My handbag organizer!

3 years ago this kid was born!

So blessed. My heart is too full to say anymore.

1 Samuel 1:27 For this child I prayed. 

Love, J xx

Infertility Hurts. Period. (Yellow Shirt Day!)

      Today is yellow shirt day for endometriosis awareness. Endometriosis is a disease very close to my heart, my uterus, my intestines, my bladder and other organs.  If you have read my posts on infertility before you know that this is the disease responsible for my infertility. Endometriosis affects one in ten women and is the leading cause of infertility. Endometriosis is when the endometrial lining that sheds each month grows outside the uterus. This can grow anywhere, it has even been found in the brain. Each month this lining sheds from the organs it has attached itself to which can cause excessive pain, exhaustion, diarrhea, burning bladder pain, headaches, vomiting, painful sex, and much much more. It can also act as a paste attaching organs together. Some women experience very little discomfort if any and for some women this pain is debilitating. Not life threatening, but quality of life threatening.

There is no cure for endometriosis. The only way to get rid of the excessive growth is to undergo surgery. This will temporarily remove it but it will grow back. Many women suffering the effects of this disease will undergo surgery every couple of years, have parts of their other organs removed,  and in some cases have a complete hysterectomy.

Infertility is more often discussed in todays society and I think that is a really important thing. I think it is awesome more and more people are speaking out! I do however think it is important to talk about the after affects of infertility as well. The causes behind infertility do not always go away once someone has been successful in pregnancy or decided to no longer seek treatment. For many of us infertility was a long and painful emotional process that began with a long and painful disease, and continues with a long and painful disease.

I am thankful for my infertility in that I have been given the most beautiful gift from this journey. My son remains the icing on my cake every single day. I still battle this disease though, it is still very much part of my life.

For those reading this that may have endometriosis I will share a few things that have been huge life changers for me! (These will not help everyone but they helped me)

1. Accupuncture. Without a doubt I have had amazing success with this. It is worth a try for those desperate for relief and many specialize in these issues.

2. It is common for women with this disease to have wheat and milk allergies! I had no idea until last year when I was at the end of my rope. Going off wheat changed my life. I mean that sincerely. Changed my life. Daily pain minimized. Exhaustion affects me less and less. I have not had a headache in 3 months!

3. Interstitial cystitis has been referred to as endometriosis's evil twin. If you experience bladder infection  symptoms each month you may have this disease as well. Do not make the mistake I did and take cranberry pills for this! Cranberry, lemon, citrus are all irritants of this bladder disease. Here is a link to the bladder friendly diet recommended. http://www.ichelp.org/document.doc?id=7

4. And here's a tricky one that is easier said than done but it helps me.  Relax! I know, I know, hard to do when you feel awful and sick, and want to rip your uterus out but it makes a difference.  Stress affects our hormones and this is an estrogen dominance disease. I take Vitamin B which is a big stress buster to help keep me calm... Sort of. Calm is still a work in progress.

Today is our day girls to spread awareness and talk about how this disease has impacted us. Please share your own stories and insights and if you have anything that work for you! I am always after new  tricks to help fight this disease.

Big hugs to all you women. You are warriors and I have the utmost respect and empathy for anyone who is suffering from this. Our numbers are large, and our voices need to be heard. Speak out. Share your stories. Support one another. We need you.



Love, J xx

  

Easy Peasy Earring Organizing, Simple Drawer Fresheners, and My Favourite Spot in the House!

This is my favourite spot in the house. It's a tiny corner of our tiny bedroom and when I walk into our room it always makes me smile. It holds two of my favourite family pictures and a bowl of summer (ie, lemon potpourri), and some other little goodies I love!

These were two of the first pictures I found for our new house and they were from a thrift store for $6. I love lily of the valley but with three cats lilies are a no no in our home so this is the best I can do. Plus they make me think of Kate Middleton's wedding bouquet and then I feel a little like a princess. I'm not sure I've ever mentioned my hard core love for Kate Middleton whose wardrobe I am obsessed with but there it is. My life long goal to be best friends with the duchess all summed up in a $6 Goodwill find. 

This shelf I found a few years ago at the Sally Ann as well and I still love it. It holds my perfume (and yes I do have Britney Spears perfume. It's ok to judge me. I judge me a little too. ) And two baskets from Ikea that fit perfectly! I love a good basket. 

In basket one is a large collection of antique handkerchiefs that I have wrapped around lavender and rose petals to make drawer fresheners and a couple extra flat drawer ones. The flat ones work great for travelling and you can also use the perfume samples in magazines as well for a quick easy way to keep your clothes smelling good! 

