Thrifty Thursday

I found some grrreat coupons and I thought I'd share my favorite's with you just in case you're interested. I might make every Thursday Thrifty, but only if it's not too boring. I'll share my favorite finds from the week, maybe. Below the coupons are a few Abby tidbits that I thought you might enjoy.

Free Gallon of Milk:
Enter to win the Got Milk free milk for a year give away and they will email you a coupon for a free gallon of milk with a $100 grocery purchase from any store, any brand of milk.

Free Coupon Booklet:
Sign up with Eat Better America and they'll send you a book of coupons in 6-8 weeks. I'm not sure what's in the book, but I thought I'd give it a try.

Free Tuna:
Click Here and print the $1 off coupon, good for any Starkist Tuna pouch (that's the technical name). We used our coupon at Wal-mart on the cheapest pouch, only 97 cents, making the tuna free!

$2 off White Cloud Toilet Paper:
Sign up with White Cloud Promotions and print a two coupons, one for $1 off and one for $2 off. After much research and reading consumer reports, this is what we've found to be the cheapest, yet still two ply toilet paper. Hurry, this one expires 2/17/10.

$1 off Desitin:
Go to desitin.com, scroll down to the bottom of the page, and print the coupon. Nothing to sign up for! I know most of you don't personally use desitin, but we think it's great, cause it's the only thing that works on Abby's rear.

As I was writing this post, I saw a stream of White Cloud T.P. running down the hall. Ahhh, our precious dollars are being waisted away by our precious daughter. She certainly is a cutie patootie. A few of Abby's favorite's:

-Foods: Peanut Butter on a spoon, graham crackers, uncooked pasta, grapes, fruit cocktail cherries, whatever mommy has on her plate.
-Drink: Juice = water, orange juice, vitamins, which she pronounces as "Ice"
-Bath Time Adventures: Soaping up her belly, sucking the water out of her toys, waving bye bye to the water, inviting the cats in with her.
-Books: Prodigal son, good Samaritan, baby faces, Animal Baby
-Entertainment: LOVES washing dishes, is currently enjoying shoving play-dough up her nose, coloring (only on things she's not supposed to or things mommy and daddy are using), anything outside.
-Toys: Car baby, baby, remote control from Sarah Light, Squirt
-Things to do that she's not supposed to: climb on the dining room table, climb on the coffee table, try and pick up squirt, kick squirt, feed squirt, dip anything into the toilet.
-Ways to mimic mommy: put makeup on, puts baby powder in her hair, shaving legs, clipping nails, laundry
-Ways to mimic daddy: blow nose, dancing, pig noise
-Little habits: turning on the angel night light from Charlie (our homeless friend), putting dirty clothes in the laundry basket and clean ones too, finding diapers and laying them out across the floor.

Dinner time!

Permanent?

This last Sunday, as we were readying ourselves for church, I was amazed at how quiet our little Abigail was being. For those of you who don't know, a quiet Abigail usually means trouble, but it is nice when I'm busy doing something, like getting ready for church. I went in the office and what do I find, only a little Abigail having a good time. She had 10 or 12 pens out of the pen cup and had created a lovely drawing all over some papers and other objects laying around on the desk, such as the printer. Not to worry though, only one of the pens was a permanent marker, and she only managed to get one black dot on her shirt and some stripes on her hand.

As I head back into the bathroom, I think to myself, "I'm glad that mess is behind us, as usual, Satan is up to his old tricks again of trying to stall us from going to church." Now, as I'm putting the finishing strokes of mascara on my lashes, Abby is playing quietly on the floor next to me. Usually I hold her in one arm, while putting makeup on with the other. For any of you who have ever put on mascara, you know that this is done rather close to the mirror, with all concentration on the brush, because heaven forbid a poke to the eye! Once again, I find myself thinking, "wow, this is so nice that I've been able to get ready without my girl clinging to my legs." As soon as I look down, I notice this strange white powder substance in Abby's hair, wait a minute it's on the floor, and her hand, the scale, all over! It's baby powder! I often put baby powder in my hair on the days I don't wash it, and as I said, she's usually always in the bathroom "helping."

Surprisingly, I didn't learn my lesson the first time, and as I was filing some paperwork in the kitchen on Tuesday, I noticed that it was terribly quiet in the house. Upon arriving in the spare room, once again, I saw my little artist with all of her pens and markers out, but this time drawing on the desk. I took a picture, so you could see how talented she it, but it was taken after I had already removed half of the masterpiece. The green is permanent marker and the black is pen. After doing a bit of research, I found that pencil erasers (you know, the little pink bricks) remove "permanent" marker from wooden furniture. Hooray!

