just this minute

just this minute Otto is sleeping in a pile of books in his bed (he doesn't join us in the "family bed" til around 1am most nights) with visions of Ralph S. Mouse riding a motorcycle probably dancing in his head. at bedtime tonight i told him that my favorite part of the day was when i was laying on the floor nursing Loretta while he was doing flashcards with Daddy on the couch next to us. he said, "i don't have to tell you my favorite part because it's the same thing." well he was probably just lying to be lazy since he did go on a field trip to the nature museum today but i don't care, that bedtime declaration freaking made my day.

just this minute Loretta is sleeping in her bassinet about four feet away from me. i'm drinking night coffee, eating some oatmeal banana bread (i wasn't kidding when i said we've been making it nonstop. never stopping!), and just feeling kind of mellow and peaceful. i wanted to share a few things that are making me smile tonight...

i won an instagram giveaway from bebehblog <-- ♥ --> a little "i heart gingers" pin came in the mail today and totally undid a frown i was making because i hit a parked truck in a parking lot on the way home from work this afternoon. i don't usually drive home through parking lots but a really neat sofa caught my eye in front of the St. Vinnie's and i pulled in to check it out. up close i realized it was a tiny loveseat and we are in the market for a full sized couch so i decided against and was zipping out of there to get to the babysitter's on time and so the fastest way to leave a parking lot is obviously to smash through all the other cars and then stick around passing your insurance information around. obviously.

funnily enough i'm not even obsessing over the damage to my bumper, how stupid it was of me to hit a parked truck (no should drive van into truck duh), or the cost of fixing my van (his truck was unscathed luckily!)... i'm just kind of whatever about the whole thing.

but i WAS frowning and then i got my little pin and it just kind of turned my afternoon around. thanks Suzanne! i hope Loretta turns out to be a ginger! what little hair she has sure is looking strawberry blondish ♥

then, with my frown turned upside down, we had a really great evening. bedtime was by the book. once Otto was asleep i cut myself a little piece of banana bread and put it on this nice plate i thrifted ($0.49) last weekend. brewed a little coffee. and now i'm about to snuggle up under this so-great-rainbow afghan that i also thrifted last weekend ($4.00) and delve into book three of the Fifty Shades series.

kind of a great evening. now to not vomit every time Ms. Steele talks about her inner goddess :) xo

we love chapter books and some other thrifting

side note, as Ot gets bigger and bigger i am having a harder and harder time thrifting clothes for him. i just wanted to proclaim this and then make a downer face at this fact. i suppose boys are just too rough on their everythings... anyways, it's not that i only buy clothes for the little miss but that's what ended up happening on our latest, greatest thrift trip...

direct your eyes to the right in that picture. something really super freaking awesome and amazing has been going down at Casa Muth lately and that is the nightly reading of chapter books! this is something i have been looking forward to since, who knows, like wayyyy wayyyy before we ever even started trying to have kids. reading is one of my all time favorite pastimes. spending hours and hours with my nose in a book, curled up on the sofa, being glum, totally got me through some super emo adolescent and teenage years and helped me learn how to be a good person and that i wasn't the only one who felt awkward and lame and odd and hated myself and just. wanted. to. be. liked. books expanded my vocabulary and my life horizons.

i really believe that the books i read back then gave me the courage to become "myself" even if that meant being different from the crowd. so anyways, i am clearly pro books and have been collecting kids' books for the future generations in the house since i was 19 (married yes, but it wasn't til i was 30 that Ot was born and now he's 3 1/2) so ya see? ya see! i am old AND pro books.

some of my favorites from those awkward emo years were Anne of Green Gables, Are You There God, It's Me Margaret, Babysitters' Club (yo, Claudia, i love you, yo), Bunnicula, Harriet the Spy, Little Women, Matilda, Nancy Drew, Nothing's Fair in Fifth Grade, Pippi Longstocking, The Phantom Tollbooth, Wizard of Oz...

books books books books books books books! so how jiggy with it was i when Ot suddenly was all interested in some of the chapter books on his bookshelf? we started with The BFG and i realized pretty quickly it was a little too "rough" so we had to kind of edit-as-we-read but Otto just loved the word play. he collapsed laughing when BFG said "crocodilly". like cackling, face plant on the bed, body heaves of laughter. me = floating to the ceiling and grinning like a goon to see that! so while we were reading BFG a chapter a night, we went thrifting and hit the chapter book motherload. the following pictures are like porn for my book-lovin eyes...

a chapter a night is now a concrete part of our bedtime routine and my heart sings, "laaaaaaaa!".

i'm linking this post up to Mandy at The Haps for her High on Thrifting Thursday. me so high! so high!

