Summer Blogger Gift Exchange

This post was supposed to be posted about a week ago but of course, life this summer has been a little cray cray over here and I hadn't gotten around to it. Anyways, I was invited to participate in a Blogger gift exchange hosted by my friend Chrissy from Simple Joys Blog and Emma from Harper and Will . We were paired up with another mom blogger and we exchanged summer gifts through the mail. Thank you so much for organizing this little activity ladies!

This was a fun activity to try and get to know someone through their blog without them knowing who you are! 

My secret blogger was Ashley from Running MOMentum  and she sent me the cutest gifts all the way from Virginia! How cool is that?! Here are the sweet gifts she sent over...they were perfect for these crazy hot temperatures we are having over here in South Florida!

My favorite were the mold to make DIY ice cream and she even included a recipe that sounds delish!!

Motherhood Failure//Mommy to the Rescue

So this week kicked off to a rocky start. We got back from Atlanta Sunday. So I've been trying to get Gus and Olivia back into their normal schedules--meal times, nap times, bed times, etc. and myself for that matter. After a week of not having to do much around the house, it's rough to come back to house chores.

Monday and Tuesday were rough. Gus threw multiple tantrums about just about anything-- He didnt nap either one of the days--you get the picture. It's never a good thing when a nap time doesn't happen. He is not himself, we all get in a bad mood. It's not pretty. And mommy is not pretty. Mommy needs nap time. That is my "me" time to do whatever it is that I cant do when they are awake.We were all glad when we saw daddy walk in through the door those two days. 

Then yesterday, started off great! Olivia slept in until about 9--which never happens. she's usually up at about 7:30 am. They both didn't really have lunch--which was fine. They're both still recuperating from sickies. Since Olivia woke up late, she skipped her morning nap which is usually about 2 hours after she wakes up in the morning. I put them both down to nap after lunch time. Olivia slept for a couple hours and Gus slept for almost 4 hours!! Let's just say that was exactly what I needed after a rough 2 days back. 

I gave my floors a good cleaning, organized our bedroom, cleaned out my closet, put make-up on, did my hair, answered some emails, it was successful! I was feeling great!! 

Olivia woke up brought her down, we snacked and played and Gus woke up. I went upstairs later and realized I hadn't changed either one of their diapers. (I am on my last day of antibiotics so I have not re-gained my sense of smell or taste yet) I grabbed Olivia first I opened up her diaper and poor thing, had had a poopy diaper I think since she had woken up from her nap and I had no idea because I can't smell anything. I am so used to just smelling that I didn't even bother to check her diaper. yeah....great! mom of the year, over here. So naturally I start cleaning her up and she starts screaming because it hurt her so bad. I felt awful. 

Then I put her down, and Gus had opened their bathroom door and I hadn't seen it. So I'm changing Gus and she prances right into the bathroom. I turn around and she had dumped just about all of their bath stuff in the toilet---their shampoo, body wash, toys. Great!

As I am taking everything out my mom calls. So i'm talking to her for a little bit in the kids room and all of the sudden I hear, "MOM", I poke my head out to see what's wrong and I can hear Gus' little voice behind my shut bedroom door. I go up to the door and try to open it and it's locked. I frantically hang up with my mother and call my husband because in this little rental we don't have those long pointy keys for the doors inside of their house like most people do. 

At this point Gus is crying because he's frustrated he can't get the  door open. So I tell my husband I can't get the door open and he says he had a skinny screwdriver in his tool box but his tool box is in his car, with him. great. so he's like you know what just screw it, tell Gus to move away from the door and knock the door down. We'll fix it later. My reaction was literally, "ummmm are you crazy?!?!" I weigh 110 pounds. This little person can't knock the door down." If you know me in person, I'm pretty small. Then he proceeds to say, "you can do it, honey! you have all your body weight!" Yeah okay whatever youre crazy. ill figure it out.

All of our wire hangers are in our room. The kids only have plastic hangers. here I am frantically running around the house looking for something long and skinny to unlock the door with Olivia on my hip while Gus is screaming and crying upstairs "mom help me!! mom help me!!" finally i found another skinny screwdriver in our junk drawer--thank God for junk drawers!! For all of you neat freaks that  hate junk our junk drawer saved me!! hahah. I was able to jamm the screwdriver in the little hole in the doorknob and get the door OPEN!!! 

The poor little thing lit up when he saw and gave me a HUGE hug!! and said, "MOM you help me!!" Then we had chocolate chip cookies to celebrate we didn't have to call 911 to get him out hahaha because I was honestly just about to!!



So that was my crazy day!!
Hope you're having a good one!!

Alexander and Sophia + The Coral Pear + Natalie Atick Photography

If you haven't already noticed I have a passion for children's clothes. Oftentimes, I find myself shopping wayy more for my little ones than myself. I just cant help it! 

