Jessica Acs. Crazy Happy Chaos

A little bit of everything. Life, animals, family, crafts, recipes.

Archives for 2012

I took a chance….

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…and so so thankful I did.

4 years ago:

I was pretty miserable, even though on the outside I seemed happy. I had basically settled on the fact that I might not ever have kids, never be truly in love, and never have a job/ career that I enjoy. Then one August afternoon I heard about the EATM (Exotic Animal Training and Management) program in California. After spending several hours online googling and reading all the info I could find on the program, a new light shone inside of me and I knew that EATM was where I was supposed to go. I finally had something to look forward to, finally something that I really wanted to work towards. After going back to college to get pre-reqs to even be considered for EATM, then visiting the campus in California, I knew with all my heart that I belonged there. To get into the program would be a dream come true for me.

3 years ago:

I got accepted into the EATM program and I moved far away from my home and my family  – to another country all by myself. (but with my 2 best furry friends, Angus & Zoey of course). Ready to start the most amazing adventure of my life.

1 year ago: (well slightly more than a year ago)

I graduated from EATM, married the man of my dreams (who was in my class at EATM), went on an amazing Disneyworld honeymoon, and then moved across the country from California to Chicago.We started our own business and for 2 animal lovers, it is our ultimate dream business. We get to educate people daily about the wonderful world of animals – and we now have over 50 animals of our own! Everyday is an adventure for us and we get to work together and be with our animals – happiness 🙂

and last month, another dream come true – the biggest dream of all: I became a mother.

We have the most beautiful, perfect little girl and we are so happy. Ava was born on July 18th at 8:22am.

It’s amazing what has happened in the last few years, and none of it would have happened if I hadn’t taken a chance.

 

I know it’s cliche, but I really had no idea how in love I would be with this little baby until I laid eyes on her. I could stare at her for hours and hours, she is just amazing. I fell head over heals in love with her the day she was born and I love her more each day. I didn’t think it was possible but I also fell even more in love with my husband! Just watching how he is with our daughter makes my heart smile. When we were on our way to the hospital the morning she was born, he said to me “I don’t even know how to hold a baby!” and I told him “Don’t worry, you’ll be fine.”

He was more than fine. He is like a natural with her. He was the first person to talk to her and one of the first to hold her (after the Dr who delivered her and the nurse who cleaned her up). In the first 30 minutes of our daughter’s life, I think he took over 300 photos of her. Total proud daddy. I was really sick that entire first day (from the anesthesia) so that day was really a blur for me. Steve was wonderful and looked after our baby that entire day. I don’t think I even changed a diaper until she was 3 days old.

So needless to say things have been busy. Trying to run a business, look after a newborn and all the general care and feeding of over 50 animals that we currently have leaves us very little time for anything else. I do kind of get a little laugh when people say to me “oh you have a newborn – you must be exhausted from lack of sleep!!”. Well actually….I’m getting more sleep now than I did throughout my entire pregnancy. That was one of the worst things for me I found, as I just could not sleep. I had no problem falling asleep but then I was wide awake a couple hours later. I think I’ve watched just about every Lifetime Movie there is – like 3 times each. Now I actually get to sleep for several uninterrupted hours in a row! And there have been several times where Ava has slept for 7 hours straight, a real treat.

I have been terrible at blogging but in all honesty, being on the computer is the last thing I want to do now when I have a spare moment. I’d much rather sit and cuddle my baby or spend time with my husband and our animals. There is always something to do around here, that’s what happens when you live where you work! I’m not complaining though, I love my life and now that our sweet Ava is here, it really is a dream come true for me.

 

A Hard Lesson to Learn…

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But a very valuable one! The last few days around here have been a little crazy. Definitely not how I imagined the last week and a half of my pregnancy would go.

About 4 days ago just when it hit triple digits temperature wise, our air conditioning decided to quit on us. Lovely. Trying to find someone to come fix it has been a huge chore as everyone is so busy and backed up right now. So here we are 4 days later still with no AC. But wait, it gets better. Yesterday morning we woke up to find we had no water in the house. Not a drop would come out of the taps. Not only does that mean no water to drink, or for the animals, but no washing dishes, no laundry, no showers, and no…flushing the toilets. O.M.G.

