Pantry Makeover!

My pantry needed a makeover!


Before:

PURE CHAOS.

AFTER:

I should have taken a closer picture of the snack shelf (the middle shelf) when it was actually SUPER organized. This is hard to keep extremely organized because we fly through snacks so fast and they are constantly changing. This shelf could also use some work- thinking 2dimensional...we'll see. 

This is the "Dinner shelf" I have anything here that I would typically need to make my decision on what to cook. Need to purchase more of the OXO containers (the ones in the back with the white lids)-- because they are life changing. Seriously. Also, buy them at Costco vs. Anywhere else. Saved me $20/ per set of 5...which saved me 40 bucks in the end. So I spent the 40 bucks I saved on these green Target bins that were on clearance:

Now if I owned this home, I'd have taken out all the shelves and painted the inside white. There is nothing better than a white pantry, in my opinion. I am however, considering adding shelf liners to these shelves because this is just sad. On the hunt for some cute ones.

This isn't too pretty but it's the bottom shelf and it's where we're keeping our stock for now. So anything that we have in large quantity. Obviously, we like dog bones around here. 

This could use some improvement, but it's the baby shelf. The spinning food rack only cost me 10 dolla! Good investment I'd say.

As you can see, the top shelf still needs work and I could use a few more OXO Containers. But I'd say it's a vast improvement. And it is definitely making it easier to shop, cook, snack, ETC.

Wahoo! What do you think?? I like it so far, even though I know it's not complete and could still use some improvement. 

Called to Serve

My baby brother was called to serve a 2 year mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints to Concepcion, Chile. Wahoo!!! Goooo Brettski!

Want more info on what that entails? This should answer any questions you have, but if you have more feel free to contact me and I'll do my best to fill in the blanks ;)

He left just over a week ago. It is all very surreal. This is the 5th Jory kid to go on a mission. I remember sending and picking up older siblings on missions, but this is what I expected of them... they were the older ones so naturally they get big and get married and have babies and it's all very normal. It's when your YOUNGER ones start doing these things that it's time to start using the wrinkle cream, because it means you're old.

In typical LDS fashion, we attended Brett's farewell talk in sacrament followed by an Open House. What could have been a better Father's Day/Farewell gift to my brother AND my Dad than to bring my long lost brother along?

 It was so good to have everyone together and send my little bro off to become a man. I mean, I suppose he became a man when he turned 18, but if you've ever met a returned missionary, you know that the mission is where they really become a man.

On their thrones, awaiting guests.

Dad & Ryan were in total harmony. They just hung out like this.

In typical Clint fashion.

Next time Uncle Brett see's these boys they'll be soo diferent! 

On Juggling...

Each Friday night, I crawl in bed while it's still light out and I don't feel like a loser at all.

Ok, maybe a little. If I'm completely honest with myself I can admit that yes, it would be nice to have a night out to hang out with friends or go on a date with my husband... but when I've tried, I'm struggling to stay awake past 10pm. 

So have you been wondering where I've been? Just because the blog had paused for a breather during my extremely hectic schedule doesn't mean I did. I get up at 4am every day to get to work by 5am, stay till 10, come home to get the Hubs and the kidlets, go back to gym, workout, run errands, come home...crash. I would normally use this time to catch up on blog posts but I just haven't been able to do it. I NEED a nap by this time. I'm starting to wonder if I will ever have a day where I don't nap. 

After nap, I'm busy trying to maintain the house and keep Tristan from feeding Ryan and Ryan from getting into everything he isn't supposed to touch. I'm dumbfounded at how many toys you can place in front of a baby and have them still crawl to the cords under the computer table. Ryan has also been full blown teething lately so we've had blow out after blow out... literally, EVERY diaper for at least a week. So needless to say we've been washing sheets like crazy. On a brighter note, I've finally found some friends that are members of LA Fitness AND want to workout. It's great! So we've been trying out some of the cardio classes they offer at night. By the time we get home (depending on class) it's time for dinner, bath, pj's and story time. I get about 1/2 hour to pick up the house and do dishes and then I too crawl into bed. And that's just a typical day-- throw in anything else (relief society activity, visit teaching, personal training, home project, play dates) and I'm on overload. 

Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't have it any other way. I love it. I love my new friends, I love our new ward, and I love this town. I mostly like my job ;) and I love that my boys are becoming little people who are the best of friends. I love that they're having new experiences out here and they seem a lot happier. 

I'm just tired. 

