So hectic...

   Ugh I feel so bad for being M.I.A. all this time but man do I need time management.  Baseball season has ended and we immediately jumped into Football for Dakota.  We have had conditioning every single day in my little time period that I actually have free time.  Of course leave it to me to not realize that DUH I can blog from my phone while I'm waiting for his practice to get over everyday.  Sometimes I wonder how I make it through each day hahahah.

   On another note, I have a lot of fun stuff coming up here on my blog!  One thing I am excited about is the Giveaways!  I have a pretty awesome coming very soon for all the moms and dads out there watching!  I don't want to get too much into it though because that will be a new post in a day or two.  I have been thinking about starting polls on my blog also that will end in a prize of some sort. I think before I do that though I might start some polls without prizes to see how well they work out that way first.

   Anyway,  hopefully I will learn to manage my time a little better from here on out and will be popping out new posts daily again!  Everything has just been so hectic lately it's insane.  Well, I hope we get a lot of entries for the upcoming giveaway!  Have a good one!  

 

NumbSkin REVIEW!!

   I received this product for free to try and write a review on!  I was not sure what I would use this product for exactly since there are so many uses but I definitely found a great use for it!  Mosquito bites!  I live in the country in Indiana and the mosquitoes are horrendous this year!  We have sprayed and have citronella candles and what not and we still get bit up when we go out the door!  This product works wonders!

   I have bought anti-itch creams before and they work for a few minutes but that's it!  NumbSkin works for hours!  I applied this product around 5 p.m. when I left for the fireworks show and we returned home around 9 p.m. and I still had no itches!  I was amazed!  After trying the NumbSkin on myself I decided to try it on my kids and it worked just as great for them!  The best part is it only takes a very small dot of product to get the job done!  I love it!

   Not only does it numb mosquito bites but it works for bruises also!  My 6 year old was playing outside and the toy he was playing with broke and he hurt his foot!  He instantly got a bruise and was crying that it hurt about 15 minutes later so I decided to try the NumbSkin product on there also!  It worked great!  Within a few minutes he said his foot was feeling much better!

   I think this product will come in handy a lot!  I have a derma roller coming in the mail shortly and I think I will try it on my face when I use that!  I am also getting a new tattoo very soon and I will be using NumbSkin for that as well!  I can't wait to see how it works!  I highly recommend it!  You can find NumbSkin right on their website:  http://www.NumbSkin.com

   If you decide to try this product yourself please leave a comment and let me know how you liked it!  I really don't think you will be disappointed!

Who tags a kid out in the face???

   So today we had another baseball game for Dakota!  It was his second or third time batting and he was running to third and the kid on the other team tagged him right in the face on purpose!  Who does that?  Not only did that kid do that but another pushed a kid off base purposely...another tagged a kid on his helmet when he didnt even have the ball...what is the deal with this? Who coaches kids like that?  I had to bite my tongue too many times tonight so that I didn't get kicked out of the game but come on...These are 8-10 year olds! They should not be acting like that!  On a good note we did win!! 14-8!  We were 11-1 in the 3rd inning so I'm betting that is why the other team was getting so hostile but it's still uncalled for!  Oh well this was just a little vent!

Amazing Contouring!!

   I have always had a serious love for makeup! I remember being a little girl maybe 3-4 years old and my mom would buy me those cute little makeup kits!  The ones with the little lipsticks that stack on top of each other!  I loved them!  In the third grade I remember getting in to trouble after school because I had brought one of my moms makeup kits to school and did my makeup in the bathroom once school let out.  I'm talking eyeliner, mascara, and bright red lipstick!  I loved it all!

   I have always been more of a natural makeup type until recently.  I always seen all the models and celebs with the beautiful full face makeup and just couldn't figure out how they did it! Until I hit youtube!  As we all know youtube has everything you ever need to know!  That is where I learned to do a basic contouring of the face! I do this every time I apply my makeup now and I love it!  It really does make such a difference!  I will say contouring is something you have to practice and eventually (if you're lucky) master!  This is a small compilation of videos I have found on youtube with some amazing contouring skills!  If you have time please check them all out!  These are definitely some of my makeup/contouring goals!