We had to go buy gallon jugs of water just so we had drinking water for all of us and each time we needed to flush the toilet, it took 3 gallons that we had to pour into the back tank. Insane!! You don’t realize how bad you take stuff for granted until something like this happens. I have a whole new respect for water, and we have been really good about conserving water too. We have a well and I did learn some good tips on living with a well from my parents who also have one. Don’t waste water is a huge thing!!!! We try to recycle water as much as we can right now anyway and we will be doing this even more now because this happened. (we finally got our water back late this afternoon but it was 2 days without which was horrible!). So learn from our situation and try to conserve water as much as possible – you never realize how valuable it is until there is none.

Today the outside temperature did drop into the 80’s. Still quite warm but a lot better than over 100 which is what it has been. It was so hot in the upstairs in our house we couldn’t sleep up there or really spend any time up there at all. We retreated to the basement where we set up an air mattress and our one fan and that’s where we’ve been sleeping. Of course the dogs, the pig and the coati all came down there to camp out with us as well. The other animals are all fine – they have AC out in their room. They are on their own system separate from the house. We did contemplate going out and sleeping amongst them as well, but the basement has been ok. Well yeah just ok. Sleeping on the floor on a thin air mattress is not my idea of a good time, especially being over 9 months pregnant. With having to get up so many times during the night, it’s very difficult. I literally have to roll off the mattress onto my knees on the floor, then pull myself up using the nearby loveseat. It must look pretty hilarious.

So the craziness aside, the good news is that in only 10 days our little Ava will be making her grand entrance!! We are so excited, and I’m also so excited to not be pregnant anymore. It will be great to be able to bend over properly again, and to not have swollen feet. Of course the best thing of all will be seeing our baby and holding her. I can’t wait.

There are still a lot of things on my to-do list for this week, but her nursery is just about completed. I have a few things to do still but here are some pictures of it so far.

Crib, dresser, bookshelf,  tall shelving unit and carpet are all from Ikea. Change table cover, crib sheet and window valences are from Pottery Barn Kids.

I love this cute carpet!

Her nursery is mostly animal themed with a hint of Star Wars 🙂

So many cute little shoes!

Hand made wipes and burp cloths. Yes we are cloth diapering her as well.

I made the mat in this frame using Disney parks maps and one of the napkins we got when we went to Club 33.

This stuffed macaw is something I got when I was 12 years old from Disney World. Funny how it looks like a Military Macaw and I ended up training a real life one while I was at Eatm.

I made these letters using plain paper mache letters from Hobby Lobby. I covered one side with maps from Disney Parks that I kept. The first A is covered with a map from California Adventure Park in Anaheim – where Steve and I had our first date, and then later we celebrated our engagement there and we also went there the day after we got married. The V is covered with a map from Blizzard Beach in Florida, where we went on our honeymoon and that’s where we chose names for our future children, Ava being one of them. The second A is covered with a map from Animal Kingdom, also in Florida and also where we went on our honeymoon.

The reverse side of the letters are covered with map paper. The first A is covered with a map from California. It shows where we went to school (and met) in Moorpark, where we lived, Disneyland, where we got married (Camarillo) and where we got engaged (Woodland Hills). The V is covered with with a map of BC, Canada – where I’m from. It shows Victoria (where I was born and raised), and Vancouver (where I lived before moving to California). The second A is covered with a map of northern Illinois. It shows the city where Steve was born and raised, and also the town where we live now and where Ava will come home to.

I did a tutorial on how I made the letters here: Homeketeers

Time for Cake!

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Angus’ birthday was a couple days ago – he is 9 now!!! I still remember the first time I saw him like it was yesterday and the first time I held him. I was instantly in love with him and knew we’d be best friends. He’s my first baby and he’s been through SO much with me over the years. So many heartaches, so many joys and big changes. He was always there to lick my tears away when I was sad, and to celebrate with me when I was excited about something. Oh Angus, I love you so much buddy.

