Bugs Worked Out?

I know some of you were having a hard time viewing our new blog over at threetimesthegiggles.com, but I think whatever the bug was has worked itself out. I suspect some of the new settings just hadn't made their way across all of the internet!

If you're still having problems I suggest trying a different browser to see if that helps, or making sure you're running the latest version of your browser. If you're still having problems you can subscribe to the new blog and get the posts in your e-mail for now, by going HERE.

Hope you're all able to join me at the new site! I think you'll find much simpler, cleaner and easier to navigate.

Oh, and if you had my blog in your blogroll, please change the address!

We've Moved!

As of the afternoon of Monday, July 19th, Three Times the Giggles has taken up residence at threetimesthegiggles.com!

Please update your bookmark/favorite, as this blogspot address will no longer be updated!

I Heart Faces - Over My Head Challenge

Have I mentioned just how much I love the I Heart Faces site? Seriously, so much fun! This week's challenge is "Over My Head" and each entry must have (of course) a human face and something, anything, over their head. It could be a hat, a balloon, a bird, etc. This assignment should bring out some creative shots, so I'd highly encourage you to scurry on over to their Mr. Linky and check out the other entries - after you admire my of course.

Happy Summer!

Who Wants to Win a Prize?

I think I have pretty awesome readers. A good number of you take the time to comment on my silly ramblings or picture heavy posts and I received so much help last week regarding the sleep issues in this house! When I was approached last week about either offering a giveaway to my readers or keeping the prize for myself and just writing a review, the choice was an easy one.... of course I want to reward my readers!

The prize up for grabs? $40 to be spent at any of the 250+ CSN stores (you'll have to pay shipping costs)! Remodeling your bathroom? You could put the $40 towards a new vanity. Have a child's birthday coming up? You could use the $40 to buy a sweet new toy! Kids keep breaking your dishes? Buy new dishes! Seriously, the options are endless! Check out all of the specialty stores CSN has by clicking here.

Here's how you can win!

1. Leave a comment saying what you need (or just really want) to buy right now.
2. Become a follower of this blog and leave a separate comment (or let me know if you already follow).
3. Check out the blog, and leave a comment, of another commenter - then leave another comment here.
4. Share this giveaway on Facebook and leave another comment letting me know you did.

That's it! Four easy ways you can enter to win. Winner will be drawn on Thursday morning, so you have until then to leave your comments!

Saturday Savings

Last week I never got around to doing any grocery shopping, which meant I was in trouble by the time the middle of this week rolled around. Some "staples" I just can't stock up on due to space limitations here, so I almost always have to shop once a week, but sometimes can stretch it a week and a half like I did this past week.

Wednesday evening I made a quick run to Price Chopper for some eggs, bananas, carrots and some of the snack type stuff they had on sale (crackers). Thursday morning the boys and I hit up Target for some cheap taco shells (thanks to a sale and a coupon you can print on the Ortega website right now) and grapes as well as a few other household things we needed. We also swung by Hen House for some free-range, locally raised chicken, local milk (nothing like "voting" for local food by spending your money on it!), granola bars, and something else but I'm blanking on what right now. Between those three mini-trips I spent about $35.

Yesterday I headed to HyVee where I was thrilled with the amount of stuff on sale! Even better is that most of this stuff will be on sale next week too (just pick up an extra coupon book at the customer service desk). Everything you see below came from HyVee and was $48.31.

The Loot:
Lemonade
Eggs - 2 dozen
Yoplait Simply Yogurt Go-Gurt - 2 boxes
Fuel Injector Cleaner (random, I know)
Iceberg lettuce
Earthgrains 100% Whole Wheat Bread - 2 loaves
Total Cereal - 2 boxes
HyVee Pudding - 2 boxes
HyVee Jello - 2 boxes
HyVee Tortillas
HyVee Hamburger Buns
Sparkling, Flavored Water - 2 bottles
HyVee Taco Seasoning - 2 packages
White Bread
HyVee Tortilla Chips
Sunbelt Granola - 1 box
Era Laundry Detergent
Yukon Gold Potatoes - 4.64 pounds
Blueberries - 1 pint
Broccoli bunch
Green Peppers - 2
Pink Lady Apples - 3 pounds
Vine Ripened Tomatoes - 1.45 pounds
Smart Chicken (all natural chicken) - 4 pounds

The Deals: So obviously a lot of the best deals this week are for store brand items. It's not often my cart is so full of store brand things! The tortillas were $1, the taco seasoning packets were .34 each, the tortilla chips were .78, the hamburger buns were .69 and the pudding and jello mixes were .25 each. Produce also had a lot of really nice bargains! Iceberg lettuce was .49, tomatoes were .98 a pound, green peppers were 2/$1, broccoli bunches were .99 each, the potatoes were .77 a pound and the blueberries were .88 after my coupon. The Total Cereal ended up being between .92 and .67 a box thanks to a coupon I had with me and a coupon that was on some of the boxes. The granola was $1.45 a box.

