Jenna-Girl

Have you met my Jenna-girl? She's my "little lover". She can come across as a little tornado at times, but she is my girly-girl, smart, artistic, and loving little girl. She's the one that went to the hospital when we had Jayden wearing her "princess" shoes, bracelets, necklace and purse (that had race cars in it). Our house used to be always cleaned and organized before she was born, now it's definately "lived in" as she leaves a trail behind her. She's the one who loves to read, cuddle under a blanket with you, and hold your hand when you're walking somewhere. She's my Jenna-girl.

Well, when Julianna was born, we did the girls' room in a ladybug theme. My mom and I painted the top green and the bottom pink with a cute ladybud border to finish the room off. I also hung each of the kids' first footprints on the wall. This is what it looked like when it was finished...


Well, my Jenna-girl must have been bored one day because she tore off the wall border and part of her name. :( The sad thing was the when she peeled off the border, part of it came clean off, but most of the paper backing stayed on the wall. This is how her room has been for several months now until she was past the "destructive phase"....

So today I decided to get the rest of the paper backing off the wall so that I could re-do the cute border. I had to actually research how to get that stuff off because it was stuck on there so good! I found the best thing to do was to get the iron and plug it in and set it for max steam. I placed it close to the wall so that the steam would heat up the paper and it reversed the glue! It just peeled right off! Of course it only does a small section at a time, so I only got half of the paper off her walls.
And of course I got burned by the iron in the process. It wouldn't be worth it without "battle scars", would it?

Coupons....

A lot of times I get asked how we do it. "How do we manage four small children while working and being involved in church?" "How do we afford to keep food on the table in today's economy?" And many others....

The answer to the first one is easy - I can only do it with God's help. He gives me strength and wisdom. I also have a great husband too that helps out a lot. It makes a HUGE difference if you are or are not on the same page as your spouse. I have to say that we make a pretty good team, and we of course have LOTS of love to give to our four blessings!

The second one isn't as easy. I have to admit that there's times where I wish we had more money to spend on food, clothes, etc. But having the "stuff" isn't as important as raising my kids God's way. We've sacrificed in order for me to be able to stay home part-time. A sacrifice that has been well worth it. We've also had to rearrange our thinking about buying.

Our society yells at you "Buy now, pay later!" and "even if you can't really afford it, it's okay - buy it anyhow!" It's hard to combat that. One way we try to save money is at the grocery store. We generally try to go to Costco once a month to do our shopping. This means saving $400-$500 for groceries. Although it's a lot to spend at one time, it is also not a lot considering we are a family of six and that's a month's worth of groceries.

There are a lot of times though that saving that for the month is hard. Especially when your husband is paid commission only. So sometimes we also shop at Kroger. This is where coupons really come in handy. It is easy to spend $200 plus dollars at the grocery store each week when not buying in bulk. This can add up quickly, so coupons are a must. I never used to clip coupons because I thought the savings weren't all that great and worth my time looking and cutting. BUT.....

Last night, I saw a TLC show called "Extreme Couponing" and it showed four women who spent $600 plus dollars buying groceries, but with the use of coupons, only paid $10 or less. One woman paid just over $2.00! Amazing!! So I've tried to take this as a challenge....Let's see how much I can save!