Secret Santa gift exchanges are such a popular way of giving gifts among groups of people. I’ve done them between friends, family, and of course at work. Sometimes you get lucky and you get a list of their favorite things with the name, but more often than not, you get nothing more than their name.  This can make it difficult and leave you searching for Secret Santa gift ideas to get you through.  I can be seriously difficult to find a perfect secret Santa gift, especially when you aren’t overly familiar with the person. Here are some great Secret Santa gift ideas under $25 for your ..read more

The transition from stay at home mom to working mom has been a rough one. Just looking through the archives here, you can see it’s been months since I wrote anything. While there are multiple things I already knew from working part-time last year, I have learned so much starting a full-time position, and I’m not only talking about at my job. I will break this down into working part-time and working full time because I have found that there are a lot of differences that I didn’t see. Each of these positions has its own struggles that I will detail out for you. I have enjoyed each stage and chan ..read more

Here we are, deep into summer, and there are just certain cooking essentials I must have every summer. These are my go-to ways for cooking and enjoying our warm summer days. While moving this spring has brought its share of struggles, one thing we really realized was that there are certain things that we need to make our kitchen work for us. There are still one or two boxes of kitchen things hiding somewhere in our storage unit, and it seemed like many of those things were things I needed. There has been a lot of replacements going on in my home. These are the essentials that we cannot do with ..read more

For one reason or another, you may find yourself needing to live with family for a time. Whether it’s because of financial hardship, because of health, or because a new job takes you to a new city, moving in with family can happen and poses a certain challenge. It isn’t easy to focus on yourself while living with family, so you need to get creative. Back in February, we made the choice to move 100 miles away, to my husband’s hometown, so he could have a better work opportunity. This move meant we would be staying with his parents until we could get settled and find a place of our own. For 8 we ..read more

This Covid-19 virus quarantine has us all in a stressed state. Some of us might be dealing better than others, but in this time, we have more specific needs. Being stuck in our homes, not working, with our kids doing distance learning, is HARD! Your mood boost can’t come from many of the things we do when we are in a normal time. It takes a little something different to improve your mood during quarantine. Normally, a post like this from me would tell you to do a face mask (the fun kind), use a sugar scrub, or go to the gym. Yet, for many of us, that isn’t possible. Many of us are still in qua ..read more

Things are hard, and many of us are now faced with being a stay at home mom when we had no intention of being one. It is okay to struggling emotionally in quarantine and as a stay at home parent. As we continue life throughout this quarantine we are faced with uncharted territory. For many, this way of life is not what they ever envisioned. If you’re a mom who knew she was going to be the working mom, or if you’re an extrovert mom who takes her kids on outings every day, being home with your kids and nowhere to go is completely foreign to you. Even as as stay at home mom who didn’t take many o ..read more

It never fails, Easter rolls around and I am left trying to think about what I should put in Little Miss’ Easter basket. I never want it to become boring for her, and as much as I loved Easter as a kid, I want her basket to be more than candy. We don’t do big gifts for Easter, so her basket, and subsequently, this list will be small affordable Easter basket ideas. This post contains affiliate links. This means that if you make a purchase through a link, I will make a small commission at no cost to you.  You can read more about affiliate links here. I have updated this post for 2020. I sta ..read more

There are a few times when moms have to really look at what they’re doing and figure out the best way to get more self-care with kids home. It’s never easy to focus on what you need most when you have kids home needing your attention. These are some of my tried and true, favorite ways to get more self-care with kids around. There always seems to be a struggle in the transition phases. We struggle when we have a newborn, when they start dropping naps, when they start school, when they’re home from school. The changes seem to come quickly as our babies become toddlers who become preschoolers and ..read more

We all know that self-care is a necessary part of our day to day life. We already struggle with that as busy moms. What do you do when you’re in a state of great stress though? Self-care when stressed and anxious is a tricky thing. Finding that balance becomes more difficult than ever. As I write this we are in the midst of the Covid-19 shutdown. School is out for 3 weeks minimum here, and none of that even matters because we just moved across the state for my husband to start a new job, which means we are now living in my in-laws home. We are crammed into 2 bedrooms with a storage unit packed ..read more

It’s almost Christmas already, I’m not sure where the year went, but here we are, looking at Secret Santa ideas again. If you want to spoil a mom, friend, co-worker, or family member with a really special gift, then this 5 item Secret Santa gift will be exactly what you’re looking for. A week or so ago my bestie/ work wife surprised me with an amazing gift. We aren’t friends that give gifts normally, so this was a complete shock. It was what was in the gift that meant more than anything to me. I don’t know what she spent, and that isn’t even important, but it was the thought that she poured in ..read more