Shopper's Club Chaos Solved!

In case you're wondering, Jason, aka "The Coupon Cowboy" is still in full swing. We get free stuff from Rite Aid weekly. 

And the Coupon Cowboy was finally successful in lassoing another couponer - his brother Joe.  That's right, my brother-in-law has become equally obsessed with Rite Aid deals.

How lucky am I?

And how lucky is my sister-in-law Shannon too?

It guess that depends on if you think having an abundance of shampoo and toothpaste is lucky.

I never have to think twice about donating to personal hygiene charity drives. 

I actually seek them out now!

Seriously though, I have to admit that I love a good deal just as much as Jason.

In fact, I'm a sucker for store savings cards.  Every time I'm at the register and the cashier asks if I want to join some shopper's club, if it's free, I ALWAYS sign up.   I like a good deal and most of the stores require you to have their shopper's card to get their in-store deals.

Some have special perks and will send you coupons in the mail depending on how much you shop there, like Best Buy and Dick's Sporting Goods. Even food chains like Panera and Subway now have cards.

The problem with having all of these Shopper's Club cards is that they take up so much room in my wallet. The truth is, I can't even button my wallet closed.

What's worse is that when the cashier asks me if I have a customer loyalty card, I fumble around looking for it. A couple of times, I've actually signed up a second time because I thought I wasn't a member, only to find two cards in my wallet later!

I know that some stores have key tags but I've found that not all stores do and I hate having a million little tags mixed in with my keys.

I once had a million dollar idea to invent a card that would electronically house all other store cards, but I guess I wasn't smart enough to see it to fruition so now it's out there for someone else to invent and make millions.

Instead, I got out my hole puncher and set to work so that my wallet would button closed once again.

Problem solved! Now I have a nice little stack of store loyalty cards conveniently on a key chain in my purse. 

And my wallet is happy because it's no longer exposed for the world to see.

  

I'll let you know how the new system works out. In the meantime, I'd love to hear how you're organizing your store cards -- or if you refuse to sign up all together.

Also - if you have an organizing dilemma - email me or comment below.

Linking up to:

 

Organzing Drawers

I'm still trying to figure out how to blog more frequently while holding down a full time job and having  a one year old and an eleven year old.  If anyone out there has any tips, please let me know.  I always think about tons of ideas to share with you all but can't manage to find the time to take pictures, upload them, edit them and write the post.

For those of you who know me, you know I have a lot of hobbies too. Jason and I both love to work out and I enjoy all kinds of crafts -- so balancing everything is a bit overwhelming at times.

But I truly enjoy this blog and all that goes along with it - the creative process, the friendships I've created all over the world, the sharing of ideas so I truly would like to make it a more regular part of my life; I just haven't figured out how.

I admire those who have.

Anyway - I've been trying to get organized around here.  I've gotten a lot of questions from people on how to stay organized with kids -- especially with all of the toys and "stuff" they accumulate.  I'll try to share some of what's worked for us in the coming weeks. 

For those of  you who have kids who are a bit older  - this post is for you.

Imani is constantly getting her nice clothes dirty by playing outside in them. Don't get me wrong, I want her to have fun and get dirty -- I just don't want her outside in a brand new pair of pants that we bought less than an hour ago sliding in mud (yes, this really happens).

Imani is the kind of girl who defies all gender stereotypes. From the time she was a toddler, I had buckets of Oxyclean  around my house with her clothes soaking in them because she found sticks and mud much more interesting than barbies and doll houses. I can't say that I blame her.

My nickname as a child was "Grubby."

Thankfully, I outgrew that.

What makes this more frustrating is that Imani chooses to grub up her clothes and then chooses those exact same ripped jeans and stained shirts to put on before we're about to go to dinner at a friend's house.  She has a little bit of trouble determining when it's appropriate to wear stained versus not stained clothes.

So I decided to try to help her with a bit of organization.

I busted out the good ole' label maker.

And labeled her dresser drawers accordingly:

We also labeled the inside of all the play clothes with by writing "PC" on the tags so there wouldn't be any question about what clothes belong where.

Imani usually puts her own laundry away so this makes it much easier for her to know where everything goes - and she knows what clothes to wear depending on what she's going to be doing.

After I finished with Imani's drawers, I realized I wasn't exactly setting a good example with my own disorganized drawers.  While I didn't need to use the label maker, I did need a new system. I have a lot of clothes and I tend to just cram them in my drawers.

I've confessed several times that I am not the organized one in the house -- Jason is. 

He's the Type- "A" - the one who cleans constantly and makes sure everything is in its place -- the one who neatly puts his clothes away and makes sure every dresser drawer is closed - the one whose hangers and shirt collars are all facing the same direction in the closet.

I'm the free spirit - the one who carelessly crams all of my clothes in my dresser and attempt to shut it with clothes hanging out -- the one who lets my closet become a disaster and then,  after about a month of living like a slob - decides its time to get organized.

This was one of those months for me.

I had seen an image on Pinterest that showed clothes stacked or "rolled" rather than folded and stacked.  Clearly the traditionally way wasn't working for me.

