Five Parenting Confessions

| One | My son makes my coffee (caaa-keee) everyday. When he wakes up I go in we say good morning, hugs and kisses, change his diaper and he walks to the kitchen pointing at the coffee maker to turn it on. It all started one day when he was extra fussy and I let him press the button now he feels it's his duty. Who am I to crush his dreams to be my Barsita?

| Two | Sleep is a BIG deal to me. Naps are so important and I make it a point to be home for them unless we are too far away. From early on M wasn't a great sleeper took him 7 months to get the hang of it. He rarely stays up past his bedtime, he slowly spirals out of control and bath times are like torture when he is over tired. I got a lot of flack for leaving places early to get him home in time to sleep, people would tell me he'll adjust but hey he sleeps through the night and we have time for just the two of us every night.

| Three | There are times I am left playing with his toys and he has moved on. When we play with blocks I have to finish what I'm building, it just feels wrong to move on mid structure. Then M realizes I'm still playing and will knock it down which usually makes me a little sad inside and I may or may not say nooooooooo and he laughs and laughs. I think secretly in his mind he may think he is King Kong.

| Four | When M is napping or sleeping I tidy up his toys really fast fully knowing that when he wakes up it will be undone in 2.3 seconds. This is an improvement from me cleaning up the toys as he moved on. We are working on him cleaning up after himself.

| Five | Sometimes on crazy days we take a special trip to Target where I get a coffee and we just browse the aisles. I know I've said it before but it's so true, Target is magical! Can anyone relate?

Linking up with Karli and Amy for Oh Hey Friday!
Have a wonderful weekend.

Do you have any parenting confessions?

DIY Cardboard Box Play Kitchen

This weekend we bought M a set of pots/pans and kitchen utensils from Ikea. He loves pretending to cook when I'm in the kitchen, it's pretty adorable. He has me pretend to taste everything and patiently waits for me to say "mmmmmm thats good" and he repeats it and goes back to cooking more. I started looking at DIY kitchens. Sidenote: Have you see how people have repurposed nigh stands into the cutest kitchens?? Well in that search I came across kitchens made from cardboard boxes. I had some boxes ready to be taken out to the recycling can and I knew he had to have a cardboard kitchen since we are lagging on buying or attempting to make one.

I had 2 boxes to work with, one being diaper boxes and one was from a new toy he got over the weekend. I gathered miscellaneous things from around the house to complete the details. The sink is a food storage container I lost the lid to and the faucet is a soap pump. I used card stock for the burner and oven. 

The first thing I had to do was make the boxes the same size, one was a little longer. I cut the hole for the sink and wrapped the boxes in brown paper wrapping paper. Once wrapped I found the sink hole and carefully cut in out securing any loose wrapping paper on the inside. Joining the two boxes was easier in my mind. I thought hot glue would work, it didn't so I used patterned duct tape. 

Making the backspalash was really easy. I cut card stock in chunky strips and placed it to resemble our kitchen backspalsh. To seal it and make it shiny I used modge podge. To finish up I hot glued the burner and oven on the boxes. 

When M got up from his nap the kitchen was ready for him to use. Once I showed him what it was he said ki-ken (which sounds like chicken when he says it) and started making cookies. 

This took me a couple of hours, it was completely free and I had a lot of fun making it!

Have you ever made a cardboard kitchen? If have or decide to make one let me know, I'd love to see your design!