Mom on a Budget

One of my top tips for first time moms is to start your baby on vegetables before fruit when starting solids. I did this so well in fact, that my son still loves his vegetables, especially broccoli and peas. However the issue I had later on though was, he hated fruit! After consulting with my go-to mommy expert, I did the following things that did work. 1) Make fruit ice-lollies! They think its a treat and not "yucky fruit". Worked like a charm. 2) Fruit snacks! Checkers has the most amazing range that was actually designed by Gordon Ramsay and his daughter. They're healthy snacks but look like sweets and my son loves them, they're his during the week "treat". Genius! 3) This actually happened by accident, I can't eat breakfast, so instead, I have a morning smoothy every day, guess what, your kids want whatever you have. So now my son has some of my morning smoothy  (1 banana, 1 green Apple, 1 red Apple, a quarter cup of frozen blueberries and full fat d...

Here's a review for all of the parents out there, to better enable you to decide whether or not to let your little watch The Secret Life of Pets. After watching it once : this movie is so cute, it has everything, action, adventure, a love story, funny bald cats with dodgey accents, a crazy underworld, Kevin heart as a crazy bunny. This is the greatest kid movie ever. After the 10th time: at least it's not Jurrassic Park 💁 Review after watching the "dog" movie as my son calls it for the hundredth time: I'm going to cancel my Netflix account if I'm forced to watch this 1 more time.

I was having this issue with my toddler, constantly finding "junk food" and devouring it during the week, now I don't mind if he has treats over the weekend, but during the week its healthy food all-the-way!! I bought these containers from Crazy Plastics in Amanzimtoti for under R200.00 for 3, found the labels and chalk in my "mommy craft box". So I go about organizing our grocery cupboard like this, making it impossible for my son to get to the weekend treats, then I put fruit in the lower shelves in our fridge.  This has worked like a charm, however, what I didn't take into consideration was that I'm SHORT so now I cant even reach the snack containers at the top of the cupboard that are there for us (savoury and sweet boxes) I know what you're all thinking, just get a step ladder or chair and reach up there to get yourself a treat. Well the thought of the amount of energy this would actually take up is exhausting in itself, so now I also don't ...

As you all know by now, I love journaling. It's something I've only recently started doing and it really is life changing. I journal twice a day, at night it's my B.E.E.T journal and in the morning I do this, List 10 things I'm grateful for and really sit with each thing I list and feel that gratitude. Obviously top of my list every day, is my kids and I sit and visualise moments I've had with them. I do this with each thing I list. Second I write down the names of 3 people who are really aggravating me. And genuinely send them love. (This one's tough but it's good for your soul). And lastly I write down and review my goals for the day. 3 Professional Goals and 3 Personal goals. So lets break this down a bit, The list of 10 things to be grateful for, now if you're in a negative space right now, that's ok. You still need to think of 10 things to list. For example, you're reading this post that means you have a device to do so on, right? You're...

Happy Friday Lovelies! Yes its Friday, which means its almost the WEEKEND BABY and more importantly its time for this weeks Mompreneur Feature Friday!!! This week I'm profiling Rakha Hiralal owner of : Ballito Baby,  "outfitting tiny humans". How ADORABLE are these tiny outfits, I want one of everything, for my daughter of course, or maybe Rakha can get me the adult version and Emma and I can go full on TWINNING! Ok checked with my Mr and this is a no-go, apparently I'm "crazy" now.  Anyway back to the adorableness, Rakha started Ballito Baby in May of this year with the idea of helping mommies source themed wear for their children, as well as comfort wear available in organic cotton. So how did this business idea come about in the first place? Here's Rakhas' story, "My Daughter always dressed in tutu’s and frill’s and they were not always easy to source. She always wore a tiara (still does, occasionally) and I was always searching the Internet ...

Lets talk about PCOS, one of my followers, who I now consider to be a friend, lets call her D, asked me to please do a post on PCOS as she suffers with this condition and is wanting to expand her family. To be perfectly honest, I had absolutely no idea what PCOS was, I'd kind of heard about it in the past but never actually looked in to it. So I go three places for information. 1) Google 2) Facebook mom groups 3) Ask my go-to mom friend who knows everything about everything (she really does, trust me) So the information on Google is quite hectic, PCOS is the abbreviation for : Polycystic Ovary Syndrome. What the heck is that? The below is an extract from the CDCs website: "PCOS is one of the most common causes of female infertility, affecting 6% to 12% (as many as 5 million) of US women of reproductive age. But it’s a lot more than that. This lifelong health condition continues far beyond the child-bearing years. Women with PCOS are often  insulin resistant ; their bodies can ...

