My Fifteen Minutes

I know a few of my friends out there are familiar with RFML or for the newbies "Rants From Mommyland". This is far and away one of my favourite blogs.  To be fair, the only one that beats it out is DYAC (Damn You Autocorrect!), which pretty much has me in tears of laughter every day.  (How do you not love a blog that posts accidentally awkward texts?)

Anyway, last year, RFML put out a call for "kitschy" type things from around the home, and I sent them the following picture:

Some of you will recognize this...it hangs next to the man (ahem) door between my garage and house.  My "backdoor", if you will.  It has been hanging there since the dawn of time, and is one of the many items inherited by us when we moved into my grandparents house.

Anyway, after a rather humourous email exchange with Kate and Lydia (the kick ass authors of RFML), they decided to hold a caption contest for my little photo.  Below is the blog post dedicated to that contest.  The comments are rid.ic.u.lous.

Probably the only thing that has made me laugh harder than DYAC...

http://www.rantsfrommommyland.com/2010/12/caption-contest-back-door-friends.html

Off to find something that could possibly top that for this year...

I love the beach...

Today, we decided to go to the beach.

I LOVE the beach...and after last summer, it was finally nice to be reunited.

But I forgot there would be sand.

We arrived, and got out of the car.

And my sandals were full of sand.

We set down our bags and spread out our towels.

And they were full of sand.

In the water, we all splashed and played with the spirit of a two year old.

And my bathing suit was filled with sand.

Silly me, forgot I brought a toddler...

And he ate the sand.

We dried off, "cleaned up" and headed back to the car.

And it, of course, is full of sand.

We headed home in the warm afternoon sun, dirty, wet and sleepy.

And my heart is fully of joy. And sand.

Try it, you'll like it! I promise!

I have to share a picture with you all that just gives me the "warm fuzzies" on the inside...partly because I just had TWENTY of my diapers replaced, for free, even though they were past warranty by 6 months and party because anything arranged in Roy G. Biv makes me smile.

(Let me tell you, CottonBabies REALLY stands behind their product, and they have a life long customer for it!  Well..."life long" being as long as I have a child in diapers!)  These are the new "Flip" diapers.  They are awesome.

Anyway, it also gave me a good excuse to (once again) extol the virtues of cloth diapering!

I have always stated that my main reason for cloth diapering (or cd-ing) is the cost savings.  It really does save you a ridiculous amount of money. A. LOT.  Regardless if you have to pay for utilities, such as water.  You. Will. Save. Money.  Period.  The fact that they- in my honest opinion - work better than disposables (FAR fewer poopy explosions with cloth) and are environmentally friendly was just a bonus.  Until I saw this segment on Good Morning America.  One of the stats they provide is that more than 50 MILLION disposable diapers are dumped in to landfills in the US EVERY DAY.  That's almost TWICE the population of Canada in diapers.  EVERYDAY.  18 BILLION diapers a year.  Now, I knew it was a lot, but I had no idea it was that much.  And that's JUST the US.
I also knew it took longer for disposables to break down, but couldn't quote you a number...now I can.  FIVE HUNDRED YEARS.  That's right 5-0-0.  Our babies diapers will still be breaking down for 16 generations.  That's our great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandchildren.  O.M.G.

Now, I feel I should fess up...Eric has not been exclusively cloth diapered.  He was in disposables for about the first 4 weeks, and then after that, in disposables for night time and outings.  Then around 9 months, we started exclusively cd'ing, even at night.  Turns out, the overnight contact with the ammonia gives him diaper rash, so we are back to a disposable at night.  But, by comparison - we are contributing about 365 diapers a year to a landfill...as opposed to the average families 1875.  I think THAT is something to be proud of.  (Not to mention that's a savings of about $580 a year!)

I rave about my cloth diapers to my girlfriends (or anyone who will listen) every chance I get.  I really DO love it.  We recently had to use disposables for about 3 weeks straight, while my dipes were being replaced, and I HATED it.  They leaked, there were stinky garbages everywhere...ick.  They are far grosser to me than cloth.

Anyway, on to the BEST part!  A great store in Heslper (Cambridge) is offering a cloth diaper trial!  Eaton Family EcoBabies is offering a Cloth Diaper Trial that includes several of the most popular brands/types of cloth diapers!  Check it out here.  Kristin Eaton is WONDERFUL, and always available to answer any questions you have.

