DIY my little pony costume

After much deliberating and flip-flopping between ideas, my daughter finally decided on princess Twilight Sparkle for Halloween this year. It was touch and go for awhile, she kept flip-flopping between Twilight Sparkle, Black Widow, and Maleficent. (Honestly, Black Widow would have been the easiest out of the choices, maybe she will still want to be that next year.) She did make up her mind to go with Twilight Sparkle this year. She told me she will be Black Widow next year and Maleficent the year after that.

I like the feeling of making her costumes by myself (even though I am not really that great at sewing), and to be honest all of the my little pony costumes I saw online were awful. So after searching on Pinterest a bit, I came up with the perfect costume. While I am going to give you the details specifically for Twilight, the general idea for this costume would work for any of the ponies. You would just have to change up the colors and some of the details.

Things you will need:
Wig (in the hair color for the pony you want)
leggings/t shirt (in the color for your pony-if you need to dye it, see my dying fabric tutorial)
tutu-in the color hair for your pony
3 foam sheets-if your pony has wings
2 felt sheets-if your pony isn't a unicorn you will only 1.
headband
hot glue

I found a My Little Pony wig on amazon for $13 (which is actually really cheap, and it's an adjustable kid sized wig). For the tail I am using a my little pony hair extension that someone sent for Sophie a long time ago (her hair is to fine to actually use it). I ordered light purple leggings on Amazon for $6 (I love amazon), and had a plain white t-shirt in her size to dye to match the leggings.

For the wings, I got 2 pieces of a darker purple foam and 1 sheet light purple foam. I free handed a wing design on the dark purple and cut it out. I free handed a smaller wing design on the light purple, then an even smaller one on the last dark purple sheet. I glue those altogether like so. Then hot glue them to the back of the shirt (I haven't done this yet because I ran out of hot glue...a travesty really).

For the headband I made 2 ear templates on a piece of paper and cut out 4 (hot glue 2 together for 1 ear). Then to be fancy I cut out a smaller ear template on glitter foam and hot glued it to the ears. For the horn I used this tutorial Unicorn headband. I ended up making it much smaller though. After gluing it to the headband the first time, I realized it was huge, so I cut about half of it off and redid it

Princess Twilight Sparkle also has a crown (she is only one other than Princess Celestia and Princess Luna that does). I used gold glitter foam and found a crown template that I liked to cut it out (I actually think it was an Elsa crown template, but it works just as well). I cut out some small diamond shapes out of the other glitter foam and glued them on, and cut a diamond out of magenta sparkle scrapbook paper I had on hand for the main gem.

The skirt I made because I felt like the costume was a little bit plain. As my daughter lovingly pointed out "Twilight doesn't wear a skirt!!". I made the skirt out of the colors of her hair and I feel like it really adds to the costume. Then I attached a cutie mark to the side for the finishing touch.

**Will post pictures when she wears it.

Diying farbic

Don't you hate when you are looking for a specific item and can't find it anywhere? I do!! I looked for a plain light purple shirt for 2 months before giving up. Everything I found was either the wrong shade of purple, or had a graphic on it. I was getting fed up and annoyed. I needed a plain light purple shirt (with no logos or graphics on it) for my daughter's Halloween costume and was beginning to think I would NEVER find what I was looking for.
Then yesterday when I was grabbing a long sleeve shirt for my son out of his closet (first time pulling them out since last winter), I saw a plain white long sleeved shirt that was in a bag of clothes given to me by a friend. It was about the right size for her, so today I tried it on her, and it would work! Woop woop! Now I just needed to dye it. I use RIT dye (I have dyed a few things in the past, so I have a few colors on hand). They are about $5 per bottle, and last forever because you really don't need much. You can use just one color or you can mix them to create another color. RIT even has a color mixing guide on their website. I am experimenting since I don't have the exact colors they used to get the color I want, but before buying 2 more bottles, I figured I would give it a try (you can always dye again if your item doesn't turn out the way you want). The guide said to use purple and denim blue, I am attempting with wine and evening blue. It only takes about 1/8 tsp of dye per quart of water.

