I also finally was able to finish How To Really Love Your Child this month and I really loved it. If you’re looking for practical ways to show love to your child, this book is really helpful. It talks about how all children need three ways of being shown love by their parents: eye contact, physical touch, and focused attention. It talks about how it’s important to make sure that these three needs are met before unnecessarily disciplining your child and it was just a very interesting read. It’s not perfect but I do recommend it!
What I’m listening to:
Lots and lots of Christmas music! My favorite station is King’s Kaleidoscope Holiday radio on Pandora. They are my favorite Christian band and their Christmas music is so good.
What I’m wearing:
I’ve been wearing this sweater a whole lot lately. It’s so cozy and perfect for this season. I’m also currently wearing this shirt from my Etsy shop for the first time and I love it so much. It’s lightweight and very soft and not to mention super cute! 😉 I’m going to have to order this shirt in a different design for every day of the week honestly they are that comfy.
What I’m doing this weekend:
Giving the house a good deep clean and finishing setting up Christmas! We started decorating our tree but have a few more ornaments to add and I need to put up the rest of the Christmas decorations. For some reason I already feel like December is halfway over and I’m hoping getting the house all set up with Christmas will help me feel more in the Christmasy mood.
What I’m looking forward to next month:
Christmas of course! I can’t wait to wake up on Christmas morning and celebrate the birth of Jesus and get to see the joy on our kids faces. It’s just the best!
Favorite Amazon purchases this month:
I just bought this advent devotional and I’m really excited about it. I love Ruth Chou Simms and having a devotional for the Christmas season also just makes the season feel extra special. It also really helps me to keep my heart in the right place and not get too obsessed about trying to make everything perfect.
I’m also super excited to see my boys in these rain boots after they get them for Christmas. They’re too cute!
Posting this a day late but I’m linking up with Shay for What’s Up Wednesday! I’ve been doing this link up randomly over the years for so long and it’s still so much fun! Also as a disclaimer, the links I used are affiliate links. Thanks so much for supporting my little blog! 🙂
Today I’m sharing a day in the life video on how we homeschool with a baby and a toddler. I also shared about some small home storage ideas, and a short two month update on sweet Melly.
I hope everyone had an enjoyable Thanksgiving! It seems only fitting to share a few of the things that I bought for gifts for Christmas this year since it’s Black Friday! 🙂
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The Story Of God Books – I’m so excited to give these to the boys for Christmas. They’re still on sale for $60 so I’m still debating on returning the ones I bought and buying them on sale. 😉 There’s five books: I Am Forever, I Am Rescuer, I Am Holy, I Am With You, and I Am Creator. Each book explains in very easily understandable ways how God is each of these things. I’m excited for the conversations it will open with our kids but I’m also excited for it for myself and to remember just simply who God is to me too.
t w o
Vtech Sort & Recycle Ride-On Truck – This is my favorite gift to give to any 1-2 year old boy. This is the second year I’m buying it for Christmas for one of my nephews. It’s really affordable for what it is in my opinion. It’s not only a ride on toy, which is fun in itself but it also has a learning aspect for learning shapes and colors. Both years I have actually gifted it with this book too because the two together are super cute and just the perfect combination.
t h r e e
My First Christmas Onesies – I couldn’t resist buying these for my sweet Melly! How adorable are they?? And for only $15 I thought that wasn’t too bad either. I can’t wait to see her in these. 🙂
f o u r
Water Tummy Time Mat – I only bought Melly a few small gifts because she really doesn’t need anything honestly and one of those gifts is this mat. It looks super fun for her and is easily stored away since we don’t have a whole lot of space for toys these days. It would be a particularly good gift for a baby who doesn’t like tummy time.
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Camping Set – I haven’t bought this yet but am considering buying it for my boys to share. It’s the perfect gift for any 2-5 year old. My boys love playing pretend and I could honestly see them playing with this for hours.
I’m also still planning on getting a few things for stocking stuffers for them too. These Water Wow pads are always a hit. And these Popin’ Pipes look like the perfect little toy that the boys will always have in their hands.
Today I’m linking up with Andrea and Erika for Friday Favorites! The links are affiliate, thanks for supporting my little blog!
