30 days, 2,700 miles...

Our trip began on March 31st with a drive to West Lafayette, Indiana. RC and I went back to see friends at Purdue. Marie and Melanie both put us up for a night so we had more time to see friends. We had a great time and wish we had had more time to spare; however, we had to continue on our trip.

Checking out the trampoline with friends Ave and Eve!

St. Louis was the next stop to see Great Aunt Jellyfish (aka, my Aunt Julie)! We had one night and half a day to spare in St. Louis. It was filled with McAllister's Deli (I sure do miss that place!), Orange Leaf, a trip to Cotton Babies (Aunt Julie was introduced to a new whole world!), and a trip to the mall.

Great Aunt Jellyfish!

Our next destination was to see my family in Branson. We were able to spend a little over 2 weeks here. It was crazy 2 weeks. RC played with his cousins, we saw some of my high school friends and had a play date with their kids, went to soccer games, had a birthday party, and so much more! Everyday was jam packed with some activity or kids coming down to play. During this time RC learned to say "GO GO GO," popped his upper molars and became quiet the escape artist!

lunch with the kids. Grilled Cheeses! RC LOVED his. He ate half a sandwich plus extra crust from the others.

Nap time. Laying down to watch HOP.

J and his cake I made. He had just bought his iPad so we thought he would think an iPad cake would be pretty cool. He loved it!

RC LOVED his cake. His was the white angry bird.

RC pushing his 35ish pound cousin around!

We finally left on April 19th to head to Fulton, Missouri to see RC's newest cousin Liam. We spent a little over a week with my sister in law to help out while they began adjusting to life with a new baby. RC spent the time watching the new baby, being jealous when mommy held Liam, learned to say "bebee,"  began standing longer by himself and began working on more teeth!

Baby Liam

Sporting his cloth diaper! So cute!

During this entire trip RC kept saying "da da da da da" whenever he missed his daddy. We skyped, but it wasn't the same. Finally on the 28th we headed for home. Around the Louisville area though, we ran into a nasty storm and headed south several hours out of our way to avoid being in the path of the storms for the night. RC did great in the car. He doesn't mind it...too much. 

Heading away from Louisville as the storm started rolling in

Yesterday, the 29th, we finally arrived home after 30 days and around 2,700 miles later!

RC was so excited to see daddy and play with all of his toys! I guess the trip wore him out as he slept over 12 hours was up only a couple hours and went back down for nap!

The best dessert EVER!!!

Tonight as a special dessert for Trudy and Kyle, I made chocolate peanut butter lave cakes! Trudy and I had this dessert back when Richard was one month old and she came down to Branson and we went our for lunch at Chili's. We shared their chocolate peanut butter lava cake. It was one of the best desserts we had ever had. So for my visit, I decided we had to have lava cakes!

This is a super easy dessert to make. First you need the following:

plus, 1 cup of water, 3 TBSP peanut butter and 1 TBSP confectioners sugar, ramkins (or cupcake pan; regular or jumbo size). This recipe makes 12 regular cupcake lava cakes (adjust the number boxes of mix for amount you need).

Mix the batter as directed with the one cup of water. Pour mix into ramkins, cupcake pan, etc. Be sure you greased the pans first!!! Mix peanut butter and confectioners sugar together. This will help the peanut butter from separating while baking. Then pour in some of the Hershey's fudge and put a dollop of peanut butter on each.

Bake and cool as directed. Tip each cake upside down on plate and drizzle chocolate topping from mix on each. Finally add a scoop of your favorite ice cream and either hot fudge or hard candy shell to ice cream. Then ENJOY!

Mommy Talk Tuesday: Sleep

This week's Mommy Talk Tuesday from The Not-So-Secret Confessions of the Second Time Mom is on sleep! Sleep or rather non-sleep is probably the thing parents dread the most after having a new baby. For me, it turned out to not be so bad. In fact, in the very beginning, I had to set an alarm clock to wake RC to nurse him because he didn't want to wake. He probably would have slept through the night from day 1 if we would have been allowed to let him!

