Night Face Routine (What I use)

So, since about March or so, I have been going organic/natural, at least when it comes to face and hair products. I don't even really remember how I got started looking into more natural methods, but one thing led to another and here I am.
So I am going to tell what I am using now(since I get people asking me), this will include cleaning products, face products, and hair care products. There is one website that I absolutely love called The Glamorganic Goddess, she reviews all natural products and gives you her honest opinion on them. She got breast cancer at 32 and claims that it is related to what we use on and in our bodies, and I really believe that everything we put on our bodies is a little much. I think less is better and I have noticed that I don't need all those products to make my skin feel nice and smooth. Simple basic ingredients have worked well for me. I might have to break this up in three separate posts. First I will talk about what I use on my skin.
My night routine:
First I take my contacts out and pull my hair back so it is all out of the way. Then I take some toilet paper and just swipe it across my face to lightly take some of my make up off. Then I use Extra Virgin Olive Oil(EVOO), to remove my eye makeup. I use the round cotton pad first to get most of the eye make up off, one half for one eye and the other half for the other eye. Then I use the toilet paper to wipe the oil off.
After that I take the cutip and dip one end into the EVOO, and wipe along my eye lashes and in between them to get the rest of the eye liner off and I wipe it across my eyebrows also.

Now I get my face wet(dripping) with a washcloth, and then I use a squirt of Cool Cucumber Facial Cleanser mixed with some baking soda(exfoliate) to form a paste. I mix it around in my hand with my fingers and then massage it over my entire face to get my make up off and cleanse my face. I then wipe it off with my hands and some water, after I have gotten it pretty much all off, I use the wash cloth to make sure I got it all and to just wash my face. The baking soda really makes my face feel nice.

 Then for my moisturizer I use Jojoba Oil, that is it!  I squirt about 6-7 drops onto my palm and rub it in both palms quickly and then massage it all over my face and neck and behind my ears, you really don't need that much. I used to always get zits or just bumps behind my ears and kind of down my neck, and since doing this, it has gone away, and leaves my skin just so soft. Yes, it was weird at first to use oil on my face, but I promise it should not make you break out. 

Then right before I get in bed I use this Sunflower Lotion Bar or some Body Butta to use on my hands before I go to sleep. What I love about these products is that it won't wash off your hands like regular lotions because they are not water based. If you have water in a product, there has to be a preservative added, and Bubble and Bee(the company where I get a lot of my products from) does not use water in her products.

Really, these three products are all I use for my night routine and they have worked since April for me.

Morning Routine will be next.

23 Months

Well, my squirt is almost 2, that is just crazy! Julie is starting to talk a lot more in complete sentences. I love it when something goes wrong and she says, "What happened" in the most concerned voice. She says that phrase a lot. 

-She got her last flu shot and did awesome, Rob was home and so he came with me. I couldn't even tell when they gave it to her, she might have frowned for a second, but other than that, she was good. Her leg bugged her just a little before nap time and we gave her some medicine and then she was good. 

-She is such a sober kid, trying to get her to smile for a picture is quite difficult.
-She has some crazy sleeping positions, I am certain if her big girl bed did not have rails she would be constantly falling on the floor. Every time we go in to check on her before we go to bed, she is some crazy position that we have to move her from. Yesterday, she was completely turned around up in the corner of her bed right next to the rails.
-Since her cold last week, she has been getting up in the middle of the night, and she will come into our room. I usually wake up to her opening her door. The first couple of night we let her sleep in our bed for a while and then we would move her back into her bed. But, I did not want to make that a habit, so when I hear her opening her door, I will get up and sit with her in the chair in her room for a little while and then lay her back down in her bed, and she would go back to sleep. Although, Christmas morning, she got up at 4:30, and not long after putting her back into bed, we would hear her door open. This happened 4 times, and finally after the last time I put her down, she stayed asleep, but I had to get ready. So, I was pretty tired Christmas morning. Hopefully this does not last forever.
-She loves to run and hide in the coat closet, she giggles and giggles every time. She also loves to run into her room and hide under her bed. She has gotten pretty good at getting under there fast, especially when it is time to change her. She will run in, plop down on the floor and then roll under all the way to the wall. I can't really get under there to get her, so I just wait for her to come back out.
-She has been starting to get Mad when I tell her no, or not to do something. She doesn't scream or anything, she just clenches her jaw, and her body will get tight and she will look like she just wants to swing at something, and just will swing her arms around. Like she is just not quite sure what to do with what she is feeling.
-After her bath the other day, her hair gets quite the curl to it. Here is some fun flippies by her ears that were just the cutest thing, and lasted like that until her next bath. I think I am going to get her bangs trimmed a bit, so they are not always in her face if they are not swept to the side.

