Now that it is finally starting to feel like Spring up here in Connecticut, I had this grand idea that I would put together a printable for a Spring Cleaning Schedule for you all, then I sat down to try and do it....every time I sit down at the computer {especially around the afternoon or evening time} my body shuts down and I end up falling asleep.

This pregnancy has been so different on my body than the first one! Any day now I will be changing diapers and not sleeping at night because I need to feed the little one, but right now, that sounds like heaven.

Instead of creating a printout, because my body does not have the attention span right now, and because I am moving so my 'Spring Cleaning' will be different than what I would normally do ~ I have decided to share with you what I have found from others. I narrowed it down to the ones I that I liked the most and that I could actually see myself using. No one has time to search through the top 101 {or even 20} cleaning check lists.

This list from I Dream Of Clean is crazy intense. If you want to get into all the little corners and make sure nothing is left unturned, organized and cleaned...this is the list for you.

At Living Well Spending Less she has a unique approach to her five steps or areas to clean. It is a simple ans sweet one page check list to help you get on top of your Spring cleaning.

Over at Oprah.com they have a Spring Cleaning schedule that should only take 8 hours from start to finish. It is a simple list and gives great direction on how to use your time wisely.

Imperfect Homemaking has a great list and printable. This will help get you home ready for the summer activities but doesn't seem too daunting.

I also had to include Clean Mama. She has some wonderful printable checklists for Cleaning anytime of the year.

Whatever fits your schedule and how intense you want to get, there is a list out there for you to help keep you on track and even get you thinking of stuff you might have over looked.

Happy Spring Cleaning!!

The ladies at church threw me a baby shower a couple weekends ago and they did such a great job. The colors for Lady #2 are yellow, grey and purple, I also decided to go with an elephant theme. I posted about the invitations here and check out these cute little party favors. That night I didn't have my camera and honestly, even if I did, there probably still would not be any photos {moving around, up and down, oh that sounds so miserable}.

At the end of the night I even took home some of the balloons for Lady A. When she came down the next morning she had such a look of excitement on face. We haven't really done balloons too much before and now she had these ones all to herself.

While l am trying to stay on top of my 49Fifty projects, it is getting harder and harder to keep up with writing about them all. It seems every time I sit down, in just a matter of minutes l am asleep. I can not wait to meet Lady #2, but I am also excited to able to sleep in my bed, get on the floor and play with my girls, all those wonderful things I used to be able to do before my body went wonky from this pregnancy.

Now it is time to make Thank You cards for all these wonderful ladies. Have I ever mentioned how much I love having my own personal cutting machine. Normally I like to create my own designs but right now l am looking for easy and fast. There is too much going on right now: Baby, packing, moving and an extremely sore body from the pregnancy. I found the best shape from the Silhouette online store, then took it into the Studio program and changed it a little to create my card shape.

I have a bunch of envelopes already so the only thing I really had to keep track of was making sure to size the cards to fit them.

Do you ever have those projects that while you are working on them you wonder the whole time if they will actually turn out. Then when you are done you could not be more pleased with them?

This was one of those for me. I love how they turned out and am so excited to give them to all those who have helped us get ready for Lady #2.

Today you will find me on the kitchen floor. The other day while Paul was out of town I was trying to get dinner ready and Lady A decided to get her stickers out. They are all over the kitchen floor now. Being as sore and as pregnant as I am ~ I decided to let her and just clean them up later, that was not a battle I wanted to fight at the time. Today I decided to figure out how hard it is going to be clean them all up so I sat down with some of my favorite cleaning friends and went to town.

There were two types of stickers 1: paper ones that left paper after trying to peal them up and 2: plastic ones where the entire sticker came up but left all of the sticky residue behind.

First peal up the stickers and get as much off as you can.
Then sprinkle some baking soda over the left behind gunk.
Dip your scrubber sponge in the hot water and ring it out then start scrubbing.

This took very little effort, I was so happy. It also got these apartment floors cleaner than I have ever seen them. Now I'll have to figure out a way to get the rest of the floor to clean up that nicely {hopefully without having to sit on the floor with a box of baking soda and a small scrubber sponge}. I'll leave that for another day, one where I am not 38 weeks pregnant and can't bend or move.

The reason I think this worked is because the baking soda acts as a scrubbing agent to get the rest of the paper residue that is left behind. It also seemed like it helped to lift the sticky residue because it would ball up and wipe away.