Please feel free to leave comments and let me know if you go this far when you apply your makeup!  What are your favorite makeup application tips?

Beauty Product Giveaway!!!

   If you are anything like me you love contests and giveaways!  I know I sure do!  I just came across an awesome giveaway over at http://leapfrogandlipgloss.com/ !  

The Giveaway includes:
Lauren B. Cuticle Balm
Burt’s Bees Cucumber and Sage Facial Cleansing Towelettes
Philip B Russian Amber Imperial Insta-Thick Hair Thickening Spray
Molton Brown Replenishing Hand Cream in Rhubarb & Rose
John Frieda Sleek Finish Comb   

These items are valued at over $70!!  Get over there and get entered!!!

Get free products

   I don't know about you but I LOVE getting stuff for free when I can!  Let's face it barely anything in this world is even close to being free...We even have to pay for clean water to drink!  These are a few sites where you can do just that! You fill in your profile information or fill out simple quizes to see what type of items they can match you with!  From there you receive your items and give them reviews in your blogs or other social media sites!  

   Influenster allows its members to leave reviews and recommendations for thousands of products we use every day!  This helps when you are out shopping for a product and want to see real reviews on the products. Just jump on Influenster and search the product and it will most likely be there and there will be many reviews to look through!  Since these items were given for free to people to try I would think the reviews are honest!  I myself have left many many reviews on this site!  If you are a blogger and would love to try items for free to review this is a great place!

 

Love/Hate Tag...

   Yay time for some interesting fun! I was tagged by Lena over at Wrong Century Write Life to do the Love/Hate game!  How it works is someone tags you and you then have to write your own post with 10 things you love and 10 things you hate! Then go and tag 10 other people to do the same thing!  I like things like this because it helps to introduce yourself and get to know other people better also! Well here goes!!

   10 Things I Love:

1.) My kids!  My kids are my world! Although they drive me nuts on a daily basis I couldn't imagine my life without them and wouldn't want to either!

2.) Food!  I am a serious foodie!  I eat it all and I love it all!

3.) Make-up!  I am pretty serious when it comes to my make-up hehe!  I am not stuck to just one or two brands! I can find something amazing from every brand!  I believe if you look good on the outside it helps you feel good on the inside!

4.) Sparkle!  I am a pretty girly girl so I love all things that sparkle!

5.) Making lists! My husband says I make lists about making lists hehe

6.) Blogging!  I have started soo many different blogs in the past because it has always been something I wanted to do and be good at but I just didn't have the resources or ideas back then like I do today!

7.) Traveling!  I have traveled by car to Georgia and Florida quite a few times in my life! I would love to go West one day!

8.) Baking!  I love to bake! Cakes, cupcakes, brownies, etc!  I have done a few baby shower, birthday, and anniversary cakes! I love playing with Fondant!

9.) Pretty nails! I love love love getting my nails done and/or doing them myself! I recently learned how to apply gel nails myself and I am addicted!

10.) The beach!  I absolutely love the beach!  They are so soothing and peaceful!  The scenery is always so beautiful! Especially at sunset!



10 Things I hate:

1.) Liars! I cannot stand to be lied to! Even the small lies!  I just don't see the point! When you tell one lie you have to keep telling more lies to keep covering all the others! It's just stupid!

2.) Spiders!  Ugh..

3.) Bad parenting!  I'm talking about those parents that allow their kids to be bullies, or the ones that allow their kids to walk all over them, or the parents that just simply do not watch their kids, or the parents that bring kids in to the world and then do not take care of them properly!

4.) Cleaning!  Having 4 kids I swear there will never be enough time in the world to ever have a clean house or an empty sink!

5.) Cold weather!  I love the snow because it's pretty but if I could have snow and warm weather I would like it a lot more!

6.) Laundry! Laundry laundry laundry laundry...need I say more?

7.) Bullies! In school I was always the one to step in when someone was being bullied!  No matter who it was I never liked that!

