I have people ask me all the time how things are with 3 little ones. To be honest, it’s great. The kids really do pretty well over all. Occasionally I have moments of feeling like I’m drowning, but really it’s been totally manageable and fun. That being said… want to hear about my Monday adventures so far?

I swear that doctor’s office is slang for the once formal phrase of “the apes house at the zoo.”

Check out Rome’s face. That was within seconds of getting into the room. I should have known then that there was a storm a brewin’.

I don’t know if this is true for your children, but for mine, as soon as we get seated in our little room my children decide to treat the room like something out of Jumanji. What?! They’re totally civilized in the waiting room (most of the time), but as soon as the nurse walks us back and sits us in our room they go mad! Don’t get me wrong, I love my kids no matter what state they’re in, but the ape-state ain’t my favorite. What is it about that tiny little box of a room? Within minutes we had rearranged the seating in the room, torn up the patient’s table paper into little pieces and dumped the entire contents of my diaper bag onto the ground. By the time we left we had even “bejeweled” the room because one of my kids had found a tiny jar of glitter I had apparently left in the abyss of the bottom of my diaper bag – my diaper bag that seems to eat everything until the most inopportune moment to spit that thing back up – like a bottle of glitter at a doctor’s office.

He was just getting started in this picture.

One of the craziest things to me is that this is just with 2 children running around. Check out this sweet little angel baby that just sat on my lap during the tornado chaos.

How do people do doctor’s appointments when they have more than 2 walkers? Seriously though, how? ??

Kristin

Sydney has a friend over this morning to play and so that means I get/got (since they’re in bed now) some extra time with my two boys! Athens reminds me so much of Rome when he was little. He is so happy and easy going. Maybe he came that way because he knew that he would need to be in order to survive in this crazy household.:)

Love his smiles and chunky cheeks. I think that since I use “chunky” as a term of endearment for the two boys, Sydney has started saying “I’m pretty chunky” randomly. That girl makes me laugh!

The only picture I could snap before Rome decided he was done sitting still.

I just overheard Sydney and her friend playing hide and seek. Sydney was hiding and when her friend walked by her friend said “where could she be?” and kept walking when Sydney peeked out and yelled ” I’m right here!” Obviously frustrated, Sydney came running out and jumped up and down in front of her yelling “But I’m right here!!” Her friend just kept saying “Where could she be?” and looked past her. I love when kids try to implement what they see us doing.. no matter how ridiculous it probably seems to them.

Also! Guys! I officially have a thumb sucker! It was bound to happen since I sucked my thumb until I was 5 or so, but it took 3 kids before I had one. I know that someday we will probably have repercussions for this and needing to help him stop, but until then, I will continue to take pictures of my cute thumb sucker!:)

Don’t ya just want to kiss those sweet cheeks?!

If I was to say that I have had fun remodeling my house, that would be a MASSIVE understatement! It took a fair amount of time to get it to where it is now, but I LOVE it! There were so many late nights, set backs and budget surprises, but it was well worth it all. It all came together exactly like I imagined it in my head.

When we were searching for a house to buy when we moved out here to Utah I had a pretty specific location we wanted, so it all came down to finding a good house. After searching around on Zillow.com for a number of weeks we settled on 3 different houses that had pretty much the same layout. These houses were ideal for the open layout I had envisioned for our next house. When our realtor took us to the houses however, the last house (the one we bought) was the clear winner. When we went through the other two houses I couldn’t help but notice that EVERY SINGLE ROOM needed some updating and got pretty overwhelmed. When we went through this house, all I could think was WHEW! This one is at least safe and livable the way it is.

Shortly after moving in (I believe it was less than a week later) I started calling our contractor and had him come out to look at taking down the wall between the kitchen and the living room. I also had him quote us on moving cabinets, ripping out tile and installing new baseboards, etc. He had awesome prices so I was able to do more than I thought we could.

Joel and I had the privilege of tearing down the drywall on the wall between the kitchen and livingroom -> which was a blast! we also installed our back-splash, installed the floating shelves, the new glass door over the microwave, did LOTS of painting, installed the mantle on the fireplace, and many more projects. It kept us busy to say the least, but I’ll say it again, it was worth it!! Here are some of the before and afters

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After:

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I love my blue door!:)

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Before (when we were moving in):

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And just a few more for fun:

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Anyway! All the stars finally aligned and we were able to keep the kitchen/living room clean long enough to get a few shots. It’s been fun thinking up ideas and watching them come to pass. Hope this can inspire your own home-reno thoughts!

Kristin

TV. It’s one of those nagging topics that just sits at the back of your mind and is discussed by all moms everywhere. I too have struggled with this question.When I first started having kids I had decided that I would never (NEVER EVER SAY NEVER…) let my kids watch TV or movies before she was 2 years old and then limit it while she was older. As she got older I slowly started letting her watch more and more. When my second child was born was when TV watching was at it’s high. My daughter watched probably 1 movie almost every day-ish for a few months.? I hit a breaking point when my daughter started acting up worse than normal and when discussing it with my husband we realized that it quite possibly was linked to her elevated amount of screen time. That’s when I introduced the idea to my daughter of Movie Fridays.