Abby Growth Stats

Here is the latest on our girl:

Height: 33 Inches, 90th Percentile

Weight: 24 lbs., 25th Percentile

Head: 75th Percentile

Please pray for her, she currently has a fever of 101.9 degrees.

Why our baby does not watch TV

Some may be wondering why we have never let Abby watch TV. During one of Abby's first few doctor appointments we were given a paper that said television viewing was bad for the brain development of children under two years of age. Today I decided to do a little research into why this is so.

According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, "Children six and under spend an average of two hours a day using screen media (1:58), about the same amount of time they spend playing outside (2:01), and well over the amount they spend reading or being read to (39 minutes)." This being said, the American Academy of Pediatrics suggests "children under 2 years not watch television and children over 2 years watch 2 hours or less per day."

In a study published in the April 2004 issue of Pediatrics claimed, "hours of television viewed per day at both ages 1 and 3 was associated with attentional problems at age 7." I was told by a friend that this "reprogramming" of the brain is caused by the fast images flashing across the screen. Eisla Sebastian agrees, when she says that the overstimulation of the brain "has to do with the fast-paced images flashing constantly across the screen, which interfere with the brain's development."

This is just a quick overview of what I found. To read more, click on any of the links within the text, or do a search of your own, there is plenty of information out there.

My 18 Month Old is Waking During the Night

The Abby sleeping saga continues and after much reading, I've decided to to diagnose her problem as separation anxiety. We decided to give her one last chance of sleeping in her crib before we switched it out for a big girl bed. Last night we put her down and used the pray and tip-toe method after laying her down, hoping that she would sleep through the night. Alas, this did not work, but, not to worry, we had a backup plan...muah ha ha ha. We had set up her pack and play (modern words for playpen) in our bedroom right next to my side of the bed. Once the clock tolled 10:30, and of course we had just fallen asleep, we heard the cries of a wee one in the next room over. Mat went in with her and attempted to put her back to sleep, but to no avail. He brought her in our room and she stood crying in her pack and play with my arms wrapped around her. The night before, she slept with us, but it killed my back, because she insisted on sleeping on top of me. Once her crying stopped I held her hand while she stood in her pack and play and I reassured her that I'd be right there next to her. I then fell asleep holding her hand, while she stood fighting sleep for a little over an hour. She popped back up about 3 times to make sure I was still there and immediately laid back down and fell asleep.

After last night's escapade we finally broke down and packed up Abby's crib and moved the twin bed into her room. I found myself a little sad, my baby is growing up, and to make matters worse the only sheet we could find was black. For some reason, I couldn't stand my baby sleeping in black, even though black was my favorite color when I was her age...weird huh?

While doing research on how to handle Abby's sleeping issues and talking with others, I was given MANY suggestions. Here are a few, maybe they will help others.

-Bring the child to bed with the parents
-Have the child sleep on a mattress on the floor next to the parents bed
-Read to the child until she falls asleep
-Lay in the child's bed with her
-Play music/a movie in the child's room
-Use the cry it out/Ferber method (let the child cry herself to sleep, going in and comforting her every 5 or more minutes
-Let her cry as long as you can stand, then go in
-Let her cry herself to sleep and do not go in (SO harsh)!

The cry it out method never worked with Abby, and besides, a wise old homeless man once told us, "that baby needs to be rocked." So, this baby wearing, rock her to sleep Mommy can not find it in herself to let the babe cry until sleep claims her.

On a happier note, we finally got paid today! After compiling a large shopping list and withdrawing the necessary funds we headed off to the grocery store to buy some much needed food. I continue to create our grocery list based on the next ten meals that I've planned out. I still intend to post these meals/lists eventually ;) We're attempting to stick to a much tighter budget for the foreseeable future, which includes planning out all our meals and buying only what we need. It's more work to begin with, but is much easier when it comes to the day to day deciding of what to eat for dinner.

I'll be sure to let you know how Abigab likes her new bed.

Is Piglet a boy or girl?

Before Abby was born, Mat and I decided to decorate her room with the classic Winnie the Pooh theme. Since then, we've been in this argument about the gender of Piglet. One of us thinks Piglet is a girl and one a boy. So, we think that you should take a vote to decide! Leave us a comment and let us know what you think and we'll tally the votes in one week. If you don't have a Blogger account, you can still comment and check "anonymous" at the end. We're not going to tell you which of us thinks s/he's a girl/boy, and Mat, no voting!

