-
Vegetarian Dinner Ideas
I’ve recently started paying more attention to what we eat and what’s in the foods we are eating. There’s a few people that I follow on instagram (here’s my favorite) that have great feeds full of information about what’s in our food and everyday products. In my attempt to be more conscious of what I’m putting into my body, I’ve watched a few health documentaries. I liked What the Health and Forks Over Knives. Next on my list is Secret Ingredients. It’s alarming how many common health problems are tied to the food we eat, and especially animal products. So, we randomly decided to start incorporating more vegetarian meals into…
-
Day Trip to Friday Harbor, WA
My family came to town for July 4th and we had a busy few days showing them around our state! We went hiking, shopping, and exploring at some of our favorite places, and even made a day trip to Friday Harbor, WA in the San Juan Islands. The San Juan Islands are an archipelago (a collection of islands) in the Puget Sound, north of Seattle. The main islands are San Juan Island, Orca Island, and Lopez Island. Friday Harbor is located on San Juan Island, and is known for their cute harbor area with shops and restaurants, and whale watching. You have to take an hour-long ferry ride from Anacortes,…
-
Family Hike in Paradise, WA (Mount Rainier National Park)
We’ve been taking full advantage of the beautiful summer weather up here in the Pacific Northwest! We’ve been trying to get outside every weekend, and most of those outings are to go hiking. We’re starting to run out of cool close by hikes that our family friendly. Obviously there’s tons of different trails up here, but we’re getting to the point where a lot of them are longer hikes. And when you’re hiking with two toddlers, 4 miles is about our max. Especially since we are wearing them most of the time. We recently drove down to Mount Rainier National Park and went on a family hike in Paradise, WA.…
-
Wild One First Birthday Party
This post may contain affiliate links. Please read my privacy policy for more info. We recently hosted a jungle-themed, “Wild One” first birthday party for our son. I picked this theme because he’s definitely a little wild, and the jungle/animal theme was perfect for him. It’s funny how much of a production I wanted our daughter’s first birthday to be, but we also still lived in Florida where all of our friends and family were. Moving across the country kind of limits your friend circle, so I figured a small, low-key birthday would be best. And yes, that was hard for the party planner in me to do, but it really was…
-
Travel Guide: Anchorage, Alaska with Kids
If you follow me on instagram (if you don’t, you should – here), then you probably saw that we were in Anchorage, Alaska recently, visiting a friend of mine from college. This was my first trip alone with the kids, since my husband had to work. (Check out this post for my tips on traveling with kids) It went much smoother than I expected, as usual. With the exception of the 30 minute meltdown on the flight home during the decent. But, it happens, and sometimes there’s just nothing you can do once you’ve tried everything to calm a baby down. C’est la vie. Here’s a little recap of our trip,…
-
How to stop your child from climbing out of the crib
Our baby just turned one last weekend! And, he is officially to the point where he could climb out of his crib if he really wanted to. He’s always been a good climber, but he’s also pretty tall, which gives him an extra advantage. Obviously he’s too young for a toddler bed, but our mattress has been at the lowest setting since he started standing. So, we decided to build a simple platform out of 2x4s to lower the mattress an extra 3-4 inches to stop him from climbing out of the crib. (THE ORIGINAL POST FROM 2019 HAS BEEN UPDATED 7/2021) This bought us a whole year before he…
-
Kid-Friendly Travel Guide to San Diego, CA
I’ve been meaning to get this post up for a long time, but it’s finally here! After living in San Diego for a year, I can say we checked out most of the “main attractions” and figured out what we liked the most. Everything on this list is family-friendly, but will be enjoyed whether you have kids or not. Here’s my list of all the fun things to see and do in San Diego, CA with kids. Scroll down to get all the details and direct links. San Diego Zoo and Safari Park Coronado Beach La Jolla Cove Balboa Park San Diego County Fair Carlsbad Flower Fields Bate’s Nut Farm…
-
C-Sections: What to Expect
In honor of April being cesarean awareness month, I wanted to share a little about my personal experience, and some things to know about cesareans. My first baby was breech and had low fluid at our 38wk ultrasound, so I was sent in for a non-emergency c-section. Due to the low fluid, it was too risky to try to flip her and induce labor. Overall, I had a great experience, and a fairly easy recovery, considering a cesarean is a major abdominal surgery. Despite the “easy” recovery, taking care of a newborn while recovering from major surgery was definitely more painful and difficult than my recovery from my VBAC experience…
-
Easter Egg Decorating Brunch
We recently hosted an Easter egg decorating brunch at our house, and it was so much fun! K is finally old enough to get excited about holidays, even if she doesn’t really know what they mean yet, aside from gifts. She was very excited about the idea of decorating eggs! We had about 10 kids come over, mostly toddlers and babies, so we had a few different age-appropriate options for egg decorating. Traditional egg-shaped cups of colored vinegar were not very appealing for this group. So, we stuck with stickers, crayons, and markers. As well as the Egg Mazing machine that we originally saw on Shark Tank a few years…
-
Hanami: Viewing the Cherry Blossoms at UW
I was so excited when I heard about the cherry blossoms at the University of Washington campus. I knew we had to make a trip over there to see them once they finally bloomed. Cherry blossoms only bloom for a very short period before they fall, about 2 weeks. So, there’s a small window to actually enjoy viewing them. Thanks to the buzz on social media, there were a lot of people there. And just about everyone had a camera or phone up taking pictures. There was also a race on campus the day we went, so that made it even more crowded. Crowds aside, we still loved getting to…
Travel • Food • Mom Life in the PNW
