The Mom Crowd

Last Friday I shared my grocery shopping philosophy and I wanted to know how you shopped and budgeted for groceries. We had a great discussion in the comments.

Amelia asked if everyone includes household items like cleaning supplies and diapers in your grocery budget.  Most everyone that commented does include all household items in the grocery budget. There was also a discussion on whether or not gas should be included. I like to keep our gas separate, so I can track my spending better.

Heidi asked if anyone had any experience using a Food Saver (a vacuum sealing kit). Trina thinks that as long as you put the effort behind it and remember what you have in the freezer then they really do save you money.

How much should you spend on groceries?

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Now that I am a stay-at-home-mom and I don’t generate a paycheck anymore, I feel like the way I contribute financially to my family is by managing the budget. The biggest budget items that I have control over is our Grocery and Dining spending.

Before I go to the grocery store I create a list, because I will completely forget it all while I am constantly trying to keep my toddler entertained and seated in the cart. To make my grocery list I first check the sale ads online. Then from there I think up 4 to 5 meals based on what is on sale, what we already have on hand, and what we feel like eating. Then I make sure that any ingredients I need are on the list.

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Choosing a name for your baby can be the one of the most fun and hardest tasks when you are expecting.  As little girls we pick out our children’s names after we dream about our wedding.  Even on my honeymoon in Italy I was constantly picking up Italian names and storing them for future use.

Sometimes we even get upset if a friend uses the name that you have dreamt about your whole life. Remember when Charlotte on Sex in the City went to a baby shower and found out that her friend was going to use her unique, made up name, Shayla?

Some families have naming traditions. My husband is a junior and we will never have a “Third” or “III.” My husband and father-in-law’s accounts are constantly getting confused at the library, car insurance company, and our church. Even with nicknames, for our family having a junior is way too complicated.

My second child is due in about 8 weeks! I have checked out almost every baby name book the library has. At night I pour over these books while adding names to my list.

I have some pretty strict criteria for my child’s name:

1. It has to be easily pronounced in English and Spanish, so both sides of the family can say the name. I really liked the name Andres and when I mentioned it to my Anglo-momma she announced that she would just call him Andy. This of course made me strike it off my list immediately, since I didn’t want an Andy. For our Spanish speakers I have to be careful with J names and names with a double L.

2. I want a name that means something nice.  At least not some horrible meaning like “serpent” or “dimwitted.” I actually like the name Soledad for a girl but the meaning of the name is “to be in solitude”, so that name is off the list.

3. I don’t want the name to be too popular in the United States. When I was born the name Amanda was second in popularity, so there was always two or three Amanda’s in my class. In fact, the other Amanda in my class always hated me, because we had the same name. She became the Mandy, while I stayed just Amanda. I am constantly checking the Social Security Baby Names list. My first baby’s name was 236 in popularity when I named her. Now that name has climbed to 206 in popularity.

4. The girl’s name needs to be feminine and the boy’s name masculine. I know gender-neutral names are incredibly popular and some are beautiful. I just don’t prefer them. When I worked in Human Resources I had to input people into the system and I would have to check off the male or female box with only their name to go off of. I always fretted over getting this wrong. I also didn’t like second-guessing if I should address an applicant through email as “Mr.” or “Ms.” For me; it is all about eliminating confusion.

5. We also take into consideration what their nickname would be and if the name can be fun of very easily. I love checking Baby NamesWorld to find out this information, because they survey people who have that name.

For our second little one we currently only have four names on our list: two boy and two girl names. We have to select a boy and girl name since we didn’t find out the gender. I am currently tired of stressing over this and I am happy with those four. We have only let the names we have picked slip to a limited few and the others will have to wait to be surprised!

How about you? Do you have any strict criteria? Do you care about what other people think about your names? Do you tell what name you picked out before the baby is born? Do you get suggestions from other people? Was it an easy process for you?

Pregnancy Lesson #236  – If you are hugely pregnant and you have to pee, don’t hold it. It is physically impossible to hold it, so don’t even try.

You never know when you will be holding your pee, doing just one more thing before the going to the restroom and your husband comes along and makes you laugh. Its starts off innocently with just a drop and you think, “It’s okay, it’s just a drop.” But you are still laughing and it keeps going. Then you are laughing because you are actually peeing and you see your husband realize that you are in fact wetting your pants.

Mortified you just stand there. Luckily you are happy that you are standing on the tile in the kitchen. You look down and realize that your favorite flip-flops are getting wet so you widen your stance a bit so they don’t get even more wet than they already are. You chant to yourself, “Pee is sterile. It can be washed. It can be washed.”

After it is all said and done your husband valiantly cleans the pee in the kitchen and watches the toddler. All while you shower and put your favorite jeans and flip-flops in the washer.

When you get over the shock of what just happened you are just thankful that it didn’t happen outside of your home, that no one else was in the house and it happened on the tile. You vow to never hold your pee again.

Um, yeah, this all happened to me this evening right before dinner! hahaa

I sometimes want to wear a shirt that says, “I am due St. Patrick’s Day, I don’t know the gender, and I feel fine!” I get asked those three questions to those answers all the time. Many people ask me “Do you know what your are having?” In fact we did not find out the gender of our first baby and we have not found out the gender of our second one either. Everyone has their own reasons for revealing the gender in the Ultrasound Room or the Delivery Room. Here are a few reasons why we chose to wait. (I would love to hear your reasons for finding out before the baby comes in comments!)

• A fear that the sonogram results would be wrong. I didn’t want to have to return a bunch of items or paint the nursery the wrong color.  (This can be a real fear, check the Barefoot Foodie’s recent post for proof!)

• For practicality – I like that my nursery and newborn clothes are gender neutral, so I can re-use everything for the second child.  Also, because people didn’t know what we were having we received gift cards and diapers instead of dresses and outfits.

• Labor and delivery was more exciting, because we didn’t know what we were having. It was also more exciting to share the baby news, because they didn’t know either.

• The fear of disappointment if the sonogram was wrong and that it would somehow affect my baby’s spirit. For my first pregnancy I felt like my instincts were telling me that I was having a boy and out came this baby girl. I think my disappointment lasted about 3 seconds and my daughter hasn’t been affected by my preggy thoughts of a boy.

• Part of the fun was making others wait. It tortured my mother. She was constantly telling me “Surely, you can see on the sonogram. The Tech knew.” Others would accuse of us knowing and not telling anyone. My husband and I can’t keep a secret. If we knew, everyone else would definitely know.

Waiting to find out the gender worked out well for us. After my daughter came into the world, the pink and purple just flowed in from family and friends. We were glad we waited and we are super excited to find out if our daughter has a brother or sister in about 9 weeks.

Did you find out the gender of your baby? Did you have any fears that the sonogram would be wrong? Was it your spouse that couldn’t wait to find out?