Slice of Life: March 16th, 2017

What a week!

We’ve been busy around here! Hadley would say that the last few days have gone down as three of her favorite ever – she had her first real sleepover with friends. 🙂 One of my girlfriends went into labor on Monday, so I met her family at the hospital, scooped up her two daughters, and brought them home with us for a couple days.

I was out running an errand when I found out that I was going to be picking them up, so I called Jamie to let him know and to suggest that we put them on the air mattress in Hadley’s room. When we came home he had both of our girls bathed, in bed, and the air mattress blown up with sheets, pillows, and blankets. That’s the kind of stuff that fills my love tank! He was surprised that I was so appreciative because he said it was just assumed he’d help get the house ready to receive a couple extra kiddos, but it meant a lot to me.

Our days looked like a lot of movies, a lot of chocolate chip cookie baking, a lot of pizza and Mickey-shaped sandwiches, and a lot of playing with every toy under our roof. 😉 I think the first night they stayed up and laughed until 10:30 p.m. while Jamie and I sat in the Living Room thinking about how this is just a glimpse into our future as our girls get older.

Back tracking a bit, on Saturday Hadley and I had a spontaneous movie date at the $2 theater down the road to see Moana. I haven’t spent much time with her one-on-one since Sadie was born, but since I’m done breastfeeding we’ll have more spontaneous opportunities to do this kind of thing. I just love her and how easy to please she is entertainment-wise.

Since I knew Jamie and I would be spending the majority of this past Saturday working behind our computers on Army/FRG/MOPS/church/showers/etc. stuff, I grabbed Hadley a couple cheap activities from the Target OneSpot section while running an errand that morning – this felt dollhouse and a gem excavation kit. My friends and I all agree that cheap, junky toys from Target or Dollar Tree that are just played with for a short time and thrown away are often SO much better than anything expensive and bulky! Kids’ interests change so fast!

Also… just a sweet picture of my littlest love. It’s so hard to believe that she’ll be one in just over a month. She has six teeth (four up top and two on the bottom), is clapping all the time, and is saying “no”, “mama”, and “dada”. We don’t know if these are purposeful or if they’re just familiar sounds to her, but it’s adorable regardless! It’s crazy because this is exactly (almost to the day!) that Hadley first said “mama” (one week shy of 11 months). She’s no where close to walking and seems perfectly happy speed-crawling. I look forward to her walking though so that she can enjoy the playground a little more maybe this spring or summer. We’ll see!

In extended family news, there’s been a lot of excitement (and a bit of anxiousness too) going on. I have to brag on my siblings because they’re both pretty awesome! On Sunday my sister, brother-in-law, and niece (aaaaand fur-niece) PCSed (moved) to Germany for a couple years. I’ve written about my sister and her family a million times; we’re really close with them. We’d love to get over and visit at some point, but right now we can’t see a time frame that would give us a chance to take a week off and go. The next 12 months of our lives are going to be BANANAS, you guys. Stay tuned!

PS: Big shoutout to a reader and fellow blogger Sarah Hogan who emailed me a NOVEL of Germany info to pass along to my sister. It was so helpful to her and very thoughtful! Thanks again!

During the same weekend that my sister moved overseas, my brother was down in Nicaragua competing in an adventure/survival race. He completed a 100-mile race about 18 months ago in Alabama, and I guess he figured the only way he would top that would be to skip the country and do something crazy. 😉 He’s home safe and sound now and had the time of his life. Pretty awesome.

Finally, this is definitely a favorite this week! I talked last November/December about Giving Assistant, but it’s been in the forefront of my mind recently as I’ve been shopping for a few things for our Disney trip next week. I’ve been earning cash back right and left and loving it!

Giving Assistant is simply a cash back website that pays you via Paypal 60 days after you make a purchase. It was pretty nice receiving all of that cash back after Christmas! You simply create a profile, make sure the little widget is installed so that it pops up (as screenshotted above) when you visit a cooperating website, and then bam! You activate it and receive cash back from your purchase. Click here to make a profile! (<–affiliate link – Thanks! You’ll receive your first $5 for using this link after making your first purchase.)

Hope you’ve had a good week so far! Stay tuned for the Saturday Sit-Down in a couple days! It’s going to feature one of my absolute favorite girls that I’ve “met” through blogging. 🙂