So I rolled all of my sweaters:

And stacked my t-shirt drawer too:

And after about three weeks, I'm happy to say that my drawers are still (fairly) organized.  It makes so much more sense this way because I can see all of my shirts.

What's worked for you to keep your drawers organized? Got any tips? I'd love to hear 'em!

Fun, Fun, Noah Turns One!

This past weekend, we celebrated Noah's first birthday.  I cannot believe a year has already passed!  It seems like just yesterday, we were bringing him home from the hospital.

And showering him with kisses.

As much as I wanted to stop time weeks before his birthday, I knew I couldn't.  So instead, I channeled my emotion into creating his first birthday party.

I spent many late nights pinning ideas on Pinterest and finally decided to throw Noah a Dr. Seuss-inspired birthday.

I found inspiration from several different websites, including this one at "Hostess with the Mostess" and this one at "Annie's Eats."

Our invitation looked almost identical to the ones at "Annie's Eats" except we changed the wording a little, since it was Noah's first birthday.

I used my Silhouette cutting machine and Jason glued all the pieces together.  The invitation read

"It's hard to believe Noah is already turning one! 

Come one, come all, and join in the fun! 

Whether it rains or if it is sunny, we will have lots of good fun that is funny! 

You should not, would not want to miss a birthday celebration quite like this."


The color scheme was similar to that in "The Cat in the Hat."  All decorations were red, white and aqua.  I used a big piece of red and white polka-dotted fabric that I purchased at JoAnn's Fabric as a tablecloth for the food table.

I also purchased red and white vintage paper straws online.

Dr. Seuss books were placed around the house as part of the decor.

We served food inspired by Dr. Seuss books including Green (deviled) eggs and ham and cheese sliders (which were absolutely delicious!)  You can find the recipe for the ham sliders here at "Annie's Eats."  

We also served "Oodles of Noodles" (Pasta Salad)

The dessert table featured Oreo truffles, which were not inspired by a Dr. Seuss book but are incredible and were gone in less than 15 minutes.

In addition to the Oreo truffles, the dessert table also had Pink Ink Yink Drink (Lemonade punch),

Truffala Tree Cupcakes (cotton candy on pretzels for the trees),

the Cat in the Hat Cake & Strawberries on sticks (dipped in white chocolate and blue sprinkles).

For favors, guests received "WhoFoo Fluff on a Stick" (marshmallows dipped in blue white chocolate and sprinkles and wrapped in cellophane).  These were tied with a string and a note was attached that read:

"Today was good, today was fun!  Thank you, thank you, everyone!"

Imani and I made big tissue balls to hang over the dessert table in red, white and aqua (I should have removed the bronze wall hangings . . . oops!)

Noah wore a "One Fish Two Fish" shirt that we found at Target.

I made his party hat using my Silhouette machine.

I also made his birthday banner using the Silhouette.

We made a timeline highlighting pictures from Noah's first year.

There was a table set up that had Dr. Seuss' "Happy Birthday to You" book for guests to write a little birthday message to Noah that he can look back on when he is older.

We only played one game, which was to guess the number of blue gumballs and red sweedish fish in jars.  The winners got to take the candies home with them.

Overall, the party was a lot of fun.  There is so much you can do with a Dr. Seuss theme and it was hard to narrow down all the ideas online.

Most of all, I think we discovered that Noah loves being the center of attention!  I was nervous about how he would sit still opening all of the presents, but he enjoyed every bit of it:

Trying on his first camo hat and making faces for the camera,

and hugging bears in a book.

He especially enjoyed when everyone sang to him and he got to eat his  Truffala Tree cupcake!

He even shared with his sister!

Happy Birthday Noah!

Addicted to Pinterest

I've been totally addicted to Pinterest, as I've mentioned before.

I have so many projects I want to try and the list just keeps getting longer. If I spent half as much time creating as I spend pinning, I'd be a lot more productive.

But last weekend, Imani, her friend and I created a couple of things that were inspired by images on Pinterest.

The first was cookie dough brownies.  The cookie dough is made without eggs so it's okay to eat raw.  Basically, you make brownies and once they are cooked and cooled, you spread cookie dough (without the egg) batter over them, drizzle chocolate and sprinkle with miniature chocolate chips.

I think I gained 20 pounds last weekend.

The second project we completed were scarves that we made from old t-shirts.  Here is Imani modeling hers.

And here I am with mine.

But of course, I wasn't satisfied with just a plain white scarf. I had to attach a pin to give mine a little punch of color.

Isn't it cute?

We made a few in different colors too.  Cotton t-shirts without side seams work the best.


For instructions on how to make these scarves or the cookie dough brownies, follow me on Pinterest.  When you see a project you like, click on the image and it will take you directly to the website where the project was featured.

Here are a few more Pinterest projects I hope to bring to life.

A framed button monogram.

Source: etsy.com via Stephenie on Pinterest

A bath mat made out of old t-shirts





A vintage jewelry wreath

Source: bhg.com via Stephenie on Pinterest

Picture gift tags

Source: sweetpaul.typepad.com via Stephenie on Pinterest

A bracelet made from nuts

Source: kbshirley.blogspot.com via Stephenie on Pinterest

What's on your Pinterest list?