Thursday, April 30, 2015

Early Potty Training: Review


I received the book Early Potty Training as part of the Ultimate Homemaking Bundle which I recently bought. As I was skimming through the list of books, I came across this one and chose it to be the first to read. My daughter's almost 3 and while she has been introduced to the potty and sits on it occasionally, she's not keen on potty training yet. My personal feeling is that she's not physically ready yet. 

The book is a short and fast read with tips on how to potty train a young kid - younger than the standard accepted age of 2.5-3 years old. While I personally do not want to potty train younger than 2.5 years, I believe in each to their own. 

The main steps for potty training that the author uses are:
  1. Take child to potty as soon as child wakes up, before child goes to bed and at nap time
  2. Start changing diaper every 2 hours
  3. Then take child to potty every 2 hours before putting on new diaper
  4. When child's dry most of the time, switch to training underwear or regular underwear
  5. Continue diapers for naps and nighttime till completely dry when up after sleep
I read this book to primarily get some tips on how to potty train and how I could get started with my daughter. This would probably more useful for somebody who wants to potty train a 1-yr-old but the tips would apply to any age. 

Tuesday, April 28, 2015

Eighteen Acres: Review



Eighteen Acres by Nicolle Wallace is a book I had gotten through Bookmooch a few years ago but I did not have a chance to read it till very recently. I started reading the book and couldn't put it down till I finished it.

Short summary: If you're into politics, then you will love this book. It takes you behind the scenes of what actually happens at the White House. It was an interesting read and reminded me of the politics in the TV show Scandal.

The story is about the first female President of the United States Charlotte Kramer and her White House Chief of Staff Melanie Kingston and Dale Smith, a White House correspondent and rising star on the networks. The story revolves around the President's re-election campaign when everything goes crazy with the rumors of the First Husband's infidelity and a horrible error of judgement on the part of Charlotte's close friend who's also her closest National Security Adviser. How these three women handle the consequences of this error of judgement is what the rest of the book is all about.

The characters felt real to me and authentic which is hard to do when you are talking about the President and the White House which often feels very out-of-reach of us ordinary people and difficult to understand. But Nicolle Wallace has done a great job in bridging that gap.

This is definitely a must-read if you're into politics!


Monday, April 27, 2015

What I've Been Reading Lately

3 Steps to Get the Most Mileage Out of Your Tires:- I didn't know that you should rotate your tires every 8000-10000 miles to decrease the wear on the tires.

One Question That Can Also Be An Answer :- I love this blog and how every post of hers makes me think.

Wednesday, April 22, 2015

Weekend Update

Last weekend, we were supposed to travel to NJ to visit some family but due to my falling sick (again!!), we had to cancel the trip and stayed at home for the most part. 

I recently read some quick and on-the-go breakfast ideas and came across the idea of making muffin omelettes. I adapted the recipe from here to use carrots, red peppers and no meat and I skipped on the cheese since I didn't have any cheddar cheese at home. The liquid was a little lumpy once mixed with the flour but I made them anyway. When they came out of the oven, they looked good but for some reason, in about 15 mins, they just completely lost all their ooph and sunk in. They tasted ok but I don't think I'll make it again.

I've always had sleep issues with my daughter and for the last several weeks, whenever she naps at home over the weekends, she wakes up in 45 mins to an hour and starts screaming and being extremely fussy. It takes a while to get her to a good mood.

One of the days this weekend when she woke up, I picked her up and just held her and rocked her a bit and she fell asleep in my arms. It had been at least 3-4 months since she went to sleep in my arms and I relished the feeling and realized I had missed it. She slept for a good half-hour and I just enjoyed the feeling. And when I finally woke her up, she was in a good mood.

I gave my daughter a new puzzle game and was quite impressed with the quality of the pieces. It was a Ravensburger Garden Animals My First Puzzle, 2-Piece and she really liked it. It was easy for her to put together and easy to store in the box it came in.





Wednesday, April 15, 2015

Seeds sprouted!