To dye:
Liquid or powder dye (RIT comes in both forms)
fabric to dye (t-shirts, onesies, receiving blankets)
bucket or large bowl
mixing spoon you don't care about (will get dyed)
hot water

Fill bucket or bowl with hot water (as hot as your tap will get). You need enough water to be able to submerge your items (you can dye more than 1 at a time). Measure out your dye and place in water, and mix with spoon. Thoroughly wet your fabric before submerging (helps it absorb dye). Submerge items and swirl around to evenly coat. Dye an hour (or more for brighter result), mixing and swirling every 10-15 minutes. Mixing it makes sure it dyes evenly.

Get the led out

So, as anyone who knows me well knows, I am a HUGE Green Bay fan. I mean huge, my biggest concern when getting admitted while in labor with our first was if I was going to be able to watch the Green Bay game the next day. The nurses thought I was crazy. Both of the kid's first outfits were Green Bay outfits.

The problem (especially when living overseas) is that NFL merchandise is SO expensive! Plus a lot of places won't ship to APO, or charge just as much as the item for shipping. I don't have nearly enough Packers gear (and neither do the kids for that matter). While browsing on Pinterest I came across a really awesome shirt that I really wanted. I clicked on it, and the link lead nowhere (don't you HATE that!?!?). Best I can tell it was from Target but is no longer available. In my determination to find a shirt similiar I came across this :

It's not exactly the same as the original shirt I was looking for, but still great. I clicked and the link actually worked!! WHAT!?!? Get The Led Out is the website where you can find this shirt (and other Wisconsin apparel). To my surprise not only did the link lead somewhere, the shirts are very decently priced. This shirt was $15.99 plus I think $5 shipping (which is is not bad at all). The best part was that they shipped super quickly (normally any site that isn't Amazon takes a month or more to ship here). I got this shirt less than 2 weeks after ordering. The best part was that there were 2 shirts! I only ordered 1! Inside was a note saying "Thank you for serving our country. As a special thank you I sent you another shirt with your order. Thank you."

Never have I received such quick service and awesome costumer service before. I want every Wisconsin fan to know that they should check out the merchandise on this site. They can also make custom orders, as they are a small tee shirt printing company. They will definitely be getting more service from me in the future!

Chipotle pork burrito bowls

Crock pot meals...who doesn't love them?!? If you say you don't, you must crazy, or maybe you are just single and have no need for crock pot meals. I LOVE them because for the most part, you just toss everything in and leave it. Great for moms who are sleep deprived, or moms who just have a crazy hectic life and are always out and about. I really don't know what I would do without my crock pot (and I haven't even been able to utilize the best feature yet because of the hertz difference here-it's the timed feature. I can set it to turn off or turn to warm after a certain number of hours, how awesome is that!? So if my meal only needs to cook for 6 hours, but I'm not home right at the 6 hour mark, I don't need to worry about it over cooking!!!). I get to test that feature out soon enough though, 6 months and counting!!

Today I tried a new meal: chipotle pork burrito bowls. Super easy recipe, and yummy! You just throw a 3-4 lb pork lion roast in the crock pot with 1/2 cup of chipotle bbq sauce, and 8 oz of tomato sauce and leave it for 8 hours on low (only 3-4 hours if on high). I made my own chipotle bbq sauce using Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ sauce, some seasonings, and a can of green chilis (I would have used other chilis if they didn't cost so dang much here). I didn't really measure out the seasonings, it is basically by preference (you can always taste test and add more if needed, or more bbq if it's too much). I used a pinch of chili powder, cayenne pepper, a pinch of salt, ancho chile powder, and adobo seasoning, mixed it, and added a small can of green chilis.

Once the pork is done cooking shred it, and serve or cilantro lime rice (or any rice you prefer) with your choice of toppings. We used homemade guacamole, sour cream, cheese. You could use pico de gallo or taco sauce as well.

**Disclaimer, next time I will add more spice. It didn't have the kick I was looking for today. Tastes great, just not enough spice.