8.) Not having a swimming pool! (heheh) It gets pretty hot in Indiana in the summer months!

9.) Leather seats!  It never fails!  Every time I get into my minivan in the summer I burn my legs because I always forget the seats are leather and they are always hot!

10.) Mosquitoes! I am a mosquito magnet!  There could be a group of 100 people and I would be the only one getting bit!


Well, that was interesting to fill out! I will say it was much easier to fill in the things I love than it was to fill in the things I hate hehe! Now it's your turn if I tagged you! Be sure to let me know when you get yours up so I can go check it out!

Blogs I tag include:
Jo Eden at: http://www.mommaboss.co.uk/
Hannah Cook at: http://faithsmummy.blogspot.ie/
Stephanie Nolan at:  http://mymomstotallynuts.com
Eliza Armand at:  www.fashion-confession.com 
Coral Lawson at: http://coral-lawson.blogspot.com.es/
Voni Harper at:  http://siobhanharper.blogspot.co.uk/
Katherine Dolan at:  www.what-Katie-did-next.blogspot.co.uk xx
Wendy Keniwell at: https://castawaywithdreams.wordpress.com/
Luiza Suatean at:  http://www.cupcakesplendens.com/
Milarie Yanina Cardona: http://itsauniquething.blogspot.com/?m=1
Marie P Made at: https://explorelovedrink.wordpress.com/
Feyi Aribisala at: http://uncovertheuntold.com/

Hahaha Funny Story...

   What is something completely off the wall hilarious that one of your kids has done before?  Mine?  I would have to say when Jaedon (my 2 year old son) came out of the bathroom with a maxi pad stuck to his privates!

   Yes, I am cracking up as I write this.  It is one of those times when you don't know if you should laugh or not.  Of course being that he is 2 years old he still follows me to the bathroom basically every time that I go in there!  I am usually pretty good about making sure that they are turned in the opposite direction until I am finished doing what I have to do so I am not sure how he learned where maxi pads go.

   He was in the "potty" doing his thing and comes out saying "Mommy I don't have nothing." like he always does when he DOES have something.  We turn to look and he starts walking towards us with this maxi pad stuck right between his legs covering all his privates and then stops because it started to hurt when he walked.  I'm betting it was pulling on his skin.  So I ask him why he did it and he tells me it was his "diaper".  Such a clever kid!

   I carefully removed it and told him those are my diapers not his!  Of course now every time he goes in the bathroom he asks me if I need one of my diapers.  I can't wait until we are in a public bathroom one of these days and he blurts it out like kids like to do!

My Best Ideas...

   Is there a certain time of day that all your amazing ideas come to you?  Mine seems to be late at night!  And when I say late at night I mean more early morning...3-4 A.M.

   I was sitting here last night writing my 2 posts and then I come up with about 10 new ideas and those ideas start filling their selves in.  I now have about 5 saved drafts here on my blog because I started the posts for each one that came to my head so that I wouldn't forget later!

   I am one of those people that takes notes about everything!  I think it would be wise to get a little notepad for all of my bright ideas so that way when I'm on the run and come up with stuff I can jot it down.  Gee,  why didn't I think of that sooner?  Well, I have and I did have a notepad in the past but my kids always rob me of my cool stuff so I no longer have that one!  I think this time I will find one that is like incognito...looks like a makeup compact or something so they won't expect.  Eh, who am I kidding, they would still get in to it! Hehehe!

   The joys of parenthood!  Can't keep nothing for yourself!

What's my name again?

   Mommy, Mom, Momma, Mommy, Mommy, Momma, Mom.............

   Snap out of it!!  Sometimes I have to ask myself...What's my name again?  Being that we live in such a small town and I am originally from out of state and I have no friends or family from my side I am surrounded by 4 children all day...5 if you include my husband who acts just as bad most of the time...I think I might lose my mind one of these days!

   I have about 8 loads of laundry that need done...a stack of dishes half way up the wall...the tub needs scrubbed...the floors need mopped like last month...fridge needs cleaned out...couches need vacuumed.

