Kiwis and Kids and Krafts

This is such a fantastic idea, that I wish I had come up with it! For busy moms, no need to stress about whether you are being creative enough, or doing enough arts and crafts with your kids, the wonderful people at KiwiCrate.com do it for you.

Each month you receive a box with all the supplies, materials and instructions for easy, exciting and enriching activities. Aimed at ages 3-7 yrs, many can be done alone, but they are so fun you will probably beg to participate. You can sign up for monthly deliveries ($19.95), or buy a gift for someone for just 1,3, or 6 months. And to add siblings it's just $7.99. Each project is designed with children's healthy development and learning in minds, and list the areas of growth such as: Creating, discovering, gross motor, fine motor, communicating and caring.This is the perfect gift for the child who has it all!

Sample Box 

Dig Into Dinosaurs

Project One

Fossil Fun

Create your own fossils using special clay, sticks and dinosaurs.

Project Two

Stompy Dinosaur Feet

Design and make your own special dinosaur feet. Perfect for stomping.

Project Three

Dinosaur Tail

Decorate and wear a dinosaur tail, a perfect complement to your dino feet.

Plus 

 

Kaylee can't wait for her box this month. It is a Wild Safari theme. We will post pics of the journey :)

Order through here for $10 off 

 Love and exploration,
Kerry the Momster

Little Red Tea Cart

Little Red Tea Cart Revamp: Weekend Project

This was a relatively effortless, affordable revamp to a tea cart for my kitchen- but would also make a charming addition to a hallway or bedroom if painted in a different color. 

• How I did it: 
• First I nailed down some loose boards on the bottom that were warped from water, then lightly sanded the wood and stains. Then I removed the wheels and painted with primer (extra primer on stained parts).
• For color I used an indoor/outdoor lacquer spray paint as I was looking for a high-gloss effect. It took lots of layers and my fingers were sore!! I went through about 3 cans and had to wait between application.

• But in one weekend the little cart went from drab to delectable and is now the "bread station" in our kitchen holding the toaster and vintage bread tin (another one of my favorite things). 

Love and charm,

Kerry the Momster

Decorating for Darlings

A friend of mine is having her second baby and is in the same predicament I was in, where the two will be sharing a room (A problem many people face). When the two babies are of the opposite sex, one is sometimes faced with a decorating dilemma. So to the style books (sites)I went. I am a huge junkie of Ohdeedoh, so I scoured the site for days before settling on a color scheme of turquoise,black and white, with splashes of yellow and orange for my wee chicks.

 

At the library recently, I found the most awesome book on children's rooms, wit many ideas for gender neutral rooms. 

Design Ideas for Baby Rooms by Creative Homeowner

Design Ideas for Baby Rooms

Love and little ones,

Kerry the Momster

Project Organize: Step 3

Clean my Closet!

Mark Twain hit the nail on the head when he said "The finest clothing made is a person's skin, but, of course, society demands something more than this."
This is my excuse for having a disgusting number of garments piled in complicated towers in my closet, all in various stages of disorganization. As part of my Project Organization 2011, this was the next stressor in my life that I tackled. I deemed it a most important one as I get dressed every day (well...MOST days) and thus have to look on this craziness constantly. Not a very fun start to a fresh, gleaming day.

Keeping the Neurotic's Notebook's thought in mind, that woman "usually love what they buy, yet hate two-thirds of what is in their closets." I set about trying to first eliminate as many items as I could bear parting with. So after a few hours ( stretched out by constant stops to feed, dress, and entertain my baby) I was left with bags filled and ready for drop offs and pick ups and give aways and sell aways. I posted some on craigslist, donated some to friends and organizations and tossed the rest. Sigh, cathartic!

Next, I decided what would be stored in my closet. We don't have much storage in our condo, so our huge closets end up being the gathering stone for all the various moss around the place. I narrowed my storage decisions down to: out of season clothes, sewing items, fabrics, blankets, and travel gear.

So here is one big organizing project, that you can obviously tell was put off for a VERY long time!

BEFORE:

Beginning the big clean out: I tossed everything out onto the bed and sorted through piles. I found my daughter in the closet too! Didn't even know she was missing...

  

And AFTER: 

Before

 

And After: I purchased boxes according to what I needed, sewing, past season, fabrics, blankets, etc.

My perfumes and scarves on display. The jars were too pretty to hide away.

Hope I inspire you to do the same... and if I don't, go watch an episode of hoarders.. it always gets me cleaning!

Love and labels,
Kerry the Momster

Project Organize: Step 1

As many of us do, I have decided to become more organized this year. Especially with regards to my finances and paperwork.

Today I finally wrestled all my important docs into well-labeled files. If you are interested in sorting through yours, here's some inspiration as to how to do it.

I used 5 separate 3-ring binders:

1. Important:
Sub sections:

•  Identity: Passports and Social security cards
• Certificates: Birth, Marriage and Citizenship Papers
• Work and Education: Degrees, Certifications, Letters of Recommendation, and leave paperwork.

2. Taxes
Sub sections:

• Tax returns filed by years (You need to keep at least 5 years of personal taxes, 7 for business)
• Tax deductible sections- medical, donations, childcare

3. Insurance
Sub Sections:

• Life Insurance
• Car Insurance
• Home/ Content
• Medical (The most stressful area of my life, if you remember from my post yesterday)

4. Finances
Sub Sections:

• Cover Page listing all credit cards and numbers, and a page listing bank accounts and numbers.
• Retirement
• Investments (this is empty, but I plan on investing in SOMEthing other than shoes this year!)