-She is also my water drinker, she usually has at least 3 water bottles around the house, she likes to carry more than one. And she got this new one from her Great Aunt Laverna and and she loves it. She always is asking me to fill up her water bottles.

 -Julie loves to see what her Daddy is doing and she was enjoying laying on his chest while he was playing a game on his phone.

-One thing that has been driving me crazy is that she always wants to watch "Pooh Bear" on the lap top. I only usually let her watch it when I am getting ready in the morning, but she constantly wants to watch it. Drives me nuts, because she is constantly saying, "Watch Pooh Bear".

Christmas

We had Christmas Eve dinner at my parents house at 6:00, and we had a good time visiting and eating. We always use the nice china, always fun to use the fancy stuff.

 Julie has become a little picky with her food lately, and she will not eat potatoes or chicken(any meat except ham), and so she had a lot of green beans and roll.

We all tried to get Julie to smile for some pictures, but she is pretty sober and wouldn't.

She loves to take her temperature, she will stick it in her ear and then look at it and say "197". We have an ear thermometer and when she finds it in our room, we always have to check her temperature.

I made some cookies that I saw on Pinterest, and they turned out yummy, the white one is made using a cake mix, butter, and eggs. They are super soft and chewy and just so good. The other was a gingerbread cookie that was good as well.

My sister brought these cinnamon tortillas that she made with my sister and homemade fruit salsa. They were so good!

Just chillin in the front room. I swear whenever my brothers and Rob get together, they are all doing the same thing, either staring at their phones or computers. Katie got to sit in the middle of them all.

Julie was having fun upstairs looking at the tree. She would try to get really close and she would lean in and just stare intently at something. It was so funny, we would try to get her attention and she would just ignore us and keep staring at the tree and then move into another spot and do the same thing. We watched a little bit of Monsters Inc.(my mom had never seen it), and then headed home to get Julie to bed and us as well.

Our first Christmas at home and since we had church at 9:00, I got up early to get ready. But Julie decided she wanted to get up even earlier, like at 4:00. And instead of getting up and then going back to sleep, she decided to get up 3 more times after each time we put her down. Finally, she fell asleep, and then it was time for me to get ready, so I got about 4 hours of sleep. Not what I planned on.
We were debating whether to bring her kitchen up before church or after, and decided just to bring it up before. Both of us were able to get up and ready before she woke up and we even had to wake her up, probably since she was so tired from not sleeping at night when she was supposed to be. Anyways, we got her changed and put her dress on before she left her room, so that we were all ready. I was kind of bummed, when the lights came on, there was a section that were out. The morning of Christmas and they stop working, oh well!

When she came out, we told her Merry Christmas and I don't even think she saw the kitchen, because she went right past it to the presents, we had to turn her around an point to it. She then started playing with it and pushing the oven lights on and off. We had her open her gifts, which I think from being so tired she was getting a little frustrated. If the wrapping didn't come all the way off or if she couldn't get it off, she would start getting upset. And if Rob didn't get them out of the package quick enough, she would get upset.

Her tired face!

She loves to wash her hands in the sink, she will say "Wash, wash, I use soap and water"(from her signing time DVD).

We were able to get her to open all her gifts and we let her play while we ate some breakfast. We basically took her breakfast with us to church, since she usually only eats raisins, and I also grabbed some bread as well. We were a little later than normal getting to church and had to sit on the back row, which meant Julie was going to want to wander, which she did a little bit, but not bad. We had a lovely meeting, with one speaker, some scripture reading and musical numbers.
Upon arriving home, Julie went back to playing with her gifts while Rob and I opened our presents to each other.

