I dont know about you but I am generally I big procrastinator on most things. My family is a close knit family and we always gather for all birthdays. Sometimes we would celebrate a week or two after that person’s birthday due to conflicting schedules. Well, I was always that person buying the birthday gift the day before or the day of our family party.  Not only did I not have a gift bought and wrapped by their actual birthday but here it is 2 weeks later, and I’m still scrambling to get them something. In fact, just the other day, I sent a baby gift to my sister-in-law after she had her beautiful baby girl. I have text after text going back months asking what she needs and yet I sent the gift after her baby arrived.

So, yes, I am a hard core procrastinator. Last year at this time I decided that I was going to try my hardest to have all my Christmas shopping done by November and for the most part, I pulled it off!! Let me tell you, it was the BEST feeling to hit Dec 1st and know that I only had a couple people left to purchase gifts for. So, here we are November 2019 and I’m determined to do it again this year.  In my family, we have 8 kiddos including my own. Four of those kids are between 7-10 years old and the other four are newborn-3 years old. I struggle with the older 4 big time. With technology being what it is right now, I find it a bit challenging to come up with gift ideas that don’t involve a screen but I determined to do it! My Mom brought down several catalogs for the kids to go through and let me tell you, there is some good stuff in them! Here are some of my kids favorites that they picked out and some that I think are pretty neat as well. 

RC Racing Drone Competition $49.95 – We have had one drone so far. Unfortunately it didn’t have a long shelf life in our home. Maybe this one will do better?

Throw Throw Burrito Game $24.99 – We personally own this game already and it is SO much fun! We enjoy it just as much if not more than our kids do. It has the same concept as spoons but with a twist. I highly recommend this game!

Solar Robot Creation Kit $31.99 – My kiddos aren’t big robot fans but I do think my nephew would enjoy this toy. 

Slime Art Kit Jewel Kit $29.95 – My daughter is obsessed with all things slime right now. I love that his kit has the option to leave it out and turn it into a art creation. My daughter isn’t a big girly girl so I would probably purchase the neon kit instead of the jewel. 

Gearjits Movie Projector $39.95 – I LOVE this gift idea! There are several other Gearjit kits available and all have great reviews. 

Young Architects House Designer $49.95 – I think this is just a fun option for all kiddos that are HGTV lovers like myself. 

Playful Check Chocolate Studio $34.95 – My daughter LOVES cooking/baking and she circled this as a “want” for her Christmas list. 

Invisible Think Game $24.95 – I saw this in a catalog and thought it seemed like a fun family game to play. The reviews have mentioned that it’s easy for kids to play by themselves as well but it is not suitable for kids who are colorblind. 

Fairy Jar Kit $24.95 – My niece is pretty crafty and girly and I think this would be a fun idea for her. 

I titled this “Average Mom Meal Planning” because in today’s society, it feels like everyone is buying organic, all natural, gluten free, air fried not deep fried, veggie chips, etc. You get where I’m going with this. Don’t get me wrong, I would love to buy all organic or at least more organically than we do BUT we are a family of 5 on a tight budget and organic doesn’t fall within that budget. 

I was raised in a home where our dinner typically consisted of meat, potato/starch, and a veggie. So, naturally, this is how most of my meals for my kids look. So, my veggie may not be organic but hey, I get a veggie on the plate. That counts for something right? I mean, I will absolutely hear, “how many bites of broccoli do I need to take?”, “UGH! Mom…you know I hate asparagus!”, “can I eat more chicken and no vegetables?”. Even with all the whining and complaining that comes with serving vegetables, it does not stop me from putting it on their plate. Now, as I type this, I have many nights that frozen pizza, mac and cheese with hot dogs, and turkey sandwhiches end up being the meal that night. We all need easy nights where there’s no complaining or need quick meals as an option when you have days that don’t go as planned and you just need to get some form of food in their tummies. So, for me, I try my best to meal plan but keep those backups available just incase.  

So, on to my meal planning. Every week I TRY to sit down and plan out a week of meals. This can become VERY time consuming if I’m in a mood where I am sick of all the same recipes on repeat and I jump on the internet in search of budget friendly family meals. Although meal planning can get overwhelming, once the meals have been determined, written down, and groceries purchased, it does make the week run smoothly meal wise. That is unless I forget to write down or purchase one of the ingredients…. 

Every week, I’m going to give you 5 meals that I’ve made and are hopefully kid approved. Lately I’ve been drawn to recipes from http://damndelicious.net . The recipes I have made thus far have been easy, fairly quick, and pretty tasty. My kids have eaten ALL OF THEM with NO COMPLAINING! What!?!? Here are some of the meals I have made and are kid approved.

