Fennell Seeds

8 Tips for Easier Christmas Prep: Master List

Tip #2 – Don’t make any purchase for the kids without making the Master List

My Christmas prep completely changed a few years ago when I realized I had 2 kids and needed to try and make things at least look equal and now with 3 kids it is even trickier. We still sorta lump most of the boys gifts together since they mainly ask for big tickets sports gifts (ex. basketball goals, soccer goals, etc) but there are definitely individual gifts as well. I had been trying FlyLady’s house cleaning system for a while and when her lists came out at Christmas it was perfect for me.

Instead of random purchases all fall and then ending up with 8 gifts for one kid and 1 for another and just scrambling the week before buying random things, I first transfer all my ideas I have stored on my phone to the lists. Then I can see where I need to edit and save some ideas for birthdays or need to start brainstorming to come up with some additional gifts.

Here is a picture of my list for the boys from last year. I did not purchase everything on the list, this is a place to put everything you think may be a good idea so you can then edit and add items. I only purchased the items with checkmarks.

And from 2013.

I have lists for Britton too and I also have a page for all other people on our list.

All my lists are saved each year so I can go back and look at what they received. It is almost like a memory for a baby book. 🙂 I have the lists back to 2011 and the toys were so cute and much less expensive back then. I am planning to go back through these lists and give a recap for Hits and Misses of toys so you can benefit from our experience with the toys.

Next week with 8 Tips for Easier Christmas Prep, I’ll talk about my big mistake of waiting until Cyber Monday last year to make my purchases. I’d love to hear if you use Master Lists?

Friday Favorites – Child sized Headphones

by Carolyn 2 Comments

Did you know they make headphones in a child’s size?

I didn’t until we kept going to the library and tried to use the computers in the kids section and the headphones didn’t fit my kids heads. Someone next to us said “I don’t understand why they don’t have kids headphones at the kids computers.” All of a sudden all my times of trying to fit my earbuds into my kids ears and the frustration they had of them constantly falling out all came to a head….why didn’t it occur to me that they make child sized headphones!

Here is an affiliate link. We have the Sony brand but it won’t let me link so just click on this and search for Sony if you want the same kind as us.
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Kids are happy to have their own headphones and I am happy to not have them turning the volume way up to hear over their siblings.

8 Tips for Easier Christmas Prep

by Carolyn 1 Comment

One of the reasons I love the blog and Pinterest world is the great organizing tips and motivation. One of the few things that I have started to master is the prep for Christmas. We travel via plane for Christmas so once we started having kids the need to prepare ahead of time for shipping presents became very evident so I needed to learn to get my act together weeks in advance. I thought I would start a weekly series called ‘8 Tips for Easier Christmas Prep’ to share the few things I have learned.

This first week lets talk about what we can do all year round. I use an app named Errands but there are several apps around where you can keep lists. Do not use the Notes app already on your phone! I learned that lesson when I dropped my phone in my margarita…yes, that really happened. 🙂 If you don’t use an offline app then all your notes will be gone if your phone is damaged.

During the year I keep various lists on my phone labeled,

Gifts ideas for Boys

Gift ideas for Britton

Gift ideas for Matt

Gift ideas for Others

And whenever I see or hear of something that I think would be a good gift I write a quick note in my list so hopefully by the end of the year I have some ideas for every person on my list.

Next week I will talk about making the big final lists before any orders are placed.

Do you have any tips for gathering gift ideas for others on your list?

Halloween Prep

by Carolyn Leave a Comment

Do you have your costumes all set for Halloween? I’m sure everyone else is scrambling around like me, right? We have been running to the door every time we hear a truck rumble by, hoping it is a delivery. My husband ordered a key piece of a costume weeks ago from China and it is coming down to the wire on whether it will be here in time. We know it is in the States but not sure where.

My daughter is going as Super Girl. As soon as she saw the costume she was all over it. We have had it for weeks and she has already worn it several times.

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My boys will be NFL players. They have who they want to be all picked out so now we need to get all the pieces together.

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We have pumpkins on our porch, both real and fake and are all ready for the candy fest! Our neighbors are all talking about dragging the fire pits to the driveways and gathering after a little trick or treating to hang out. Sounds like a great way to keep the trick or treating from lasting for hours.

