It sure has gotten crazy around here.....

It sure has gotten crazy around here.  When I was putting pen to paper and laying everyone's schedules out for the fall, it all worked so nicely in theory.  Reality is a different beast all together!

Monday starts off with me taking K to kindergarten at 8:45am while R stays home and works with G on her school work and entertains M (thank goodness she is content to play by herself sometimes!).  I return from drop-off and he departs for work by 10:30am.  At 11:45am I load the car with G and M and we go pickup K from kindergarten.  We then rush back home where we have 45 minutes to scarf down a delicious, nutritious lunch (insert sarcasm here!) and then we're back in the car again on our way to G's private flute lesson, followed by band practice.  While this is all taking place, I am desparately trying to convince K and M that it is "rest time" in the car.  G rejoins our merry troop and then we set off for the ballet studio for one of her weekly classes.  Providing no one dawdles after ballet class, we make it home by 6:00pm and I rush to get another nutritious meal (insert more sarcasm!) into my children and then rush them upstairs for bath and bedtime by 8:00pm (that's the goal but more frequently, it's 8:30pm).

We wake-up on Tuesday and start a slight variation of the routine again.  By the time Friday rolls around, I am giddy with exhaustion.  The question is, when is to much, too much?  Between school and extra curricular activities it seems we are on the go all the time.  I now realize why my mom let us only do one activity after school!

So glad we had the opportunity to spend a week at the beach last month even though in now seems like a distant memory..........

and this was supposed to be the easy one.......

Everyone knows it's going to be hard to send the first child off to preschool, but the third?  It should have been a piece of cake to drop her off at her class and head out into my two and half hours of "me" time, but when she got to the classroom door and held out her hand and said, "I'm going to miss you Mommy!", it was all I could do to hold it together until I could get to the car :-(  I was so out-of-sorts about the drop-off, and stalking my phone in case the school called me to come get her, that I didn't really enjoy my "me" time at all!

But on a positive note, she had a great first day of preschool!  She was excited and couldn't wait to show me what she had worked on when I picked her up. 

We'll see what happens on Thursday!

Tiaras anyone?

August has brought us some pretty interesting days and in some respects, I am glad it is coming to a close.

My sweet K had to have some dental surgery--a root canal and then insertion of six stainless steel crowns.  Because of the amount of work that needed to be done, we chose to put her under general anesthesia.  This momma was a mess!  My rational mind knew that she couldn't sit still for that length of a procedure and that she was already a little scared about going to the dentist, but there is no telling the heart to be rational as you watch them put your child under.  G had to have a similar dental procedure when she was five and you would think I would be a veteran at this, but no, it was like doing it for the first time. No matter how much you try to convince your child that it's not going to be a big deal, it's a big deal!

Thankfully, the procedure went smoothly, was over pretty quick, and K bounced back pretty quickly from the anesthesia.  Other than her teeth being sore for a couple of days, she hasn't really mentioned it at all.  Now, little Miss M on the other hand, is fascinated by K's crowns.  She asks frequently if she can see K's "tiaras".  That's a hoot!  I'm sure the dentist could the sell the idea of getting crowns much easier to little girls if he would just call them tiaras!

We came, we saw, we conquered......

Okay, we'll maybe we didn't actually conquer Walt Disney World, but we definitely tried to visit and see everything there.  (Which is actually impossible if you've ever been there.)  We did a five day trip and maybe covered half of what they have to offer.

There were parts of WDW that will have to wait for another trip--Downtown Disney, Typhoon Lagoon, the mini-golf park, Wide World of Sports complex, Animal Kingdom.  This trip was primarily focused on the Magic Kingdom.  We did spend a day in Epcot and a day in Hollywood Studios but at their current ages, the girls were most interested in what the Magic Kingdom had to offer--Minnie Mouse and the princesses.

Our last trip to Disney was five years ago--G was five years-old-and we went at the end of October.  Note to self-remember October for the next trip!  I couldn't believe how hot and humid it was for only being May.  The heat zapped my crew!  By 2:00pm in the afternoon, everyone was wiped out--including me.  So thankful that we stayed on a Disney property and were able to take advantage of the pool in the afternoons.

The upgrades in technology over the past five years were also phenomenal.  Last time we had paper tickets and this time everything (room key, park tickets, fast passes, meal plans, etc.) was linked to our "magic bands."  Good and bad at the same time--good because it was all in one place and we didn't have to worry about keeping up with wallets, tickets, paper, etc., but bad because one day we left the park and went thru a Taco Bell drive-thru only to discover that we didn't have any money and they didn't accept "magic bands."  Funny now, but a bit embarrassing as we had to pull out of the drive-thru empty-handed!