Does anyone else feel like they can't keep up, or am I just getting lazy? 

A little bit of what we've been up to: 

(More later on my baby brother's Mission Farewell, Pantry Reorganize project, and some house updates...)

Ward pancake breakfast at Lake Meridian-- Tristan playing with his new friend, Felicia. (Ok, MY friend but he thinks it's his... I guess can can share.)

getting a little snuggle time in with my baby :)

Playing with the Green's :)

Typical boys

Tristan's NEW Bike. I'll take better pics later, but it's so cute-- it looks like a little dirt bike :)

Playtime with the Hilary's. 

Laundry Matters

Last week, I talked about a pet peeve I didn't even know I had-- well, before I found out about that pet peeve, there was a GIANT, and I mean

GIANT

pet peeve I did know I had.

It has to do with laundry, and it goes something like this:

If you stick clean clothes back in the hamper, or in a pile in the couch  and leave it there for an extended amount of time where they will surely wrinkle...

I will kill you.

No, okay... I'm kidding. I won't kill you, but you might just wish I did.

I don' t know when this started, I mean I didn't even start doing my own laundry til I moved out of my mother's house, which was when I was 19. I had to ask my first college roommate how it was done (true story). But it doesn't matter, because the point is... when I discover that this has happened, my chest gets tight, my face gets hot, and I want to explode. Yes, seriously. 

I can't control it.

I'm a woman. and a mama. 

Laundry matters, ya know?

Instead of exploding, I have somehow managed to convince myself to take 10 deep breaths (and we need every single one), and RE-DO the laundry. But you know what, I hate doing laundry, and enough is enough!

So yesterday, after the Hubs spent his afternoon doing this:

and then left this:

I had a slight meltdown. 

I had every intention of calling the Hubs to simply and calmly remind him of my OCD/Anxiety/Panic attack about laundry, but it came out more like this:

The fiesty came out.

I tried and tried to suppress it, but I just couldn't control it.

So this is my public apology:

Dear Hubs,

I'm sorry. Don't hate me :)

Love, 

Me

What's yours is mine, baby :)

As most married couples learn over the course of marriage, there are perks of being married...and there are, what we're going to call "downfalls". One of the things I wonder a lot, is why we marry the people we like? Once you're married you never get to see that person! Okay, so that's a downfall of marriage. You miss your spouse. 

But one of the perks, and my personal favorite:

"What's yours is mine" 

(Men: don't forget--this only applies to the women.)

So, Alex.. is actually Eric's friend. or was. But I like Alex too, so we're going to call him OUR friend. Because we're married, and we share everything.

You know who else really likes Alex? 

This little guy.

My favorite memory of Alex (and probably when I decided that he was my favorite of Eric's friends) was one night back in our apartment on Capitol Hill. Eric and I were having a dispute. Ok, a FIGHT. Like a real pretend fight. One where we would argue about something that neither one really knew what we were arguing over, but whatever it was... it was to be taken seriously. We used to argue a lot and then I'd sometimes throw belongings out the window or do crazy psychotic girlfriend type things. But this night, I think we were just really tired and didn't want to actually hash it out. So we agreed to take to our own belongings. Since the bed was mine, I got the "bedroom"* and Eric got the couch. 

*We rented a "One" bedroom apartment but our bedroom had CLOSET doors that led to the living room, so there was no privacy really and no such thing as sound proof*

Our first apartment :)

To my surprise, Eric actually asked me if he could have Alex over. I agreed and Alex came over. 

So here's when I decided I liked Alex. You know how when you're a kid and your friend's brother is being a jerk, so you're not allowed to talk to said brother because he's the "enemy"? Well, for some reason a lot of people carry this false sense of loyalty with them into adulthood. But not Alex. He said Hi to me and talked to me as if there wasn't a giant elephant in the room. 

And then he made me dinner. 

That was all it took. 

I bet you didn't know I was so easy to please.

( Eric will be silently disagreeing as he reads this...)

Date Night with a 2 year old.

We've been dying to take the kids to the Children's Museum since my friend mentioned it to me...oh, a year ago. She did also mention that it was kinda pricey but well worth it. And well worth it, it was...but pricey? Not for me.

Want to know why? Because I got in for free. Oh and so did the rugrats.

First Friday of every month from 5-8pm is FREE. Yes sir. I am glad I called first though to verify (I wanted to find out what the catch was-- THERE ISN'T ONE!) because the lady did tell me that at about 5:45pm is when they start a waiting list and there is usually a line to get in. I was there at 445, no line, no wait, no money. 

