Weekend Review

This was a BIG weekend for Isla. She walked her first 5K...kinda. Daddy walked and wore her in the baby bjorn. She had a blast and looked super cute in her Puma Tracksuit :) While my loves were walking for a cure, I was at Pure Bliss Spa of Jupiter. I received a massage gift certificate a while back from Victor's boss and just got around to using it. This spa is beautiful and the masseuse was amazing. She didn't make a peep :) I highly recommend this place if you're in the area and looking for a relaxing spa experience. And if you're asking yourself why I went to the spa instead of my babe's first 5K, it is because the appointment was booked before the bib was bought. So there.

Baby Puma Tracksuit - Gift from last season (similar here)

We are still making some pureed baby foods for Isla. We spent a few hours yesterday peeling, boiling, and pureeing fruit and veggies for her Infantino squeeze pouches. We love these because they make feeding on the go a breeze and you can fill them with vodka to enjoy adult cocktails at outdoor events.

There are times when Isla is thirsty and she's already had her milk. I don't like to give her juice because I know it isn't the best vice to get your little one hooked on, even if it is watered down to nothing. I had what I believe to be a moment of brilliance while making her fruit and veggie purees. The cooking water! Why waste it? I sampled the water we boiled her fruits and veggies in and it was delicious! Plus it contains all of the lost nutrients of the foods during steaming and boiling. Instant juice! I had some left over medela storage bags, so I filled 'em up and froze what we wouldn't use this week. I don't know if this is AAP recommended and I don't care. She loved it!

No family weekend would be complete without a trip, or two, to Publix. It takes us forever to get through the grocery store. EVERY blue hair stops us to chat up Isla and tell us how adorable she is...and we're okay with that.

Seat cover by Itzy Ritzy

Valentine's Day: Mini & Me

Here it is! My Valentine's Day gift guide for mini and me. Now, I'm not delusional; I know my love. My love is NOT a Valentine's Day gifter, or a Christmas gifter for that matter. Last year was the first year I received a Valentine from him. He left work, drove to Costco at lunch, and brought home two dozen roses for Isla and I. This means I had to spend the next hour cutting and arranging said roses. Ummm, thanks? We then made a lovely dinner of Chicken Helper and watched a movie with a then two month old Isla. I will say that he has rocked out the birthday presents for the past few years, so the man is forgiven.

This gift guide is more of a what-Isla-will-be-getting-and-what-I-will-be-buying-myself-guide.

 

1. Be Loved Tee: 15% off today!

2. Heart Skinny Jeans: 15% off today!

3. Olivia and the Perfect Valentine

4. Sleeping Bag: Isla is a little young for this, but I can't pass it up. It is SO cute and 

can be personalized as well.

5. Headband - This is the same style that lots of people have asked about in Isla's Christmas 

photo shoot and her FSU game day photo shoot. I love these leather bows!

6. Bee Mine Jammies

7. Bee Mine Cookie Gram: I sent these at Christmas to the little loves of my life 

and will send them again for V Day. Daddy might get one too :)

8. Gold Pearl Earrings

9. Hello Heart Baseball Tee: I ordered one for me and one for my mini.

Splish Splash...

I don't think any of us have left childhood without having our picture taken in the bathtub. I always thought it a bit odd when flipping through old photos and seeing all my naked glory in the tub with not only my brother, but whatever random child happened to be over for a play date that night.  Well, now I get it. Its adorable! So when there's a chance at two baby butts in the tub? Done and done!

Isla adores her cousin and her cousin adores her :) We miss him already!

Isla's First Birthmas

Isla turned 1 on December 19th and I'm just now getting around to viewing the photos and sharing them with family. We had a small party with friends (no kids) at 6:00 pm and promptly put her to bed at 8:00 pm. Why? So we could enjoy the celebration of her birth...with beer and friends!

Invite was made on RedStamp.com

This site will print and ship custom quantities. Since we only needed 15, this is the route I took. I also used the site to send digital invites to friends and family whose address I didn't know, or to those I felt didn't care if they received a printed invite ;)

Onesie: Made by me using an American Apparel bodysuit and fabric paint

Banner: Made by me with crepe paper, glitter glue, hot glue gun, and cut up holiday tinsel

Heart Crown: Made by me with red fold-over elastic, paper, glitter glue, and hot glue gun

Santa Cake: Publix

The party decor was pretty simple and mostly made by yours truly the night before with a bottle of red wine.

I have an obsession with washi tape

I used tons of Ball jars with sand, tea lights, and twinkle lights

Photo booth props from Target

Holiday Lights Sweatshirt: Wildfox

Earrings: C+I

Gertie got lots of mistletoe love

And so did they ;)

All in all it was a great party with great friends. Isla scored lots of goodies and more bottles of wine than I did on my birthday...

Penny Pincher

I have become a pretty frugal person. However, I do love to shop. Before my baby daddy came along, I didn't think twice about plopping down the plastic and going ba-nan-as at every store I hit at the mall. Then came Victor. Victor is a bargain hunting, coupon coding, discount store fanatic. He's always on the hunt for the best deal. I laugh, because the man doesn't blink at a $200 bar tab, but will audibly gasp at a $200 anything...unless it's on sale. I learned early on that I could bring home anything I wanted as long as the big reveal was followed by, "you wouldn't believe the sale Nordstrom was having! I just couldn't pass it up!" He would look on in admiration and think my shopping the sales transformation was complete. Hello, $58 $18 Lulu Lemon yoga mat, I needed you.

