Mom 2 Mom Consignment Sale in April

Guest blogger, Anna Mae Trievel from Ann Arbor with Kids and Fun with Your Kid, shares her recent post on an upcoming Mom 2 Mom sale. 

The Spring Mom2MomConsignment Sale will be held at Liberty School in Saline on Saturday, April 13, 2013 from 9a-2p. The Mom2Mom Consignment Sale is a department style sale with items divided by type rather than by seller. Clothing will be sorted by size and gender making it easier for the shoppers to find what they are looking for. 

Admission is $1 prior to noon and free after noon. Sellers and volunteers receive admission to a pre-sale the night before. 

As a shopper, I like that Mom2Mom Consignment sale is sorted by department and that they verify the condition of every item. It will be so much easier to just shop from an entire section in my daughter's size than to visit multiple sellers to determine who is selling items in her size, the condition, and prices. Check out some tips for Shoppers at sale.

Recently I was sorting through some of my daughter's old toys with the intent to donate them. However, as I was sorting through them to create an inventory list for tax purposes, I realized that many of them were still in very good condition. I also knew that I have several boxes of my daughter's old clothes to sort through in our upstairs closets. So, I have contacted Mom2Mom Consignment Sale about being a seller. There are only a few sellers slots left, so if you wish to sell, you should contact them soon.

Past Mom2Mom Consignment Sale

As a seller, the Mom2Mom Consignment sale allows you to prepare and drop-off your merchandise and not man a table for the sale. As a seller, I love that I can prepare my items ahead of time and drop them off for the sale without having to sit there for the entire sale to sell my items. While they may have more rules on condition, labeling, and presentation of your items than other sales, the convenience of not being there on the day of the sale is worth it for me.

Anna Mae Trievel writes the blog Ann Arbor with Kids about family events and activities in Ann Arbor, Michigan. She recently launched Fun with Your Kid to provide information about events happening across the country or region, product reviews, travel experiences and more.

Guest Post: Prioritizing You! (Part 2 of 2)

Last week, guest blogger, Anna Mae Trievel from Ann Arbor with Kids and Fun with Your Kid, shared her tips to make sure moms remember to make themselves a priority. Here is part 2 of 2. 

Based on the success of the coffee group mentioned in last week's post, I want to setup a regular event with another group of friends from my daughter’s school. 

I have talked with another mom about twice a month meetings: one week doing coffee and one week doing lunch. So far, we have not organized anything official, but have done coffee a few times, lunch once and a movie once. We also had an after-school outing with the kids.

My husband and I are fortunate to have family in the area who like to watch our daughter (and where she asks to sleep-over) so we are able to have date nights without arranging a babysitter. 

Date nights are also something that can be scheduled to make sure you have your own time. If finances are tight, you can arrange a routine trade-off with a friend so that you each get a date night once a month and once a month you watch the friend’s child(ren). 

Another option is to look for places that have a regular kids' night out event. Plan to take advantage of those when they are offered to have your regular date night. I have seen them offered at gymnastics centers, inflatable bounce places and my daughter’s school.

So when organizing your schedule, don’t forget the importance of scheduling your “me time”, “date night”, or even family game night.

Anna Mae Trievel writes the blog Ann Arbor with Kids about family events and activities in Ann Arbor, Michigan. She recently launched Fun with Your Kid to provide information about events happening across the country or region, product reviews, travel experiences and more.

Zero Waste Lunch

My child's zero waste lunchbox. 

When you are organized you can do so many things that you might not be able to do otherwise. One of the things that being organized allows me to do is pack zero waste lunches for my kids. It is a small thing that makes me happy. 

My main goal for my children's lunches is to have everything together in one package, so that they can focus on eating the (mostly) healthy food that I pack. 

The photo above shows the insulated lunchbox loaded up. The ice pack (on the left) is tucked in the pouch so it can stay put at lunch and not get lost. On the other side my child has a cloth napkin, a Nalgene bottle (BPA free and made in the USA), utensils and a two tiered bento box I found on sale at Old Navy last September (also BPA free).  

Of course, an organizer's kid has to have everything labeled. This is a great example of good, better, best labeling. I used a combination of Sharpie pen, Brother P-touch and Name Bubbles labels. Except for the napkin, everything has a label, even each individual utensil. 

Bento box using silicon cups to separate food.

The second photo is an example of a lunch I packed for my kids this summer. I use silicon cupcake cups to separate the food in the bottom tier of the bento box. The top tier is just thick enough for a sandwich. This lunch contained cucumbers, tomatoes and basil from our vegetable patch. The fresh mozzarella ball is store bought. 

Last week I volunteered at the school during one lunch hour. The parent volunteer's role is to help the young kids open containers, clean up trash, keep things together and on the particular day I volunteered, it seemed that half the class had to use the bathroom during lunch. 

Even if your goal is not a zero waste lunch, make sure your kids can easily open the containers or packages in their lunchboxes. While it may seem easy for us, I opened a lot of cheese stick packages last week. 

Carolyn Anderson-Fermann is a public speaker, organizing expert and founder of Simply Organized Life. Carolyn will be presenting "Easy Organizing for Busy Families" at My Urban Toddler in Saline, Michigan on September 26, 2012 (childcare is available, check with My Urban Toddler for details). Register with My Urban Toddler by Wednesday, September 19, 2012. 

Guest Post: Moving with Kids (Part 1 of 2)

Mommy blogger, Allison Stanton, of Ally's Helpful Hints for Mommies, recently moved with her two preschool aged children in tow. Ally shares her moving experience and organizational tips to make moving with kids easier. 

Thanks to Carolyn for letting me guest post!  She asked me to share some tips with you on moving with small kids. 

We only moved a few miles away but we still packed up everything really well because we had help to do it. 

I started out a couple months before the move date going through as much as I could and getting rid of items we did not need anymore. I gave clothes my youngest did not wear to a friend. Other items we no longer used were given away to friends that wanted them and things that were not usable were dumped.   

I boxed up a bunch of things in the beginning that we did not use everyday to get a head start on packing.  This included decorations, pictures and extra clothes. It was basically anything I knew that we did not need right away. I stacked boxes in corners of our small apartment and had a wall in my boys room that was stacked up to get things out of the way.

As I was packing I made sure to label the boxes to find things easily after moving.  It does pay to mark the boxes on all sides as this helps the guys bringing in boxes know where to put them.

Next week I will share more tips to prepare for moving day. 

Who is Ally? My name is Allison Stanton and I am a stay at home mom of two boys: 5 and 2 years old. We live in Ormond Beach, Florida. I love connecting with other mommies and helping each other out. I pass along hints for mommies and I receive help at the same time.  You can find me at my website at http://www.allyshints.com or on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/allyshelpfulhintsformommies.