Rob got me a waffle maker, yeah! Ours broke a while ago and we have been wanting waffles and weren't able to make them.

I got Rob some pants and shirts, and this Saranoni Adult size blanket. It is the same blanket that Julie has and carries around everywhere. It is so luxuriously super soft!

Rob also got me a Magic Bullet Baby Bullet for making baby food. I will probably only use it for smaller batches, as I will probably make big batches and just use our blender. But I think this will be good for just little things we don't want to have to use the big blender for. We will see how I like it!

After opening our gifts we headed over to my parents house, they were just finishing up opening gifts and so Robert and I opened up the gifts from my parents and my brother who had our name. I got some baby food making related stuff, like a steamer pot. And we got some Tovolo perfect cube ice cube trays from my brother with a spatula that I wanted. I also got a baby log book from my parents to track the babies schedule. So excited to use it. Rob also got a leather belt and some chocolates.

Got Julie and I a little lunch before heading home so Julie could get a little nap in. She of course had to play with her kitchen some more before heading to bed, but went down around 2:00 and slept until 4:00. So glad she got a little nap. After her nap we headed to Robs parents for dinner. I didn't get any pictures, but I will have to get some from my sister in law who I know took pictures :), we had a good evening and loved hanging out and chatting with everyone. What a lovely day, and Julie even slept all through the night.
Next year we are going to have to try implementing some new traditions! I realized I didn't even get our morning family Christmas picture of all of us!

What a Mess!

I always tell Rob, "You aren't cooking unless you make a mess", since it seems like I make some kind of spill or mess every time I cook. This time it was getting the salsa(homemade salsa, I might add) out of the fridge, and it was on top of the sour cream when I took it out. It fell and totally splattered everywhere, I think I even got some up my nose. It got on my shirt, and pants, and socks. And also the fridge door, all over the floor of course, and then we noticed a few good size sploches on the ceiling, how in the world did it do that, I do not know. All I know is, I hate it when I make a mess like that. 

 Robert thought it was pretty funny and the first thing he said was, "Where is the camera?", he did wash my shirt for me in the sink from the spots that got on it. And the floor was due for a good mopping anyways so everything is clean now.

31 Weeks

31 weeks feels a little more uncomfortable, but is it strange that I sometimes forget that I am pregnant! I have been loving cauliflower lately, with some sour cream mixed with a ranch packet. It is just so good right now. This little girl is sticking her feet out more, where it is like I can almost grab them, I have to place my hand on my belly and push her feet back. It seems like she is stretching, I can feel her down low and up high at the same time, kind of weird. Other than Julie waking up at night this last week from her cold, I have been sleeping great, usually not even having to wake up to go to the bathroom. And I finished buying Julie's birthday gifts, now just need to wait for it to get here. Ordered something from Australia, never have done that before. Then I need to fix her other gift up and pain it and make some little doll clothes and we will be set. And I don't think I will make a cake for Julie's birthday, she doesn't like cake, she won't even go near it. We had an ice cream cake for my Dad's birthday back in November and she wouldn't even sit on your lap if you had cake in front of you. So, I will have to come up with something else! Silly kid!

No ear infection!

Well, Julie woke up this morning with no fever, and no constant runny nose. And she only woke up once which I was so glad about. We still made an appointment with the doctor just to check her ears out. No infection, so either it drained during the night, or she never had one. I also put some Maleleuca Essential Oil on her feet, which is supposed to help, so I don't know if that is what helped or not. We got home from the doctor and she wouldn't eat anything for lunch and her fever was back. So I gave her some medicine and she went down for her nap, slept for a good two hours and was happier when she woke up. She asked for some orange juice and I also made her a smoothie, and she just had a slight fever. She must have been hungry because she ate really good for dinner, and went down to bed just great. I know we are on the mend because her nose is drying up and not so runny, and getting flaky around her nostrils. So, hopefully tomorrow she will be even better.