Over the years I have picked up a few of his tricks and I can honestly say that the man knows what he's talking about. I always used my debit card and saved my credit card for emergencies (because I had debt and was quickly paying it off). He then introduced me to the rewards program game: Open a new card, put everything on it, pay it off, and in three billing cycles I'd have a free round trip ticket to Europe. Winning! Oh, and the Hyatt card? Get it, get it now! Hyatt will give you two free nights at any property in the world when you hit their 3 month spending minimum. We used those two nights in Paris and stayed at the Park Hyatt Vendome. Our room rate was 1,000 EUR ($1,000+) a night and we stayed...for FREE :)

I will never forget this bathroom - SIX faucets filling up that amazing bathtub!

Now for my favorite penny pinching lesson learned from Mr Bargain Hunter...Fatwallet. Have you used this site before? SO EASY! Click here to create an account. I reference this site before every online purchase. Retailers pay fat wallet a referral fee to get you to their site. They then pass on a portion of that fee to you. Every click adds up fast! In the past year Fatwallet has paid me $132.81 for buying stuff I would buy anyway.

12 Month Favorites

1. Baby Bjorn - My baby daddy wears her in this EVERY day! He uses it when walking the dog, at the grocery, vacuuming the floors (true story)...

2. Babylit - These book are great! They are one word to a page, but if you remember the story (or don't) you just fill in the story line. Thanks to my bestie, her collection was started in December.

3. Yogurt Melts - These are our shut-the-eff-up treat! Put some of these in the munchkin snap cup, sit her in front of the Today Show and pure silence follows :)

4. Aden + Anais Stroller Blankets -  Now that it is getting cold in Florida (hehe), we need a little extra something at bed time. These blankets are soft and amazing...just like everything from aden + anais

5. Boon Flair High Chair - This high chair is fantastic! No crevices for food to hide and mold, easy clean up, and adjusts to bar and table height. Ah-may-zing!

6. Munchkin Snack Cups - Put those shut-the -eff-up treats in here :)

7. Boon Bath Toys - My mom got these for her for Christmas and she loves them! She tries to gather them ALL up. She fills one hand, fills the other and then realizes she needs more hands...so she sticks one in her mouth and then fills up the hands again. I die.

8. Light up rubber ducky - I picked this up at CVS as an impulse buy and it was the best $1.99 I spent in January. Turn off the lights and instant love :)

Valentine's Day Garland DIY

I am on a mission. I'm on a mission to make almost every holiday a special one for Isla. I love decorating and I love DIY. I'm not the best, obviously, and I don't have a TON of time. What I have is a desire for Isla to grow up in a home where the seasons are celebrated and her food is color coordinated :)

I wanted to do something simple and easy to transition her nursery from Christmas to Valentine's Day. I used washi tape to write LOVE and XOXO on her walls and added this simple felt garland to her crib. Don't worry...I remove it before nap and bed time. Here's what you need:

1. Felt balls - mine came from the $1 section at Target

2. Needle

3. Scissors

4. Thread - pictured is baker's twine, but it was too thick to fit through my needle. I improvised by using thread, but doubled.

5. 10 Minutes

All you do is double up your thread and tie a knot at one end. I measured her crib and knew the length I needed. I then laid out my balls and organized them in the color pattern I wanted. I then threaded the balls  on the string and continued until finished. Don't worry about spacing now, as the balls will move around as you thread. When you're finished tie a knot and voila!

Now, I may be a mediocre mom, but I do know enough to know that I need to remove this garland at nap and bed time. So here is how I hung it:

I used two 3M Command Hooks and tied loops at each end of the garland. I can now easily hang and remove when she's in her crib. Genius? I think so :)

Now, go make some Valentine's Day Garland for your little babe...or yourself <3

Mediocre at best

So I did it, or rather am doing it. I'm starting a blog. I have been thinking about it for some time and am just now getting around to it. I realized that I'm not doing a great job of keeping track of my sweet baby Isla's milestones and daily awesomeness. I refer to myself as The World's Best Mediocre Mom. Mediocre because although I make her delicious food from scratch for every meal, plan every outfit as if I would wear it myself...I can't remember when she first said "mama" because I didn't write it down in some hideous, plastic covered baby book with an old school safety pin on the front. This is where M is for Mediocre comes to the rescue. I will chronicle our daily lives so when I forget her birth length when filling out forms at the doctor's office, I can just pull it up here :) (That happened yesterday - Oops)

In addition, I love cooking, DIY projects, scoring amazing deals, and learning photography. So there will be lots of uninteresting posts about those topics as well. 

We will start here. This is me and my baby daddy just a few shorts weeks before Isla Mae blessed us with her presence. I love this picture. I love the candid smiles and the pure happiness we felt during this month before our sweet girl entered the world. We were just so happy that is was FINALLY happening...