Hi Lovely Ladies, Here's a great beauty on a budget trick, I got from one of my readers: use mayonnaise as a hair mask! Its FAR cheaper than actually buying a hair mask and you probably already have a jar of mayo in your fridge right now. Ok so anyone who reads my blog or lives within a 30km radius of me, knows, that I've been having some, lets say.... "Hair Issues". For those of you that don't know, I'm brunette naturally and decided to do what all crazy people do at some point or another in their life and dye my hair blonde AT HOME. This resulted a long journey of trying to fix my yellow, orange and purple "unicorn hair". I eventually did and when I posted the story of the 5 stages of hair grief I'd gone through TWICE, a lovely lady told me about how to fix the next problem - what all of this had done to the health of my hair and that I should try using mayonnaise as a hair treatment. This works! And the best part is, its cheap. You're look...

Guys, I've figured out the biggest question on all of our minds since March 2020.... No, not whether Bill Gates created this virus, or if you'll get better signal once the "5G microchip is implanted" in to you via the vaccines, or even if you'll grow an extra arm or something after getting vaccinated. I'm talking about THE BIGGEST question..... What's with the toilet paper panic buying???? I mean really, why on earth do people panic buy toilet paper, in times of turmoil? Well my friends, it's actually quite simple, these people aren't crazy, they must just have toddlers. Exhibit A My son at 1 years old eating toilet paper... Exhibit B  My daughter who's just turned 1, guess what, eating toilet paper. So there you have it, don't point and judge these "toilet paper hoarders", they know that they're about to be in an enclosed environment with their toddler and they're just trying to make sure there's enough, of this vital...

Alright, this is the third and final instalment of the "night bottle weaning battle" (I hope) We're sort of getting there, my daughter has a bottle around 9pm now and then sleeps until 4am BUT now wakes up at 4am FOR THE DAY. Read that again, 4AM FOR THE DAY. Time to bring in the big guns, I'm a quarter Scottish  (perhaps that's why I'm frugal 💁) so I thought let's channel my Scottish routes and get my "Braveheart" on.  Here. We. Go. 

This weeks Friday Feature Mompreneur is really important to me personally, as she was my doula for Emmas birth and was ultimately a HUGE part of saving her life. With all of the chaos going on last year, we looked in to going, the midwife & doula route because that meant that obviously my fiancé would be able to be there for the birth, as pretty much all hospitals weren't allowing dads in. Which is so sad and my heart truly goes out to all of the dads out there who couldn't be there for the amazing experience of watching their baby be born and to the super moms who had to do it alone. Bronwen was absolutely amazing, she held me, rocked me, massaged me, reassured me and kept us all calm through the entire birthing experience. I have such a huge amount of respect for Doulas, they are so underrated and underappreciated. If you're currently pregnant, please do yourself a favour and look in to getting a doula for your birth! Bron isn't just a doula though, she actually s...

When we found out I was pregnant with baby number 2, I scoured the internet for cute or funny ways to announce this (once it was safe to do so of course, ie second trimester). There are TONS of ideas online, we went with this eviction notice one. Side note, my son had just woken up from a nap and was grumpy when we took these pictures, so no, he wasn't traumatised by the "eviction notice", he had no idea what was going on. So don't hate on me...

First things First, you'll need the following items: A mop A bucket Floor cleaner A kitchen timer The patience of 1000 monks Supporters readily available for last minute pep talks (for you) Oh and of course, a baby step and toddler toilet seat. So my son's 2 and a half and completely potty trained at nursery school. At home it's a different story..... And I've tried on numerous occasions without luck. I decide to tackle this dilemma, over a hot long weekend because the advice I'd seen online was to let them run around butt naked. This works Moms! Set the timer to go off every 20 minutes and take your toddler to the toilet.  Try and make it fun though, sing a song ( Now this is a story all about how. My life got flipped-turned upside down. And I'd like to take a minute. Just sit right there. I'll tell you how I became the  prince  of a town called  Bel-Air.  In west Philadelphia born and raised. On the playground was where I spent most of my days. Chillin...

The intention of this post is to reassure every single women and especially moms with body image issues that we ALL have them. These photos of me were taken exactly 8 days after giving birth to my daughter, Emma. I knew I had a "pouch" but I didn't care. I was so proud of my body for the absolute miracle of being able to birth 2 kids, 18 months apart. I was superwoman. My body was a freaking machine! Prior to this, I would've been on a diet for months before allowing any bikini pictures to be taken of me, let alone actually post them. I remember a few years back exercising and dieting like a machine for months before going on vacation to Zanzibar and even then I wasn't entirely happy with my body. The pride I had in my body, was unfortunately short lived though. We are all constantly inundated, with edited photos of women and even though, we all know those pictures aren't real, we still unconsciously shame ourselves for not looking a certain way. My weight has...

