What happend?

What happened to Mommy's Busy Bees? God began to work!

Over the last few months, God brought a few e-books into my possession. The first being Organized Simplicity and the second being 31 Days to Clean. God used the premise of these books working together with the book I have been reading for a Bible study at church, What Did you Expect?, to start the burden in my heart.

So as I take this journey with the Lord, I will keep you posted on how He is developing the principles of simplistic living and intentional living in my heart and family. Can't wait to see what God has in store.

Shopping Evaluation

With the Super Walmart opening in our area (and Bottom Dollar Foods too), I knew it was time to do a price comparison to make sure I'm shopping at the best place and getting the best deal for my money. (Before sales and coupons) Here is my simple plan to figure out what is my best plan for shopping and having a base for knowing who has the best deals each week.

• Make a list of everything that over the course of time you need to buy (its OK if you miss something, you can tack it onto your list as you are walking through the store.) 
• Make a list of all the stores that are possibilities for your shopping
• Go to one store each week and do your shopping. In the process, make sure you have written down the real price (not the sale price) for each item on your list and the quantity you receive for that value (quantities may change especially if you are including a BJs or Sams Club in your list like I am.)
• Break down results and compare - easy list then of what your best deals are and where to get them and then when you see that sale,  you'll know if it is a good deal or not!

Happy Shopping!

Christmas Cookies in a Jiff!

Do you work all day and come home to the same busyness of every day with all the holiday prep piled on top? Do you stay at home with one, two, three...(you get the idea) little children who are under foot and need Mommy's help and attention. Are you lucky to get one batch of cookies made, let alone a variety for Christmas?
Me too!
The natural solution in my mind was a cookie exchange, but that is too much work too... or is it. We just did a cookie swap for the moms who send their kids to UBCS Day Care. Here are some easy tips to put together a cookie swap that takes very little time and effort.

• Host the exchange with out getting together. You can do this by collecting cookies, dividing them out, and handing them back out. While this takes a little work on the part of a couple of people who organize the exchange, it is well worth it and really doesn't take all that long if you find the common threads in all of your lives.  We had the moms drop the cookies off when they brought their children to day care Wednesday morning. Today (Friday) they will pick their cookies up and take them home. There are other simple ways to do a swap. If you  know how many people are participating have everyone divide their cookies into that many ziploc bags and everyone takes a bag from each person at church or where every you see eachother. The sky is the limit! Think outside the box.
• Keep your cookie amount reasonable and unchanging. We did 5-6 dozen cookies each for an exchange of about 20 ladies.  For a smaller group we did simply what one batch of your cookies yields. 
• Have everyone bring their cookies in a disposable container - they won't get it back! And they also need to send an empty tray or large tin to take the cookies home in.
• Give a time buffer - if the moms forgot the cookies on Wednesday, they could bring them in Thursday.
• Be creative and have fun! There are lots of ideas out there, so do your research!

Have you participated in a cookie exchange? What things did you notice that made your exchange a success?

Making Dinner Prep Easier

Whether you are a busy working mom, or you are at home all day long, getting dinner ready can be a very stressful time of day. Here are some ideas to cut down on stress and make it easier to enjoy your family meal each day.

1.        Have as much of your dinner prep done before hand as possible (the night before , during nap time, or in the morning)

2.      Have special activities that the kids can do only when you are making dinner.

·         Special coloring activities

·         Special books – Leap Frog Tag

·         Special toys

3.      Set up a meal swap with a few friends. (Details to come about this one :) )

4.      Double your meals and put one in the freezer for another day.

5.      Cut onions the night before or when you are prepping another meal and bag them. Then when you put your meal together in the morning you don’t go to work smelling like onions.

6.     Get older children involve (they can help with simple prep or setting the table.)

Well, sorry I haven't posted in weeks. I learned that it took me way too long to find papers the way I was. I spent 3-4 hours a week and that was for the first time through a lot of the material I was covering. So we ended up buying a book. I'll post a link to the workbook later. I really like it. But this blog will be dedicated to ideas for Busy Moms with Busy Kids. At Upper Bucks Christian School and Day Care we are starting a Moms 2 Moms group. This blog is especially for M2M, but I hope in the mean time that it will benifit ladies all around the country as well!