   This is what goes through my head on a daily basis.  Along with...Jaedon just ran out the door with no undies or pants on...Julien is eating red and will be climbing the walls in about 10 minutes...oh what am I talking about he's already climbing the walls as hes eating the red candy...Dakota needs to take out the trash...I need to call so and so...Did anyone get the mail today?  Where's the dog...oh there she is eating a candy wrapper that Julien threw on the floor instead of the trash can.

   Am I the only one or is this a typical mommy brain funtion?  Hehehe!  I guess I can say my kids really keep me on my toes and keep my brain working!  And yes I meant for this post to all over the place and run on forever!  It's a little look inside my head for the 10 seconds it took to read it!  What goes through your mommy brain all day? Please feel free to leave a comment and let me know I'm not losing it...or at least not the only one anyway...hehehe.

Wish Me Luck!!

   Well, as some of you may already know,  I love writing!  I guess you could say that is why I started this blog.  I recently payed for an E-book that had some different writing jobs listed and I decided to give a few of them a try!  Today, I applied for Examiner.com.

   Examiner.com is a site where you can write articles on a number of different topics.  For instance, parenting, arts, news, etc.  You pick the topic and apply and hopefully get hired.  I know there is pay but I am not sure how much or how often.  Money is money I suppose and we all know every little bit helps in some way or another.

   At the end of the application it said they would notify me in a few days to let me know if I got the job or not.  I hope it's soon because I get so anxious when I'm waiting for things like this.  Well, wish me luck!!

Family Day...Minus One...

   Well, since the weather was BEAUTIFUL today (80 and sunny) we decided to have a nice family day!  We don't get many of these because we are always busy with other things like family get togethers with the extended family or sports.

   We live about 45 minutes from Michigan City, Indiana so we decided to visit the zoo there!  Washington Park Zoo is the name!  It is a pretty small zoo...we caroused the whole zoo slowly in about 1 hour!  It is small but still big enough to enjoy!

   They have a Bengal Tiger!  Very pretty!  As well as 2 BEAUTIFUL white tigers!  I could sit and watch them roam their habitat all day!  There are other awesome animals like the grizzly bears, zebra, eagles, several types of monkeys and what not!  There is also a little group of goats you can pet!

   The admission is only $7 for adults and $6 for children 3-11 so since Dakota was not with us we only spent $27 to get in the zoo!  That is a great deal considering most zoos cost that much for one adult alone!  Parking is $7 for the whole day and you can walk right across the street to one of the many beaches!  We didn't do that today but we will!

   After the zoo we went to McDonald's for dinner and then to Big Lots to spend money...because we always seem to do that! HEHEHE!  We had a great day in all!  I wish Dakota was with us but he is enjoying himself with his friend Ian and his family at the go-kart races!

   Next weekend we have Jaedon's 3rd birthday at his great-grandparents home in Kokomo!  Then the weekend after that is my cousin's baby shower!  However, I do plan to make time for more awesome family outings like this before the kids go back to school in August!

Best Friends Forever...

   Do you remember being little and having a different best friend every other day?  Oh how I wish I could go back to those days!  Running the streets with my little gang of 3rd graders...running from one park to another...stopping at the corner store to buy a pop and some candy before going home and getting grounded for a day or 2 for being 5 minutes late.  Those were the days!

   Dakota is 9 years old and going to the fourth grade!  He has a few friends in school but nothing outside of school since we live in the country.  There aren't many kids around where we live so it makes it hard.  He had 1 friend that came to stay at our house a few times but that friendship didn't work out.  He didn't want to do anything but play video games the whole time he was here and they just didn't mesh well.

   Baseball has been such a blessing!  Not only is Dakota doing so well in baseball this year but he is making new friends also!  The regular baseball season ended and we went in to tournament.  The tournament ended early for us because there was a fight between coaches.  Dakota went on to All-stars and there are a few kids on the team that were also on the regular season team.  Dakota and him are a little over a year apart but they get along great!

   One day after the game Dakota asked to go to his house for the first time and he had a great time!  He spent the night there two nights in a row!  I was very surprised because he has never stayed anywhere before!  He came home yesterday and went with them today for the night to go to a fish fry and then to see go-kart races tomorrow!  They have really become great friends!  I couldn't be happier!