I love free things.

Before I can go on with this, I have to tell you about one of my biggest pet peeves that I didn't even realize I had and how it happened, and also how I almost crawled out of my skin trying to contain myself...

The downside of this free event is that of course, I had to fly solo in the parenting department. The Hubs works a terrible swing shift and I never have a Friday night date. This isn't new, it's been going on for almost 3 years so I'm pretty used to it. I'm also pretty savvy in human tetris. I can carry two kids, a diaper bag, and 4 bags of groceries AND open the trunk all by myself. I'm not going to be modest, I handle my own pretty well.

 I strapped Ryan in the Baby Bjorn and off we went.

Tristan was over the moon with interest at all these things that I was allowing him to do. We pressed buttons, pulled knobs, yelled crazy gibberish at perfect strangers, splashed water, made loud noises...etc. All was well until we found the train table. We literally spent about 45 minutes at the train table. Ryan was bored, I was bored... it was time to leave. Knowing full well that this wasn't going to go well, I tried to gently tell Tristan that we still had other things to see. Of course, this makes no sense to him because as far as he was concerned, this was why we were here. I finally had to pry the trains from his hands and drag him out. I don't like to baby this kind of behavior and I've learned that the best way to deal with this (with Tristan of course- every child is different) is to ignore him...I have in the past, tried to nurture and baby and talk him through it but as harsh as it sounds, the best way to handle things with Tristan is to rip him from the situation. Out of sight, out of mind. 

Sooo... naturally my child is literally flopping around on the floor like a seal kicking and screaming. It was the most epic tantrum I have yet to see. I stood there and watched him waiting for him to calm down. I did have Ryan strapped to my body afterall and I didn't want to throw my baby in the Lion's Den by picking Tristan up off the floor. But again, not that I couldn't have if I wanted to. Anyway, the point is that I didn't want to. This is where the fun part of parenting comes in; I'm the parent and I make the rules.

So when this woman, who I assure you was really just trying to help, comes over and picks my 2 year old up like he is a baby and tries to rock him and coddle him... I wanted to run screaming from the room. At first, I was too shell shocked to do anything for about a minute. And then I recovered and tried desperately not to freak out. I calmly pried my 2 year old from this woman assuring her that he was fine and that I did not need her help...but I did say Thank you... although I felt that was very unnecessary. When I say PRY, I LITERALLY had to PRY my child from this complete stranger. 

Did I mention that Tristan was completely terrified when this strange woman picked him up. He went from freaking out to pure panic. I think I would too if some random person tried to hold me. This is another one of those "Before I had kids" realizations that I'm fairly sure most parents go through. Before I had kids, I would get really irritated when kids would be freaking out in public and parents were just standing there... and now I completely understand. So the moral of this story is: before you judge, you should have kids :)

And also, don't touch random people's children unless they're dying, you're asked to, or it's the apocalypse.

I assure you, that over time my screaming child will have figured out that Mommy ignores screaming children and favors well behaved ones. 

The Little Farm

Last week we went to...

... A PETTING FARM.


Is this not the cutest little barn you've ever seen? Yes, that's because you can't smell it through the computer. No, but really...it was super cute and just $3! You can't go wrong with 3 bucks. If your kid is anything like mine and hates trying anything new, it doesn't even matter because 3 dollars is the cost of a coffee I don't need.

The fun part about living in a new area is that I have literally no idea where anything is, so everything seems new to me. It's like Christmas morning every time I make a wrong turn! So really, this place was 15 minutes away. On the downside...who knew Auburn was so close :/

One of the lovely ladies from our church organized this whole little play date for all of us to attend together. We got the whole farm to ourselves. Which is a good thing, because all the kids decided to park themselves in a mud puddle and I don't think people who weren't accustomed to families with 5 kids would have appreciated this.  They just don't know how to have fun like us Mormons ;)

He was a skeptic on the pony.

Soft fluffy baby bunny? NO THANK YOU!

Ryan, on the other hand, tried to squish tiny baby bunny.
We'll have to keep an eye on this one...

This darling little girl is Emma.
Eric tried really hard to capture her face
but he claims he didn't want to be creepy about it
(although I think this might just be more creepy.. :/ ).
He adores this little girl and hopes that one day
Tristan will be dateworthy material for her. lol.

Matching. I didn't do it, I promise.

Where there's wheels, there will be feuds. And so it begins...

donkey. 

Ryan is wondering, Is this bunny fatter than me?