Etsy Shopping Spree

I went on a small etsy shopping spree today, sending a tea sampler to my mom, a super cute skull bag to my sister and an awesome handmade journal to a friend. I have added quite a few items to my favorites from these and more wonderful artists who put so much love and hardwork into their creations and I know that something handmade means so much more and I think that even applies when someone else made it. I really hope they enjoy their gifts and I hope this has inpired you to check out Etsy for awesome handmade creations for all your gift giving needs...and maybe you will find something fantastic for yourself! :)

CHD Awareness Week

I was blog jumping and I found a great CHD adult survivor blog Inspiring Hearts, there you can find lots of stories of CHD survivors and I find it a great resource for CHD parents. Everytime I read stories of these adult survivors and how they lived their childhood I feel that it affects how I raise Carter. He was born with TGA and I feel like he deserves to have a regular childhood and not be sheltered because of his heart defect. His cardiologist says he should be able to play sports and run around like every other kid and if he can then he will. I try to do everything I can to raise awareness of CHD and I hope he will do the same when he is old enough to share his story on his own. I hope that he will show off his scar to help people understand the number of babies born with heart defects and that they should support such a worthy cause. He will be a strong kid who will grow into a strong man and he will have an outward symbol of how he fought to survive and blew away the expectations of his healing time after his heart surgery. I know my kid is one tough cookie and will go on to inspire people and motivate those who hear his story.

Makes me more excited to watch Carter grow

This video was shown on a blog I follow The CHD Blog it is a great inspiration and shows how awesome it is when these kids effected by CHD grow up to lead pretty normal lives...

Spend wisely...

So we have had to try to cut back...way back...since I quit my job to stay home with Carter. I have it down to a science to spend about $120 for 2 weeks worth of food, and I have just started cutting coupons so that should go down even more. So we are faced with our tax return money coming and the list of things we "should" and "want to" do with it are endless. We are getting a good chunk of money back, but I worry it will go away quickly without many productive purchases being made.

Here are the ideas so far

1. put money away to go to europe next year
2. pay off debts
3. fix up the house
4. buy a treadmill
5. stock up on groceries and paper goods
6. pay off medical bills
7. go on a cruise to the Carribbean
8. buy a stylist chair for my home salon
9. put some in savings

Technically we could do a little of all of the above, but I am trying to figure out the best balance, Ray wants to split it 50/50 and do what we want on each side, but I find that highly unfair because I am the "mom" and I will just end up blowing all my money on bills, groceries, and necessities while he is the one who wants to probably play a little and then spend some on the house. I think we should stick together and make a budget for the refund before we spend a dime or I fear we will blink and it will be gone and we will have no idea where the hell it went.

I am cyberwalking to support CHD

Please support me as I raise money for CHD for their walk on Feb 21st, I am going to raise at least $500 and I need your help, any donation even as little as $5 will make a difference. Please email me at meganatpef@aol.com so I can send you the donation form. And if you can forward my email to anyone who would be interesting in donated it would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you for your support.