Cute and nice smelling. This one is made from my Oma's handkerchief. Sentimental and useful!

The second basket is my jewelry holder. The Tiffany box holds some larger earring I rarely wear and the silver one holds my sentimental jewelry safe and contained. The faux egg cart if my favourite though!

With nine little spaces all my frequently worn earring fit in here. This was $2 from Michael's and worth every penny! You could easily do this with an actual egg carton or if you want something fancier Anthropoligie has some very cute ceramic ones. And as for my stud earrings...

I keep them together with buttons. Cheap and convenient buttons! Cute and easy to grab. Easy to pack too. The ones on the end Doug got me for Christmas. Aren't they ridiculously cute?!

So that is my easy Peasy Jewelry organizing! How do you store yours? I'd love to hear your ideas in the comments below!

Love, J xxxx

A cookie sheet, some magnets, and some glue. My new menu planner.

I'm pretty smitten with this project. I was inspired on pintrest by someone who had made a magnetic board for their office from a cookie sheet and I thought it was genius and cheap. And let's face it cheap is always a huge bonus!

I decided to use the idea to make a menu board so with my handy label maker I made some magnets for the days of the week, plus a few extra at the bottom for extras that may need to be added on. I had all these pretty yellow flowers I've been wanting to use for something! 

Then I added the clothes pin and a bag for all my extra menu ideas. I typed them up and printed them on sturdier paper but you could easily save yourself the time and just cut the paper and hand write everything out. That said it is showing up as really dark for some reason but in person I can read the items perfectly clearly. 

I'm going to link up my old menu planner at the bottom because it may work brilliantly for most people. For me I found because it was in my family binder I didn't use it as much. I usually look at my cleaning and laundry schedule before bed just so I know what I need to do or if I have anything to prepare then night before so this for me makes more sense. I like knowing what my jobs are for the next day and it's easier to just glance at this then pull out my binder. 

Let me know what you think? Any cheap organizing ideas that you have found work great?

J xx

http://homemadebycarmona.blogspot.ca/2013/01/menu-planner.html

http://www.bhg.com/rooms/home-office/storage/cheap-home-office-storage-ideas/#page=6

Be Our Guest (Surviving the season of joy)

The holidays are always a stressful stressful time and really they should be the most enjoyable of the year. Family and friends getting together shouldn't cause our anxiety rise and migraines to come upon us. So here are my best holiday tips from someone who has massive amounts of anxiety when people visit. I can become a very unpleasant person in fact prior to house guests.

So how do we make the holidays pleasant? For one let go of perfection. Do what you enjoy and do it well. If you like cooking, cook up a storm. Baking? Go nuts! What if you are not a fan of either? Plan ahead and keep it simple. Don't spend hours on something you find entirely stressful. Your guests want to spend time with you they are not going to care if your appetizers are top notch.

I love to decorate and do all the little touches for my guest room so that's where my energy goes. I cook ahead what I can because it's not my favourite thing to do and this year baking has been minimized too because I just don't have the time or inclination. Focus on what you enjoy and your guests will enjoy it too. Store bought muffins won't kill anyone... I think.

Plan ahead as much as you can. I have tried to break down little chores for the last couple of weeks so that the day or so before people come over I'm not panicking. If your guests feel like you are stressed out it's hard for them to enjoy themselves. No one wants to feel like an inconvenience.

If you are a bit uptight like me (uptight is the nicest way to put it) this may help you. I like things a certain way so I stress out over little things that a normal person probably wouldn't even consider. Because I like things to look a certain way I have planned ahead for my own craziness. I have an empty drawer in our only bathroom. This way guests stuff is out of our way and contained as well as a shower caddy. I have towel hooks designated for guests so my bathroom stays relatively the same. When you have a small space it's nice to still feel like there is a semblance of order. It's minor things but for me they make a huge difference.

Now given I LOVE to do the "bed and breakfast" type things I created a guest binder. We decided to name our house "Millie's Cottage" after Millicent who was the original owner of our 1920's home.
In it I put our address and closest intersection, as well as our internet passwords. I also have a breakfast menu, and since it's Christmas I put a Christmas picture in with a small calendar of what we'll be doing over the holidays while our guests are here. I have always wanted a guest room so doing things like this was a blast!

I also created a guest basket full of bath things, tooth brushes, cotton balls and q-tips. Also men and women's deodorant, shampoo and a sleep mask.

Because our home reminds me of a Jane Austen novel I have lined the book shelves with her books and I ordered a print of a Pride and Prejudice quote from Etsy for above the bed. Who doesn't love Mr.Darcy? These are the things I love to do and hopefully our guests can enjoy.