A Lazy Sick Day

Well, we made it to all of our Christmas parties that were three straight days in a row, and the next day Julie had a runny nose, but other than that was okay other than not sleeping the greatest. Got up with her three times during the night but she went back to sleep pretty good each time. Then today, she was running a slight fever and had a sore nose from being wiped every 30 seconds, and was just not herself. Slept for about an hour for her nap(usually will sleep 3 hours), and then slept on me in the chair for another half hour. But, she had that mouth open, tired eyes, feel like crap kind of look all day. She would say "nose", or "kleenex" when her nose needed wiped although she hated me wiping it. Poor kid, hate seeing her like this, it was a long day. She watched Pooh Bear's Christmas a few times today, and basically lounged on the couch. Then she laid on the floor right before Rob was to get home and fell asleep for about an hour. She was so tired! The room is cleaned up now, but it sure looked a mess, can you find her?

And then she hardly ate anything as well, I fed her a muffin for dinner with some milk and that is all she ate for dinner. Then she started pushing on her ear and whining and crying. Darn, probably her first ear infection, so we called the doctor on call, gave her some Ibuprofin and are going to go in to see the doctor in the morning. About a half hour after taking the medicine, she perked right up and was back to somewhat of her normal self, and her nose was not constantly running, so she went to bed just fine. Which means I should go get ready and go to bed, just in case she wakes up a few times tonight as well. Probably got it from one of our parties we went to, but glad we were able to make it to all of them sick free. Now to get over this before Christmas, Rob and I think we have it a little too, but not like Julie. I have a sore throat and a little runny nose, and hope it doesn't get any worse than that. Well, hope everyone out there stays well! Not good timing though, when you have three days til Christmas and can't really leave the house. Oh well!

30 Weeks

30 Weeks, and still feeling pretty good! Went to Robs Work Christmas Party tonight, we had a great time. Got to sit by great company. I realized that I still have a ton to do before Christmas, for one I need to get my house cleaned, it has become very cluttered, it is just driving me nuts and once that is taken care of I know I will be good. My doctors appointment went great last week, still just a boring doctors visit, measuring 29cm, and everything is just great.
And my Santa Advent Wall Hanging on the door in the picture says that we have 5 days left until Christmas, ahhh, better get things done!

29 Weeks

Most nights I don't have to get up to use the bathroom, which is odd. I still do occasionally, maybe like 1-2 a week! I drink plenty of water also. Still feel the same size. Love feeling the rolly polly movements every day. I have got some aches and pains, but nothing major. I have been starting to exercise a little more, my posture is always awful while I am pregnant which then makes my back hurt, and so hopefully this exercising will help strengthen my back. I have a doctors appointment this week, so we will see how things are going!

Julie is wanting her way more and more, where if she doesn't get what she wants she will start crying. I really try not to give in and usually don't, some days she just can drive me crazy! She is in a phase right now where she doesn't always want to sit with us while we read to her, so she will wander around the room and then come back to the side of the chair and look at the pages, and will also pull herself up and want a kiss. I know she loves to be read to, because after each book she will get another for us to read. 

Rob doesn't read to her that often, but last night she wanted Dad to read to her and then after putting her down she started crying and came out of her room, saying "Daddy Hold you", and Rob ended up having to lay with her in her bed until she fell asleep before he could escape. She was attached last night to Daddy. She also loves helping her Dad fix things, Rob gave her this little screw driver that she uses while Rob is fixing something. She loves it. She really is just growing up, she is really getting good at her sentences and talking. Some phrases she has been saying are, "I have a sore bottom", "I want some more raisins", "What Happened", "Broken Crayon", "Oh, my, goodness", "I need something", "Mommy, hold it", or "Mommy do it" Christmas lights on", "Watch Pooh Bear". Some of her phrases just crack me up.

Ikea Trip

Went to Salt Lake on Saturday to get Julie's Christmas presents and I think she is not going to sleep Christmas night, because she will be having so much fun with her toys. We got her gifts at Ikea and got everything we planned on getting her and we also found a bookshelf for our basement, yeah, I am so excited! Now I can get all of our books off the table down there, and the room will look so much better. Little by little, the basement is looking better and better. Our trip was so nice as well, the weather was great, Julie slept most of the way down and on the way back she talked and talked and then finally slept the last hour. She was so happy during the trip also, she sure is a happy little girl. While at Ikea, we got her out of the cart to play with the gift we were getting her that was all set up and she loved it. She kept wanting to go back. Now all I need to do for her is make one more thing and we should be good.

