little ones

Product Review: The Honest Company

images Have you tried any of the (many) items that The Honest Company has to offer?! I signed up for free, to receive my free sample of their bulk items. I received the essentials bundle for my free sample and I really loved what I received. I then decided to keep my membership (which you can cancel at anytime)... so for $35/month you get 5 items from the Honest Company.

After I received my box (which is super cute by the way) I wanted to cancel my account. I thought "There's no way I'll need surface cleaner, body wash, shampoo, lotion, and healing balm every single month! That's insane!"

I thought this and then when I went into my account to cancel it, I realized you can edit your bundle! This changed everything. The Honest Company makes soo many different products. So, every month you can get something completely different. Here's what I got this month:

• bug spray • wipes • stain remover • diaper rash cream • hand sanitizer spray

Here's how it arrived! --->

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Their products are plant based and all natural. Which we love, and everything is just super cute, which is even better. Here's what the site looks like when you have an account:

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It's also much cheaper to purchase their bundles from their website, than it is to buy any of their products separately at Target. I also really like their diapers (have you seen their patterns, they're crazy cute!!!!), but they are way too expensive in my opinion, and I'm super happy with Target's Up&Up brand diapers, but so far their products are pretty awesome, and they all work great.

Here's what I decided to get for next month:

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If you're interested in signing up for a free trial use this link!

**This post is my personal opinion and I did not get anything in return for writing about The Honest Company.

My Kids are sick, and it's my fault.

10313172_10101510935076348_3238861546537874740_n I'm a first time mom of twin 18 month olds. Before becoming a stay at home mom, I was an event coordinator. I'm very organized and love having control. I'm OCD, and having anxiety in many areas of my life. Having twins really rocked my world. I think God realized I liked doing things on my own, that He chuckled and said "Here you go Amber, surprise! I'm giving you twins.. try to control this, see if you can do this on your own." When you're an event coordinator you know what's going to happen practically down to the second, when you have twins (or kids in general).... you don't have control of pretty much anything really. You have to be ready for the unexpected.

So, when my kids get sick, I have a slight panic attack. I go into this complete guilt mode.

I think things like: "It's my fault they're sick!" "Did I not give them their vitamins?" "If I could just remember to give them probiotics they would never get sick!" "Is my house dirty?"

My poor Lily Bean is sick right now. She's so grouchy. When she got sick on Thursday evening, and it lasted more than 48 hours, I immediately think that she has this horrible disease.

Does anyone else do this to themselves? I know I will always worry about my kids to an extent. I'll always want them not to be sick and not have to suffer in any way. But I also know that I need to let go and trust God in every area of my life. I need to cut myself some slack. I put way too much pressure on myself and I hate it. I had a complete meltdown yesterday morning. I'm soo thankful for my awesome husband, who is soo helpful and such an awesome dad. He doesn't ever worry about anything.

I make my days stressful... it's not my kids fault. I know I'll always worry about my kids to an extent. I know I'll always want the best for them, and I'll never want them to be sick. But I know that I do need to let things go. I need to realize that I'm doing my best, and to cut myself some slack. Any other moms out there really hard on themselves?

St.Patrick's Day Activities!

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I love to celebrate every holiday with my kiddos. And since we homeschool, I love getting creative and taking a day off of the normal lesson routine to observe and hopefully convey effectively the importance of each special day. Every year on this day, I always do a fun "green" only meal. Whether it's green pancakes and green milk with green butter and green syrup, or a plate filled with various naturally/unnaturally green items, my kids love it!

Here's what we did today for lunch:

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Food colored some cinnamon applesauce, pickle spear, popcorn with green M&M minis, raw organic broccoli with slightly colored green ranch veggie dip, and I tried my hardest to "paint" a four leaf clover on a piece of sliced provolone. They ate it all up and loved how silly it was. Other ideas for green foods would be celery, green apple slices, kiwi, honeydew, sweet green peppers, veggie straws, etc. And as long as you have green food coloring, you can pretty much make anything turn green. :)

For some school fun I made up three quick games, one for each level academically that I have. You can make these games more difficult if you have older ones.

color sort

For Miss Avery, I quickly cut out six circles and placed them in a regular sized muffin tin. I took a marker for each color of the rainbow and colored one color per circle then placed a circle in each tin.

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I had some various rainbow colored puff balls and put them in a separate container for her to pull from.

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She had a blast naming all of the colors and sorting all of the balls into the correct color tins. This activity is great for an older toddler or young preschooler like Avery. This kept her busy (she did it over and over again) for a while. And it's practical enough to keep for another day....or a moment when she is simply into everything.

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rainbow addition

For Carter, my 5 year old Kindergartener, I made up a game that would encourage some extra addition practice. He enjoyed this game so much that I just may make a more extensive version and include subtraction.

I was in a hurry when I made these games. I literally did it all in twenty minutes because the kids were excited for new activities and Olivia was threatening to reorganize the entire homeschool closet as I was using it. So I used what I had in front of me. In this case, I took 3 red solo cups and had some leftover rainbow stickers from Olivia's rainbow birthday party (go here for that post) and just simply stuck them on each cup. I then wrote with a sharpie a number on each cup that would represent a possible answer. I took rainbow Popsicle sticks (you can buy a pack of many at the Dollar Tree) and wrote a simple addition problem on each one that equaled to one of the answers on one of the cups.

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Carter then had to mentally answer each problem on each stick and place that stick in the correct cup. He had so much fun and got faster as he went along.

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pot 'o gold syllable sort

For my first grader, Hunter, I wanted a game that encouraged reading, vocabulary, and syllable counting. I took a white sheet of paper and glued the edges of two yellow pots (glue edges ONLY!!!), sprinkled them with a bit of gold glitter, and put a number on each. I took the same rainbowy Popsicle sticks that I used with Carter's game and wrote St.Patrick's Day related one and two syllable words. Hunter then had to clap while saying each word aloud and sort the sticks into their respective pots of gold. He, too, had a lot of fun with this game and it gave us an opportunity to discuss some of the words that he didn't know of before.

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Add in a fun history lesson about how amazing St.Patrick was and what the big deal is about this Irish holiday and I'd say you just had yourself a "pinch-free", super fun holiday with your kiddos.

Now it's back to laundry and to ice that triple chocolate fudge cake that has absolutely nothing to do with St.Patrick's Day aside from the fact that I need chocolate.

Love, Alicia