   I remember getting my first best-friend when I was in first grade!  Her name was Elizabeth and she lived about 2 houses away from me!  I would wake up every morning before my parents woke and run down to her house!  I would stay there all day and come home at like 7 that night!  And repeat the next day!

   Good friends are hard to come by!  I have 1 true friend that I have had since the 6th grade! I am now 30 years old and me and her have never had even 1 fight!  We haven't seen each other years now but we talk on the phone regularly and we are still just as close as we were when we were together 24/7 back in the day!  I really hope that is they kind of friendship this one turns in to for Dakota!  He is a great kid and deserves it!

Keep bees away!!!

   Do you have bees swarming around your home and want an easy way to get rid of them?  This might be the strangest remedy you have ever heard but it DOES work!

   My neighbors decided this year that they were going to be bee keepers!  This is all fine and dandy besides the fact that I am allergic to bees!  They have probably about 30 bee boxes in their yard which is located about 20 feet from my house!

   When they built their first, maybe, 10 boxes I was seriously worried!  Last year I was stung by some type of bee and my whole arm swelled like a balloon and was in pain, red, hot, and covered in rash!  I really don't want to go through that again so I decided to do some research!

   Apparently, honey bees are non-aggressive which is good because my yard was swarming with them!  However, Dakota was stung twice in a 2 week window!  The research I came up with only landed me with things I have tried in the past that never worked!  The inverted 2-liter bottle, the orange juice mixed with borax, the cinnamon sprinkled along the yard perimeter, etc, they never worked for me!

   I was talking to my mother-in-law one day and she told me to stuff a paper and hang it from my deck.  I of course asked if she was feeling ok...hehehe.  How is a stuffed paper bag going to keep the bees out of my yard?!  Well the reason it works is because the bees think it is a hornet nest and they stay away!  And it ACTUALLY WORKS!!

  To make this amazing contraption I just took a medium sized paper bag and stuffed it with some plastic grocery bags I had an abundance of.  Then tied a string to the top and tied that to the top deck!  It has been there over a month and has worked great ever since I put it up!  It is not the prettiest thing in the world but it does work!

   If you decide to give this a try please leave a comment and let me know if worked well for you also!  

Happy Father's Day...Yesterday...

 

   Boy, what a day we had yesterday!  Every year on Father's Day we usually go to the parade here in town and then immediately after that we go to Indiana Beach for the $0.25 ticket promotion they have there.  Last year we decided we were no longer doing that!  The park is always over-packed on that day and it takes forever to get on the rides...it's just a hassle!

   This year we changed things up a bit!  Myself and the kids made daddy breakfast in bed first!  We had fried eggs, turkey bacon, and hash browns!  After breakfast we got everyone ready and went to the parade!  The kids got a bunch of candy of course!  After the parade we shot over to the baseball field to practice a bit for the game we have tonight! We were there for about 2 hours!  After baseball we went to have pizza and play mini-golf!

   Overall, we had an awesome day and I am pretty positive my husband and my father-in-law had a great Father's Day!  I know the kids definitely had an awesome time!  The mini-golf spot has a big arcade and bounce houses also!  By the time we got home everyone was exhausted and ready for bed!  I think this might be a new Father's Day tradition!

Got smoked...

 

   Well, yesterday was a double header as well as the very first game for Dakota's All-stars baseball team!  I couldn't be more proud that he was chosen to be on the All-stars team this year!  This is his 3rd year playing baseball and the first time he has been picked for All-stars!

   Being that we are such a small town we don't have enough kids to separate the minor and major teams so we play together as one team divided in to 4 small teams!  All-stars then takes the best 3-4 kids from each team and separates them in to the proper age groups for those teams!  It's confusing, I know!  But that's baseball!

   Well, as I stated, yesterday was the first All-stars game for the year...AND WE LOST both games!  Our team was always the winning team in our area!  We only lost 1 game all season and tied one other one!  So when we came to this All-stars game yesterday our heads were still pretty big from winning the season as well as basically winning the tournament (that's another story).  Well, those blown up heads were quickly deflated by the time the second inning started with the first game!