Cheesy Avocado Quesadillas.

I will admit that I did leave out the avocado in the quesadilla my older two split. This was an absolute case of me not wanting to deal with the battle of getting them to eat the avocado. I did put it in my husband, my youngest daughter, and my own quesadillas and we loved it.

https://damndelicious.net/2015/02/07/cheesy-avocado-quesadillas/

Parmesan Chicken Bites

These were messing to make as is any meal where you’re dipping meat in flour, eggs, and another mixture. I also didn’t have a pan big enough to fry all the chicken at one time. So, I needed to cook in batches and we ate in batches. With that said, my kids absolutely LOVED this meal. I paired this meal with green beans and halved baby red potatoes that I lightly coated in olive oil and then coated with a packet of dry onion soup mix. I baked those on a baking sheet at 400 for 20ish minutes. We love these potatoes!

https://damndelicious.net/2014/12/26/parmesan-chicken-bites/

Slow Cooker Korean Beef

I tend to make at least one slow cooker meal a week. Wednesdays and Thursdays the kids have sports and I teach piano. So, making dinner gets tricky with our schedules overlapping and sports taking place during normal dinner hours. So, these days I try to plan for slow cooker meals. This was a tasty meal that we all enjoyed. My sauce didn’t thicken very well but we didn’t mind. I added cooked broccoli and minute rice to this meal. Easy peasy.

https://damndelicious.net/2015/02/21/slow-cooker-korean-beef/

Slow Cooker Tater Tot Casserole

Here we are with my second slow cooker meal. 🙂 This was good but I think we all like the other meals better. With that said, my kids ate it and didn’t complain. So, that’s a win in my book and I’ll be making it again.

https://damndelicious.net/2017/02/25/slow-cooker-tater-tot-casserole/

Easy Chicken Tikka Masala

So… I’m going to be honest… I was not a fan of this one at all. With that said, my kids and husband LOVED it. So, I decided to include this one because even though the spices are not ones that I love, at the end of the day, it’s clearly a good recipe given everyone else loved it.

https://damndelicious.net/2019/02/08/easy-chicken-tikka-masala/

So there you have it. 5 meals that we have enjoyed and will be making again. I can definitely see more meals from damn delicious coming your way next week but I’ll throw in some other meals as well. Hope you enjoy these and bon appetit!

Happy Labor Day Weekend! I wanted to round up a few of my favorite sales and clothing pieces for you. If you follow me on FB or IG, you’ll know that I post a lot of sales from Old Navy. They just ALWAYS seems to be having amazing sales. Today however, I’m going to kick it off with a great sale at Hanna Andersson. The quality of Hanna Andersson is AMAZING and they are having 40% off full price items and you can take an additional 30% off sale items. I’ve included a couple of my favorite boy tops below with the links to the shirts. To check out the entire site, click here.

Justice is also having a Labor Day Sale. You can take an extra 50% off sale items when you use code gimme50 at checkout. I can’t include pictures because I can’t save the images for whatever reason. I’m guessing because the shirts are on actual models?? 

Jungle Fun Tee

Ruffle Peasant Top

Sequin Shoulder Sweatshirt

Children’s Place is also having a good Labor Day Sale. Because I need to get my kids up for school, I do not have time to post and link my favorite here. BUT it’s worth checking out if you kiddo likes graphic tees and flip sequins. 

Here is the link to this super cute backpack diaper bag I found at Burlington. 
I know I’ve been posting about clothing sales but when I went to Burlington’s website to check out their sale, this caught my eye immediately and I had to share. It’s only $19.99. Originally $39.99

 

Alrighty… that’s all I got for you today. I will get better at this blog posting, sale link thing as I do it more. I thought I could squeeze out a few more pictures and sales BUT time has flown by this morning and I have a full day after I drop my kids off at school. I hope you don’t mind my colorful text. I wanted to change it up a bit this time from the standard black and white. 🙂 I hope you all have an amazing holiday weekend!! 

2018 was a BIG year of changes for not only myself but for my entire family. This was the year that I went from being a full time working store owner to a stay at home Mom and oh my goodness….. it’s been an interesting transition.

On December 1st, 2017 we closed our beloved store in Minnesota and on January 1st, we started our new season of life in Memphis. To keep you from having to read a novel, I’m going to skip the details about Kids Carousel, BUT I will absolutely write about it in another post. Anyways, I wasn’t sure how I would transition to this new role I now had. At first, all was fine. We had an entire garage full of boxes that needed to be unpacked and find their new place, furniture needed to be put together, we got the kids enrolled in school, and put both in karate. Being such a big transition for them, we wanted to get them in a sport right away to get them involved in something and also make new friends.