5. Daily

• Quick Reference: This includes pages for important numbers like SS, Drivers license, Doctors, Billers numbers. etc
• To do: Items that need to be addressed immediately, to do lists of things around the house that need fixing/replacement/etc, things to send
• Ideas and Inspiration: Areas for recipes to try, projects to make, general goals, etc

Then of course I have my handy, would-be-lost-without daily planner for setting appointments, dates and it even has a section for to-do lists and shopping lists in the back that can be torn out.

Some other interesting things I encountered regarding finances is that unpaid medical bills DO affect your credit, so don't let anyone tell you they don't. Also be sure to go to the Social security Website and use their calculator to determine how much SS you will get when you retire. It will be a shocking wake up call, as you will probably be unable to even afford a place to live. for instance, if you make $30,000 a year and are  paying in to SS for 30 years, you would be paid out the equivalent of today's $800 a month. Who could survive as a family on that? Especially if you only have one person paying in! It's scary so make sure you have a plan. I'm calling someone NOW to schedule an appointment regarding retirement.

So hopefully all this will help me stay  on track of everything this year...starting with sorting out the insurance  and retirement messes!

Love and colored post-its,
Kerry, the Momster

Second Time Around

Becoming a second-time mom brings with it new fears of how to balance life with another little soul depending on your very-stretched resources. Also is the knowledge of knowing the lack of time, lack of sleep and amount of pain involved. However, I was very aware of these expected life traits prior to planning for Baba Dos, and welcome them with open arms because of the other traits that trivialize these negative ones, with the magnitude of their joyous existence.
"Been there, done that" also affords me the knowledge of the tremendous love, giggles, pride and giddiness that accompany the stork's gift. The ever-growing, constantly changing and consistently amazing aspects of your child, blind you to all the un-ending worries, choices and routines.

I also feel there are some nuggets of wisdom I have under my belt, that I wish I could have told my old self prior to baby's arrival; which I will impart here for (hopefully) some lost new mommy to gleen some info from.

1.  Everything you say can and WILL be used against you (and most likely in a public setting). Some of your repitions might be cute, like the time my daughter told our barking dog to "Drop the attitude", or some frustrating like, "Why do I always have to do everything??" (on being asked to brush her teeth), to the downright rude "Oh shit!" (on dropping a fork on the floor). So be careful what you say, 24/7!!
2. Document everything! You might think we you will never forget the cute nuances of baby hood, but unfortunately (and sometimes fortunately) you do. You grow with your child as he/she develops so there are new games, new milestones and chores to look forward to. In an already over-occupied, mushy mommy brain, this doesn't leave much room in the memory department, so snap away and write it down somewhere. I have a book by my bed where I write funny quotes and dreams my daughter has, and then I have a box for each year which I fill with receipts, notes, photos, certificates, cards, tickets etc. I just keep stashing them in there and then put the quotes in there too and cds with photos. At the end of the year I am supposed to organize the items into an album, but  I have 3 years thus far, and not one album BUT all the items are there to look through and remember when I finally do have the time.
3. Sleep is the reset button. From the beginning, everyone tells you to sleep when your baby sleeps. This is very true because the biggest cause of post-partum depression and fighting with your spouse is lack of sleep. With more rest under your belt you are better equipped to face the challenges of parenting. I think sleep is a cure-all, and as someone who battles to get it, I hold it in the highest regards. Sleep will forevermore take precedence over almost anything: sex, shopping, socializing. Furthermore, after a particuarly difficult day, watching your sleeping child resets your over-whelming love for them, and even if they were being little terrors until the moment their heads touched the pillow, suddenly they are angels from God in your eyes once more. It's a great reminder of what it's all for.
4. You will most likely be consumed with guilt for the rest of your life. The mommy wars aren't just about moms arguing over breastfeeding vs. bottle and working vs. stay at home, they are often against yourself. You will feel guilt for so many things: too much TV, not enough photos, not getting vaccines, getting vaccines, too much sugar, not enough intellectual stimulation for your child, not enough toys, too many toys, not enough time, too few activities scheduled, losing your temper, spanking, not spanking... just a few of the constant barrage on your sensibilities and ego. Everyday there are seemingly 700 choices to be made, and be made by you, and you may never feel you make the right ones. But when you are feeling overwhelmed, just recall your own childhood and know that your parents went through the same thing, and you turned out okay (hopefully). Or know that you are at least making better choices than them:). But most important, know that just the fact that you are worrying about MAKING the right choice, makes you a good parent, who put the well-being of your child first. 

Hope these little gems stick under somebody's bonnet!
Love and child-rearing,
Kerry, the Momster

Able Labels

I've been in major nesting mode, having 6 weeks left until delivery. The other day I cleaned out my cabinets (don't tell my doc, as I'm supposed to be on bedrest!), and decided that the only way to ensure that everyone puts the items in their rightful spots, is to go label crazy. And so I did.
Here they are! If you would like me to email you the workable word document, comment with your email address, or email me directly, if you're afraid of crazy internet stalkers.

I just printed them onto sticker paper and then taped over them with packing tape, to create a laminate effect.

Love and labeling,
Kerry the Momster

where the earth and sky meet

This is where I want to be right now. I have a huge crush on soft chairs in bathrooms and enormous windows of natural light everywhere. It illuminates my best feature- nakedness! 

All this needs outside the window is a some blue ocean. 

If I had this bathroom I would be the cleanest girl on earth because I'd never leave it.