Turning three...time flies

reflect on time flying (b'day next week) and Annabel being 19 months already (less milestones marked!)

Double nursery - double trouble?

double nursery pros and cons debate continues!

Potette plus potty - perfection!

Love the potette plus potty! pic story referencing both kids (purchasing of refills!)

Getting eggcited!

Started a few Eastery activities round here!

Not easy doing any really complicated crafts with two under three....but we had a fun, messy time!

This was my first experience using dollar store craft kids and well the paint is basically dye and it was rather messey and difficult, perhaps a greater $ investment would have brought a better product, not dye based, who knows....but I will look into it more thoroughly for next time!

Our next project is to paint some Easter bunny money banks.... I am toying with the kids giving them as Easter gifts to the local women and kids shelter...to brighten two little ones Easter break...?

Pictures to follow....

Money management for mini's

Sorry about the title - I could not encapsulate what I wanted to say any better than that!

Ever since I was a wee one - money management was important to me...The first time I was allowed to cycle to the neighbouring town by myself (2.5 miles of fields away) I took the opportunity to open my own bank account! Spurred on by all the negative talk of these kids are eating us out of house and home. The rate these kids go through shoes we won't be able to buy food! That kind of thing that grown up folks never thought twice about saying... well it had an impact on me... let's not get into my feet and how they are brick shaped, but stay focused on the money side.

Because I genuinely feared for my parent's ability to keep a roof over my head - I felt I needed to take matters into my own hands and start saving - I used to be sad when my parent's cars were clean, no leaves had fallen and I could see no other way to make a buck (couldn't do a lemonade stand - what with being surrounded by field after field.. no people!) One time whilst my mother was scraping melon pips into the garbage I had a light bulb moment I planned to save them and put one a night under my pillow and dupe the tooth fairy into leaving 50pence a night! That would have been a good racket!

It is against this backdrop that I wish to make my own conversations and contributions to my children's understanding of how money comes into and goes out of our lives, but in so much more a healthy way!

Recently discussing this topic with a friend I got to find out that a tool I was hoping to find to help with this does actually exist - The Money Savvy Pig®



"Personal finance education needs to start young. How? With the same universally loved childhood toy, the piggy bank....but with a 21st century twist! The Money Savvy Pig piggy bank has four chambers, one for each of the four money management choices a child should be taught from the time they are small. They are SAVE, SPEND, DONATE, and INVEST. "

I am so excited and so getting a pink one and a blue one for my wee ones! I use a jar system and the kids know about the jars, but it is not as child friendly as I would choose, so this is fantastic! Excellent range of colours and great price of $17! (This is not sponsored - but I wouldn't say no to receiving a savvy pig that we could gift on!)

Suitcase sleeper

Sleep - it has been a big topic and a sorely missed friend for the last 15 months, especially as my firstborn started sleeping through at 5 months!

Anyway - I keep lamenting my mistake when I had to go away for a few days and I took my then 5 month old daughter and she had to sleep in my suitcase, each night her sleeping got better until the last night she slept through!



In the busyness of getting back I didn't get time to unpack before bed the first night home and I just didn't think, I put her in her proper crib and she slept badly, somewhere in my sleep deprived haze my brain was unable to think of trying her in the case again!

Well fast forward ten months, sleep is still an issue, not as bad as the every 10/20 or at best 40 mins waking - I am a light sleeper so getting back to sleep was impossible! A few times that suitcase crossed my mind and then the other day I was going through some old photos and I saw one I had taken (on my phone still only digital, not printed) of her in the case and I so regret not having tried it!

Ho hum - one day she will be a teenager and not wanting to get out of bed - I know it, until then, I am functioning on v little sleep!

(No she is not a good napper either!)

((Yes - I have tried an insanely long list of options - just about everything except putting her in a case and now she is way too mobile for that option!))

Winter colds

Yikes - we made it all the way to February without any colds and I saw lots of friend's families being taken down with bugs etc and being wiped out for weeks at a time. I was delighted that we escaped it, until a few weeks ago the first cold hit our house, it comes for a few days we lose a night's sleep or so, it fades away then after a few days - it's back!! And so it goes on! I don't get it! Oh well, I can feel spring coming despite the huge snowfall recently!