This post has been due since Lexi started walking 5 months ago.

SHOES!

Such an important part of a baby’s wardrobe.

Making sure what they are wearing is comfortable, doesn’t rub, lasts through their roughplaying, looks great and is versatile (because at $30-50 per quality pair of shoe, they better last long and look great).

Proper footwear is surprisingly important for your baby’s foot health, their developing walking skills and their comfort.

Here are our favorite shoes and brands:

A year after having a baby and I think I am finally in a good place when it comes to my personal care routine. {I am always searching for better products, though, so I will keep updating you if I find something superior}

I still don’t have time to do certain things regularly, especially now with my new website, Daily Mom.

I don’t get to shave legs unless I am going out somewhere semi-important.

I forget to moisturize my body more often than I care to admit, and that is one of the biggest things I need to work on.

I wash my hair only if I know that I will be leaving the house. Or when it’s really dirty.

I put my make up on at the same time or when I want to look more put together at home.

I like to prioritize and personal care falls somewhere in the middle on the priorities list. However, one thing I have done over the last year is assemble a good “team” of personal products that I use, love and swear by. They help me be a little bit more of a woman that I want to be without having to put too much effort into it. I’ve been mentally writing this post for 6 months and each month I would add something else to it.

In fact, in the last week, I’ve had a chance to try out some organic and natural hair products that I am quite impressed with that you can read about on Daily Mom in the coming months. I am thinking about going on a mission of finding more obscure products and brands you don’t see in retail stores and trying them out. If only I could find time…

In the meantime,

This is probably the most requested review of all times. And for a good reason.

Clek’s Foonf has been the most hyped and anticipated release of a juvenile product in 2012 and 2013.

I cannot tell you how excited and honored I am to be one of the bloggers to be able to try it out and give you guys my opinion.

As my long time readers already know, our car seat experience has been “interesting”, to say the least. If you’re interested in reading our story of the first few months of constant car screams and our solution, read this post.

To be completely honest, while I was absolutely psyched about trying out Clek’s Foonf, I just couldn’t see how there could be a car seat that would be significant better than our trusty Maxi Cosi.

And it took me a good few months to truly appreciate what sets Foonf apart from all other car seats.

I could spend hours writing about the technical specs of Foonf, talking about the unparalleled safety and the technology behind the seat. It is truly one of a kind convertible seat that can arguably be called “BEST FOR BABY” without being melodramatic.

A few months ago, I had a talk with Babyhome representatives about trying out and writing about all Babyhome’s products. It was a big undertaking on my part, considering I couldn’t use some of them items due to Lexi’s age, but I was curious enough about it and felt like it would help broaden my “baby gear” horizon, as well as hopefully give some of my readers new ideas as to which products might work for them.

After slightly under 6 months of trying some Babyhome products and thoroughly inspecting others, I’d like to present to you this feature.

{and if you’re not in the market for a stroller, a bassinet, a high chair, a side rail or a bouncer, at least check out the video featuring adorable Alexis rocking out on each one of the aforementioned products. She found a way to have fun with them all. Wait for the last product, it was shot more recently and she’s the most adorable there, at 13.5 months}.

As I am slowly and painfully trying to design/fill/create Alexis’ playroom I am finding absolutely zero guides online as to how best to do it.

The truth is, while it is very personal as to what kind of playroom you design for your children, it is also important to make sure that you’ve got all your educational and creative basis covered, as well as make it a comfortable, safe and inviting environment.

So I decided to put together my own guide. It’s not a guide for OTHER people, it’s MY guide, though you can definitely use it to help you define your baby’s playroom areas, as well. I’ll be sure to put in a few finds for you guys, too.

PLAYROOM {in progress} GUIDE

The first giveaway in the 50 Days of Giveaways!

Yes, you read it right! The 50 Days of Giveaways on Daily Mom have begun and I have the honor to kick them off with our first giveaway!

I probably don’t need to repeat myself on here  but if you haven’t already become a reader of Daily Mom, you should really check it out. It’s a new website that I launched a month ago with a group of girls.  It’s an amazing resource of posts and articles for the modern woman and mom. Imagine Pinterest worthy posts with useful information about all aspects of life – from parenting to beauty, fashion, green living, health, fitness, and more.  No fluff whatsoever.

We’ve been preparing for our launch celebration, a fabulous event, called 50 Days of Giveaways, for months now and we’re finally there! For 50 days, we will be giving away one awesome prize a day to thank our new readers.

So today I am proud to present to you, our first giveaway!

This one is for all of you, TTCing folk!

While it seems like neons ago, I remember the time spent preparing for the conception of  Alexis. It was exciting, scary, wonderful!

If you’re currently trying to conceive or are planning to in the future, this giveaway is for you!

Today’s giveaway

The time has come for you guys to learn about what it is I have been working on so hard for the last 6 months. FEBRUARY 28th!

DAILY MOM

I’ve mentioned this name in passing a few times, but I doubt many of you noticed or paid attention. However it is now a huge part of my life that I am incredibly excited about. It took a lot of work and it’s almost here and you, guys, get to be the first ones to see it. A new portal that will hopefully stand out in the sea of mommy-oriented websites. I first came upon the idea for the website when I was sick of wading through hundreds of useless posts that sucked me in and wasted my time on big corporate website ( you know the ones I am talking about, those with scandalous news and celebrity gossip).  One post that has the potential of helping me as a mom and a woman among 10 posts of useless (but admittedly entertaining content). I wondered if there was a place for a website that doesn’t try to entertain, but tries to help. I instantly thought of Pinterest and how awesome of a service that is. My next thought was “I wish there was a blog like Pinterest, where all that awesomeness was delivered to me daily in a blog format into my email or RSS feed.”

DING DING DING

(that was the lightbulb over my head) Now over a year later after the initial idea and 6 months of grueling work along with my kick ass team of moms, Daily Mom is here.

So what is Daily Mom?

This is how we define it!

BABY JOGGER

So when Alexis started walking with support at 9 months, she walked with us holding both her hands. She was fast and excited and loved it so much that was all she wanted to do.

Soon she wanted more independence and had to ONLY hold one of our hands. At 10 months she started taking independent steps, but inconsistently, so her main form of transportation was still by holding onto our finger for balance.

Needless to say that was ROUGH on our backs. We are 5’11″ and 6’4″. To get down to her level in order to hold her hand, we really have to bend. Our backs started feeling it, so we attempted to straighten out a bit which was possible by tilting our body while holding one of Lexi’s hands. (hello, one-sided back pain!)

Then the real walking started. See, Lex wasn’t like some babies who carefully take step after step, lower themselves slowly. No, she was like the other type of babies, who sort of just take off and run. NO stopping, NO walking, NO lowering herself down. If she were to fall, it’d be a face plant, no doubt.

- Lexi, say hi to tile floors!

- Tile floors, say hi to Lexi!

I have a soft spot for Tiny Love. It’s the first company that I discovered that is conscious of toxic chemicals in children’s products. It’s the first company that I started obsessing over when I saw all their products. It’s also one of the first companies that was added to my baby registry.

For the first few months we used ( and destroyed) our favorite Princess Gym that was a gift from American grandma. It was probably THE most used accessory in the house. By the time Lexi “grew out of it” developmentally, we had nothing but the mat left. All the toys had been carried around and taken with us so much that the gym no longer served as that. Then it was time to buy a bigger mat for Lexi to play on before she started crawling.