DONE!!!!

I've officially completed my 15 training hours I needed for child care.... 

EMSA approved:
CPR
First Aid
Preventative Health Practices

I think I actually learned something in each class, even being super basic.  I had taken CPR a million times but never had to be EMSA approved, so this time I did it on the Dummies and it definitely made me 100% more confident in my skills :D

And first Aid had good tips.  Can't think of anything spectacular off the top of my head.

Preventative health was good, boring, but good.  It basically went over sanitizing, cleaning, and the common sicknesses day care kids will bring into our home.  That part actually scared me to be honest... worms in kids butts, lice, scabies... AHHH!  oh my gosh, I couldn't stop itching!  lol

But, glad to have that done.  I'm going to call our Analyst and leave her a message today to get our inspection scheduled.  Hopefully for about 2 weeks away from now :D

I'm so excited to almost be DONE with this process.  The thought of having no income come June is KILLING my stress level. 

So, that's the major good news I have for the moment :D

We have a busy weekend of a wedding shower, and a TON of church because my munchkin will be in the Kids Choir for every service (that's 4 times!  lol).  And we have random people and family coming to different services. :D 

Oh, and I'm currently making Cheesecake pops for the wedding shower I'm heading to tomorrow! :D

awesome, amazing, fabulous, delightful weekend!

Had a great weekend.  Totally killed my diet (part of the reason why my weekend was so great probably!  lol), but I will overcome this week. 

I'm honestly so tired from the weekend, I'm coming here to try and get motivation to get on all my projects for today. 

So, on Friday I installed the wood floor in the kids room 100% BY MYSEFL!  AHHHHH!  insane.  I've never used a saw before, but I feel totally inspired and I'm ready to... pretty much build a house!  lol  Pictures to come soon! 

I have some revamping to do on a free bunk bed we got from our friend Alex (thank you thank you thank you!).  The kids have been in toddler beds STILL cause every time we think about buying them new beds some money issue arises.  :(  So, she was going to burn hers and I said WHAT???  I'll take them.  So I'm going to make the side guard rail and the latter and rig them together.  Oh and sand and paint them.  ALL the kids furniture is currently different colors.  Their dresser is white, the beds are a light wood, their train table is a black/espresso.  Since the train table is the newest thing and easiest to match everything else too, I'm gonna paint the dresser and beds to match it. 

The kids room still needs the molding done, but I'm gonna wait 'til I do the floors in the other bedroom and then do the molding at the same time.  BUT, today I need to move everything from the kids temporary room, back to their room so I can scrape the ceilings in there, spray texture, paint the ceiling white, paint the walls (who knows what color yet), install the floor, install the molding... insert nap here!

And pretty much all that stuff needs to be done this week!  And that's with a sea world trip thrown in the mix on wednesday.  ahhhhhhhhh! 

So, that's why I'm missing!  lol!  I hope to be back soon... VERY soon!  I have so many pictures that need entries to go with them. 

Oh, and update, had to take my cpr/first aid class on saturday.  While there, BORED, I got a facebook message....  if you remember this entry "How are your relationships?" you'll remember my struggle with a friend, I said things I shouldn't and never gave her the chance she deserved.  I was a HORRIBLE friend.  So, I sent her a message about 2 weeks ago and hadn't heard anything back.  So I got a message back during my class and it was GREAT!  We actually went to dinner with them saturday night after my class and they came over and BBQed with us Sunday.  I'm VERY happy with my decisions and I'm so glad that they are part of our life again.  I couldn't have asked for a better outcome and I'm working on being an amazing friend!

I'm gonna stop here because my children are running around the house like little maniacs and screaming for breakfast and hopefully if I go make it I'll get motivated to wash their bright outfit for kids choir (they have to wear the same one like 5 days this week, lol), move their room back and scrape ceilings..... uuuuuuuuuuugh. 

Yum Yum Cheesecake!

So, I know a TON of people that wanted my cheesecake recipe that I used of my cheesecake pops.  So, I'm gonna post it here :D

Ingredients

• 15 graham crackers, crushed
• 2 tablespoons butter, melted

• 4 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese
• 1 1/2 cups white sugar
• 3/4 cup milk
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup sour cream
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a 9 inch springform pan.
2. In a medium bowl, mix graham cracker crumbs with melted butter. Press onto bottom of springform pan.
3. In a large bowl, mix cream cheese with sugar until smooth. Blend in milk, and then mix in the eggs one at a time, mixing just enough to incorporate. Mix in sour cream, vanilla and flour until smooth. Pour filling into prepared crust.
4. Bake in preheated oven for 1 hour. Turn the oven off, and let cake cool in oven with the door closed for 5 to 6 hours; this prevents cracking. Chill in refrigerator until serving.