First Day

Well, today was Sophie's first day of school. It went smoothly, other than the ridiculous rain. The kids did really well with waking up early, I was actually impressed. We were even able to talk Sophie out of changing her first day outfit with no tears (she wanted to wear a my little pony dress, but it was pouring and not very warm). Bret even did ok with being woken up early today.

She was so excited about starting school, she went right in and sat on a shape, she wasn't even interested in giving hugs until we waited and asked her to give us some hugs before we left. She was just ready. At first Bret was sad about Sophie being gone all day, saying he missed her. After a bit, and some fun; we had coffee/snack time with some friends while making some diaper cakes (Bret played). Today is the first day in a long time that Bret hasn't had a complete freak out moment. We came home, danced a little, he colored, then read a book before lunch. 

He was not impressed when it was time to pick her up from school, he wanted her to stay there. She had a blast. They got yummy snacks, and a special treat (a ring pop). She made a lot of new friends (though she didn't think to ask anyone's name), they had lunch, and played. She is already begging to go back, and is sad that she has to wait until tomorrow. 

*Her first day of school pictures didn't turn out how I would have liked. I wanted to do them outside, but it was raining, and the lightning in our house is awful. I just had to make due with it though if I wanted the pictures. I made a little sign for her pictures using PicMonkey (our printer kind of messed up so it looks a little off).

Busy

Today is the day before Sophie starts preschool. OMG!!She is super excited. She had her student orientation and picture day yesterday. They did their school pictures and then they got tour the class room, and do a little playing. She was super sad to leave, when it was time to go she said, "Are you leaving now?" When I told her we were both leaving she got upset.

After nap time yesterday Sophie and I went to Showa Park and did part of her  5 year photo shoot (I did it a little early so I could take advantage of the perfect weather). We did a Cinderella shoot and it was so much fun! Sophie had a blast, Mommy had a blast, everyone at the park thought she was the most adorable thing ever. She has such personality, I maybe posed her myself a handful of times, and the other 90% was just me capturing her being 110% herself. I started editing those pictures today in between baking 64 cakes for the upcoming festival. (Did you know mixing up batter for 64 cakes takes FOREVER?!? Seriously, I was mixing cake for about 3 hours.) All the counter tops/tables/my desk are covered in cake, whether it be cooked or waiting to go in the oven. The kids were super upset that they don't get to eat all this cake (it would be cake for days up in here).

They were happy, Mommy opened the windows and blasted some music BakeFest 2015 (at least until nap time). Mommy took advantage of Daddy being at work and decided it was Christmas music time! (He has a rule about starting Christmas stuff too soon, but he's not home, so I don't have to follow his rule!) Now I'm enjoying some Christmas movies while the kids sleep and waiting to switch out cakes. I still have a lot of pictures to edit too. (I will say after editing a large amount of photos I totally understand why photographers charge as much as they do. Last night I only edited about 4 and it took me about 2 hours!) It's worth it though, they turned out so well. The second half of her 5 year photos is going to be a glitter photo shoot, but that will be closer to her birthday. I needed a nice day so that she wouldn't freeze/get wet in her Cinderella dress.

Turkey sloppy joes

We have had some pretty rainy days lately. I don't know about you, but when it's chilly and rainy I want things like chili, soup, and stew for dinner. They are nice and warming and make up for the gloomy rainy weather outside. I also love to bake when the weather is like this, but I'm on a 30 day eating challenge, so cupcakes and cookies are a no go for me. 

I don't think there is anything better than being in the kitchen cooking/baking while dancing to and belting out some good music. It's probably one of my favorite things to do, I put my playlist on iTunes on the computer, crank it up, and get busy. Plus, on days like that, dancing warms you up. Also, it's perfectly OK to use your mixing spoon as a microphone during a power ballad. 

Last night I was busy in the kitchen. I was mixing up some healthy sloppy joes for the family for dinner, and mixing up some pumpkin cupcakes for my husband to take to work this morning, along with some homemade frosting. 

Today I am going to share with you the delicious sloppy joe recipe from last night. These are made with ground turkey and are delicious! My husband is not a fan of sloppy joes but he liked these (he just said smaller chunks of pepper next time). It says to use red pepper, I used a green one because I cut my red one open and it was all rotten inside. This recipe is pretty quick and easy (easy enough that I was mixing up cupcakes while cooking it). 