After a few months had passed, I started feeling unsure of my new role. Don’t get me wrong, I love having time with my kids. With that said, I do believe there are people who are more suitable to stay home with their kids than others. I have come to the conclusion that I fit somewhere in the middle of those two groups. You see, for the last 7.5 years of owning Kids Carousel, my kids came to work with me most days. If they weren’t with me, they were with my husband or other family members. I got the best of both worlds. I got to work and be around my kids. If I wasn’t around them, I knew they were with people who I fully trusted, loved them as much as I did, AND they were free! Haha! Anyways, while I wasn’t sure if being a stay at home mom was good fit for me, I did not care for the idea of putting them in daycare either.

As I toiled with what I should do, I did find a life group at my local church called MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers). I was a little nervous about showing up to this group in the middle of their semester, but I also knew I needed to make some friends to ease the loneliness. It took till the fall semester in 2018 for me to really find my place and I’m so happy I kept making myself attend. Hearing other moms share their highs and lows and knowing that you’re not alone in the struggle of maintaining your sanity most days, was reassuring.

I have still struggled with the dilemma of, do I find a job or don’t I. Honestly, if I found the right job that had set hours and brought in enough income to pay for daycare and a surplus, I would probably take it. I have not found that job yet. I have years and years of experience with working in children’s retail, floor displays, management, and customer service. I also do not have a college degree. THAT my friends is what has become a big struggle in finding a good job. I am very, VERY good at retail. I love interacting with customers. I love helping them pick out coordinating outfits for family photos, giving them all the pros and cons on various baby swings so they go home with one they love and will best suite their needs, and getting to know them and their children. Retail hours will not work in our life right now. Between my husband’s schedule, the kid’s sports schedule, and retail’s crazy holiday hours. It isn’t a good fit right now.

So, here I am. I am still at home with my kiddos. Trying not to lose my sanity and yet soaking up all the moments I can because I know many would loved the opportunity to be home with their littles. I will say, my sanity has gotten much better since school started back up. Haha! Kidding… but not really. I still keep an eye on the job market and when the time is right, I’ll find something. Just know that if you’re struggling being home or being a working mom, the grass isn’t always greener on the other side and both positions have plus’s and minus’s. No matter which position you are in, find other moms to do life with. My friends from Minnesota and the new friendships I’m making here, definitely make life easier. We were not made to do life alone.

Hello!! Welcome to Just An Average Mom Blog! In this first post, I’ll tell you a little about myself and what you can expect to see and read from this site and social media. So… here we go!

My name is Caitlin and I have been married to my husband, Joey, for 14 years in September! We got married VERY young so it is crazy to write down 14! For whatever reason, we don’t take selfies together and it always requires some scrolling to find the most current picture of us. In this case, I had to scroll back to 2016 which is when we had our last professional picture taken of our whole family. We have since then had pictures taken of our kids but have not pulled off family pictures.

Speaking of our kids… we have 3 beautiful blessings in our family. Colton is 10, Rhyen is 7, and Jordan recently turned 3. My sister just snapped this picture of me with my munchkins not that long ago.

This picture accurately portrays how taking a picture in this season of life is for me. I have Colton who is becoming a preteen boy and clearly doesn’t want to snuggle in close to his Mom. You can see my arm is reaching out trying to pull him close but he wasn’t having it. Rhyen, (our middle child) is not at the stage of her brother and will still snuggle in. Yay! It was a toasty day in Memphis so she was trying her best to cooperate and smile but was more than ready to get into some AC.  Then there’s Jordan… who is a hard core threenager right now.  She of course has her sweet, cute, playful moments. In this exact moment, she was not at all interested in sitting still and smiling. She was determined to run around and pick up all the pink flower petals that were lying all over the ground. So… there you have it. My brief into about me. I’ll definitely be digging in further in future posts. Trying to keep this first post short and sweet.

There are many things you’ll be seeing in this blog. I’ll be posting about motherhood, life going from a full time business owner to a stay at home mom, any great sales I find that involve anything kid related and recipes (new and old) that my kids love. I hope you’ll find this blog entertaining, relatable, helpful, and uplifting. I’m not sure what else to write about at this point so… I’m going to leave it at that. Jordan is sleeping and the kids are in school so I’m going to grab a nutty buddy bar that I have hidden in the pantry and enjoy that with my cup a coffee before my day of tasks begin. Have a wonderful day!