New idea!

Time, I never seem to have enough of it no matter how hard I try. And if someone says one more time "well if Blaine were in school" I will rip their head off and fed it to the dogs, no really.

Its not about coming up with more hours in the day to get things done or putting Blaine in school it is about me making the most out of the time I have.

I am bad for getting onto a task and losing track of time and instead of getting time to do the other things I needed to do I have now run out of either time or energy.

Timers, my phone has this neat little feature which I am sure most new phones have it (insert sarcasm tone). As I write this blog my timer has been set for 1 hour. That means I have 1 hour to blog for today and if I happen to get more time later on then so be it but right now I get hour to get whatever thoughts are going on in my head out on the white screen of my blogger template.

This means that when I start a task, depending on what it is I have 1 hour to either finish it or move onto the next thing I need to do, which includes cleaning!

When it comes to Blaine or his schooling there is and never will be a timer. Playing and learning are done without limits!!

I use my timer for cleaning, baking, cooking, blogging, working, party planning, etc.

It is not used for shopping lol, as it takes me 5 hours and 10 stores each week. 

Take today for example. I have 1 hour to blog, 1 hour to bake, 1 hour to clean, 1 hour to fold and put away the laundry, 1 hour to work on my sisters baby shower, 1 hour to work on business stuff and so on.

I know it may seem pretty simple to most people to be able to just move from task to task but my brain doesn't and never has worked that way. What happens is I will start cleaning, get distracted by something in that room IE the book shelf needs sorted so I will move onto that and the cleaning wont get finished.

Unless Blaine needs/wants something then my focus is only on that activity for that amount of time.

Crazy right, wonder how much you can get done on one thing in an hour, well when my focus is only on what I am doing for that one hour I can clean the whole main floor, fold and put away 5 totes of laundry, start and finish 2 blog posts, cook and clean up an entire meal all before serving it.

When you force your mind to focus and tell it, "you only have 1 hour you got this" it just happens.

Client orders, sometimes I limited myself to 1 hour at a time depending on what it is and then an hour later on etc because I become hyper focused at times and hours and hours can go by and it isn't creating a good balance between work life and SAHM life.

How do you focus? How do you divide your time?

I will update in a months time and see how I did with this :)

Baby Shower: Butterfly Napkins

Yes I am still working on things for my sisters baby shower. It is only a month away and still a lot to get finished.


These are super cute and could be used for a baby shower, a birthday, mothers brunch, Easter dinner and so many other occasions. I used white utensils, pink napkins and gold curling ribbon because those are her colours but you can use any you would like.

The bigger the napkin the bigger the butterfly, also if you used those tiny elastics on the utensils first it would make life so much easier but, there are children going to be attending the baby shower so I don't want to risk the chocking hazard.


Supplies:

Curling ribbon
Scissors
Tiny Elastics (if you are using them)
Napkins
utensils

Step 1:

Gather your supplies

Step 2:

Cut your ribbon the desired length.

Step 3:

Stack your utensils

I found knife, fork, spoon order stacked the best.

 Step 4:
Fold your napkin like a fan

Step 5:

This gets a little tricky and where the elastics come in handy for hold them today while you tie.
Hold you napkin in the over top of the utensils all in one hand, while wrapping the ribbon around both the stack and the napkin then knot. Make sure you not is at the top of the center crease.

Step 6:

Trim the ribbon ends but not too much these are the antenna for your butterfly

Step 7:

Curl just the top of each ribbon end.

 Step 7:

I fluff out my ends to make it look more like a butterfly than a bow tie, but that's all up to you and your likes

And you are done, now I have 40 more to make!! Enjoy!!!

Speech

With homeschooling comes comments and opinions from all sides and with those comes more mom guilt and with that comes the worry that you are not doing enough, that your child isn't where they are supposed to be, that you are doing you child a disservice.

Then comes appointments like the one we had the other day at Pathways, it is our local center that helps children with all kinds of things. From speech to severe autism, they are amazing!