Some of my purchases (apples, eggs, Earthgrains bread to name a few) weren't rock-bottom prices, but they were low enough that I felt I could "splurge" a bit on them.

Total Before Sales, Tax and Coupons: $92.96
Total After Sales and Coupons: $45.69

I Need Help

We have serious bed time issues here and we are just at a loss as to what to do. If you've had toddler bed time issues, I need your help! Here's a brief run down of the issues and what we've tried....

• Bed time is at 7:30pm - most nights the boys don't actually fall asleep though until 9:30 or later. That's two hours of messing around!
• The boys do still nap most days, but even on the days they don't nap they still mess around for a couple of hours.
• They're waking up at 6 or 6:30 in the morning and often have crabby tendencies as a result.

What We've Tried

•   Super Nanny technique of just putting them back in their beds without talking. The boys thought that was hilarious.
• Locking them in their room (we've reversed the door knob) and ignoring them. Works great until we hear crying and fighting.
• Sitting the offender in an extra long Time Out (5-10 minutes depending on how many times they've been in TO that night already) in an attempt to let all the kids calm down completely.
• Moving the offender to a different room to fall asleep and then move them back to their room after they're asleep. Problem here is those door knobs aren't reversed, so Nick and I will often end up in the hall holding the door shut until they just give up and lay down.
• Giving them 10 minutes to just lie in their beds and talk before telling them it's time to be quiet.
• Sitting on the floor in their room for 10-15 minutes until they're calm and quiet (then about 5 minutes later they're wild again).

Some of those attempts at controlling them have worked for a week or two and some have never worked. Last night a friend suggested giving them each a certain number of "passes" for coming out and asking for hugs, kisses, to be covered with a blanket or to use the bathroom. I may give that one a shot, even though I'm not convinced the boys are old enough to "get it".

Any other ideas? By 7:30pm my patience with the boys is done. Another 2 hours of shenanigans sends my stress level through the roof! Nick and I often alternate dealing with them, but boy would it be nice to just sit on the couch and talk or watch a movie without having to pause it every 3 minutes.

Fun Times

The boys had a ball this past week, hanging out with Grandma and Pop Pop. We did all kinds of fun things (some of which I didn't take any pictures of *gasp!*) including a trip to the zoo and playing at the park...

Chase and Jackson. Such a shame my focus was on the dragon and not them! Darn! And yes, Chase is wearing his shirt backwards. Again. He's always so proud of himself for getting himself dressed that he hates it when I try to help him or "fix" whatever he did wrong.

Jackson and Pop Pop checking out the kangaroos.

Hope there isn't a squirrel living in that hole!

Chase flying across a bridge at the park! And yep, his shirt is backwards again... his shorts are also backwards, but that's harder to tell in the picture. 

Jackson

Not so fast, Pop Pop! 

(Don't worry, they weren't really going that fast - I just messed with my shutter speed to make it look like they were.)

In baby news, I'm now 10 weeks along and so ready to be out of the first trimester. The fatigue is killing me! My nausea had gotten better in the last week until some icky heat and humidity rolled in yesterday. Now I feel gross again if I spend too much time outside. 

Too Much Fun

Poor Chase. He had too much fun yesterday! Between a morning at the zoo and skipping naps to go swimming at Aunt Laura's, he was wiped out. It should be noted that when my children fall asleep in the car they NEVER can just be transferred to a bed. Never. They always wake up. Yesterday, Chase didn't budge and let me put him in a bed.

I Heart Faces - I Heart My Country

This is a non-competition week over at I Heart Faces, but it's been a couple of weeks since I've been able to participate! Because it's a non-competition week I can enter more than one photo - Woohoo!

The theme this week is I Heart My Country. We get to feature favorite pictures from our home town or state! Growing up in Maine there is no shortage of beautiful places to photograph. Living in the mid-west now, I have seen some truly beautiful expanses of open space! Today I'm going to feature a favorite from each location (I bet you can guess which is Maine and which is Kansas).

You can join the fun and show off your favorite place by visiting I Heart Faces!

Ice Cream!

The boys love the ice cream truck. Sadly, for them anyway, it rarely passes our house. Instead it turns 2 blocks down. The boys can hear it, and they can see it, but it almost never comes close enough to flag down. Here they are Thursday night watching the ice cream truck turn too far down our street...

Friday night Pop Pop took matters into his own hands by running down the street to flag down the ice cream truck. Great excitement followed!

Saturday Savings - Buying Grass Fed Beef

Yesterday I took a blogging break. My parents are here visiting and I had a busy morning planned. Due to my parents being here I also haven't done any normal grocery shopping. However, I still have a fun deal to share with you all!

