I just found something that is going to save me time and money on a regular basis!  It’s a lot of fun too:)!  Check out Alice.  It’s a service to help you buy all of the kitchen, bathroom, household, baby, kid and lots of other STUFF that we all have to get regularly but have to go find first, put it in the cart, purchase and then lug it home.  We are now happily ‘lug-free’!  Heck, let UPS do it, right?!?! Oh, it’s ALWAYS FREE SHIPPING at Alice too!  Even for tiny orders:)!!!  Definitley, let UPS do it since it’s easyyyy and only takes 2-3 days!

Saves me MONEY:  The best part (other than saving a ton of time on a regular basis, which I know I mentioned) is the AUTOMATIC COUPONS!!!  Yes, that’s right!  All of those manufacturer’s coupons are automatically found and applied to your order!  Yesterday I placed my first order and bought a pack of Huggies Supreme diapers that retails for $10.99 and usually costs $9.69 from Alice… for only $3.50 after coupons!  Take a peek and notice how MANY of the things I bought had coupons!!

All in all, I bought over $80 worth of things I buy ANYWAY, I got it delivered for free, and AFTER COUPONS I ONLY SPENT $56.76!!!!!!!!(…)!!!

Saves me TIME: Now instead of tromping though the store and forgetting a few things along the way… and buying some more that I don’t really need… I get to pull up my “Shelf” to see what I always buy!

You can even get automatic reminders if you want.  Alice’s organizational features are truly fantastic and I am really looking forward to never running out of anything ever again, and the cumulative savings of both time and money thanks to Alice.

Also, Alice makes shopping Green and Organic very easy!  They carry lots of great brands like Earth’s Best, Gerber Organic, Tom’s, Kashi, Seventh Generation and MORE!

Want to try Alice and save $10 off of your first order?  CLICK HERE, sign up to shop and never run out of anything again!  It’s SO simple and trust us it’s going to be one of your Favorite Things just like it is ours:).

I’ll see ya there!  Look for me online at Alice as Bellaziza in the “Neighborhood” and we can chat or tell me what you think in the comments of this post:)!  For now, back to shopping….

Crista

Doing our best… It’s something that we all believe is enough in theory, but in practice we still many times go through a range of emotions.  As parents it’s inevitable, right?  We do our best for our kids, teaching them in the process that their best is good enough… or not.  It’s a theme that’s been coming up again and again in my life and something that I thought that you, our lovely readers could relate to, so I just wanted to take some time to share what’s been going on here.

We’ve been going through some great transitions here as a family at Chez Bellaziza… most notably a change of well, chez! We made our big move from Texas back to New York and just 3 weeks ago moved into the house of my dreams.  She’s 100 years old, but the girl’s got good bones!  Sounds like a nice thing to say about a beautiful old Victorian, right?  Hehe!  Just before the move I read that death, divorce and moving are the three hardest things to go through… and I didn’t believe it before… but I do now!  Thank God things are just starting to settle down:).

I had been posting my “Crista Goes Cloth” segments a while back and know there are definitely some of you wondering if cloth stuck.  Well, it did… kind of.  I did my best.  Through moving?  No.  When we go out?  No.  But at home, where we are most of the time, absolutely!  Unless for some reason I don’t…. but I usually do.  I love the three-day-wash of the ones we’re using too.  Let’s just say it makes it doable:).  I feel a little greener with each disposable that I don’t need.  Go green!  Just me doing my best here.

Doing my best, often translates in my mind into giving my family the best.  That’s much of the premise of this blog.  I have always been a huge supporter and believer in breastfeeding being the only best way to go… but sometimes your best just isn’t enough.  That’s been my experience recently anyway.  It’s been so emotional too!  I found myself in the formula aisle looking absolutely lost the other day when I realized that it was just something that I was going to have to do.  Was breastfeeding Camilla about her or about me afterall?  Breast is best, but when your girls aren’t cooperating and baby’s hungry and increasingly irritable, something’s got to change.  It was quite literally the first time I had ever even thought about formula.  Naturally, I looked to which one was the most expensive, thinking it probably sucked the least,  and bought it.  It did the trick until I found the wonderful formula that we’re happily using now.

Later that night I looked online and researched formula… a lot.  DHA?  ARA?  Cow’s milk?  Soy?  Lactose free?  Powder?  Liquid concentrate?  Plastic bottle?  One of these is supposed to make my kid smarter??  Arghhhhh!!!!  TOO MUCH!  It took a long time, but I finally found what I have come up with as the absolute best option for moms and babies who just aren’t able to breastfeed… or who need to supplement with formula (*raises hand*) and breastfeed as much as you can.  It’s called Baby’s Only Organic and it’s made by an organic pediatric medical food company called Nature’s One.  If you’re asking what’s the difference between their organic formula (being an organic pediatric medical food company) and the other mass marketed brands, I’ll be sharing more about that a little later.  There is a huge difference though and one that makes all of the difference in the world to a mom who can’t supply what’s best.  It’s been a little emotional here:).