My 3 year old daughter knows her days of the week because she knows that Friday is her movie day. She wakes up every morning and asks “Mommy, was that a nap or a sleep (bed-time)?” After I tell her it was a “sleep” she says “Good! What day is it?” The closer it is to Friday, the more excited she is when you tell her the day. For instance, if you mention it is Thursday, you can bet her tone and eyebrows will be raised and there will be a special sparkle in her eyes when she repeats “Thursday!!” Having Fridays as our designated movie days has been great for my daughter as well as for me. She knows that she gets to watch a movie on Friday and therefore doesn’t ask to watch movies every 2 seconds on the other days of the week. It’s great! I was so tired of her asking if she could watch “one episode” every single time she was bored. Because she doesn’t ask, I don’t break down as often either and let her watch them. She watches movies on Friday. Period. (minus the occasional mommy break-down moments.. we’ve all been there).

She gets to watch a movie and eat popcorn during her little brothers nap time in the morning and it’s a special treat. Sydney’s mood has improved tremendously and I really do believe that it is due to the decrease in screen time. I can totally tell a difference in her attitude? on days that she watches TV vs days that she doesn’t. I’m not saying that watching TV is a bad thing all together, it just needs to be in doses.

Being that we only had one car for the first 3 years of marriage it meant that I had to come up with a million other ways to entertain my daughter since my husband took that one car to work during the day. I came up with a list of random things that you can do to help the time pass in a better, more positive way. This will hopefully help you avoid those TV watching days just a little better.

Please excuse the extremely cute chubby baby “nudity.”

Bath time. My kids LOVE bath time. Especially in the winter, this is a great way to change things up and also keep the kids happy and entertained.

Read books. After breakfast almost every morning we sit down and go through our library pile of books. All 10-20 of them! Seriously. We spend about an hour and a half just snuggling and reading books. It’s fabulous.

Walks. We do this a lot! We did this more before we got our second car, but this is a great way to spend your time! Everyone gets out of the house and is able to get fresh air therefore yielding better family vibes.:) It’s also really important for kids to have time to get out and run around and also just be out in nature.

Go to the park (invite friends). Often times we end up over at the park twice a week. I love it because I am able to have a few minutes of me-time when I can watch the kids play and I can have time to think. We also invite friends to the park sometimes too. Then the kids have friends and I have friends to have adult conversations with.

Go to the Library. We go to the library at least once a week. This is a great source of entertainment for my kids and gives me a mini break. When we can make it, I try to get to story time as well. Story time gives me a few minutes of not being needed. I love my kids, but when a mom can have a mini break, take it!:)

Bake together. I love to bake. This love of baking I have has apparently transferred over into my daughter as well. Any time I pull out my measuring cups or a bowl, my daughter runs in and starts pulling up a? chair and asking if she can help. It’s messy and slow a lot of times, but it’s worth it.

Go for a run with the kids in the stroller. This creates some really great me time. My kids know that when they are in the stroller and I am running that they can chat with each other. This is mommy’s quiet time and I don’t chat with them unless someone is bleeding or we dropped (and usually ran over) a toy along the way. I put one head phone in (that way I can hear them if I do need to help them) and crank the music.

Exercise videos. Even if my kids aren’t participating, they are usually playing nicely just because I am in the room with them. My daughter usually starts out doing the exercises with me but by the end has gotten distracted by a toy and is off in the corner playing quietly with it. My son on the other hand, that’s a different story. Usually he plays as well with teh occasional crawling on my back while I am sweating over doing planks. It’s entertaining.

Clean the house. My daughter LOVES to clean. I have a hard time letting her sometimes because it ends up taking me double the time to get a job i HATE done than it would if she wasn’t helping. But aren’t we trying to use up time anyway? PLUS then your child is learning some very needed hard work skills. Just make sure you don’t do any cleaning with kids that requires bleach.. or I guess any other harsh chemicals.

Grocery shopping. I know some of you might be laughing on the inside at this one, or maybe even laughing out loud. I LOVE to take my kids grocery shopping. I grocery shop once every 2 weeks and the kids and I look forward to it. I split it up into two days. The first day I hit up the normal grocery store, and usually Walmart as well for the diapers, and then the next day we head over to Costco. My kids know that they get a special treat at both Costco and the grocery store. They get to choose one special treat from the bulk bins (usually 3 gummy bears or a small handful of m&m’s), and then on our Costco day they get the samples and most the time we buy a treat (usually the berry smoothie) from the food court after shopping. This has helped to make my grocery shopping trips a fun thing for the kids and I.

Play time. You can either get down on the floor with your kids and play with them with their toys, or sit on the couch in that room and read a book while your kids play. If I am in the room, my kids will play for a good hour or 2 sometimes.

Books on youtube. My daughter is a big fan of the videos on youtube where people read books to you. We get books from the library a lot that have the CD with it, but this is nice because it turns the pages for you. I don’t have to help her get back on the right page every few minutes when she forgets to turn to the chime.

Check out local museums. We recently bought passes for some local museums here and we LOVE taking advantage of those. I love it because I can go any day that we are just bored and have nothing going on. I also love it because if a child starts having a meltdown and we have to leave I can without feeling guilty that we spent x amount of dollars!

Good luck trying to decide how your family wants to tackle the TV watching dilemma. Hopefully these ideas can give you some ideas for things you an your kids can do instead of watch TV. Also, since Easter is quickly approaching and I still haven’t even thought about Easter baskets… Check out my post from last year Three Steps to Having a Healthy, Happy and Inexpensive Easter (Filling Easter Baskets for kids)

Happy Easter Y’all!