So in celebration of his birthday (and Zoey’s birthday from last month too!), we ordered a little dog cake from this cute store I came across last month near us: Reese’s Barkery. I love this place! They are a dog bakery plus a small pet store but they don’t sell any animals, just supplies. They also don’t sell crap, they just sell the really good stuff, and the couple who own and run it are locals and they are super nice and knowledgeable. (and apparently their daughter also has a pet pig who lives in the house just like Norman! He’s a lot bigger though, over 100 pounds! yikes! and their pig sleeps on the couch too, haha!). I will gladly shop at this store rather than the big box stores! Support the small businesses for sure. One place we never set foot in is Petland. No way jose. That place is awful and sells puppies. We won’t shop at any place that sells puppies (unless they are adopting out rescues) as it’s obvious they come from puppy mills. Terrible. Can’t believe these places are still in business.

Anyway, we got our little cake for the 3 dogs and Norman to share – it’s a carrot cake. That was an easy decision as all of them love carrots. But of course what’s a party without cake for us too? 🙂 I made our favorite cake: Angel Food with a vanilla cheesecake frosting. YUM! Steve and I don’t need an excuse to have Angel Food Cake, and this is one cake that Steve will never turn down. (he isn’t a big one on sweets.)

The dogs and pig all enjoyed their cake very very much, as we did with ours!

The birthday Boy

The party-goer’s! Don’t they look thrilled? It’s so hard to get a group photo of the 4 of them, especially when there is a cake sitting on the nearby ottoman. I can almost read their minds in this photo: (from left to right)  Zoey “You guys are seriously cramping my laying time on this pillow”, Moose “Why am I wearing this hat….oh!! Is that a toy over there on the floor?”, Angus: “Darn it Norman! You’re stepping on my leg!”, Norman “I smell cake! I see cake!”

Angus has given up at this point.

 

Even baby Twitchy got in on the fun, although he didn’t get to have any cake.

Angel Food, oh yeah!

 

The other animals got a special treat today too! Fresh picked romaine, spinach and kale from our garden!!! I LOVE having a vegetable garden! I walk Norman over to it every morning and we share a few fresh picked strawberries or peas.:)

 

In other news this week: Steve and I actually got away for a couple days. Well ok, a couple nights but really only 1 day. We went up to the Wisconsin Dells for a quick getaway. I guess some people refer to these last getaways before their baby is born a “BabyMoon”. LOL. Yes this makes me laugh cause as if you can escape the reality that this baby is almost here. Sure you can go for a getaway but is there a whole LOT of stuff you can do when you’re 8.5 months pregnant? The Dells has loads of waterparks and amusements parks but guess what? I’m 8.5 MONTHS pregnant!!! I can’t go on any of the fun rides or any waterslides, plus once again, I’m pregnant so do I WANT to be running around a waterpark? Whale in the pool – look out!

What we did do was fun though. We got there after dinner on Monday so we walked around the main strip in town where all the touristy stores are and we were basically just typical tourists. It was fun though and all the stores were open late which worked out nice for us. Then we found this place called Wizard Quest and it was amazing! It’s hard to explain but it was like being in an adventure/real life video game/ scavenger hunt kind of thing. We had a blast!! We went late – at 9:30 and stayed until after they closed at 11pm. We enjoyed it so much that we went back the next night too. There was some physical activity involved as well as mental, but as long as one person on your team can do the physical stuff then you’re good.  Yay for Steve as there was no way I was sliding down huge tube slides and crawling through tunnels and stuff.

The next days we rode the Wisconsin Duck Tours. You know those old army vehicles that can go both on land and in water? Yep those. It was fun and we saw a lot of gorgeous scenery. The seating was really cramped though, hardly any leg room at all, I had to sit sideways cause my legs are too long. Then we went mini golfing at an awesome place called “Pirates Cove”. They had 7 different courses I think. It was huge! We did the 2nd most challenging course and I won! Woo! I haven’t won a game in so long. Maybe I should play more mini golf while I’m pregnant!

Later in the afternoon we went back to our hotel (which had both an outdoor and indoor waterpark) and we spent an hour and a half floating around in a double tube through the lazy river in the indoor waterpark. It was amazing! I was just happy that I was able to get myself into the tube so easily as I imagined it would be a lot harder. Steve did have to sort of dump me out of it when we were ready to leave though, lol.

Anyway, we did actually have a fun time away, and we crammed a lot of stuff into our time there. We missed all the animals like crazy though but we were getting regular text updates from our good friends who were house-sitting for us. 🙂

Inside Wizard Quest, Steve being funny

 

And finally here are a few recent pictures of our little baby coati “Twitch”

Who can resist this cute face?