Now this is what I use to make a cheesecake.  BUT, remember, I'm posting this for use with my cheesecake pops, in which case you don't have to worry about it cracking.  Once you make the cheesecake and it's all done, just throw it in the mixer.  I throw mine in the kitchen aid for a few minutes (yes, graham cracker crust and all).  If it's still really gooey, I add more graham cracker crumbs.  

Once I feel like it looks good, I pull out a spoon full and drop it into a tray full of graham cracker crumbs.  Get the whole thing a nice coat, THEN you can roll them into nice balls!  

Once they're in the balls you freeze them for a few hours then they're ready to make into pops!

 

Just heat chocolate candy melts in the micro at 30 second intervals, stirring in between EVERY time.

Once it's ready, take your lollipop sticks and dip the end into the chocolate, then stick that end into the cheesecake ball.  Give it time to harden before actually dipping the WHOLE thing into chocolate.  

 I like to do mine in two batches.  So I usually have two pans of balls and if one pan is out, the other is in the freezer.  So I get the sticks in all the balls on one tray and put it in the freezer, then do the other tray and put those in the freezer and take the other tray out to dip in chocolate.... kinda confusing, you get it?  lol

 

Anyway, you can find my post on my Cheesecake pops here...

 My Cheesecake is cool, My cheesecake is Poppin'! 

 

And REMEMBER, just like I said in the post I link too.. if you can't make a good tasting cheesecake for nothin, DON'T!  Go buy one!  lol  Or if you're running short on time and don't have HOURS to let a cheesecake cook and cool and this and that....  Just go buy one and throw it in the mixer.  Honestly, it's not a big deal and a nice time saver tip.  Especially if you're making these last minute for a big event... you don't want to show up with funky tasting cheesecake!  lol  And that lesson does go for ALL cake pops.  You could literally go buy almost any cake from the store, mix it up and turn it to cake balls.  You may have to add more frosting or graham cracker... things along those lines, but for the most part you should be safe that way.  And that's AWESOME if you're not a good baker.  The chocolate dipping part is easy!  

 

 

Are we done yet???

I swear, the world of home remodeling & fixing up is NEVER ending!  I can't WAIT for 5 more years when our house is paid off and we have more money to fix more of the big things that need to be done.  'Til then of course, little by little, we're getting there.

So, after a week of madness.....  demo, painting, ceiling scraping... and worstly, LIVING on plywood floors with a house covered in dust from removing the tile glue and crap... ugh...  FINALLY on thursday our flooring was started and all put in (well, now ALL put in, but all the rooms they were hired to do) by Friday night!  :D 

Since my child care inspection will be here way too soon, there's no way we had time to lay 1400 sq. ft. of flooring in the main living areas (living room, hallway & entryway - 1168 sq. ft, bathroom - 65 sq. ft, kitchen - 122 sq. ft.) so we paid for that to be done.  Plus those are areas our guests really see and have a TON of angles not to mention the rock fire place to go around.. gosh.. they spent almost ALL of friday just on our little kitchen alone because the angles were so hard.  So, we wanted those areas to be done right and look the best.   Money well spent.

So now we have the flooring for the two bedrooms, one being the kids sleeping room, the other will be set up with more baby toys for the younger child care children. 

Anyway, I haven't uploaded all my pictures from my nice camera, BUT I do have a sneak peek cell phone pic I can share 'til I do...

 

Can't even tell you how much I LOVE it!  My parents had installed the carpet when I was in 5th grade.  that carpet was going on 17 years old.  And I can't tell you how many dogs my family used to have.  Actually right after the carpet was installer, our family dog had puppies... yeah... 6 puppies NOT potty trained.  Ugh.. and when we took over the house 2 years ago, my childhood dog was still around but on her last leg.  In her prime of course she would never pee in the house, but when she was practically blind and barely walking, pretty much all she did was pee and poop in the house.  So the carpet was hammered, to say the least.  Not to mention the fact that we live on 3 acres of DIRT!  Let me tell you when we ripped that carpet up, there was literally PILES of dirt!  PILES!!!!!!  Like little mountains.  It was gross.  I will NEVER get carpet again.  NEVER.  with dirt, kids and dogs, carpet just does not work.  I don't care if I have to sweep and mop everyday the rest of my life...  

So, I need to get back to cleaning the layers of dust off everything and getting my construction zone back to home condition, so I can move onto the next project..... :D  Can't wait to share pics of all we've done though!