Just before my son turned 4 he had an apt because I was worried about some of his word sounds and the way he says things.

At that appointment she told me to work on waiting games so he could work on waiting for the other person to go.

The differences from then to now, which is about 6/7 months later. He is 4, is has at least double the attention span of last time, is great with waiting his turn and scored high on everything expect for explaining why two things go together. IE foot, bed, hand. Foot and hand go together because they are both body parts. His answer was because you walk with one and write with the other. Which she said if it wasn't a standardized test he would have gotten that right. IE Pants, Bread, Shirt. Pants and Shirt because they are both clothes. He said because they keep you warm. She said once again he would have gotten that right but because its standardized it has to be a certain way.


At the end of the appointment she said he is doing amazing and discharging him because he is a at the age 6-8 for speech.


There is a test that when he is 6 I might want to have him do there which is the same as what I have. My ears hear it but my brain doesn't process it all the time. This means that people repeat themselves a lot or it takes a min for my brain to catch up lol.

Just the way it is but he can't be tested for it until after 6 years of age.

One proud momma over here!!!

He may not be able to write yet but he can speak and organize and follow directions in an advanced way.

I will toot the homeschool horn for a few days or until someone so nicely points out that hes missing out on such and such and mom guilt takes over once again.

Whats your mom guilt look like?

Planners

My all time favourite planner is the Happy Planner from Micheals. I love that you can take pages out and add pages to modify.

I love my planner so much I sit down and fill it out at least twice a year and forget to take it everywhere when I leave.

Fancy cover for my planner (I bought it with a planner in it many moons ago)

Guess that means I love the idea of my planner and being organized. Its a good time if I remember to update the giant 2 month wall calendar before 4 months have passed lol. Do I suck at planning and being organized? No not really. I am actually great at planning, organizing and all that jazz. What I lack is the time to actually fill these things out and the memory to take them with me.

My happy planner cover, not that you can see it inside the fancy case

I tell myself every couple of months when I start a new planner or fill out the old one that I will do better, that I will remember to take it with me, to fill it out and remember where I left it last. I get so much joy from filling out the pages with my beautiful pens. I have a thing for pens I will explain in another post.

Inside the planner this is month at a glance.

When I update the wall calendar I promise I will fill it out so everyone in the house is on the same page. I end up forgetting or lose my wippy board markers, or they get used on paper and then are no use for the washable calendar.

What each week looks like. Lots of room under the days to put information

As it turns out I planned on setting up my planner today but well it would seem I couldn't find it anywhere. My normal stash spots for it are the kitchen table under all the homeschool stuff, in the car down beside the passenger side of the seat or with my bullet journals in the living room. It seems it is not in any of those spots.

All cleaned off from Feb/Mar lol

 So planner is set aside for another day when I remember.

On the upside I do use my google calendar which is connected to my sons dads phone as well so he knows whats going on. The only down side is I always tell myself I will put it in the calendar later and end up forgetting.

Sigh one day I will be pro at this stuff but for today I will continue to put in the effort.

What is your favourite planner? What is your favourite way to stay organized?


Update: I ended up finding my planner on top of the fridge, not entirely sure how it got there because I am far to short to reach it. Turns out I need to get new pages for it. The current pages end in June, oops.

Homeschool Week 19

Animal Tracks! This would be way more fun if we had actual snow but this year winter seems to be delayed.


We will be using the same two work books we have been working through for a little but now. They are morning starters an educational workbook that I found at Dollar Tree and my first book of color craze, which was also found at Dollar Tree. The book we are working on this week is called "school" by Scholastic. We have also started doing our letters on paper this week we will be covering E, F, G he loves that after he finishes doing each row of letters he gets to do a letter in his own name! Our science experiments came from "The USBORNE big book of Experiments".

