BACK TO SCHOOL PRACTICE WEEK!

In our house, getting ready for back to school is not about pencils, paper and notebooks. Its not about new clothes, tennis shoes or backpacks. Getting ready for school for us, is making sure we go to bed on time and wake up on time.

The first week of school is already a transition, so why add more stress by being tired. Since I was in high school, I would always take the week before the first week of school and “practice” getting up early, getting out on time, eating breakfast and getting to bed on time. This way by the time school really started I would be ready.

Well I implemented this type of thinking into my kids. Sunday officially kicked off PRACTICE week for our house. The kids were absolutely thrilled…NOT! But they did set their alarms and was up bright and early this morning.

Since they were up early, I’m hoping (fingers crossed) that they will be tired enough to hit the beds early tonight (oh yeah, means I gotta make dinner earlier now..sigh).

With the past three months of summer vacation, they have perfected the art of sleeping in and staying up late. This week will have to transform them back into my cute little sleeping angels!

We shall see how tonight goes, but here’s to hoping its all good!

Since my oldest daughter (she will be 8 on August 11th) was 2 we decided to forgo birthday parties (both of my girls birthdays are in the summer anyway) for a BIGGER, happier, birthday celebration. Some years we will actually have a party, but since we have a lot of “family” friends our party counts get up to almost 50 people. Between food, supplies and decorations (my themes are always over the top) I can easily spend almost $500 on a “simple” party.

So my husband and I devised a plan to not have a “birthday” party but to have a week/ weekend long celebration. I call it the birthday-palooza week! It all started when my oldest daughter was turning 3. We birthday-palooza-ed ourselves in one weekend. Here is how it went down: Saturday morning we woke up and got manicures and pedicures then went to lunch at the Oviedo Marketplace, RJ Gators to be exact, saw Underdog the movie, then went bowling, then went to Outback for dinner and then came home and play a great game of hide n seek in the dark. Even with the entire day of activities we STILL spent less then if we would have had a party.

Last year, she chose to take 4 friends to Kobe Restaurant! It was great, they were entertained, I didn’t have to cook or clean up and it only cost us $150!

Well this year, we decided to treat my youngest daughter to the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique so she could be transformed into a princess! OMG she would talk about this for weeks! If you remember from one of my earlier posts, she went back and forth on which Princess she wanted to be before she finally decided on Tinkerbell.

Since you had to be 3 years old to get the princess treatment, we had to wait until after her birthday before we could go. We made our appointment for the 30th.

We got there about 10 minutes before our appointment and waited only several minutes before they called us back. We had chosen the Crown Package; which includes hairstyling, shimmering makeup and nails. You can choose from 3 hair styles — Fairytale Princess, Disney Diva and Pop Princess. We chose the Fairytale Princess as I thought that was most age appropriate for my 3 year old.

She was very good, sitting there while the Fairy Godmother and her staff transformed her into a Princess! For the cost (it was $53.87 + a souvenir glass slipper that grandma and grandpa got her for her birthday another $22.90) IT WAS TOTALLY WORTH the excitement and anticipation that my youngest daughter experienced! I would totally recommend the experience and definitely plan on returning and reliving this experience with my daughters! Maybe a special Christmas gift or another type of holiday….

Here are some of the highlights! Enjoy the pictures!

So yes, we have been potty training my (now) 3 year old daughter. She has good days and bad days. Some days shes excited about wearing her big girl panties and then some days she only wants to wear her pull ups. I am under the gun though because she starts her 3 year old class in 3 weeks and she HAS to be completely potty trained.

This particular incident is quite comical though.

It was an ordinary Thursday, however, my sister and I were FINALLY getting to that yoga class at the gym. It had been several weeks since we decided to attend, but something would always come up.

So here we are in Yoga Class, about 20 minutes into meditation, when one of the Kids Gym Counselors motions for me. I walk out (without my shoes and socks) to meet her. She tells my that my daughter has a poopy diaper and is sitting on the toilet. I went into the bathroom where my 7 year old daughter was trying (unsuccessfully) to control the situation. My 3 year old was on the toilet finishing “her business” but her pull up was clearly sitting on the floor with a little Poop in there. My youngest said she wasn’t finished yet, so I went back out to my bag to get another pull up. Well guess what?!?! There wasn’t any there, I would need to raid my emergency stock in the car. So I grabbed my keys and headed out the door. On my way out several gym employees asked me what was going on that I was “walking” around barefooted. I laughed and said I had an issue.

I ran out to the car (barefoot) and grabbed another pull up. As I was walking back into the gym, a mom with 3 kids was getting out of the car and headed in. One of the little girls said to her mom ‘Why is that lady walking around without any shoes?” Her mom did not skip a beat and said “Well my guess is that she was in Yoga and needed to come out to her car for a diaper.” I turned to the mom and said “Thank You! Another mom who knows what I am going through!” LOL.

After I got back in and took care of my little girl. I started to walk back to yoga when a thought went through my head. I would be barefoot during yoga class and I was SURE the bottom of my feet would be black. Sure enough they were gross, thank goodness for baby wipes!

Please tweet me or facebook me your “MOM” stories! We are waiting to hear about them…..