Heart Hand Prints T-Shirt.

This is a project that I did with the kids last year for Valentine's day.
I bought a pink T-shirt and some red fabric paint.
I had each child dip their hands in the paint and make a heart on the shirt with their hand prints.

It's a very easy, inexpensive and thoughtful Valentine's day present.

Holidays Post Partum.

We took our tree down this morning, our living room is back to its normal mess, the Christmas decorations are back in the shed until next year. So now what? The last week of the year is the most anticipated and the most hyped up time. Since the day after Thanksgiving we have been getting ready for it. Decorating, shopping, planning, making sure we didn't forget anything, the lights, the ornaments, the stockings.
Planning the Christmas holiday is very much like getting ready for a newborn. Mommy does most of the work, the shopping, picking the cards and sending them, wrapping the presents... Would be nice for Santa to help a little, the guy gets all the credit.
On Christmas morning, the kids get into labor tearing up the wrapping paper, screaming, shouting, getting so excited. What is it? What did I get? A truck? A doll?
We then celebrate in church, kind of like taking our newborn to get christened. After a whole week of celebration (eating chocolate, chocolate and more chocolate) we welcome a new year and just like that it's all over. Our holiday hormones will level off, our blood sugar will go down, holiday post Partum depression will start settling in by tomorrow morning. We could just drown ourselves in chocolate truffles (we have about 10 pounds left over) but we decided to be healthy. What's wrong with us?
I think that's one reason we make New Year's resolutions. It gives us something to look forward to after the holidays. It helps us cope better with the "Holiday crash". So why make resolutions that are going to make us more depressed. Forget about dropping the extra pounds, we're not going to waste some perfectly good chocolate. Let's all focus on being better people, better friends, husbands, parents, neighbors and let's make this world a better place.

New Year's Resolutions.

For most a new year means new resolutions. Some very popular resolutions being losing weight, quitting smoking, quitting drinking, getting out of debt, volunteering...
I don't smoke and rarely drink and even though I could afford to lose 15 to 25 pounds (and will lose them) I don't want to make that my new Year's resolution. Spending more time with my family would be a good one but it would mean starting a new career and as much as I would love to, it's not very realistic and most resolutions fail for being unrealistic.
Why are we making new Year's resolutions anyway? To better ourselves, our lives, our family lives...
So as I am sitting here taking a few minutes before going to work, looking for a good resolution, I am reflecting on this past year.
Back in 2009, I wrote a post titled "life happens" about how our lives changed after a few years of marriage and three (fantastic) children. Letting life happen like that has not necessarily been a good thing and it has brought more downs than ups to last year. So as my New Year's resolution I will not let life happen. I will make sure that 2012 brings us more ups than downs.
Happy New Year!!! Cheers!!!