Couponing, Halloween, Ladybug Bed

I love Kroger and Target. But mostly, I love that Publix accepts their coupons as competitor's coupons so I can score major awesome deals like this haul from Thursday.

It may not seem like a ton because it wouldn't stack very easily to show it all, but it's almost $60 worth of groceries and I paid $2.18. The real cool part? At least half of it was fruits and veggies. It's easy to score a zillion bottles of free soy sauce, but when I can get a great deal on food that is actually nutritious, it makes me feel like I'm doing a good job as a mom.

The groceries included:

1 package celery

1 package spinach

1 package carrots

7 bags of frozen vegetables

1 bunch of bananas

4 cans of tomatoes

a bag of pears

2 cups of yogurt

1 jar peanut butter

2 dozen eggs

4 packages pierogies

10 protein bars

Natalie heartily approves

And, I had a cute video to share from halloween, but my battery died, so I'll have to post it later.
Basically, Natalie liked trick or treating a lot. Micah didn't want to take her to very many houses, but she was having fun, so he was lame and sat in the car for the latter half. Everyone was so happy to have her trick or treat at their house and gushed about how cute she was. I was worried that she would be too shy. She definitely wasn't her cute, smiley self, but she came out of her shell a little bit and said trick or treat and thank you, even though at times I was the only one who could hear her. Natalie did a lot of walking and I enjoyed the nice weather. It was shorts and t-shirt type weather. Yeah. And here it is November 3 and we still have to turn on the a/c in the afternoons. Ay, the south.

Anyway, she was definitely interested in the candy part. Here, she enjoys some chocolate before bed:

Speaking of bed, Natalie has not been having it. Like, any of it. A couple of days she protested taking a nap and was a nightmare at bedtime and as Micah went in for the zillionth time to quiet her down, she was hanging quite athletically from her crib, screaming her head off. So, the cage-submission-sleep-method that we have been going with is no longer going to work I guess. We already had a bed in her room, but we took her to pick out some bedding to finally make it "hers". She opted for this lovely pink-and-green ladybug motif (after I refused the disney princess garb because I think that they make bad role models) and so far we have spent two restless nights and fitful afternoons trying to get her to sleep in it. I'm pretty sure that if we just let her chose her sleep schedule, she would just never sleep. Which is a problem.