Another Birthday Already!

I'm busy planning my baby's third birthday. THIRD! How can she be three already!?

Her favorite book these days is The Very Hungry Caterpillar so I thought that'd be the perfect party theme. I have found lots of cute ideas on Pinterest... from invites to crafts to food.



I'm thinking the kids can make their own caterpillars
and take them home in little baby food jars!?



How cute is this?

 

We'll have the party at a local playground which has picnic tables under a shelter (that came in handy for Lea's Lego party last year as it rained half the time!).

 

 

Here are some pics I just took of Emma this afternoon (I needed one for her invite). She is growing up so, so fast!

 

Sassy!
 



MOMS Club Retreat

I joined our local MOMS Club a few years ago. It's been invaluable to me and my girls! We have made so many friends and we keep pretty busy with activities & play dates.

Our chapter just returned from our first MOMS Club Retreat! We got several ladies together and rented a house in the NC mountains for the weekend.

It was a great trip... full of laughter, eating and exploring the area. Hopefully, this will be the first of many. We're already talking about doing a Fall retreat at the beach!

 

One of the things we munched on all weekend was this Sombrero Pasta Salad that Kelly made. It was really good!

"Mommy, I'm bored!"

I guess it comes with the territory of a five year old. Lea has been saying to me, "Mommy... I don't have anything to do!" a lot lately. So, I went to my favorite go-to for ideas, Pinterest, and found that this is actually an issue with a lot of moms and kids!

That's where the "Bored Jar" comes into play. I have come up with 39 different things for Lea to do when she can't seem to think of anything on her own. Here's the catch... half of them are fun things and the other half are not-always-so-fun things. ;) When she comes to tell me she's bored... she has to get a piece of paper from the jar.

Included in this list are...

• Choose five books to read
• Have a dance party
• Draw a treasure map
• Clean all the doorknobs in the house
• Water the indoor plants
• Choose two toys to donate to someone in need

I'm sharing the PDF file I created that lists my "bored" ideas.  I printed the list twice so I could fill up the jar well. If you have any cool ideas to add to my list, tell me in the comment section!

There are a couple that might be specific to our family... "Play the Party Game", this is a reference to our Xbox 360 Kinect which has a "Party Game" that gets the girls jumping and moving. The other one is "Take the dog outside and brush her hair". Obviously, if you don't have an Xbox or a dog, just leave those two out of your jar!

One last note... There are several items in my list that say to clean something. I have a spray bottle that's filled with a 50/50 water & vinegar mixture. This is a great, non-toxic solution that can be used to clean and disinfect lots of things. I added several drops of lavender oil so it smells better. This is the only cleaner I let the girls use!

TWO YEARS

Has it seriously been almost two years since I last blogged???

Just goes to show you how busy my life has been!

There is no way I can or will even attempt to catch up on everything that has happened in the past two years, so I will just pick up where we are now....

Lea is 5 1/2 years old and will be starting kindergarten this summer. Emma is 2 years old and will have her 3rd birthday in two and a half months. Kevin got a new job a year ago and now he has more free time with the family (his old job was working him to death!). And me?... well, I am still staying home with my girls. I keep busy around the house with projects here & there, help plan play dates for our local MOMS Club (as well as, serve as a board member) and make sure the girls have educational, active & fun things to do.

Fall 2014