Today, I am featuring two stylish children's brands who are both owned by moms. The first one, Alexander and Sophia, is a children's clothing line with adorable, hip styles for little ones. The talented women behind this line is a team of sisters, which I find so incredible!! 

The second is The Coral Pear, a baby shoe brand. They make all different styles of top quality leather baby moccs that are competely baby proof--meaning they are very hard for toddlers to get take them off! DING DING DING!!! That is the biggest problem I have with velcro baby shoes for Olivia! I highly recommend you check them out!

These women gave me the opportunity to style pieces from their latest Summer Collections on Gus and Olivia! Which I was thrilled about! 

On Olivia, I paired Alexander and Sophia's Dainty Lace Shorts with a simple chambray top and Pale Pink Bow Moccs from The Coral Pear. 

I am completely in love with these shorts! I love how delicate and feminine they are! The bow moccs, I think, sets The Coral Pear apart from other baby Moccs brands. I love that they are more girly that other uni-sex mocc styles! They are so comfortable for baby's chubby feet and very durable!

Gus is wearing the Bowtie Button Up from Alexander and Sophia with some bright Salmon Shorts and our favorite Saltwater Sandals. 

And the button up with the chambray is seriously just the cutest! It's classy but stylish at the same time! That's one of the things I love about their lines!

It was such a pleasure working with all of these lovely ladies and their fabulous brands for this collaboration and a huge Thank you to Natalie Atick for snapping these shots for us! Check her out here for all of your photography needs! 

And Lastly, Alexander and Sophia is giving away a $25 gift certificate to their online store to one of my fabulous readers!! The giveaway will start today and end Tuesday June 17th at midnight! 
You can enter below through the rafflecopter!! Good LUCK!!!


a Rafflecopter giveaway

IM BACK!!

I feel so bad I put my little blog and fabulous readers on the back burner, unintentionally :(. The past couple weeks have just been a whirlwind! First, Little Gus came down with hand, foot, mouth so he was out of school for a week! It sounds really gross but its really not as bad as it sounds. It's a virus really common in young children where they get low grade fevers and a bumpy rash on the palms of their hands, the bottoms of their feet and inside their mouths. Poor little guy was such a trooper! He was desperate to get out of the house but since it is highly contagious we were pretty much stuck here. A couple days later he started up with high fevers and was diagnosed with an ear infection. (This was Memorial day weekend)

On Memorial Day, right in the middle of our cabin fever, the hubs started getting bumps on his hands and feet and sure enough he got hand, foot, mouth--very rare for an adult to get it from child. So my husband was home for the whole week with hand, foot, mouth. Then, Tuesday Olivia started with a runny nose and fussiness so back to the pediatrician we went. You can imagine what a thrill this was to be back at the peditrician. Sure enough, she had a DOUBLE ear infection. I don't think I had ever had my entire family sick at one time. 

The best part is that we had a road trip planned to  Atlanta for a friend of mine's wedding that  Thursday night. Fabulous timing, huh?? All of these sickies didnt stop us. Everyone was on antibiotics--but me. so packed up the car and headed to Atlanta. I was so excited for the wedding  and of  course so excited to spend time with my parents!! 

We get to Atlanta and I came down with a cold. Gus and I still went to the wedding which was absolutley beautiful!! I am so happy for the newly-weds! It was so nice to see old high school friends I hadn't seen in a long time! Gus and I had such a blast!!

Sunday rolled around and I was in pretty bad shape. I could hardly talk and my ear was killing me! So I went to my old doctor's office and I was diagnosed with a double ear infection and I ruptured my right ear drum!! yeah ouch! It hurt so bad! 

Thank goodness I was in Atlanta and although Gus had to fly back to Miami Sunday night, I had my parents and sister there to help me with kiddos! I am thankful for them! I quickly started feeling more like myself and joining my sister, parents and kiddos in on all the fun! 

We had a blast this past week in Atlanta! The kids soaked up their grandparents and vice versa! 

My mom is a pre-school teacher and she had a summer camp this week so Gus went to summer camp with her and just had a blast!! I would go pick him up early and he refused to leave with me!! I didnt complain! 

We spent some quality time with my parents and they got to spend some quality time with the kids. I think we may just have to make this a summer tradition from now on!!

Gus flew back to Atlanta to pick us up friday night and we spent our last day there doing family stuff!! We don't have Bruster's in Miami, (my favorite ice cream place) so I introduced the kids to it and it was a hit! They have these mini baby cones they give little ones and they LOVED them!! Olivia got it in vanilla with a face on it everytime we went and since Gus is a little older I let him try the cotton candy explosion with sprinkles (Cotton candy flavored ice cream with pop rocks in it)...yeah...that wasn't a great idea after he was bouncing off the walls hahah! Oh well! 

We drove back last night and got here early this morning so today we spent it unpacking, organizing and catching up on sleep! of course it wouldn't be complete without a couple toddler meltdowns, ha ! 

Be sure to keep a look out this week on the blog, I have some exciting stuff coming this week!!