We have a new baby in the house!

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No, it’s not our daughter Ava – she’s not due for another couple months. But we do have another new baby that we recently added to our family… it’s a little white nosed Coati (AKA Coatimundi). We’ve had him just about a week now and he’s almost 3 weeks old. I really am in love all over again. We named him “Twitch” because he twitches a lot in his sleep. We’ve actually been on a waiting list for this little guy since January and we were just informed by this small zoo near us that he was available for us last week. Because he is being bottle fed every 2-3 hours, he goes everywhere with us right now. It’s a good thing we can take him to work with us 🙂  We have already turned into paranoid new parents! Not wanting to leave him, making anyone who touches him wash their hands first, waking up the first few nights every hour just to check on him; oh yes, I’m sure we’ll be even worse when Ava gets here.

Last night was the first time we left him for a couple hours. We went over to our local movie theater (which is exactly a 4 minute drive from our house) to see the movie “What to Expect When You’re Expecting”.  We fed him before we left and made sure he was asleep then we rushed home after the movie and he was still asleep! Whew! haha

 

Someone asked me a couple days ago what the typical day is like for us. There really are several “typical” days, depending on if we have shows to do, how many shows, and if we have a day off from shows. We are very thankful to be so busy right now with work, and right now we really only have 1 full day off a week. Not really a day off though, as there are always a ton of things to do around here.

So here is our typical day with shows:

Depending on the time of our first show and how long it will take us to get there, we get up at least 2-3 hours before we have to leave. Sometimes that means a very early start to the day, and takes us back to our days in the EATM program when we used to get up before the sun did.

Steve and I divide up the morning duties and we get to work. The dogs and Norman (the pig) go outside first then get their breakfasts. Now that baby Coati is with us, he also usually eats around this time too, depending on the time. He wakes up once during the night for a bottle, then sleeps until about 6:30 when he cries again for another. He’ll be up again between 8:30-9:30 for another feeding and a little bit of playtime.

Next is feeding for all the other animals: all 50 of them. They all get fed, waters filled, cleaning as needed, handling if we don’t have to rush to a show, and some get to go outside if the weather is nice. (Rabbits can run in the backyard, tortoise has an outdoor enclosure on the lawn, etc).

This continues until it’s time to get ready to leave for shows. Depending on which animals are coming with us, we get them into their carriers, makes sure we have water bottles and snacks for both us and all the animals, then we start loading them into the vehicle.

Throughout the day between shows, the animals with us are offered water, snacks and for Norman, walks. The funniest thing is when we are downtown Chicago (which is very often) and we need to walk Norman. Many times the only places we can stop to let him out is at some inner city park or even a grassy boulevard. He gets so much attention from people – who are just amazed that we are following a pig around with a poop bag!

Once we get back home, we put all the animals away, feed those again who need it, make sure waters are all full, then feed the nocturnal animals. Depending on what time it is, we cover the parrots cages as they like to go to bed between 6-7pm each night. Then as we’re finishing checking on everyone else, the 3 parrots do their nightly routine of chanting “Night Night!” really loud for about 10 minutes, followed by one of them laughing (kinda a creepy laugh too!).

Time for the dogs and Norman to go out for another walk, then get their dinner. Baby Twitch gets another bottle (and he gets bottles throughout the day while we’re on the road too). One of our bearded dragons is on 2 different antibiotics for an infection in her foot. Poor thing, we have to give her both an injection and oral meds every day! It’s been a month so far but our vet was here the other day and he wants to keep her on it for 2 more months! We hate having to give her a needle each day but she is so good and she knows now that she gets her favorite super worms after as a treat.

Next is getting all the paperwork done from the day and getting more paperwork done for the shows for the next day. After everything is done, we basically fall into bed and are asleep within 30 minutes. Twitch gets another bottle and he loves to snuggle with us so we let him while we watch something on tv, then its time to sleep for us all.

If we don’t have any shows our day starts and ends the same but we run errands during the day or we do extensive cleaning and lots of animal handling. Steve is also building bigger enclosures for some of our lizards that are getting larger.