And if anyone knows where we can find a newborn cabbage patch doll, please let me know! I have been searching online and just can't find what I want. I want one that is bald and has a soft body. They have a surprise newborn that you can buy, but you don't know the gender and some come with a little puff of hair on the top, and I just want a little baldy. Hopefully I can find one before her birthday in January.

28 Weeks and Julie

 Well, I am now in my third trimester! The baby is super active in the evenings! Still trying to think of names, we like to use family names or variations off of a family name. Some names that we found are really interesting, and that we won't be using are Gertrude and Agnes. Picking a name is really quite difficult!

I am feeling pretty much the same as usual. We got some of the basement cleaned today. I put away my sewing table and stuff that was cluttering our family room downstairs, and moved it into a bedroom downstairs and then we organized the food storage room, and are getting rid of anything with an expiration date of 2009 or before, and then stocked the shelves back up with cans that have been taking up space in our living space. So we have no more cans lying around our basement, they are in there proper place. And then we put all the toilet paper and Kleenex's and other storage things in the closet. Our next thing is we have got to get a book shelf. So fun to get the basement a little more put together.

And here is Julie with her new coat, she loves it.

 Whenever I let her choose something from her Halloween bag, she usually will always choose a sucker or a reeses peanut butter cup. She doesn't drool as much anymore while eating, which is a plus.

 Watching her cousins at Thanksgiving has gotten her into drinking from a cup. And she is doing quite well at it now. She has had a little bit of practice, the only thing she plays with in the tub while having a bath is a little plastic cup that she uses to catch the running water as the tub fills up, and then will dump it back in the water or put it up to her mouth to drink it. But, I think she is really getting the hang of drinking out of a cup.

 Enjoying her sucker! This is usually where she will eat also, on her knees at the counter!

 Last night a little after laying Julie down for bed, she started crying! We left her for 10 minutes or so to see if she would calm down, because the days before this she has done this and just wants to be taken in the other room. So, I finally went in there to calm her down and see what was the matter. Oh my gosh, in the dark all I saw was that her face looked really dark, like dark brown. I immediately knew what it was and yelled for Rob to turn on the light because her face was COVERED in blood. Including both her hands and into her hair on one side. And then this big blood spot on her pillow. 

So NOT what I wanted to see, it was a scary thing to see every inch of her face, including her eyes covered in blood. I had snorted her nose earlier that morning, and it was a little bloody and so I stopped. With it being so dry and all, she just got a good bloody nose. She will rub her nose and say Kleenex, and has been waking up from naps because of her nose bothering her. So, we carried her into the bathroom and stripped her down and gave her a bath. She cried and cried until we got her all dried off. Poor kid, I wish I would have gone in sooner, but didn't know. She watched a little bit of Pooh Bear before we laid her back down for the night. Holy Moly, I never want to see that much blood again. I threw all of her blankets and clothes and things into the wash on a cold rinse and then washed them, and they came out clean, but the pillow was a total loss, there really isn't a way of cleaning that and we have a lot of pillows, so we just grabbed her a new one. She slept well for the rest of the night and even fell asleep while I was reading her book before nap time. She was a tired girl!

-We went to my parents house on Sunday, and Julie was holding her bottom and saying "Go Potty", which she usually just wants to go sit on the potty. I asked if she needed her diaper changed. Next thing I know, my Dad went running into the bathroom and caught Julie as her bum went falling into the toilet water. Luckily only her pants got wet, and I had some pants int he diaper bag. But, she had climbed onto the Big Potty all by herself. Glad my Dad saw her and ran in there. She will usually go on the Potty at night right before bed, and always wants to sit on her potty through out the day, maybe we will have to work on Potty stuff a little more. 

-She is talking in longer sentences now and using more words, she will tell me, "I have a sore bottom", which doesn't always mean she has pooped. She loves her "Purple diaper" and "blue diaper". It is fun to sign I love you, and then Julie will say it back. 

-She is becoming a little sneak, where she will take something and run into a corner and hide or under her bed. While I was taking a shower she snatched an old toothpaste that we have in the drawer, I came into the family room and didn't hear or see anything, so I peeked around the corner of the couch and there she was trying to get the lid off, being so quiet. 