Finally something about hospitality is that we are teaching our children what it means to be hospitable. So when we are running around freaking out about visitors (which believe me I am an expert on) I'm teaching my son that hospitality is stressful. That friends and family are stressful. I'm basically teaching him that none of this is fun which is a horrible message and one I need to work on constantly. I don't want him to think the holidays are when everyone yells at each other and mommy is crying over spilled milk. Literally.

So from me to you I wish you and yours a wonderful holiday and that you enjoy the warmth and company the holidays brings your way.

" Christmas is a season for kindling the fire for hospitality in the hall, the genial flame of charity in the heart."
   Washington Irving





Happy Holidays! Jessa, xx

It Was Supposed to Be Sexy

Because it's our 9th wedding anniversary and what better gift than sharing an embarrassing story with all of you. You'll have to excuse me as I bare my soul among other things today.

 A few years ago I thought it would be fun to take some "risqué" photos for my dear husband. I got myself all prettied up, put on some fancy ridiculously expensive underwear, and set up our computer to take what I hoped would be sexy yet tasteful very sexy pics. I mean if George Costanza could do it, surely I could give it the old college try.

 There I was in all my glory looking forward to surprising him and when the moment came (drum roll please) he looked at me like I was nuts and lectured me on the fact anyone could now have access to these pictures. This was rather anticlimactic in many ways as you can imagine. I mean he really seemed concerned that some cyber stalker had been waiting for this moment when amongst our boring old vacation photos of fully dressed people, my naked behind would suddenly appear. Given his reaction in all honesty I was hoping that was the case so at least someone would appreciate the effort.

 We looked at each other and while I thought I had married a total jack ass, he thought he'd married a clueless tart. We were both right to be fair.

 I never again attempted such a fiasco and promptly forgot about blocked out the entire experience... Until one evening when we had a couple friends over for our Friday night game night. We were sitting around listening to music chatting away when suddenly our two male companions leaned forward jaws dropped and said "whoa!" while eyeing the computer screen. I leaned forward to see what was so exciting and there I was. Our computer had gone to screen saver and was cycling through our photo albums and the pictures I had all but forgotten were flashing upon the screen. And let me tell you this, as embarrassing as said moment was, I still looked fabulous.

 Doug of course was shaking his head I think secretly relishing the fact he was indeed correct and naked pictures really do come back to bite you in the proverbial naked behind. And I was thinking of every single celebrity who has been caught in this same situation and wondering if flat out denying it was me would in fact work. It turns out no, that tactic in fact does not work.

 So let my embarrassing moment be a lesson to you all. That said I've been sitting here for five minutes now trying to pin point what exactly the lesson is... I suppose it's that if you're at all an exhibitionist floozy make sure you marry a like minded individual.

So Happy Anniversary my dear husband. I love you like crazy and I still firmly believe that when we're 90, you are going to be appreciating those pictures a heck of a lot more.

 J xx

Where To Begin...

                                       

 
                I've been thinking about where to begin in sharing about our new home and projects and future ideas and it occurred to me I should begin where all things begin, inspiration. I started making an inspiration board a few years ago and it used to sit on the back of our bedroom door so I'd see it before I closed my eyes and first thing in the morning. I found it became impossible to not wake up inspired by the images I had there. My pictures tended to vary and focus on a wide array of goals. One was a picture of an organized closet, one was a quote on entertaining to prompt me to socialize more. I had a picture of Jennifer Aniston doing yoga, and a picture of Angelina Jolie speaking out. I'm sure the occasional guest saw this collage and thought I was some freaky stalker of Brad Pitt's love life. Actually I even had a pic of Gwenyth Pawltrow in this gorgeous Tom Ford gown. Maybe Brad Pitt and I do share the same taste in women. None the less, it inspired me in some way and I found whatever the image was at some point I'd feel I had accomplished the goal and would add on a new image. I'm very visual so this worked beautifully for me.

So I thought I'd share my new inspiration board that is currently in the guest room/ what I call "the Jane Austen reading room" because I'm pretentious like that. It was a cute framed bulletin board I picked up at a yard sale for $7. It currently is filled with ideas for organizing, fashion, the guest room, and family. I always like to have a picture up of a happy couple or family because it makes me happy and reminds me of what's important.

I've also included a few gorgeous boards that rather put mine to shame but offer great ideas if you're in the mood for your own inspiration!!

Love, J xx

Images from
http://ledansla.blogspot.ca
http://ifferslittlenest.blogspot.ca/2009/04/message-inspiration-chalk-bulletin-and.html
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rebeccasower/3751620035/in/photostream/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/54015225@N08/8267450754/