Hello Lovies! Its Friday!!! Which means its time for my weekly feature. This week I'm profiling Sayuri Varuthan, who started her own business called, All In The Presents.  "My specialty is the Hot Air Balloon Gift Boxes but I cater for any of my customers needs." As you all know, I normally only profile mompreneurs but when I heard Sayuris' story I felt compelled to support her and her small business. She might not be a mompreneur but she is definitely an entrepreneur, go-getter and an absolute delight in general.  'All In The Presents' specialises in making gift boxes for all different occasions and the idea came about from receiving something similar for her 25th birthday! Here's Sayuris' story: In 2016 she did a Flight Attendant course and is currently a Flight Attendant for Mango Airlines, while also burning the midnight oil studying HR Management through UNISA.  Given the ongoing situation within the Aviation industry and Mangos current status, sh...

******UPDATES IN PINK****** Labour pain : feels like the worst period pain you've ever had, lasts a while then goes away, comes back for a while goes away. Start timing the duration of the pain experienced and the time between when there's no pain. Water Breaking : Literally feels like a "pop", then instant release of pressure, followed by TONS of liquid, sit on the toilet and once you're ready to go to the hospital put a thick sanitary pad in your underwear. After birth : bath with salt in the water, it will burn but it will help the healing process. Also in case you don't already know, you'll continue bleeding for at least a month after birth. So stock up on pads. Don't  worry about stocking up on size1,2 & 3 diapers, you'll quickly move to size 4 and then 5, stock up on size 5.... believe me. Breastfeeding : I could only breastfeed both of my kids for 5 days. There's absolutely no shame in not being able to breastfeed. Some of us can...

Attempt 2 of weaning my daughter off of her bottle is tonight. After my first failed attempt, I did what all sleep deprived, crazy people do. I turned to FB groups for a solution. There were some interesting suggestions, my favourite being that, the moon, stars and mars have to be alignment (who knew), some people tried to sell me special bottles and unfortunately 1 mom "mommy shamed" me because I was weaning my 1 year off her night-time bottles. Come on moms, let's stop that already! Nevertheless, there was also a lot of great advice offered, which I have gathered, analysed and brought in to play for tonights "battle of wills". And just as a back up, I will be rocking my own version of Rambo tonight. Girl Rambo or as I like to call it... Grambo....  Edit: googled Grambo and according to the urban dictionary it mean Rambos grandmother..... I may feel a billion years old thanks to sleep deprivation but I think we need a name change.... Let's go with mombo, ye...

 Hello Ladies, I heard about this home made face mask about 10 years ago and have been doing it since. Not only are the ingredients probably already in your cupboard/pantry (if not they're cheap) but the benefits are AMAZING. 1 teaspoon nutmeg 1 teaspoon of ground cinnamon  2 tablespoons of honey Mix all ingredients together and leave on your face for 20 minutes. Benefits: Nutmeg:  makes the skin plump, which can temporarily reduce and remove fine lines and ugly wrinkles. Cinnamon:  is an antiseptic, meaning it will help reduce the bacteria on the surface of your skin to aid in the prevention of pimples and even help dry out existing pimples. It also stimulates and revitalizes the skin by drawing blood, oxygen and nutrients to the surface of your skin, leaving you glowing! H oney:  plumps up the skin with natural moisturizers, and in addition, is lush in antioxidants and has antimicrobial attributes.  Honey is also naturally antibacterial, so it’s...

 🌟🌟🌟🌟Competition Alert🌟🌟🌟🌟 Hey Parents! @happyreader2021 has partnered with Mom on a budget.com to give away a R1000.00 book gift voucher per month, to one lucky parent out there leading up to December 2021. What inspired this competition, was a new tradition I started with my 2 year old son last December. Instead of buying a traditional advent calendar, I bought 24 books for him to unwrap each night leading up to Christmas. Then on Christmas night we read the story of Christmas from his children's bible. This way you're filling your kids with knowledge, imagination and wonder, instead of chocolate leading up to Christmas.  I know what you're thinking we're in August, why are we talking about Christmas and advent calendars now? Well, books can get a little pricey, especially if you're a parent to more than 1 baby, like I am. All you need to do to enter is like both Mom_on_a_budget.com2021 and Happy Readers Facebook pages, head on over to Instagram and follow...