Category Archives: Moms

Zucchini Brownies

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I’m not a baker. Never have been. I actually have ruined 95% of the things I’ve tried baking over the years. I can cook decently well but me and baking just can seem to mesh

However, I did successfully bake the best zucchini brownies ever! And I’m not a brownie person! I actually very much dislike brownies, cookies, cake, etc. But these were pretty good! Would I crave them again? No. But that’s because I’m not a brownie person. If I was I’d be making these every week!

I think what I liked about them was that they didn’t have that oily texture. I hate that so many baking items require an oil base. Zucchini replaced the oil in this case. So instead of an oily feel, it was just very moist and soft. None of that greasy feel when you picked them up. I also didn’t feel as guilty having one because I was like well, there is zucchini so I’m getting a hint of a veggie!

Ingredients:

•2 cups flour (I used rice flour)

•1 cup grated zucchini

•1/2 cup cocoa powder

•1 cup granulated sugar

•1/2 cup skim milk

•2 eggs

•1 cup chocolate chips

•2 tsp baking soda

•2 tsp vanilla extract

•pinch of salt

Frosting:

•8 tbsp cocoa powder

•8 tbsp water

•4 tbsp sugar

•1 tsp vanilla extract

Recipe:

•Preheat oven to 350 degrees

•Spray 9×9 pan with cooking spray

•Combine all ingredients (minus the ingredients for frosting) into a bowl and mix until smooth

•Pour batter into pan

•Bake 25 minutes

•Combine ingredients for frosting and mix till smooth

•Once brownies are done and cooled, top with icing

Break in truth

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Recently we had one of our vehicles broken in to. While it doesn’t seem like a huge deal other than stressful due to loss of items and damage of property, it’s actually a very violated feeling. It’s a weird feeling to know a complete stranger damaged your property, went through said property and then took your personal items. In our case they took a lot of items. Thousands of dollars worth. I’m sure you’re wondering why we would have so many expensive items in our car. Well, when you get home late and are tired, the last thing on your mind is to empty your vehicle in case of a break in. Also, our vehicle had limo tint on its windows, so it’s not exactly easy to just see in. Everything that was taken was not out in plain sight. It was in a glove box, center console or hidden under the seat.

It’s sad when you think about the world we live in now days. The fact that just locking your vehicle isn’t good enough any more. In all honesty, the neighborhood we were in isn’t exactly a safe neighborhood so we should have expected something like this to happen. But you never really expect it to happen to you.

I now have this constant fear. Will they come back? Were they watching the house or just the car? Are they still watching the house? No other cars on the block or in the neighborhood were hit. Just ours. Neighbors had vehicles on the street and in driveways. Not to be rude but there were vehicles on the street that seemed like an easier hit. Yet ours was the only one hit. It’s as if they were watching the house and saw that that night was the one night we didn’t bring in these items, which we normally always do. It was probably just a random hit, but it’s still scary. If they’ll hit a locked vehicle that’s parked next to a security camera, what’s keeping them from burglarizing a house? Yes I said it was parked next to a security camera. However nothing was caught on camera. The internet went down and the camera needs internet connection so it caught nothing. Just our luck right?

As frustrating as it is losing material items, the worst part is just the fear. Any feeling of safety and security I had is now gone. I’m sure over time it’ll ease, but I’ll never 100% feel safe anymore.

Benefit of fevers

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All our lives we have been told (if you paid attention to your Dr or in health class 😉) that fevers are beneficial to fight infection. Having a fever can be scary, especially if it gets into the 104+ range. However, it’s also good. A fever, which is an elevated body temperature, sets in motion a series of mechanisms that regulate our immune system.

If you remember back to health class in high school, your hypothalamus is what sits at the base of your brain and regulates body temp. When your hypothalamus detects pathogens from the immune system, it signals for the body to generate and retain more heat. Thus triggering a fever.

There’s a saying…..”feed a cold, starve a fever.” If you have a fever you should avoid eating. You want your body focusing on the fever and riding itself of pathogens. By provoking digestion, you are over stimulating the parasympathetic nervous system.

Most fevers, a doctor will tell you to just stay home in bed and rest. When my son was 2 he got a fever of 104. The doctor told us to put him in a luke warm bath. If him temp continued at 104 or higher for two hours or more, then we were to take him to the emergency room. It’s scary, but again the body is just fighting an infection.