Which candy do you steal out of their bags after they go to sleep?? I love MnMs…gotta be plain though. 🙂

Vicks on the feet stops sniffles

by Carolyn Leave a Comment

My Mom asked me about this tip again the other day. In our family whenever my kids have a runny nose or the start of a cough we use Vicks. This comes from my husbands side of the family and trust me, when he first did it I was questioning why he was rubbing that sticky stuff on their feet. My kids have always easily run fevers whenever they are sick, so the start of sickness has me worried about all the missed school and activities. If they show signs of colds Matt will rub Vicks on the bottom of their feet at night before bed and put socks on to cover them. When they wake up their sniffles and coughs are never worse and after a couple nights of the treatment the symptoms go away. I swear it has helped ward off so many colds in our house.

You can get some Vicks through my Amazon affiliate link here.

Let me know if Vicks on the feet works for you!

Bonus Cleaning – Cleaning Doors

by Carolyn 2 Comments

So once a week I want to focus on a bonus cleaning. Something to keep me motivated to do a little extra around here and get our house in better condition than it is currently. Now that we are getting out of toddlerhood with my kids I feel like I can start to climb out of just doing the bare minimum in house cleaning. Sure, I take care of the vacuuming, making the bed and cleaning the bathrooms but everything else has gone by the wayside. Oops!

After a busy summer with the kids coming in and out of the backdoor I have noticed how disgusting those little hands have made the door.

Example A.

I simply used a Magic Eraser. (click here if you are remembering you need to stock up on these awesome sponges) Remember affiliate links never make you pay more than you would if you went to Amazon on your own.

Use a little elbow grease…

And voila!!

Let’s pretend that took me hours to do so I can sit back and feel like I am the best housekeeper ever…ha!

What should I work on next?

Edited later to add….

Just an example of what happens in my life…I didn’t even think to clean the other side of the door and a few hours later I was walking out and looked down and it was even more disgusting than the front! Ugh…why is it not in me to think to clean both sides! 🙂 Just a little look into my brain and why I need the accountability of Bonus Cleaning on the blog!

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Easiest way to teach kids to tie shoes

by Carolyn Leave a Comment

I had a huge response from friends this summer when I posted pictures on Facebook of how I had my kids learn to tie their shoes. I don’t know if your kids are like mine but sometimes they don’t want to listen or learn from me. Guess what they do love? They love to do anything with the older boys down the street and look up to them like crazy.

Well, when my neighbor mentioned her 10 year old son was into earning money, I had a brilliant idea (these are few and far between for me, ha!). I paid her son and his friend $5 per kid to teach my boys to tie their shoes. They had to prove to me that they had learned by each of my boys tying their shoe for me by themselves and they earned their $5. It took about 30 mins for my boys to learn and they were in heaven with so much one on one attention from the older boys.

My neighbor said those boys were super happy to bike to the store right after with their $5 to get a treat. Is this not the easiest way to teach kids to tie shoes ever? I’m happy, my boys are happy and neighbor’s boys are happy. Win – Win – Win!

Here is what we used to use…

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Now…

–Carolyn

Honey Child

by Carolyn Leave a Comment

I must call my daughter Honey a lot. I didn’t realize this until we started playing doll house together and to her the little girl doll isn’t called the baby or kid, she is the Honey. 🙂 Britton is starting to love to play pretend and make up scenes to play out. They all involve the Mom saying “No”.

The normal scene also involves my daughter telling me exactly what to do.

Britton: “You are the Mom and the Honey and you both come to the store and the Honey wants to buy a puppy and you tell her No, that you don’t have any money, only a credit card and I am the store owner and I say sorry I don’t take credit cards.”

So we act it out so that anything the Honey wants she can’t have. All the no’s are getting old quick, do you think Britton is trying to tell me something? She is one smart cookie.

Welcome!

by Carolyn Leave a Comment

Fennell Seeds Family Photo

After almost 8 years of having a personal blog for just family and friends, I am ready to join the blogging world. A little about me, worked in the insurance industry for many years, married the love of my life, had identical twin boys and then a little girl. Wow…my life summed up in 5 seconds. Of course, there is a lot more to it and I’ll share the nitty gritty details as we go through this blogging adventure together.

One thing that I have always struggled with in my adult life is managing and keeping our home. I am not a slob or a complete disaster but it just doesn’t come naturally to me like it seems to for others. I am always the one at someone’s home saying “How did you know how to do that?” or “Did I miss the class on cleaning floors? I have no idea if I am cleaning them right?”. I am not OCD or type A, I need some accountability and a little help and motivation to get my act together. So come join me in learning tips and tricks from each other. I can’t wait!