Football Season

Football season is finally here!! Week 1 is only days away (for those that aren't aware, football season is probably my favorite season). I'm super excited! I am a huge Packers fan and our season opener is against the Bears (football rivalry at it's best). I am that fan that wakes up at 2 am so that I can watch the game (one of the joys of living overseas). 

Even though the Packers will always by my #1 team. Green and Gold until I'm dead and cold! I just like watching football in general. I watch even when they aren't playing, because I like knowing how other player's stats are and where the other teams are in the standing. I like to scout out the other teams to see how we will do against them. 

My husband I started a football card last year and it is honestly HUGE now, I like just going through our binders of football cards and reading stats (really, I could spend hours doing it). I also like just organizing them in general (not sure why, but I do). We have a few kick ass cards including a signed Brett Favre, a gold Aaron Rodgers and a gold Brett Favre. Other signatures we have from the Packers are: Jeff Janis, Jonathon Franklin, Davante Adams, Ha Ha Clinton-Dix, and Richard Rodgers. We also have Dion Jordan's auto from the Dolphins. We have a few awesome jersey cards (means they contain a piece cut from an Authentic jersey personally worn by the player in an official game). These cards are usually numbered because they are rare. The Donald Driver jersey card we have is 9/25, meaning there are only 25 in existence and we own the 9th made (the lower the number the more rare the card). We have a Bart Starr jersey card numbered 11/25. We also have jersey cards for James Jones, and Greg Jennings, and Jordy Nelson. We have a Superbowl patch card for Aaron Rodgers. A card we just got today is an old Jets card: Joe Namath numbered 28/99.  We have a lot more numbered cards, but this post would never end if I listed them all. 

I just joined a fantasy football league with a few other Packers fans (my first time playing fantasy football, but I'm pretty excited about it). While I didn't get all of my first choice (obviously Aaron Rodgers was gone in the blink of an eye),  I got a decent team. My QB's are Andrew Luck and Johnny Manziel (bench). My WR's are Dez Bryant, DeSean Jackson, and Brandon LaFell (bench). Running backs are Frank Gore (didn't get any of my top choices for this position), Rashad Jennings, and Ameer Abdullah (bench). Tight ends are Dwayne Allen and Charles Clay (bench). Kicker is Sean Gostkowski (this was my number 1 pick for a kicker). My main defense is the Bills with the Colts as back up. I am still waiting for my waiver for Anquan Boldin and Andre Williams to be approved for my 2 open slots. While this might not be the best line up, now I know what to expect and I will be better prepared for next season and fantasy football. 

YAY football!! My daughter will be playing flag football this year. They start in October and I am so excited for her! The teams are NFL teams, so fingers crossed she gets placed on the Packers!! I might die if she ends up with a Bears or Vikings jersey for flag football. 

Simple at home lesson plan

My last post was about wanting to start working with Bret one-on-one once his sister starts school next week. I've started working on a fairly simple (nothing too detailed) lesson plan to follow starting that next week (since she starts school on a Thursday), and we are going to need to get used to getting up and ready for the day much earlier than we currently do.

I want to somewhat get him on the new schedule before actually starting with jumping into at home learning. He doesn't really do well with change so I am sure the first few weeks are going to be a challenge. He normally wakes up between 7:30-8 and doesn't want to do anything until after 9. We will need to be at the bus stop at 7:30, which means leaving our house by 7:15 (fully dressed and ready). I also wanted to keep the lesson plan fairly simple so that if something comes up, it's not a huge deal. Both myself and my husband will be volunteering at the school on his days off, so it needs to be something that both of us can do with him (if it falls on a day where I'm at the school and Daddy is home with him). 