   My husband played baseball when he was a youth also and he warned everyone this particular area that we played yesterday was very serious about baseball.  As he put it "Those kids aren't given bottles as infants, they're given a bat and ball".  Boy, was he right!  The first game they smoked us 15-3!  Talk about a loss!  And the second game we lost 17-4!!

   I will hand it to these boys though!  They were still in it to win it and had no negative feelings towards that team like they do with the other teams in our area!  I think it just made them realize that they still have a long way to go and more practice time needed!  Practice makes perfect!

   Tomorrow we play our second team and I have a great feeling these boys will come in strong and finish even stronger!!  They have a love for this game that I think just got stronger with these losses they faced yesterday!

   Every strike brings me closer to the next home run. -Babe Ruth

School's Out For Summer...

   Ok, who is with me when I say I seem to forget what it's like being with kids 24/7 once school lets out for summer break?  All the extra messes, extra meals, and extra headaches.  Don't get me wrong I absolutely adore my kids but school has been out for about 2 weeks now and I need a vacation already!

   I wonder if my kids ever get tired of hearing me ask them to clean up their bedroom?  Crazy thing is they have 3-4 toy boxes FILLED with toys that they never touch UNTIL I ask them to clean their room!  Once their room is cleaned it's like they find all these buried treasures they seemed to never know about then they just start going through all these toys and make a new mess.  I tell them all the time if they would just do a quick 5 minute clean up every day and use team work their room wouldn't get so out of hand!  However, that never happens...maybe it's time for a chore chart!

   The week school let out we went grocery shopping as we would any other week.  Within 2 days we had went through 2 gallons of milk, 2 boxes of cereal, 1 package of Ramen soup, 2 loaves of bread, a whole package of sliced cheese, and 2 gallons of lemonade.  This was just from snacks alone and not counting the 3 actual meals we have every day!  If anyone has any great cheap snack ideas that are actually filling please let me know!  Maybe they will give my bank account a small break! (haha)

   I do know one thing my family needs to break out once again and that is the "get along shirt"!  When the kids are fighting with with each other or arguing with each other we have a large t-shirt and have them both fit into the t-shirt at the same time.  They then have to sit in this shirt together until they decide to apologize and get along once again.  Of course this is just a temporary fix but I'll take what I can get!  The funny thing about this is they can be fighting like cats and dogs before we fit them into the shirt together.  Once we have them together in this shirt they are laughing and having a good time.  BOYS!

   I often wonder how things will change as my boys keep growing older!  I do know in these days they might drive me nuts and have me pulling my hair out (haha), but there will be a day when they each decide to move out of the nest and I will be wishing that they were still in my home making their messes and eating everything in sight!  I will forever be grateful for all these messes!  After all, they are just more ways we are all making great memories!  Now to go clean up a few more messes and get some snacks made before Julien's baseball game in a bit!

 

 

I little look into my family...

   So, to start this blog off fun, I though I would do a nice post to introduce my family!  We are a family of 6!  Myself, my Husband, Step-son, and 3 boys together! My husband and I have been together since October of 2004!  He already had a 3 year old son (Deven) when we got together!  In December of 2005 we welcomed our first child together, Dakota!  We were married in March of 2007! We welcomed baby #2 (another boy Julien) in October 2008! In February of 2009 we moved out of my in-laws home and in to our own little home!  July of 2012 we welcomed baby #3 (yet another boy Jaedon)!

   Yes! Sometimes life is crazy being the only female in the family but it's still fun!  We do plan to try for a girl maybe sometime in the fall!  We shall see!

   We are a pretty normal family!  We love spending quality time together when we can!  The boys play baseball and soccer!  When we are not doing sports we are fishing, shopping, going out to dinner, watching movies, etc...

   I don't want to go too deep in just one post...You will learn more about us as the posts go on!  Well I hope you continue to visit my blog and if you have any ideas for me to write about please shoot me a message or leave a comment!