Time may change me, but I can't trace time! (L)

Hello!  I'm the "little" sister (my big sister is physically smaller and has been since I was about SEVEN).  This is what I look like when I'm standing in my bathroom:

I have an almost-18-month-old son and in a little over 6 weeks (if things go according to plan!) I'll have a beautiful baby girl as well.  I've been married to the coolest guy I've ever met for about 4 and a half years and every day I wake up happy to be me! (although most days I'd like to wake up happy to be me a little bit later....)

I'm sure you'll learn more about me through these blogs, but since you already know that I think my sister's obsession with gift wrap is a wee bit over the top, you might be interested to know that I used to wrap a mean present. I too loved the ribbons and bows and complimentary wrapping paper colors... These days my motto is, "Ain't nobody got time for that!" In fact, the family party where my sister presented that pristine pug-adorned package, my family gave our gift in a red gift bag with pink tissue paper. That's right. It didn't even match. Why?  That's what I had in my house. Do I care? Nope! The gift was well received and the birthday girl barely paused to toss the mis-matched tissue paper before digging into the PRESENTS! My sister and I laughed about it, but I doubt anyone besides the two of us even noticed.

Here are a few other things that I used to care about that I gave up on when I became a mom:

#1 - Keeping the Baking Soda in my refrigerator fresh:
"Ain't nobody got time for that!"
I'm actually very impressed that the baking soda in my fridge right now is only expired by 3 weeks.  I'm fairly certain that the one before that was from 2012.  In my pre-mom days I would argue that fresh baking soda helps to keep your whole fridge fresher and healthier.  Is it true?  Maybe.  Do I care?  Nope. Why? Because I have too many other, more important things to do!

I wonder if the ricotta cheese next to the baking soda is expired... 

#2 - Washing my jeans every time I wear them: 

Gone are the days where my pants went in the laundry nightly!  I have exactly 3 pairs of maternity jeans and if they're not covered in some form of goo that came out of my son, and they don't smell, they don't get washed!  (if either of those conditions are not met, they do get washed...) You may think that this is pretty gross.  If you think that, it is unlikely that you have children! 

(just a note - I did pick these pants up off the floor as soon as I took this picture because clothes on the floor is something that I DO care about very much and I fight the daily battle to keep them all in their proper drawers, closets, or hampers.) 

#3 - My pedicure:

I'm going to spare you the picture of my gross toes, but just so you can create your own mental picture, I'm still rocking the pedicure that I got with my sister the day before her wedding two months ago! Before my son was born, I enjoyed bi-weekly pedicures in beautiful salons where I'd lazily page through Hollywood gossip magazines. Now I paint my own nails after the little man is sleeping and the laundry and the dishes are done... when I remember.  Even this hasn't happened in quite a while because for the moment, when I look for my feet, I see this: 

There are many more things that have changed since I became a mom, but it's getting late (almost 10:00!!) and I have to go to bed.  10 years ago I would be thinking about starting to get ready to go out soon... My how things change!  And it's all wonderful.  It was wonderful then and it's wonderful now.  I can't wait to see what the next 10 years bring!  

I wrap because I care (B)

I have a slight obsession with gift wrap. I don't entirely understand it myself, but it is very real. Little Sis is completely supportive of it, but admits she doesn't quite get it!

If I had to put my finger on it, I'd say it started one Christmas around six years ago. I stumbled upon the perfect storm of paper, bows, and gift tags, and, of course, bought the lot of them. I just really enjoyed wrapping up those gifts for my loved ones! Ever since then, I have, for the most part, sworn off gift bags completely, and been obsessed with beautiful paper, cloth ribbons, and all manner of "acoutromon." Multiple small objects, awkward half boxes with odd protrusions (common in toys for young children), and the like, may still end up in bag, but for the most part it's paper all the way! 

I did these just last weekend for two wonderful little girls, one on each side of our family, that happened to be turning six the same week:

Dear friends recently adopted a beautiful baby girl, and of course, that meant more wrapping! 

 

I love to tie a small toy or large festive lollipop in the ribbon. This is a Daisy "Itty Bitty" from the Hallmark store. It's so cute! I got the Little Mermaid one for my youngest nieces' 1st birthday gift. The little plush pug keychain pictured above was put on the birthday girl's backpack before I could blink- it was a complete hit! 

I also like Hallmark for the wrapping paper; their brand is my favorite. The regular paper has a grid printed on the back for measuring ease and perfectly straight cuts, but on the gift above I used their double sided paper! That great bright pink is on one side with the light purple on the other. They also have a light pink and baby blue one that I tend to keep on hand for baby showers. I've also used it to wrap gifts for my girlfriend's boy/girl twins! Very handy there. Unfortunately, I don't generally take pictures of my gift wrapping, so I can't share them- I just happened to take these to send to Little Sis, and well, here we are... 

Our SisterNESS (B)

Our sisterness lead us here.

My "little" sister is a mom of one, soon to be two, little cutie pickles.  I am the stepmom of one amazing little fella, and, hopefully, it will not be long before I am a mom too!
We both understand the struggle of balancing full-time work with family life.  We were raised by parents that both worked full-time, and yet still managed to raise us with lives full of magic and wonder.  I don't know how they did it!  In a world without Pinterest and Facebook and blogs- they were so creative and thought up so much fun for us!  We consider it our job to fill the lives of the little ones we are helping to raise with the same magic.  Luckily, we have each other! Oh yeah, and our wonderful husbands too!

We love to find and plan new fun things to do with the kiddies.  There is an endless list of ideas we remember from our childhood, things our friends think up, things our "friends" post on Facebook, and let's not forget Pinterest!  Sometimes it is outdoor fun, sometimes indoor, but we try to keep the little ones engaged and entertained.  We also craft and decorate and bake!  Oh, do we bake...

Our love of cookie baking has lead us to opening the SweetNESS Bakeshop on Etsy.  We bake specialty sugar cookies for themed parties!

This blog is about our journey.

And we thought it would be really fun to post about all of our crafts and projects and treats- share with other moms, step moms, aunts, people, etc. out there that enjoy this sort of thing too!