All-in-all a great trip!  The kids are still talking about it, reliving it thru their autograph books, and talking about when we return (probably in another five years, unless we hit the lottery!).

First day when we were still all "fresh"!

Some afternoon "down-time" at the pool.

Breakfast with the princesses!

Note to self--if you ever wonder why it looks like someone has been rummaging in your stroller while you were gone, it's this little guy!

Finally got to meet her Minnie, that was one happy girl!

A little retail therapy while the big girls were riding Tower of Terror with R.

"Ready, set, go!" for the Toy Story Mania Ride.

Loved meeting Princess Tiana.  By far, one of the prettiest princesses at Disney.

"Bye-bye Disney!  We'll see you next time!"

Blogger guilt..........

Blogger guilt........I'll admit that I haven't been too active on here lately, but didn't realize it had been almost two months!  I could say, "wow, where has the time gone?", but I know where it's gone.  In those two months, we've celebrated Easter and Mother's Day, the oldest got Invisalign, the youngest has undergone more allergy testing, we've attended school programs, gone to class picnics and field trips, completed a season of Lil' Kickers soccer, graduated from Preschool and moved up to 5th grade, and we've continued weekly dance and flute lessons. And just to make it interesting, throw in a trip to Disney at the end of all that.  In other words, we've been slam busy with life and instead of writing about it, I've been living it.  So no apologies from this guilty blogger!

A Disney post will follow shortly---too many cute pics to include here.  Here are some pics to bring this up-to-date:

Easter morning.

Who knew you could find the Easter Bunny at McDonalds?

Art show at school

K and her BFF's.

G getting her Invisalign.  You can't see them because they are "invisible"--hahaha

One of our multiple trips to the pediatric dermatologist.  Thank goodness for electronic devices!

A trip to the Science Museum.

Little Miss M on the playground.

K at her class picnic.

Here's my soccer girl.  Only girl on her team and only player with a pink princess ball.

G at her end-of-year awards program at school.

Seriously, could this kid's smile get any bigger?  She had just won a tablet for collecting the most boxtops/labels for education.

K and her BFF at their graduation party.

I can't believe she's going to be a kindergartner in the fall!

....and she's 5 years old now

My dear sweet K had her 5th birthday last week and what a fun birthday it was.  We had a "Frozen" themed birthday party, birthday dinners with the grandparents, donuts for breakfast, special treats each day of the week leading up to her birthday, and cupcakes to share with her friends at school.

It was a busy week.  In fact, the past month has been overly busy with all the regular scheduled activities and then tossing in two birthdays with parties.  I'm glad that Little Miss M's birthday is not until June--it gives me a bit of time to de-stress from these last two.

I've also started to bear witness to the passage of time with my middle child.  Several weeks before her birthday she started telling me, "I'm almost 5 years old now."  This would usually come up when it was something she didn't want to do.  For example: a trip to Costco means that she and Little Miss M ride in the cart--just easier for me to keep them corralled.  She told me, "Mom, I'm almost 5 years old now.  I'm too big to ride in the cart."  Another example:  we were having breakfast and using the same cups with lids that we've used for a very long time and she announced, "Mom, I'm almost 5 years old now.  I'm too big to use these cups with lids.  I want a cup like G has."

Why can't they stay little, just a little while longer??????

The birthday girl just starting her day.

Donuts for breakfast on our birthday.

Getting ready for the party.

Princess Anna paints fingernails.

Old and young were captivated by the princesses.

Princess Anna and Queen Elsa.

Happy Birthday G!

G turned 10 years old last week.  How did that happen?  As per the routine established by me, we celebrated the birthday all week.  (What was I thinking when I started that?  It was obviously before I realized that there is only a three week difference between her and K's birthday :-)

I setup the birthday bucket, took cupcakes to school, celebrated the birthday with donuts for breakfast and Taco Bell for lunch, had a birthday dinner at Grammy's house, a birthday dinner with Mimi and Papa, and finished off the week with a party with all of her friends. 

It was fun, crazy, chaotic and bittersweet at the same time.  Somewhere, way back when, we decided that 10 would be the cut-off for the big parties with all the school friends, etc.   A relief that it's over but some sadness that we've hit that milestone marker.  I put together a photobook for her as a momento of the week--and it didn't hurt that I had a coupon code for a free book :-)

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