-She knows that the crib is the babies bed.

-She really is becoming a little girl, and it makes me sad and happy all at the same time!

We are Van Owners!

Well, we have had our Van for a week now and I really love it. It is a 2007 Nissan Quest! Charcoal Color.

 We headed out on Black Friday, after looking at some cars online. We first went to my parents house and I laid Julie down for her nap. We went to Valley Motors first, we were going to test out the Kia Sedona, Honda Odyssey, and whatever else they had. I was really set on liking the Toyota Sienna, but they didn't have one here. After looking at the cars they had, they had one Nissan that they had just priced that morning. We decided to test the Nissan out first. And we really liked it, it was very roomy inside and did not have that squished van feeling. Rob fit into the drivers seat very nicely, which is one thing I wanted to make sure that he could do. I drive all the time because Robs legs were too long for the Buick that we had. We pulled into a church parking lot that was up the street and checked it out a little more. Then we headed to my parents house and my Dad looked at it, and my Mom and sister. They liked the looks of it. So, we headed back to the dealer to test out some more vans, but really like the Nissan. Next we tried out the Kia, and well, we took it for a very short ride, we didn't even make it out of the dealer parking lot before we had decided that we did NOT like this one. We headed up the road and promptly turned right around. It just didn't fit, my head kept touching the head rest, and I don't like that and it just didn't have the leg space, we were just not a fan. So, our next one that we were going to test out was the Honda, although it was more than we wanted to pay, but we at least wanted to test it out. I can't remember if we even sat in it, but it wasn't roomy inside either. So we passed on that, we went in and talked with a salesperson about the Nissan, and then we decided to drive through some of the other dealers around and see what they had and there prices compared to the Nissan. The Nissan at Valley Motors was priced the best out of all the dealers we went to and we liked the color also at Valley Motors. We went to Utah Carzz, and checked out the Toyota Sienna they had there, it had basically the same feel as the Honda, and really we just weren't interested. I really thought I would like either the Honda or the Toyota, but we didn't like either. So, we drove back to Valley Motors to take the Nissan for a longer test drive out on the highway. When we got there, there was a lady that had just test drove it and really liked it but was wanting to go down $500 dollars in price and they weren't willing to go down that low since it was already priced really good. So, since she was still on the lot, she had first pick if she wanted it.
She decided against it and we were able to do a longer test drive which we drove it out to show Robs Dad and his Aunt. It drove so smoothly and just felt nice. We drove back to the dealer and made a deal, and we are now the proud owners of a Nissan Quest! It is a little wider and longer than the Buick so it took a little getting used to, but I think I am getting the hang of it. And getting Julie in and out is so nice, soooo very nice. I simply love it. No more bending to get her into the car. And she loves it, she talks non stop while she is in it, she loves the light that is right above her chair. Saying, "Light on", whenever it comes on. We still keep her rear facing since it is the safest, and she now has more leg room. It was easy to install the carseat. Overall, we are just happy with this purchase. This car buying experience went super smooth and was so easy, our first test drive was our last. Not what I thought we would end up buying, but we LOVE it!

Christmas is Up

  Well, we put our Christmas Tree up and decorated it yesterday! Julie had fun handing me ornaments and she has been great at leaving the ornaments on the tree and leaving the one decoration on the table alone. I keep telling her we Look with our eyes, we don't touch and she has been really good. We only put our tree up and a Santa pulling a reindeer. I might have to pull a few more things out if Julie does okay with the Santa that we do have out.

Love that Rob has his hand on my belly in this next picture, this picture reminds me of our picture last year, which looks really similar(which is posted below this picture)

2011(still need to get rid of those pink blinds)

2010(Julie has grown up so much in this last year)

It was kind of funny to see Julie crawl under this chair to the other side, it really is pretty low to the grown and she doesn't like to crawl under anything. She is afraid she will bonk her head, and we would try to get her to crawl under this chair for fun and she just wouldn't do it, and tonight she did it on her own.

This is our spot where we read stories before naptime and bedtime, reading the same three books.

So excited for this Christmas, can't wait to see how Julie reacts to everything! It truly is so much fun when you have a little one to celebrate it with.