One thing is for sure, there is never a dull moment around our house! Whether we are tripping over a dog, scrambling after a ferret who is running for the bedroom, or chasing Norman through the house because he grabbed a box out of the recycling bin and has it in his mouth ready to tear apart, there is always something!

Speaking of Norman, he is almost 10 months old now and weighs 23 pounds! He is slightly bigger than Zoey (the largest of the 3 dogs) but all the dogs still rule over the pig. Norman is getting so much better about not getting into stuff around the house now, but we are also better at not leaving stuff out for him – we’ve finally piggy-proofed the house! His latest favorite place to be is on the couch. I was looking for him the other evening and found him sound asleep on the couch. He had even covered himself with the throw blanket and just his hooves were sticking out. Quite hilarious.

So that’s a little glimpse into our life. We’re usually exhausted, but we love what we do and we’re happy.

Norman buried himself under this blanket.

Bottles now line out countertops. His favorite is the Dr. Brown’s bottle.

Yay! Our backyard is all fenced in now!

Moose giving Twitch a kiss

Can’t Get Enough…

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of popsicles. I know, random right? It’s something I constantly crave and have been for weeks. Months even maybe, I don’t know, I really don’t remember how long. Our freezer is overflowing with boxes of various flavors of popsicles though. Today is for sure a day when they are greatly appreciated. It reached about 80 degrees here and inside our house it’s been real toasty.

What else have I been craving….root beer floats lately! I’ve only given in a couple times to those so far though. And water, lots and lots of ice cold water.

So I am 28 weeks today. Wow. I remember reaching 8 weeks and being so excited for making it that long. It’s funny though cause I’ll wake up in the morning and find myself lying on my back as usual, and I’ll feel completely normal and for a few seconds a wave of panic overcomes me as I reach down and feel my tummy. Whew! Ok the bump is still there, yes I am still pregnant! haha. Odd how I can so quickly forget the 4 or 5 times I was up during the night to pee. Oh pregnancy joys.

Speaking of pregnancy joys, I get a whole slew of weekly emails from various sites that update me on how my pregnancy is or should be progressing. Today I was informed my baby is the size of a rutabega. Really? A rutabega? Could they not use something else that might be more common to visualize the size of?

Last week I opened an email that said “Welcome to this next week of your pregnancy! There are exciting things to come for you and your baby!” Then the next line said:

“In this issue:

– Heartburn

– Bleeding Gums

– Leg Cramps”

Oh EXCITING!!!! Woo! Thanks for the heads up! ….blah

And none of those were news to me since I’ve had all of them for the last month already. Loads of fun.

Otherwise though I have nothing to complain about. Starting to feel more tired again like I did in the first trimester but that could also be because I’m getting up real early again.

I am loving my big recliner that’s in the nursery so much. I try to sit in it whenever I can but then all 3 dogs want to sit with me too. Zoey often beats me to the chair every time so I have to scoot her over. A couple nights ago Norman the pig was in here with us and he eventually got bored wandering around the room and jumped right into the chair – with me and the 3 dogs!! I had to get up fast since his little hooves are quite sharp and he was basically sitting in my lap.

so then Moose gets down and Norman realizes he has room to lie down.

 

So much for getting to sit in my big chair. *sigh*

Today they all tried again to sit with me, so I then tossed my Boppy pillow and my preggle pillow into the crib (which is right beside the chair) and I plunked them all into the crib. Turns out they just wanted to be in the room with me as they were perfectly happy lounging on the pillows in the crib. Too funny.

As funny and cute as this is, this will not be a regular occurrence. I need to get them all used to sleeping on the floor of the nursery or in one of their own beds or we are going to have real problems once little Ava gets here!

 

Sliding on into 3rd….

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Trimester that is!!! 3rd trimester already, O.M.G.