A few months ago, after watching the movie Food, Inc, Nick and I felt compelled to buy only grass fed, locally raised beef and hormone free chicken (we prefer free-range but that's been harder to find). I made myself a little spreadsheet of organic and all natural food prices at area stores in order to keep track of various prices and was shocked at how much this meat was going to cost us.

Every once in a while I would find some (at Hen House usually) for around $3.50 a pound and I would buy several pounds. I know the cheapest way to go is to buy part of a cow (whole, half, quarter), but we don't have a chest freezer so don't have the space for all of that beef.

A couple of weeks ago I started searching online for farms near Kansas City that raise and sell their own grass fed beef by the pound. I actually found quite a few! Most of the sites listed prices and the difference between the various farms was staggering. I finally found one farm though (North KC) that had fantastic prices! I contacted them early this week to confirm their prices and that they had meat on hand and arranged to pick up 14 pounds of beef on Thursday morning when I was up north at the airport anyway.

The price of ground beef is only $3.10 a pound and the rest of his meat prices are quite good too! I highly recommend checking out Long Livestock Company. Mike, the owner, was great to work with! He did warn me that business is picking up and I'll need to place orders further in advance probably next time because he's been selling out quickly. Hope this little tip is helpful to you and your family!

(Oh, and the tenderloin we grilled up last night was really good!)

Pizza on the Grill

Seeing as I get asked quite frequently for my favorite, family-friendly recipes, allow me to share with you a brand new favorite.... Pizza on the grill!

Can I just tell you this was, by far, the best pizza I've ever made? I've made pizza in the oven for several years and it's just alright. I'd still rather order pizza, but the homemade is alright when we're being cheap. This pizza last night though I think I'd gladly make over ordering take-out pizza! The crust was a perfect, light-brown color and had just the right amount of crunch to it. The toppings were heated perfectly. I seriously am salivating right now and wishing there was some left over in the fridge!

Ok, so on to the how-to. Understand that this was my first time ever cooking pizza on the grill, so some of it was winging it and some of it was using bits of advice I received from various Facebook friends. The crust recipe came from The Pioneer Woman. (If you've never visited her site, prepare to be hooked. Did I mention she also gives away the coolest stuff?!) The pizza crust recipe can be found at the bottom of this page. She recommends letting the crust sit for at least 24 hours, but I didn't have that long so only let it sit 2 hours. It still tasted fantastic!

For the "sauce" I drained most of the water out of a large can of petite diced tomatoes and then dumped the tomatoes into a sauce pan. I added some seasonings (onion powder, garlic powder, basil, oregano, salt, pepper and sugar) and cooked it for about 30 minutes. Then I scooped the tomatoes (leaving as much liquid as I could in the pot) onto the crust and spread them out. Added some pizza cheese and some sliced, smoked sausage (the only topping type item I had in the house).

As you can see, I cooked it on my pizza pan, which has holes in the bottom. I think that helped with the crisp crust, although my crust has never been that crisp in the oven. Others have said they used a pizza stone, but I don't have one of those.

I had all four grill burners on and turned to low and I cooked the pizza for about 15 minutes. I used tongs to lift the edge of the crust every so often to see how the bottom was looking. This pizza was seriously perfection! I have the other half of the crust in my fridge for now and will move it to the freezer in a day or two, and I cannot wait to make it again!

Oh, and we also had the very first cucumber from my garden last night. Yum!

Lagging

I noticed the other day that Tyler is once again lagging behind his brothers in the height department. This happens every few months and always Tyler catches up... eventually. He's never caught up in weight (he's 3-4 pounds lighter than Chase or Jackson), but he always catches up in height. Right now though, the difference is quite big! Check it out (that's Jackson with him)!

Meanwhile, as the boys grow up so do their destructive tendencies... Poor Mr. Penguin! He no longer has a head, wings or feet!

Our Weekend in Pictures and Video

We had a fun filled 4th of July weekend and hope you did as well! Here's a run down of the fun we had, in pictures and one video!

Friday night we (wisely) decided to  go see some fireworks. We were thinking the boys might need most of the weekend to recover from being up so late (we were right) and it was looking like rain on the 4th, when all the other displays would be happening (again, right). The boys had a ball waiting outside as it got darker and darker and then they Oooohed and Ahhhhhed every time one went off!

I was wishing I had a tripod while there. It was insanely difficult to hold perfectly still long enough to not have blurry fireworks. Most came out like the first picture below, but I did catch one decent one...

Sunday was cloudy all day, but we didn't let that stop us from taking the boys to swim at Aunt Laura's pool! They've been dying to try out their new Puddle Jumpers since they arrived last week. I tell you what, that was the best money spent all summer! The boys LOVED swimming and kept exclaiming "we don't need Mommy or Daddy!".

When Jackson got out and put on his towel, he looked like a little football player. Cracked us up!

Yesterday we took the boys bowling for the first time! They had a ball and we'll definitely take them back again sometime this summer.

Chase won, but not by much!

Hope your family had as much fun as we did this weekend!