products that save my bacon daily...

1) the boon spoon.



whoever invented this, i would like to give them a smooch. well, at least blow them a kiss from a few feet away. this baby feeding spoon rocks! you just unscrew it, dump in the rice cereal/baby food/ yogurt, close it up and it seriously helps with mess. so your kids don't end up looking like this:



i love that i can just put pop the cap on and put it in the fridge if leah hasn't finished all of the food, and is GREAT to travel with. seriously. get one.

2) the stick vacuum.

a friend blogged about this several months ago and said that she loved it for her apartment and i had no idea how much it would simplify my life until i got one. i thought just having the big ol' honkin regular vacuum was fine. but enter leah, who started crawling at 6 months and wanted to pretty much chew on everything and anything she could get her hands on...including the day-old mac & cheese noodles that had fallen below caleb's chair.

i love that it's lightweight (in case you have to hold a 25 lb. child at the same time), quiet (in case that 25 lb. child is taking a nap when you need to clean the floor), and works great on tile & linoleum (in case the 25 lb. child likes to also venture into the kitchen and entryway for new crunchy crumbs to munch on). make sure to buy the cord-free with a rechargeable battery. just to make things a little more simple.

ben thought it was an 'unnecessary purchase' until he actually started using it.

and the best part??

it's also easy enough for a 4 year old to use. caleb is now in charge of the morning vacuuming and he absolutely loves it and does a great job.






this isn't the exact one that i have, but it's even a little cooler because just look at that handle! so nice for under a table, couch or bed.

***also make sure to buy one with a swivel-head. it turns sideways or flips around backwards. genius!

3) bumble & bumble's surf spray.

for a gal who has whined about her hair waaaay too many times, i finally found something that helped me out. i have naturally wavy/curly/frizzy/not cute hair. if you think i am lying, it's because i have to work hard to get it to look normal. i've made this reference before, as an analogy of what i look like if i go to bed with my hair wet:


ben has witnessed this event a couple of times in our marriage. the one word that came out of his mouth when he saw me?

"woah."

and not in a good way.

so when i got a coupon for 30% off, i decided to try out a new product. and seriously, the surf spray has been awesome. i can get out of the shower, put in some leave-in conditioner, spritz on some surf spray, scrunch my hair a bit in my hands, and wha-lah!

the result goes a little something like this:



not the best picture of it, but you get the idea. it has simplified my life so that on those days that i don't have the time to blow-dry and style, this stuff saves the day.

4) the magic treehouse books on cd.



these little babies have saved my sanity in a major way. every day caleb has an hour of quiet time....and i always plan it around leah's nap time. since we don't have a yard he can just go out to, or a big toy room, we set him up in his room to play by himself and listen to some books on cd.

do you want to know how this started?

he got one in a wendy's kids meal and we turned it on in the car. i thought he would be bored out of his gourd. but instead he loved it! so i bought some more off of amazon and now we have quite a collection. caleb loves hearing about the adventures of jack and annie, who visit different countries, solve riddles and always find their way back home. (it kind of freaks me out when i come into his room and he has memorized all 10 chapters of each book and is talking along with the cd's. but it also lets me know he's actually listening.)

so he gets to pick out whichever 2 cd's he wants to listen to for the day during his quiet time, and he knows that quiet time is over when the cd's are done. and i get an hour of peace and quiet to myself, while he's getting to use his imagination. a win-win.

5) downy wrinkle releaser.

my friend marie blogged about this, and as a woman who HATES to iron, i had to give it a try. it SERIOUSLY works like magic. many a sunday morning i'm running around trying to get myself and the kids ready (when ben works overnight) and i'll realize that i've forgotten to iron my skirt or caleb's shirt or leah's dress. as long as the fabric isn't too heavy (cotton is great. denim? not so much.), all you do is spray this lovely product on, smooth out the wrinkles and wait for about 5 minutes for it to dry. magic.

so in church i can loudly sing, "glory glory halleluia!" without having to worry that everyone is staring at my frumped-up, wrinkly skirt.

6) lidocaine prilocaine.



i know there are many out there who are anti-vaccinations, but when caleb contracted meningitis at 2 months old and had repeated seizures for 3 days because of this illness, we got on the pro-vaccine bandwagon.

my kids get pretty fussy after the shots and usually have one rough night of sleep. but the hardest part for me?

the initial shots.

when my friend aubrey told me that she uses this lidocaine cream to numb the area on her daughter eve's arms or legs before she gets her shots...and that eve doesn't cry or whimper or anything now when she gets them...i knew i wanted to give it a try. (FYI, aubrey's mom is a nurse and was the one who told aubrey about it.)

i asked my pediatrician about it, and questioned why it isn't offered to all kids before they get their shots to prevent pain? he answered me that he felt it didn't work, because the shot actually goes into the muscle and still causes pain, so it really wouldn't help anything.

i asked him for a prescription anyway.

and i'm here to tell you.

it does work.

i gave it a try on 9 month old leah after i got the prescription, rubbing the cream on a couple of hours before her appointment. when we came in and i told the nurse and the doctor that i had put it on her, they both looked at me like i was that psycho-over-the-top-can't-bare-to-see-her-kids-in-pain mother. both told me not to be surprised that it wouldn't work.

after her 6 month shots, leah howled for about 10 minutes after the shots were administered.

but at her 9 month shots, with the lidocaine?

she didn't even flinch. seriously. i realized as the nurse was putting on the band-aid that i had been holding my breath, and i let out a big sigh.

the nurse remarked that she had no idea that it would actually work. i told her that since she now sees that it does work, why not let the doctor know and start recommending it to parents?

so just in case they're not, i decided to. it's awesome stuff.

***i'm not sure how well it works on the deeper-muscle shots like the MMR because leah hasn't had that shot yet, but i do know that it works on the routine 2/4/6/9 mos shots. at least for us.

***make sure that you ask your pharmacist or pediatrician how to use it properly. it needs to be put on about 2 hours before the shots, and also needs to be wrapped in saran wrap & taped. also make sure to find out exactly where to put it on. you don't want to be numbing up parts that don't need it. anyway, just ask the experts. they'll tell you.


7) eye concealer by smashbox.



i have no idea how sleepless moms look so good without this stuff. i know for me, when i haven't gotten enough sleep, the first place that shows it is my eyes. i'm not the best at accessorizing outfits, but i do know enough about it to say that sporting dark under-eye circles is not the way to go.

the lovely sephora worker tried this on me after i told her that i needed a miracle cure for my sleepless-nights eyes. while she didn't take me up on my offer to have her come and stay awake at my place every night while i slept, she did offer this product. as she put it on, i watched myself transform.

who was this bright-eyed creature looking back at me in the mirror? and what is wrong with her hair? (this was before the surf spray purchase.) i bought it right away, and have loved it.

because even if my tramillion yawns give away my exhaustion,

at least i look rested and refreshed, right?

yep, it's pricey. but the good news is, i bought mine almost a year ago and still have it. i don't use it every day, but you only need to use such a small amount to make it work that it lasts forever. also, sephora and ulta are constantly offering coupons. so take advantage of their deals.

so there are some things that i love, that have made my life better and more simple. and no, i didn't get paid for blogging about any of these things. but if anyone wants to offer me money for writing this posting i would absolutely be happy to accept!

now.

what are some of your favorite things??

seriously, i love hearing from other people what works for them.

so blog about it & let me know so i can check it out!