Day 1:

Sight word Play flash cards, this week we are reading the book lunch by scholastic, writing, workbook, animal tracks worksheet, ABC Mouse

Outing: Playgroup

Day 2:
Sight word Play work sheet, reading book Lunch, science, workbook, animal tracks video, ABC mouse

Outing: Skating


Day 3:

Sight word Play flash cards, reading book Lunch, writing, workbook, Animal tracks at the park, ABC Mouse

Outing: We are going to check out animal tracks and see if we can figure out what animals left them.


Day 4:

Sight word Play work sheet, reading book lunch, science, workbook, making animal tracks with paint, ABC Mouse

Outing: Skating

Day 5: 

Sight word Play flash cards, reading book lunch, writing, workbook, ABC mouse, animal tracks video

Outing: Library

DIY tutu baby shower invites

When you sister is the Queen of Pinterest you get amazing invites for what works out to .65 cents each instead of 5.50+shipping each.

Now I made 40 invites so your supply list might be smaller than mine if you are making fewer invites.

Supplies:
  Card stock in your choice of colour. I used pink and got it at micheals for 6.00
  Template. I hand cut mine but you can cut them on the curict machine.
  Flat Pearls. I got mine at Dollaramma
  Washi tape in your colour choice. Because I needed glitter gold I had to get mine at micheals instead of the dollar store so it was 8.49 for 2 rolls.
   Sisscors
   Xazto knife
   Glue stick
   Plan white paper
   Printer or hand write the information on the white paper
   Tulle 1 roll in the colour of your choice. I used whatever I had left on partial rolls from the business but you can get it at walmart for about $3.50 a roll. 
   Time It takes about 1 hour per invite from from start to finish.
   Letter stickers in your choice of colour. I used gold glitter sticker paper and used the curit machine to cut the letters out.
  Glue gun

I started with cutting ALL 40 of the invites from my card stock after tracing them on the card stock from my template.


Then I did all the glitter tape, this is time consuming and detail oriented. You have to do around the neck, each arm, each leg hole for the top piece and each leg hole for the bottom piece. You can not put all your tape on and then cut it because when you peel it off it will rip your card stock.


I used 5 pearls per neck line but you can use as many or little as you would like.

Fold your invite as so

Put your letters on the front of the invite

The tulle I measured the width of the space where I was putting it, doubled that measurement because I am gathering it. Fold the tulle top to bottom, then gather/pleat how you would like. Glue to the front of the invite with your glue gun.

Cut your plan paper to the size of the inside of your invite, hand write your information on them.
or
Type up the information you would like inside your invite and print them using wallet size on your printer settings. Then cut them out.

Use the glue stick to glue the plan paper inside your invite.

Also use your glue stick to glue down any washi tape that is coming up or the top part of the oneies to keep it from popping up.


Note: I had to glue gun my pearls down because they kept falling off.

Underwraps, Over rated

Trying new restaurants in town is one of my favourite things to do, you never know what hidden gems you will find.

UnderWraps Cafe was greatly over rated. I figured it would be something crossed between Taco Bell and Mucho Burritos, boy was I wrong.

The decor and tables are very nice. The cafe is tiny which would normally give you a cozy feeling, UnderWraps gives you more of a squished feeling. The food looked amazing from behind the glass counter, the women working that day was glued to her phone and short to the point of almost rude.

I ordered the pulled pork nachos and Connely got the chicken burrito. His burrito had cooked veggies, rice, cheese sauce and chicken. On the side was spicy mayo We watched her put it in the griller but it was not grilled by any stretch of the imagination. It was soggy and falling apart. Without the spicy mayo the chicken was tasteless.

The topping choices were limited to about 7 choices. My nachos were topped with cooked veggies, pulled pork, cheese sauce and salas. The pulled pork was completely tasteless, as were the chips and the veggies. The salsa had no spice, no flavour. The pulled pork was tough and chewy.

To say that UnderWraps Cafe is not a hidden gem is an understatement. This is not a restaurant I would recommend nor attend in the future. I would suggest hiring staff members that a tad more pleasant and welcoming for starters.