so i would really love to hear some of your favorite chapter books so i can be on the lookout. i've heard great things about Gruffalo. what others do you and your kids love or do you remember loving? aren't books the best?! <-- not a real question because they just are.

high on consignment shopping with a groupon thursday

i'm also high on coke zero and power yoga and mockingjay right now (it's been a good night) but we're here to talk about thrifting, ahem, and for the first time in FOREVER i actually went shopping somewhere other than CostCo or Target! as of lately that is major cause for an exclamation point. so anyways... last weekend, before we went shopping at CostCo, i gathered up my childrens and printed off a groupon i bought months ago for this little Eugene kids consignment store called my little children and i... went... shopping! it was awesome.

for a total out-of-pocket cost of $47 (including a $30 gc i paid $15 for - whoot to the groupon!) i got sunhats for both kiddos, a new sling wrap (red with white flowers), brand new freaking cute hanna andersson tights, socks, a kimono, onesie, leggings, dresses...

... "character" pajamas for the Ottobot (which is a whole side story, or interior drama or something that i just want to mention because Ot is obsessed with character clothing and i, for the most part, can't stand character clothing and it's this bad scene. i would never stop him from wearing what he wants but can i just say, "ugggggh! and then throw up a little by your feet.) and a pair of like really cute, linen-blend gap khakis that hopefully will fit Ot by the fall. not pictured: we also picked up a Blue's Clues storybook. that's a lot of adorable loot for roughly $4/item! i'm feeling pretty jazzy about the whole thing.

it is funny, though, getting out and about with two kids. on the weekends we usually have a solid day or so where it's just me and Ot and Et and we almost always have an errand to run, like CostCo or Target or on a really thrilling day Trader Joe's. at first i was really intimidated to take them out, just overwhelmed by the idea of coordinating car seats, wearing Loretta, hoisting Otto into shopping carts while wearing Loretta, what if Ot needed to go potty? what if Et had a blowout? or needed to nurse? the mind reels. i was sweating it big time. but life demanded that i get over it - just go for it - and you know what? so far it's been totally manageable to take these two out on our weekend errands. i was really proud of us for braving the consignment shop and what a toe-tapping success it was!

so i'm linking up with Mandy this week over at The Haps -->

i'm not positive this counts as pure blooded thrifting but it's tangential thrifting at least, right? (ps. i don't know if i used that word right, haha!). maybe sometime soon i'll brave a real thrift store with these two? eek. maybe.

❤ thrifting thursday ❤

applique dress/top for baby: ninety cents

so we were pretty sure tuesday night that baby Loretta was on her way! huge false alarm. mehhhhh.

i did have an appointment with the birth center/midwife today and i'm 3-4 cm dilated and 60% effaced so that's heartening, but doesn't really mean anything or put a timeline on this. could be tonight, could be next week. gah! i'm so impatient! i just want this baby already. me = OVER being pregnant. being pregnant is sooo last week.

soooo... to take my mind off pregnancy limbo, i got myself out of the house today and participated in Mandy of The Haps' thrifting thursday.

i had two hours all to myself and was fueled by a half-shamrock, half-strawberry McShake (i am a genius! amazing milkshake concoction! delish!). that shake must've had a little magic in it because for $12.50 i found six things for little Etta, vintage shoes for Otto that fit him perfectly, a children's book that is near to my heart, and even a dress for mama (not for today, but maybe for a couple months from now, spanx-allowing).

flashback: 1982

reading the Monster at the end of this Book to Otto five times this afternoon while he kicked his chubs legs over the edge of the bed, sporting his GASS shoes, was such a flashback to my childhood. that book is the funniest thing. with each page i would look at Ot like, "what should we do?" and he would laugh and say, "turn the page!" so silly. so fun!

vintage or otherwise frilly items for baby Etta including hand-made baby bell-bottoms 

i even found a little something for me. it was actually $5, the most expensive thing, and i hesitated like crazy because i couldn't try it on and even though i really (like really really) love it and it says it's a size 10... i think in the late 60s/early 70s when it was made a size 10 was more like a size 6 today. anyways, i'm pregnant, who knows what my body's gonna be up to in a few months. i'm hoping! hope hope hoping! that this will fit. don't you think it'd be so great for work with a cardi or jacket and some tall brown boots.

$12.50 for everything feels like the score of the century! even if the dress ends up not fitting (but i really hope it does fit). and it got me out of the house today and my mind off this whole why-baby-stay-inside-me-want-baby-outside-::grunt:: business. at least for a couple of milkshake fueled hours.

ok, so harness your psychic powers and please zap me with labor vibes!

xo,
lindsey