RC has continued to be a pretty easy baby. Around 8 weeks old he began sleeping through the night. By sleeping through the night though, I mean sleeping for about 8 hours. He first began with going to bed around midnight and sleeping until 8am (this wasn't a big deal for me as I generally don't sleep well before midnight anyway.). I decided to let RC make his own schedule. With being a SAHM and RC the only child, I figured things would probably work out easier if I let him do it himself. It didn't take long before he worked his way from midnight as his bedtime to around 8pm with still sleeping until 8am or later.

With him sleeping so long we ran into him waking due to peeing through his cloth diaper. It was time to find a nighttime cloth diaper combo to get him back sleeping through the night. We finally found a combo with a Flip cover, stay dry microfiber, and 2 hemp inserts. Another problem we ran into was him waking due to being hungry. He went from not nursing during the night to feeding every couple hours again around the 4 month mark. This turned out to be because he was getting bigger and not getting a full belly before bedtime anymore. He went on rice cereal at that point and the first night he had the cereal, he was back to sleeping through the night!

Nap times are a bit trickery. In the beginning, of course, RC was like any other newborn. Later, he started taking only 2 maybe 3 times a day. Now, there are days that h one nap is a struggle, but only if when I can tell he is super tired and keeps fighting sleep. Most days he takes a nap no problem. Again since I let him tell me, sometimes that means nap time doesn't come until 4pm! This usually isn't a big, but sometimes does push his bedtime a bit later for that night.

RC is only a year old and later I do foresee some potential problems. Currently we are on a trip where he is sleeping on a twin mattress. In the middle of the night, he has begun waking and thinks it's play time. Later when we decide to move him from a crib to a big boy bed, I think we may have some issues with him getting up and playing in bed. I suppose if this happens and he is quiet, it might not matter too much. He does like to wake a play quietly in his crib for about an hour before he actually cries to get out.

So far with RC, I am not pushing anything and I feel it is working out well for us. When we decide to have number two, I hope things will work out the same way.

An amazing opportunity!

Have you heard of Thirty-One? I first learned about Thirty-One when RC was just a month old. I was back home visiting family when my sister asked me if I wanted to go to a Thirty-One party. I just looked at her and asked "Thirty-One what?" I checked out the website and said I'd go, but wasn't sure I'd buy anything. Boy was I wrong! All my spending money for my trip was gone in an instant! I kept the catalog and over the next month I kept looking through it and looking at the $99 consultant option. I discussed it with my husband and decided to give it a try. Thirty-One has given me the opportunity to get out of the house, have some me time, and make a little money for some extras in our life.

This opportunity can be yours too! Until May 31st, you can earn a $99 rebate by selling $1,000 in your first 30 days! This means your enrollment kit is virtually FREE!!! There are TWO kits to chose from now.

Either kit comes with $300 worth of product AND business supplies. By selling $1,000 in your first 30 days you will also get, at minimum, $250 in commission, earn the $99 rebate AND earn more free products with the startswell program!

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Real Diaper Week: Nighttime Solutions

Nighttime diapering can be a challenge when cloth diapering. Disposables are engineered to hold a lot of urine, however, many choose to cloth diaper to keep the chemicals and toxins away from their child.

Nighttime cloth diapering can be accomplished. First, layer layer layer. It may take multiple inserts to get enough absorbency for your little one to make the 8 - 12 hour sleep. Check out different types of inserts. Hemp is a great solution. It holds more inch per inch than microfiber, however, it doesn't soak up urine as fast as microfiber.

Our nighttime diaper solution is a Flip cover with aplix (velcro closure) with a stay dry microfiber and 2 hemp inserts. This provides our RC with 10 - 12 hours worth of absorbency. The downside, it makes for a pretty thick diaper. RC wears 2 sizes larger in jammies.

If you are having trouble getting the best nighttime solution, ask around. Check with your favorite retailer and see if they have suggestions on what to try. Don't give up. There's always a solution!

RC in his Tiny Tush Elite 2.0 All Star print