I didn't want it too detailed because I learned from experience that if you try to plan every second down the T, things usually don't work out the way you want. One the things you will see for every day is the letter of the day. We learned with Sophie (who had a very hard time learning her letters) that focusing on one letter each day, and just doing a quick review of the others is much more helpful. You will also see things like yoga, "movement", and sports in there; that goes back to the article I referenced the other day about physical activity helping with cognition. There are also life skills in there for him to work on. I also repeat a lot of the things instead of doing something brand new each time, that way it really sticks. I also have things like deep breathing in there, that is for teaching him how to calm himself down.

I decided to just focus on 4 things a day, that way I'm asking him to focus for an extended amount of time. I know that expecting him to focus for 1-2 hours at a time is just setting myself up for failure. Also why I add a lot of physical activity and things like music in there; because I know those are things he really enjoys, and I can use that to help him learn. You will also see one week I don't have Monday on there; that is a day that Sophie doesn't have school, and I figured we would do something all together as a family.

Working on calming/focusing with a preschooler

With Sophie starting school soon, I will have more time to focus on Bret and work with him one-on-one. I have tried "at home preschool" with both of them (or what we call "learning time"). When trying to do learning time with both kids, almost every day ended horribly with Bret in full on meltdown mode, Sophie angry because he was taking away from her learning, and Mommy frustrated because every time I tried do fun learning things with them it blew up in my face. We eventually took it from 2 hours down to about 30 minutes a day, then completely stopped because I was too burnt out trying to get Bret to focus for more than 1 minute, trying to keep Sophie from getting distracted by her brother, and stopping all the fights that came up.

It's very obvious to my husband and I, our close family, and close friends that Bret has some form of either ADD or ADHD (he is not diagnosed as he is not old enough, but we will not be shocked at all when the time comes that a teacher/doctor tells us that). We both have a family history, so we knew the likelihood of one or both of our kids having it was high. Bret is a very sweet little boy, but he has problems focusing. I know everyone wants to say that is normal for a 3 year old, and to some degree that is true, but I KNOW his problem is above and beyond that of a normal 3 year old (people seem to forget that he is not my first and only child). He can't sit still for a minute (this is no exaggeration, even when occupied by something that can keep his attention, which doesn't happen often, it's almost like he NEEDS to fidget). He goes from super happy and sweet, to completely destructive and disruptive in less than 5 minutes when he gets frustrated (which happens about once an hour at least). He is smart, and we can definitely see that, but he has the hardest time with seemingly simple tasks (such as putting socks on). 

I am currently doing some research on how to work with him at home, so that when the time comes for him to start school, we don't have a complete train wreck on our hands. The Atlantic is a great resource. It is geared more toward school aged kids, but is still really great information. It goes into detail about how exercise can improve childhood cognition and brain health, and can be a great alternative to medication for children with ADHD. I definitely plan to work some physical activity into our learning time (much easier when I can do one-on-one time with Bret at home). One of my other main focuses for while sister is at school is teaching Bret ways to calm himself when he gets into his super frustrated/meltdown phase (which unfortunately can happen at the drop of a hat). The only time he really gets physical with other kids is when he gets to this point, so my main goal is to get him to notice BEFORE he gets to that out of control point, and learn how he can calm himself down when he is there. After reading a few different blogs/articles about this and one thing that seems constant is setting up an area in a room that will act as their personal space/calm down area. Almost all of the articles I read also included giving different objects to help the child soothe themselves (sensory objects such a squishy ball, play-dough, rice bin, etc). We have tried "calm down" bottles in the past and while kids thought they were really cool, the first time we made them use them, the bottles got thrown at each other. We are setting up a "calm down area" in Bret's room. He has a little chair in one corner of his room that will work nicely (as long as we keep reminding Sophie that she cannot invade his personal area). I am working on getting a basket to fill with some sensory objects, noise canceling headphones (since noise can be a huge trigger for him), a soft pillow he can yell into if he needs it, his favorite book, and some pipe cleaners or other object he can twist and bend. I have already started working with him a little bit on taking a deep breathe when he starts to get frustrated when something doesn't go his way (like putting his socks or pants on), and this seems to be working in those situations. I may also incorporate some yoga into our one-on-one time and teach him some calming poses for him to do when he gets frustrated or upset.