I just wanted to let everyone know what’s been going on though with our big move, why things have been a little slower than normal here on BFT (but no less fabulous!!  Is it the Summer of Strollers here or WHAT?!?!) and also the info on our choice for Camilla’s formula.  With all of my recent research on formula, I felt I needed to get the info up fast so that if any of you were going through the same thing, that you would have our findings to benefit from too.

Doing our best and giving our kids the best is something we all strive for, but in the end, I really feel at peace with just what is MY best.  My girls will grow up seeing me make mistakes, solve problems, be resourceful, maybe not quite measure up, succeed gloriously and everything else in between.  In the end they’ll love me the same too I think:).  That’s mommyhood.  It’s not always what we think it will be, but we do our best in spite of circumstance, and both learn and teach from the experience.

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I just read this article on The Giggle Guide, one of my favorite kids industry sites.  It talks about cloth diapering and the come-back that it is making.

Did you know that it takes 2.5 times more water to manufacture disposable diapers than it takes to wash reusable diapers?  Well I was surprised too.

I’m well into the swing of things here and it’s going pretty well.  I’ve taken a few breaks here and there, but the sense of accomplishment when I take a clean load of diapers out of the wash is something pretty unique.  Maybe someday my girls will thank me for it.  In the mean time, my bank account and my dear husband are:).

Other great cloth diapering resources that I found in the article are www.Diaperjungle.com, www.clothdiapers.com, and www.realdiaperassociation.org.  These are all wonderful sites that not only answer questions, but really get you feeling good about making the commitment to going cloth.  Bravo!!!

Okay, we’re all moved and I’m ready to do this!  We recently relocated from Dallas back home to New York and I knew I needed to wait until after the big move to make my switch from disposable diapers to my brand spankin’ new Bambino Mio Cloth Nappy System! UPS delivered everything on Friday and I watched the DVD, and read the instructions thoroughly, being the cloth virgin that I am. I washed my ‘nappies’ in hot water as instructed and I was ready to go. Oh my gosh they are so soft and cushy after washing!  I’m in love!  I’ve never been intimidated by a product, so this is a new experience on top of a new experience for me.

It all seems pretty easy though, I must say! We did 4 cloth nappies total yesterday on Mother’s Day, so YAYEE!  Four less diapers in our local landfill – GO ME!!! I was a little scared to leave the house in them, so we did disposable for our little jaunt out for lunch and to visit family.  I also kept our little sweetie in disposables for bedtime. What can I say?  Getting completely comfortable will be a little bit of a process it seems. She is taking her morning nap in the cloth nappy right now though, so it’s getting better already:). I really like it so far and I feel like it’s my little contribution to our Mother Earth this Mother’s Day.

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Also be sure to check out Bellaziza Favorite, The Plain Mary Kensington Play Mat!

Okay, so this is something I never thought I’d see myself doing, but (drum roll please) we are going to attempt to quit disposable diapers!  (OMG, I know!)  Do I not have enough on my plate between this lovely blog that you all come back to read so faithfully, our two sweet babies, my dear husband and oh yes, we have a product line too!  So why bother?

I do care, however I’m just not one of those ultra eco types.  Convenience is my dear friend.  My laundry gets laundered no prob… but is sometimes, ahem, not promptly folded (visualize: the mountain on the guest room bed, a.k.a. The Situation Room, thanks to my dh.).  I can’t shake the thought of our landfills though and all of the diapers and everything else that our family contributes that’s going to affect the planet our girls inherit.  I won’t go over to the brown-paper diapers either since I’m all about the premium super duper comfy deepees for our little girls.  What is more premium than cloth though?  Being that I am a high thread count type of gal, I think that’s what got me interested.

BambinoMio’s system is what finally got me to give cloth diapering nappying a shot (”nappy” because it’s a British company… hey, is ‘nappyING’ even a word?).  It’s supposed to be convenient and even affordable!  I was sold there since easy is just that, EASY… and who wants to go out and invest $500 or so to get started in cloth diapers when you’re not 100% sure you can realistically commit?  Bambino Mio kits are about $100 per size which is totally do-able even if you go back to disposables.  There is also some sort of special bucket / storage / laundering system that makes it all very easy …and a DVD.  Dumb it down for me, sil vous plait:)!

So I’m excited!  If I can do it with how crazy things get here, I know others of you who have been toying with the idea of cloth can too.  I’ll keep you posted:).

Crista

PS – In the mean time, there’s a great Celebrity Baby Blog poll that you should check out on cloth diapering and the trend of going back to it that’s started over the past few years.