10 Reasons I Am a Great Mom

 

1. Because I care, and listen, and try to understand.
2. Because I managed to stay sane so far with my "I want to be everywhere right now, and I don't want to sleep" kids.
3. Because I think my family is the best of what happened to me, and I love them all.
4. Because I read out loud the same books again and again, every day, many times a day.
5. Because I enjoy the every day discoveries of the world with them.
6. Because I am still breast feeding and co-sleeping: it's very boring and annoying at times.
7. Because I quit a great job to stay at home for my family.
8. Because I try to teach my kids to be great people.
9. Because we are going to the vacation in 2 days. Yay!
10. Because I am going to survive 10+ running and screaming toddlers for our Zoo Party when we'll get back, LOL.

The Perfect Sippy Cup

We didn't find our perfect sippy cup for my breast fed baby just jet. We tried several different types showed on the picture here. They all have their pros and cons. Camilla might take a sip from them, but she doesn't really like any of them.

 



 

This is one of the plastic cups I bought for the family this season. Everybody loves them: they are much prettier in real life then on the picture. The baby loves this one too. Probably because it is see through so she can see and want what's inside. And it still has attention-catching color and texture of the palm trees. If she'd drink from it by herself, the liquid is everywhere, which is fun too - LOL

I am dreaming of the nice peaceful scene of the baby with her bottle of water playing quietly somewhere by herself. Not happening. Here is a picture of my dream: a movie night with the bottles. This one lasted for several minutes.

We need to find a nice bottle ASAP because we will be traveling quite a bit. If anybody have a piece of advice for me, I would appreciate it so much! I am thinking of trying the Joovy Dood sippy cup next.

Update

Found one! It's Munchkin Straw Cup. Fun orange colors for summer fun. Camilla loves it. It was the first time in 18 months that she drank milk from the bottle - Yay! And there are pictures of cows playing soccer. So she walks around drinking milk and saying "Cow! Cow!"

The straw is not plastic - it's very soft and nice. The drawback is to take the bottle apart for washing. They sell the straws separately. I saw 4 straws for $6 at Amazon. It closes for traveling:

Nuk! Camilla loves it. It's pretty orange and red. The spout is soft and shaped in unusual way to fit right into the mouth - LOL. The handles move around, and they are soft, comfy, and shaped to help the little fingers hold it easier. It's easy to wash. So far, works great for us!

Thanks, Brittany and Jessica, for pointing me in a right direction! Gotta love blogging Moms: they know everything!!! <3 I've just started blogging; and I am very impressed with the many of you, Mom Bloggers out there! Millions of  very helpful and exciting ideas, interesting thoughts, opinions... I am so in love with all of you!



Busy Bag Swap 2

This is such a fun! My baby got so many great activities, and she loves all of them! We are preparing for the vacation. I am scared of the 8+ hours in the car with this busy toddler. Busy bags will be a lot of help in the car and everywhere else!
Here are some of the stuff we've got:

Color wheel.

She is to match the colors on the wheel with the colors on the cloths pin. There can be different variations of this. Match shapes, letters, numbers, animals...

"The bird eats worms".

The bird is a cloths pin. The child is to use it  to pick up "worms" hidden in paper grass. Very cute!

"Draw a face and say "Hi" ".

The girl's face is made of hot glue on cardboard. Mommy puts a piece of paper over the face, and Camilla rubs it with the side of a crayon. (we will work on it; there are fine motor skills still involved - still difficult for 19 months old) Then, the face shows off on paper, and we can say "Hi" to a new girl - LOL.

Camilla was so happy to have so many new activities here and there through the day, and I didn't have to spend any time to prepare it. I am in love with busy bags! So looking forward to another busy bag swap! I will make sand art bags. If anybody has any great busy bag ideas, I'd love to hear them!!!!

Busy Bag Swap

Busy bag is a zip-lock bag containing a fun activity for kids. It meant to be small enough that you can stick it in your bag and pull it out to get your kid busy when travelling. Getting ready for a vacation! Yay!!! Everybody was to make the copies of the same bag in the amount of families participating. So that we exchange the bags, and each family would leave with a bunch of different bags filled with fun! It can be very simple, like several macaroni and a rope to put them in to make a jewelry.
So, here is mine:

Does it look like fun already? There are 4 busy bags in this picture. "Learn your colors". The picture is made in the laundry room without the light and flush. OK, sorry, here is a picture with a flush:

I found the locker kits on clearance, $1.50 per kit. There were a dry-erase board, a star dry-erase, a light, a clock, a dry-erase marker, and a mirror. I used the packaging board to make a book. The inside is dry-erase itself.

And I covered outside with primary colors. The attached ziplock contains several pieces of felt of different colors and a light. I hope, our toddlers will have fun with changing the color of the light when it's dark. And when there is light, they could see what causes the light to change its color and be more interested in playing with the felt and naming the colors. The light comes apart easily. So we can close the bag and reinforce it with scotch before giving it to a child to play. The other side is a pick-a-boo mirror. Flip a piece of felt to see yourself!

I can't wait to see the other bags we are getting. I'll post an update after the swap. Please, leave a comment! I'll be very interested in your busy bag ideas because we are having another swap in a couple of months.