A few of my favorite things...

It's 6:45 in the morning. For the third night in her entire 18 months of life, my daughter Roxy has slept through the whole night. So of course I was awakened at 5:41 by a nightmare (it involved baseball bats, garage door openers, and an evil villainess who wanted my dog).

Think happy thoughts, Lindsay. Happy thoughts. Like these things, which I love right now.
i absolutely adore the retro kitchen series...i kinda wish these were poorly made, so mine would fall apart and i could get these new ones. alas, they are really nice.

not baaaaaad at all...

Envirosax. Who doesn't feel that nagging guilt everytime they go to the store and lug out bag after environment-killing plastic bag of groceries? My sister felt my guilt and bought me a set of Envirosax a couple of years ago. My set is color coordinated and sooooo pretty. The ladies who check me out at the farmers market every week oooh and aaaah over mine each time. They also have a kids line, so if you don't have a rockin' mother in law like mine, who makes your kids their own reusable totes (love you, Sue!), your kids can go green too.

this would only be better-looking if it had some dark roast brewing in it...

Retro Percolator. My husband and I are solid devotees of the Senseo coffeemaker. Unfortunately, when the aforementioned bebe doesn't sleep, or when we have guests in our little bunga-ranch, we need more caffeine. I found my gorgeous stovetop percolator at my favorite antique store in all of Atlanta the other day. I had never used a percolator before, but it was so pretty I couldn't resist. And while some coffee snobs will tell you it doesn't make the perfect cup, this sometimes sleep-deprived mom will tell ya, tastes pretty good to me!

stories for the older kids, games for the younger. no more chasing the baby during storytime.

Find the Duck. I've seen Usborne books around for a long time, and I've always thought they were charming. But I recently purchased the Complete Farmyard Tales book, and am even more thoroughly charmed. Here's why: The stories are sooooo cute, about a farmer mama and her two kids, Poppy & Sam. My older daughter loves the stories. But what is especially great is what's in their for my baby. On every page there is a cute little duck hidden somewhere in the picture. So as I read the story to Ada, Roxy stares down the page looking for the duck. When she finds it, she points to it with her puffy little index finger and yells "Duh! Duh! Duh!" For once I can actually get them both to sit still long enough to get through one, two... sometimes three whole stories. Well worth it's weight in cuteness. It also comes with a CD of a man with a soothing British accent reading all the stories. The kids love the cd, but when I tried to read the book in my (pretty good, thankyouverymuch) accent, Ada said "Mommy stop doing that." Oh well. At least Roxy was happy, scouring the page for the duck.

Dolcemente,
Lindsay