For Christmas this year I have felt the conviction to pull away from the consumerist nature of our culture as much as possible. However, my favorite way to show love for others is by finding just the right gift for them that I know will speak to their heart. This can be for a birthday or holiday or just randomly when I’m at the grocery store and I see something that I know they will like. So as you might imagine, Christmas and birthdays are a bit hard for me not to get carried away and want to buy all the things for my favorite people. And while I don’t ever go into debt to do this sometimes I may just stretch the budget just a bit further than is necessary.
So this year I wanted to try something new to help me reign in those desires to bless my people with all of the things. Especially because my kids are very loved and will be getting many things from family members and don’t need much from us anyway.
This year I decided to try the “something they want, something they need, something to wear, and something to read” trend. It definitely made me more intentional about what I bought them and definitely helped me cut back on what I wanted to buy for them too. Here’s what I got my oldest, who is about to turn five in January.
Dino Smashers – He actually saw this on a Youtube commercial and has been asking for it ever since so I thought it would be the perfect “something he wants”. It’s actually still on sale for $14 and is a lot bigger than it looks so is an awesome but affordable gift for your 2-7 year old.
Animal Chair – I actually bought this for him for Christmas when he was almost two. Three years later and the first one has been used every day since and is falling apart so I thought it was time for a new one.
Rain Boots – Shane has been asking for rain boots for a while too so I bought these for both him and Riley so they can splash in puddles in the Spring. I was going to buy these ones but came across the short ones instead and thought it would be better for our two year old. I thought the taller ones looked like they would be hard for him to walk in. I love how they come in so many different colors too. I can’t wait to buy the pink ones for Melly. 😍
The Story of God Books – These are actually a joint gift for him and Riley and I’m so excited about them. They are five books explaining who God is in a very simple and easy to understand way. They also have really awesome pictures. I’m really hoping that they will open up a lot of conversations in the future about God and the Bible. They are actually on sale for only $60 now and I’m frustrated that I bought them too soon for $75. 🙄
We are also planning on buying one more “big gift” to share between Shane and Riley but I’m not sure what it’s going to be yet. It feels good to keep things simple this year. I’m going to be sharing what we are getting our two year old soon too.
Have you ever done categories for gifts like this before? How did you like it?
I decided this week that once a week we are going to have a “fun” day because our homeschool curriculum only has four days of work. Yesterday was our fun day this week and we watched the “scary grinch” aka the older How The Grinch Stole Christmas and baked sugar cookies. It was so much fun!
t w o
We got our family pictures back this week! Like I mentioned a couple weeks ago, I hate preparing and taking them but I absolutely love having these pictures to look back on! In case you’re looking for cute Christmas outfits for your kids, these are the boys shirts and jeans, and this is Melly’s adorable dress and her tights. I think I’m going to have to buy her the next size up so she can wear this dress for Christmas! I can’t wait to design our Christmas cards soon. Maybe I’ll do that this weekend…
t h r e e
I have been loooving this book this week. I started it a while ago but I have been reading it very slowly because it has such great content in it and I want to truly absorb as much as I can. My morning bible time has been so good lately, I have been enjoying my favorite holiday coffee blend, reading my favorite devotional, spending some time in Romans, and then ending it off with a chapter of this book. It has been a really great start to my days!
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Melly in this baby bathrobe 😍. I can’t even with how cute she is. If you aren’t familiar, we have two boys and Melanie is our first girl and we are totally just obsessed with how adorable she is especially in all of the sweet girl clothes. This robe was a gift so I can’t link it specifically, but here’s an equally adorable one if you are looking for one for your baby girl. And here’s just the cutest little robe for a baby boy! 😍😍😍
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We made our annual apple pie with the apples we picked last week. I’m not crazy about apple pie honestly but this dutch apple pie is sooo good. It would be great for Thanksgiving next week!
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I made these strombolis this week too and oh my gosh, they were soo good. We don’t follow the recipe for what’s inside, just for the dough. In this one I added pepperoni, green peppers, and onions, mozzarella cheese and a little bit of ricotta. So so good! The only other thing that I wish we had was Rao’s sauce. It would have been way better with it.
Thanks for joining me this week! I’m linking up with Andrea and Erika, come join us. 🙂 Also some links are affiliate links. Thanks for supporting my little blog!