Tip: There were stickers under my bucket of hot water as well. Once I moved the bucket after taking the photo the stickers under it were damp from the humidity and steam coming from the bottom of the bucket. When I pealed those stickers up most of the paper and sticky backing came up on the first swipe of my thumb nail. If you have a steam mop I would suggest trying that first.

This week I have been thinking a lot about my Grandpa or Grandpa Great as we affectionately call him. His wife passed away just over a month after we first moved to the East Coast. They had been married almost 20 years, for my younger brothers she was the only grandma they remember. He still has his own place but my parents have given him a room at their place as well so he can be closer to family. My dad also built a huge chicken coup because my grandpa was not leaving his 'ladies'. All the great grand-kids have loved being able to watch and feed the ladies. It has been over two years and the little ones still get excited about going out in the morning to collect the eggs.

I thought it would be a fun idea to send him a card letting him know we are thinking of him this Easter season.

You can find the chicken here. The 'chicken wire' fence is one I designed so that it would be sure to fit the front of the card {a letter size piece of cardstock cut in half then folded}.

We all get them....Clogged sinks!!

I do not know about you but it drives me crazy when I got to wash my face and see the sink start to fill up when I turn the water on but the pug is not in the sink. Blah!

Many different things can contribute to a clogged sink: whiskers, soap, toothpaste, the list goes on. I have also noticed, now that our little one is really into brushing her teeth, that the bathroom sink clogs a lot more often. My guess is that it is all that extra toothpaste going down the drain. Once again it is time to clean them out. There are a couple of different remedies you can try that will not cost you nearly as much as calling someone into your home or using harsh chemicals around  your house. We all know right now I am all about no chemical cleaning while I am pregnant.

Sorry, there are no photos. This was a hard one to photograph but I figured there were plenty of people out there looking for home remedies for clogged drains so I am posting it without photos.

Method one:
If you have ever gone to a Science Fair you have seen the exploding volcano that so many kids like to do. Well, that same science can go into unclogging your drain. Pour 1/2 cup of dry baking soda down the drain followed by 1/2 cup of white vinegar. I cover mine so that the reaction works faster instead of letting the air escape. If you do that it should just take a few minutes, otherwise let the baking soda and vinegar sit for about a half hour. Then pour boiling water down the drain to help 'wash' away the gunk.

It is no secret that baking soda and vinegar have been my new best friends on this cleaning crusade of mine so this is the one that I went with and it worked great.

Note: if you have plastic pipes just use tap water at its hottest setting. Using boiling water could melt the plastic pipes.

Method two:
I am not a Coke or Pepsi drinker and after reading what some have said about how well they can be used for cleaning, I do not think I will ever drink these. BUT....They can be used on clogs, lime scale and other hard to clean build up spots.

Get a two liter of coke and let it sit out until it reaches room temperature. Pour it down the drain and let the corrosive abilities do their thing. After about an hour or two run hot water to wash out the pipes. The acid and fizz of the soda work to break down the buildup.
Source

Method three:
Plunger. That's right, your trusty plunger that is sitting next to your toilet. I know, the thought of putting that in my sink grosses me out too, but it can work. There are also smaller plungers out there made more specifically for sinks and tubs. There are a couple of tricks to using a plunger. First, make sure there is water in your sink or tub. Second, make sure there is water in the bulb of the plunger. This way all your energy will go straight to the clog when you use it. If it is full of air you won't be getting the full force of the plunger on the clog.

Note: Be warned, this one can get messy.

Method four:
Your trusty wire hanger. Yep, just untwist it and put the hook part down the drain. This will work if the clog is towards the front of the pipes before the goose neck {'U' shape} part of the pipes, the part you see right under your sink.

If the clog is too much for any or all of these by all means call a professional.

This weeks card is dedicated to my little sister. She is a very dedicated mother of two and has done a great job raising her kids. I have been able to look to her example on a number of occasions.

It seems kind of funny as I type that because we could not be more different. We are the closest siblings in age out of six, we look nothing alike and our personalities are very individual from each other. Growing up, friends at school thought on of us had to be adopted.

Recently she has decided to go back to school. I could not be more excited for her and her kids as they take on this new adventure. This will also help her in providing for her kids as they get older.

So I thought I would send her a quick note to let her know how excited I am for her and her family.

To give the card a little dimension and pop I curled the peddles of the flowers.

Designed and cut on my Silhouette Portrait.