As you can see a lot of my seeds have sprouted. 3 of them have sprouted 2 leaves and become tall enough that I put them in another container for them to get more sun.

Only the peppers and the coriander have not sprouted so far. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that they will sprout soon. Otherwise, I might have to try again.

This last weekend, I ended up buying 10 cu ft of garden soil for the raised bed garden I'm planning for this summer. Also, I bought 2 tomato plants and a strawberry plant from Home Depot to plant in some containers as soon as danger of frost is past.

For some reason, it gets warm during the day but gets chilly at night. I guess that's spring!

What I've Been Reading Lately

Safest Used Cars Under $10,000 for Teens - Consumer Reports :-The cars listed are Chevrolet Malibu, Ford Focus, Ford Fusion, Hyundai Sonata, Kia Soul, Mazda3, Mazda6i, Toyota RAV4, Volkswagen Jetta, Volkswagen Rabbit/Golf. These are mostly cars made between 2004-2012 and start from $5590.

Love and Wealth are not enough :- This article really got me thinking. I really want my daughter to know I "get" her and love her for who she is and make sure she knows that.

Friday, April 10, 2015

Simple words to live by for busy moms!


I got this in my email from The Abundant Mama and this really touched my heart. Words to live by! It's hard but I think making the effort would be so worth it.

Thursday, April 9, 2015

Pushing past the tired..

Recently, I've been feeling more tired but still I've been trying to up the amount of work I do at home. I came across this quote -

You might as well do it; You're going to be tired anyway. 

It gave me some motivation to push past the tired and get some more done.

Tuesday, April 7, 2015

What I've Been Reading Lately

Money mistakes in your 30s :- I'm in my early 30's and I'm guilty of at least half of the items on this list. I do spend too much money on my daughter and we have bought more house than we really need. Also, while we do save money, we are not really saving for my daughter's college.

How To Break Free Of Emotional Eating :- One of my goals is to lose weight this year and I'm finding this particularly hard. One of the reasons is because of emotional eating. One of the other reasons I overeat is also when I'm bored at work. Now that spring is almost here, I'm hoping to start going for daily walks - hopefully, that should help.

Sunday, April 5, 2015

Busy Saturday!

I spent sometime today working on some household tasks I had been putting off. I finally replaced the wreath on my front door with a new one.


Last year, my gardening hobby/experiment was 50/50. I had an ok harvest but not as well as I had hoped. But it was not too bad either. So this year, I'm planning to increase my scope and try more plants. Also, I thought I'd try planting seeds instead of buying the plants from the store. 

I bought a jiffy seedling greenhouse and planted a bunch of seeds - some perennial flower mix, basil, coriander, peppers and cherry tomatoes. Based on how these go, I may plant some more. I will keep posting on this.



Thursday, April 2, 2015

March Update on Goals

I can't believe it's April already! 25% of the year is already gone!

March was a good month for me. I've felt much better and my daughter's sleep-trained for the most part. I'm still working on getting her to sleep longer than 5:15 in the morning but it's been a huge improvement in my sleep. My cleaning's been more on-track with trying to clear clutter before it builds up. There's still room for lot more improvement but one baby step at a time. I've also been doing more baking and cooking than before.
  1. Lose 12 lbs: This was a sad fail for me. I just fixed my weight machine and I checked my weight - it's 136 pounds. So I've put on another 4 pounds and now my goals is to lose 16 pounds.
  2. Learn swimming: Waiting for my summer plans to get fixed before I can register for classes.
  3. Read 12 books this year: I read The Frog Princess, 20 Minute Meals and All You October 2014 magazine this month. 
  4. Do 12 craft or knitting activities this year: Didn't get to this.
  5. Introduce a new experience to AGirl once a month:  I took Agirl to the Children's Museum in Acton, MA. It was a great trip for her - she had a lot of fun. 
How has your progress been on your goals?

Slid off again!

The last few weeks have been extremely busy and I have not spent much time on the computer at all. So I have not been blogging much - hope t...

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