DIY cake

I found a really awesome tutorial for putting images on cakes a while back and decided I wanted to do that for Sophie's birthday. I am going to be making her a Twilight Sparkle cake, but I wanted to test it out first to make sure it would actually work (as most of us know sometimes Pinterest tutorials don't always work out as promised). 

Today was the perfect opportunity to test it out. We are having a BBQ to celebrate my husband getting promoted. So, I figured, make him a staff sergeant cake! 

To start out; I usually use a box cake because it saves time and effort for me. To make a box cake taste a little better though, all you really need is a few things. To make a box cake taste homemade you will need: 1 box cake mix, 3 whole eggs, 1 cup granulated sugar, 1 cup flour, 1 cup sour cream, 1 tbsp vanilla extract, and a dash of salt. **Note: use cake flour if you can.

Whisk the dry ingredients together in a bowl. Mix the wet ingredients together and add half of the dry mix. Mix well, then add the rest of the dry ingredients. Beat well, about 3 minutes. Preheat oven to 300 and grease pans. Bake at 300 for 20-30 minutes (depending on size of cakes, I used 2 8inch round cake pans and baked for 20 minutes). Then turn heat up to 325 and bake for an equal amount of time. **These cakes are delicious!

I used to have issues with my cake crumbling when frosting it (even after letting it cool completely). This time around I put the cake in the fridge overnight before crumb -coating it, and it make all the difference. I crumb-coated, then place back in the fridge. After it hardened, I finished frosting it and placed back in the fridge. This is the link for the tutorial for transferring an image, Image Transfer. I made my image while waiting for the crumb coat to harden and then placed in the freezer. The image for this cake was very simple.

The frosting is a homemade buttercream frosting that is very simple to make. 4.5 cups powdered sugar, 1/2 cup (1 stick) softened butter, 1.5 tsp vanilla, 5-6 tbsp milk. Beat butter until creamy, add milk, sugar, and vanilla. Beat until smooth. (The blue frosting was a store bought tube because I didn't have food coloring, but it still worked well.)


**This is probably the first cake I have made that I am 100% proud of.

Getting back on track

It can be easy to get derailed, life happens and things come up. Last year I was doing awesome, working out every day, going to trainer, eating super healthy. I lost about 25 lbs. Then I went on vacation; out come the bad eating habits (can't exactly expect my family to cater to my new eating habits), and the fast food, and everything else that comes with traveling. Then came the knee injury and not being able to do much. When we got back home I kept up those bad habits. 

I tried to get back into the working out, but I was still eating like crap, not much of a change. Then my knee got even worse. After some physical therapy my knee can still hurt (mainly when running or doing extensive leg stuff, like squats). I have been trying to get back into the groove (especially since I have gained ALL the weight I lost back). I have been working 4-5 times a week, but after a month hadn't really seen much of a change. Still weigh the same, haven't noticed much getting smaller. I used to use BodySpace workouts, but unfortunately almost every one of those has things I can't do (like running, jump squats, etc). I have kind of tailored my own leg workouts to what I can do without making my knee hurt (some body-weight squats, leg curls, leg press, leg extension, and others). 

This month I started a 30 day challenge to help with getting back on track and losing some weight. The challenge is :

I am making one exception to this, I committed to doing this before my husband got promoted and this weekend we decided to throw a party for him, so I will be breaking it that day and that day only to help him celebrate. I also decided to commit to no alcohol for those 30 days (aside from hubby's party), and I am adding a day on the end to make up for the day I am cheating.

I have also started buying more lean meats, buying the leaner options for meats that we eat regularly. Also buying more produce (even though our bank account takes a hit on that one).

For October my goal is to limited processed food as much as possible, and find healthier alternatives to my favorite snacks. November the food goal is to eat no refined gains at all that month. December the goal is to not go crazy with holiday treats, and limit it to 1-2 treats per week (I LOVE holiday baking and tend to go overboard and end up eating a ton). My goal is to lose 20 lbs by January, and tone up my muscles (mainly in the midsection). The ultimate goal is to be down 40-45 lbs in the next year or so. It is going to take a lot of work, dedication, and will on my part, but I am getting there.