So I put the challenge to all of you - but ESPECIALLY my girlfriends who still have kids in diapers, or who are expecting (first OR second OR third - it's NEVER too late to start.)

PLEASE - TRY IT!  YOU'LL LIKE IT!

And if you decide not to, that's ok too...but be prepared to answer me this:  Give me ONE good reason why not.

Meal Planning

So, I have been trying for days now to sit down and blog about this.  My new best friend.  It's called Dine Without Whine.

I. Love. This.

Basically, it's a service that I signed up for a couple of weeks ago.  It cost me all of $17 for three months.  And what do I get for said $17?  Each week, they email me dinner recipes for seven days (including suggestions or recipes for side dishes), and also two desserts and two brunch recipes.  BUT the BEST part about it...they also send the shopping list!

Or is the best part that it has cut down our grocery bill in a BIG way?  Like, probably $50 a week.

Or the fact that I have probably eaten more vegetables and fruit in the last two weeks than I have in the last two months combined?

Or that we're not throwing out produce like we used to?

Or maybe that Trev can start dinner himself, when he gets home an hour before I do?

And that he can take the leftovers in his lunch.

Or that it's NORMAL food, that's good for you, tastes amazing, and is easily adaptable to your own taste?

You see, my problem has always been that I HATE having to think about what we're going to have to dinner by the time I get home from work.  I am sure you're all no stranger to this feeling...and our eating habits (specifically mine) were suffering BADLY.  I really want to foster healthy eating habits in Eric, and so it was time I finally did something about it.

I decided to organize myself while Trevor was gone to camp for a week.  And to make it fun, I even incorporated a fun "scrapbook" project as part of my organization.

Take a look...

Really, this was partly an excuse to use my Cricut...(shoutout to all you scrappers out there.)...to make the "days of the week".

So, as you can see, I have seven cupboards lining the inside of my kitchen.  All I have to do is stick up the dinner we're having that night, and VIOLA!  I can come home a brainless zombie, and still make a delicious, nutritious meal for me and my family.

(Note:  Please ignore the fact that only one day has a "meal" posted.  Tuesday has tomorrows meal, Wed/Thurs I am cooking meals I don't need recipes for, and we're gone to the cottage from Fri. to Mon.)

Just this one small change has created a "ripple" effect:

Trevor actually helped prepare one of the meals last week, and said how much he enjoyed being in the kitchen together.

We no longer have dishes piled up on the counter...somehow we are motivated to put the dishes in the dishwasher right away.  (For those of you that know me, you can now pick your jaw up off the floor.)

We have, without even trying, started to sit down as a family every night to eat dinner.  That was something that has always been important to Trev and I, but without a good, solid meal to draw us to the table, it seemed like a wasted effort.

In a nutshell...for $17 I have given my family: nutrition, savings, cooking skills, tradition and something other than sandwiches for lunch.  Not a bad deal, if I do say so myself.

Choose Canadian!

So my Dad sent me this video…it’s an ad that has been produced by Hellman’s Canada. It is SHOCKING.

http://www.eatrealeatlocal.ca/

We import 700 pears for every ONE that we export. PEARS PEOPLE! You could practically grow a pear tree in your house in the dead of winter…so why are we importing so many fruits, veggies and meats?  Especially in Southern Ontario.
We have some of the richest farmland in the whole country, and the grocery store wants me to eat peaches from Chile? WTF. The next time your browsing through the grocery isles, REALLY take a moment to see where your food is coming from…I’m willing to bed you’ll be surprised. I have become increasingly frustrated by the lack of local produce that is generally available where I do my grocery shopping. Really annoyed, actually. The good news is, this has motivated me to shop more and more at my local market. It really has become as simple as going through my shopping list, and ticking off the items I know I can get at the market. Cheaper? Not necessarily, which is also aggravating. However, I am happy to pay a few cents more to support my local farmers, and local economy. (The “Mommy Time” I get by myself at the market on Saturday morning is just an added bonus…even if I have to get up “early”.)

Take the time to go through the site and “Take Action Now”. There are great lists of local fruits and veggies that are available in your area seasonally, and even a section to “Get Your Grocer On Board”.

Please pass this site on to as many people as you can…it is SO important to support not just our local farmer’s but our CANADIAN farmer’s.

And, because I am also a Mom, lets support the future farmers, like these…