So I truly suck at blogging. My first excuse was going to be that I’ve been busy, but come on, the baby isn’t even here yet! If I’m busy now, then what’s it going to be like once she’s born?
Honestly though, yes things have been busy. I was sick with an ongoing cold of some sort for almost 2 months. Nasty. But I’m now feeling a lot better, just super tired as I don’t sleep well anymore. I wake up at all hours in the night and either just lie there or turn the tv on and watch re-runs of Big Bang Theory that we have on the DVR. Fun times. Then when it’s time to get up in the morning, I end up dozing off and begging for just another few minutes to sleep. *sigh*

Baby world news: still feeling pretty good pregnancy wise. The sleep issue aside, other things are going well. No weird cravings, no nausea. Still sleeping on my back some of the time and my stomach at other times, so I guess my tummy isn’t that enormous yet! haha. I feel her moving all around in there all the time now, it’s so amazing. She weighs about 2 pounds now and is over 14 inches long. CRAZY to think there is something that big moving all around inside me, cause her movements so far are still pretty slight. We are excited though, and we are pretty much ready. We have the nursery almost done (just have to get some pictures on the wall), and all the baby gear is here. Her clothes are all put in the dresser and hung in the closet, books in the bookshelf, etc. Now we just need the baby 🙂

I’ll get some proper photos of her nursery up as soon as it’s totally complete but for now here are a few little peeks.

I think she officially has more shoes than I do already! And this is just part of her shoe collection for the 0-3 month age! I have a whole drawer full for following months!

Angus asleep on the carpet. The dogs all love the baby’s room!

My favorite spot in the whole house. We have this huge rocker/recliner in the corner of her room and already I spend most of my free time sitting/ reclining in it. It’s one of the only places I can sit that doesn’t hurt my back right now. However, it seems not only to be my favorite spot but the dogs spot of choice as well. I rarely get to have the whole chair to myself, it only takes the dogs a few minutes to find me and then all 3 of them are sitting in it with me.

Animal news: We have some new members of our family including a pair of ducklings!

This is Bruce (dark duck) and Sami (blonde). They came from the same farm that we got Norman (pig) from.

We have 56 animals now so just their everyday care takes a lot of time. This is another reason we are so busy all the time. Animal shows are going well and also keeping us very busy. Animal Quest

 

Some of our crew:

Trixie, one of our Flemish Giant Rabbits, she weighs about 22 pounds.

Norman playing with Angus

Moosie

Zoey checking out Howard the tortoise

Angus watching Howard take off across the yard

On a hot day, Trixie preferred to be in the house where she could lie on the cold kitchen floor.

Kiwi enjoying some sun

Nugget the Gold Tegu

Fred the Bearded Dragon

Buffy the ferret

Jabba the Cane Toad

Shelldon the Sulcatta Tortoise

Our largest snake: Jig the Albino Burmese Python

Trixie with the other 2 bunnies: Munroe (the white & gray), a baby Flemish giant, and Hank (brown): a full grown Rex

Mikka the ferret

 

Here is a sad story from a couple weeks ago:

This is our newest little Hairless Dumbo Rat, Remi. We just got him back in February and he was the sweetest little guy with the best personality. All of a sudden he went from fine one day to having severe breathing problems the next. I found him almost heaving his breathing was so hard and I knew right away it was pneumonia and I could hear it in his lungs. I had a guinea pig die like this several years ago and it hits these little guys fast and hard. We have a great exotic vet who looks after our whole menagerie and I called him and left him a message and by the time he called me back not even 45 minutes later, Remi had already died 🙁  I knew he was dying though so I just held him and he seemed to just want to be with me and snuggled into me, minutes later he died in my hand. R.I.P Remi, we miss you.

 

Other news:

My parents came to visit a couple weeks ago! This was their first time seeing our house. My Dad and Steve assembled all the baby furniture and set it up in the nursery, then my mum and I went in and rearranged it all. Lol.

We had a great time with them, and the next time we’ll see them, Ava will be here!

the guys setting the crib up.

With Sami the duckling 🙂

Oh and these will probably be the only 2 photos I will post of myself pregnant! haha

 

Norman is getting so big!! He’s close to 25 pounds now.

A funny pic of Norman when he just woke up. He buries himself in numerous blankets in his crate at night.

 

Crafts:

Be sure to check out Homeketeers on a regular basis for their fabulous contests, giveaways, articles and tutorials on everything from crafts, scrapbooking, home decor, baking and family!

I just did a tutorial today on how to make cloth baby wipes. We’ll be cloth diapering little Ava and I really wanted to make some cloth wipes to use along side the diapers. It was so easy and I love how they turned out!

Check out the tutorial here

 

Well that’s all my news for now. Hope everyone is having a wonderful Spring so far! 🙂