What’s crazy now days is the minute we find out someone has a fever, we go into full on panic because it’s possible they have corona virus! Before this pandemic, if someone had a fever they were told to go home and rest and no one really thought twice about it. But because of this virus, you get a fever, and people literally run from you! Lol

You body does some really cool things if you just pay attention to it. People are so focused on a quick fix and pump themselves with medication too early so their body becomes reliant on medication vs allowing it to use its immune system and fight it as god planned. Mind you, not all illnesses can be fought off by the immune system. I think we can all agree that there are quite a few cases where medication is needed. Please don’t go on the attack. I am not anti medication. I am just one who prefers to let the immune system try to work first. Then if help is needed, you call your doc and get your body extra help!

Terrible twos

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Terrible twos was definitely a bit brutal! People told me it was rough, but it wasn’t what I was expecting. The random melt downs, complete defiance, temper tantrums, etc. I knew he would push his limits but lord!!! Mix in the fact that he was still learning to talk and it made things so much more difficult for both of us. He would try to tell me something and got frustrated because I didn’t understand what he’s saying or wanting.

Every day I was exhausted! It’s an exhausted I’d never felt before. It’s a mix of mental and physical exhaustion. But weirdly enough, he wasn’t exhausted (ever)! It’s like the terrible twos upped his energy level. I was worn out well before he was. His bed time would come around and I was the one who needed to go to bed.

What didnt help was other moms telling me “wait till he’s 3 that’s worse than 2.” Come on people!!! Give a new mom a glimmer of hope! I need to see the light at the end of the tunnel and comments like this don’t help!

We are now at 3 and it’s a whole other ball game. He’s now able to talk, very well actually. But he still doesn’t know how to verbalize his feelings or emotions. So when tiredness comes over him and he’s ready for a nap, a lot of the time he just goes crazy. He’s not that kid who tells me he wants to go nap. He has always hated napping. Instead he acts out or throws things. What’s funny is he will throw something, look at me and go “mommy I’m being bad” and sometimes he actually goes and puts himself in timeout! It takes every bit of strength in my body not to die laughing. Because let’s be honest….the wrath of a toddler who’s in a mood and you laugh at him….nope I’m not going there!

He is a good boy. A very good boy. He’s so loving and does try to help out and share with his brother. We are just in a stage. I try to remind myself of that. Obviously in the moment it’s not exactly the thought going through my head. Most thoughts are more like “dear god please make this stop.” 😂 But as bad as I say it is, it could be worse. He isn’t as bad as some horror stories I’ve heard. He really is a good little boy. He is just learning and trying to figure out his emotions and life in general! 💙

Conversations with toddlers

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One of the most exhausting things in the world……having a conversation with a toddler. My child is obsessed with the trash man, trash truck and trash bin. The trash bins outside not the small trash cans in your house.😂

I have no idea why. That’s just his thing right now and he talks about them non stop. Every conversation, no matter what it’s about, you can expect him to bring up something about a trash can or the trash man. If he hears a truck outside, he yells out “trash truck!” It could be just a regular, non commercial truck and he still yells it.

If you take him on a walk he will point out every single trash bin in the neighborhood. EVERY SINGLE ONE! What could be a 10 minute walk turns into 30-40 minutes because he has to stop so many times to point each one out. And heaven forbid the lid be left open on one or the front side not be facing out. He will let out a gasp as if something terrible just happened, point to the trash can and tell you the lid is open or it’s not facing forward.

I’ll be honest, it was funny and adorable at first. But now it’s a little tiring. I keep hoping every day something new will peak his interest and he will start talking about that every day. I need a break from hearing about the trash men, truck and bins! 😳

Doggy Diet

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My Sadie bear had to go on a diet per the doctors orders. She weighed in at 82lbs at her last visit. The vet recommended getting her down to the low 70’s.

She said no more packaged treats and to cut her dog food by 1/4. She said absolutely no table scraps. However, hard boiled eggs and baked chicken were great snacks for her (in moderation).

After starting her diet I realized I’m the one who made her fat! My poor dog! I never realized how many table scraps I actually fed her. If I made Ryder a sandwich and cut off the crust, Sadie got the crust. Leftovers from dinner that I didn’t want to keep, I’d toss to her. Random parts of my snack or lunches I would give her. It had become such a habit to drop her food, over half the time I didn’t even realize I was doing it. That is until I put her on a diet. I was cutting the crust off Ryders sandwich and went to hand the crust to Sadie and stopped myself. Feeding the dog was literally a habit I was having to break!