Good News! We think the cat is out from under our house, Yay! We haven't heard her all day today, and Mat had the hatch open most of the day yesterday. Hopefully she got out yesterday, and didn't die under there, that would be stiiinky. Poor little kitty mow mow. Since the cat is out from under the house, this means that it's got to be something else keeping Abby up between one and two hours a night, ugh.

The last two nights, Abby has climbed out of her crib and cried, pounded on her door, played her piano, etc. We have tried rocking Abby every night, but she just lays there in our arms, bright eyed and bushy tailed, pinching our noses, waving, sticking her foot our face, and popping out her pacifier to say, "Hi". It's so hard not to laugh, because she's so stinking cute, but it gets a little old in the middle of the night. After a few nights of this, excuse me, I mean two weeks, we decided to let her try and cry a while in her crib since the rocking thing wasn't working too well. During this "crying" time, she decided to be a little monkey and climb, climb, climb. Last night, the second night of this, when we were at our wits end, Mat was about to go in and try his hand at laying her down, but when he poked his head in, she was asleep on the floor with her blankie and sippy cup, awwww.

Luckily, Abby's 18 month appointment was today with her new doctor, who we loved. She suggested that we wake Abby from her nap a little early and maybe move her to a toddler bed, or a twin without the box spring. After cleaning out mountains of ear wax, she discovered that Abigab had some fluid build up which may have been left over from an ear infection. This made sense to us, because she had a super high fever about two weeks ago. The night time waking may have been a result of pain from the ear infection, and turned into a routine. Now all we have to do is break the routine, ha ha ha! Easier said than done.

Have a wonderful night or day and don't forget to let us know about Piglet. If you're still unsure how to do this, click where it says "comments" in blue writing below. This will take you to a page where you can tickety type away inside the "Post a Comment" box. Next, click on the drop down menu and select "anonymous" if you have no blogger account. Last, click "post comment" and it will be posted after we approve.

Our Sabbath

I just sent Mat and Abby to the store to buy some produce for dinner, for the week, and almost as soon as they left, it began pouring, thunder, lightening, the works! My poor family!

We went to church today at a church we have visited once in the past. It was a good sermon, with a warm and lively church body, but we're still not used to the sole form of musical worship being to hymns. After church, Abby was completely exhausted. She was sitting in her high chair attempting to eat her chicken salad with homemade bread, baked by Daddy, when she began chewing on her arm. I wrote the following song for her (pretty talented, I know):

If you're sleepy and you know it gnaw your arm
If you're sleepy and you know it gnaw your arm
If you're sleepy and you know it, then your eyes will surely show it
If you're sleepy and you know it, gnaw your arm

Two weeks ago, we decided to take a sabbath, once again, every Sunday. For us, this means going to church, resting, and doing things we enjoy as a family. I don't know about you, but I don't particularly enjoy doing dishes or cooking with my daughter dangling around my knees and whining for me to hold her. Yesterday I made homemade chicken salad for lunch today, raviolis for dinner today, and Mat made the bread. It has been so nice to not have to cook, but still enjoy yummy meals.

I've got Abby's 17 month photos all uploaded to the new site, and I'll post them tomorrow.

New Photo Album

We are trying to find a new online photo gallery, as we have run out of space again in our current Picasa storage. I think we've found one, with unlimited space, now I just need to upload all the photos. I'll try to get that done ASAP, so you'll be able to view Abby's 18 month photos, which are now all on the computer, but not online yet. We'll be sure you know when this happens, but it may take a few days with hubby's homework load and computer occupancy.

It was a balmy 59 degrees today and we were able to relieve some of Abby's cabin fever. We went to the park for about 45 minutes and had an all around fun day, minus the whole dish rack crashing to the floor and 3 pieces breaking. We are down to seven bowls and six salad plates, which isn't a huge sacrifice considering that only two of the three of us use breakable dishes.

Abby has her 18 month appointment on Wednesday, which means more shots...boo hoo. I never look forward to the times when baby receives shots. This always results in fussing, fever, and waking during the night. We'll also be missing work on Wednesday for this, leaving an especially short work week of three days, since we already have Monday off. Well, I'm off to play with the little one currently biting my pants for an hour before bedtime.

Phelps Fort

Mat built Abby her first fort today. It was super cute to go into the spare oom and see a floral print fortress with my husbands legs sticking out the side and baby sounds coming from within. I just had to go in and see what all the commotion was about and I found Abby so excited to be inside her princess bouncy castle transformed FORT. At one point she was so giddy that she tried dragging squirty man in with her. He wasn't too keen on the idea of being picked up, but he did venture in and wonder around a bit.