It’s been exactly a month and I took Sadie to the vet to get weighed. She weighed in at 72 lbs! That’s a 10lb weight loss in 30 days! You can see she feels better. She moves around a lot more. She actually goes bounding after the kids to play with them. Before she looked like she had to drag herself up off the floor if she needed to move.

A one mile walk used to about kill Sadie. She would come home and lay on the floor for a while panting. Now she can go almost 4 miles and needs maybe 10 minutes to recover before she’s ready to go and play with the boys again.

I think she still has a few more pounds to lose. The extra weight can be hard on her joints, especially with her being 12 years old. But she’s made great progress! I think 5 more pounds should be no problem for her. I’m proud of my old pup. She’s getting healthy so she can take care of her brothers for a few more years 💙

Morning person

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I’ve never been a morning person. I don’t like getting up early. Don’t get me wrong, I can! I have no problem waking up early, getting dressed, getting my kids ready and fed, etc. Getting up isn’t the problem. It’s that I don’t WANT to get up early. 😂

On the weekends, before kids, I slept in till 9am. During the week when I worked in marketing, I slept till 7am and was in the office around 8/8:30am. I changed jobs, became a teacher and I somehow got the “lucky” school that started classes at 7:30am. So I had to be to school around 6:15am. That meant a 5am wake up, because it wasn’t a close drive like my previous job. 😳

I think god was preparing me for children of my own when he brought me the early morning teaching job. Because I now have children who get up between 5-6am ready to play! I’m still not a morning person, and I would love to be able to sleep in every once in a while. But I wouldn’t trade it for a minute with my little ones. I love getting up and starting my morning playing with them. 💙

Potty Training….

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How’s potty training going in our house? Well my toddler prefers to poop in the yard like the dogs instead of going in the toilet like a big boy. So I’d say it’s going well. We are just taking a small detour. 😂

My kid does things on his own time. He walked one month after crawling. He woke up one morning and started talking. He literally had me so worried he wasn’t going to talk. He got to 2 1/2 and still wasn’t talking. Then out of the blue he just decided ok today’s the day I’ll start talking and it hasn’t stopped!

So no I’m not pushing the potty training. I’m letting him do things on his own time. Would I like him to be potty trained right now? Absolutely! Diapers aren’t cheap. But often times when you try to force a kid to do something they won’t or actually take steps in the opposite direction. So I’m just letting him tell me when he’s ready. We encourage it and talk about it, but never force it.

I’m not exactly sure why he wants to poop in the yard. It is a little odd, I’ll admit that. But he does love his dog. And maybe he’s just intrigued by the fact that she does it outside. I don’t know. I’m just trying to laugh it off for now. Because one day when he’s older, and potty trained, it’ll be a great story to tell!

New House Framing

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Its starting to look like a house! They have started framing out the second floor! It’s so cool to walk through each room and be able to see room size, windows, etc.

While walking through the house we have actually had some new ideas hit us. We have a few changes we want to make and are keeping our fingers crossed the builder says they’re still doable.

There’s nothing but a slab and framing up, but the house looks so beautiful to me! I love how quiet it is out there. No one can build behind us so at night when in the backyard you just hear the crickets and frogs. It’s so peaceful.

It’s going to be really hard to be patient with this build. I want to move in now!!

Living with mom after 30 😳

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Living with mom after 30….. Ok it’s not exactly as sad and pitiful as it sounds. 😂 We are building a house. In order to get our old house ready and on the market, we moved out of it.

We are redoing the kitchen floors and refinishing the downstairs hardwoods since the dogs nails destroyed them. We would have to be out for a week while all this got done, so we just moved into my moms house. Rather than move back and have to gather up both kids and two large dogs every time someone wanted to come view the house, we figured staying at my moms during the selling process was just easier. The idea of having to scramble to clean up a million toys and the mass amounts of dog hair before someone comes to see the house (possible multiple times a day) just gives me anxiety. Not to mention, with all this Coronavirus stuff still flying around, I don’t want to have to disinfect everything each time after someone views it.

So yup, I’m living with my mom after 30! But not in a sad and pitiful way! 😂 Do say a prayer that we don’t drive her crazy before the house is built. The boys and I are a lot to handle. Their toys alone have pretty much swallowed up every bit of free space the house had.🤷🏼‍♀️