A Halloween Play Date

Before you say it..yes I'm that parent. I go over-board on planning a simple play date. That's right, expect planned activities (that rarely work out), goodie bags filled with trinket toys (your welcome for the added clutter) and most importantly giggles (despite how messy, crazy, loud,and clustered my house is..the little giggles are so worth it!). I just love planning fun get-togethers with my girlfriends and our kiddos. The rest of my life can be a complete unorganized mess, yet I can plan a pretty great (small) event.

Okay, I'll be honest, the real reason I love play dates is to see my friends...I love chasing around our kids sitting around and constantly reminding our kids to play nice talking with these ladies about anything and everything. It's like a therapy session without the $$$$. Seriously, I love them.

Originally, I had the idea of getting together with my mommy friends and our kiddos to get a few pictures of the kids with their costumes. On Halloween day with the commotion of trick-or-treating, the chances of us getting a group picture...not likely. We all love those super adorable and awkward pictures for graduation boards, so I like to get a head start on those. Our kids may be best friends, not so friendly - friends, casual acquaintances, couples, whatev...but at one point - they all played together as toddlers. So of course to get said picture, we needed a "Halloween costume picture" get together, and what better time to have a Halloween play-date?! None, this was the time. :)
So I sent a mass text (see I'm not totally crazy-I didn't even send an official homemade invitation) and told the ladies my plan, and we made it work.

I had such a great time, and I know Sophia did too because she fell asleep at 6:30..score!

 

The kids enjoyed some tasty snacks.

1. Sensory bin with spaghetti noodles and creepy Halloween things.

Cook the noodles, run under cold water, and dye with
food coloring in separate containers until play time.
Add in any small fun toys.

2. Window cling Frankenstein.

 

3. Eye ball picture frames

 

Taking the picture was so much harder than I thought it would be:

 They weren't all looking..

 They were touching...

 Again not all looking, and costume malfunctions...

 They were too close for comfort apparently...

Or the picture was blurry...

 So you settle for the best...

 

 Have a Happy Halloween!!!

Sophia's Second Rodeo Birthday

Warning: This is a picture heavy post.

I am so excited to share Sophia's second birthday party with everyone. This year we went with a rodeo theme. I found a lot of ideas on Pinterest. Here is my Pinterest board of ideas for her party. Here is the invite I created on Photoshop and sent out:

Welcome to our Rodeo.

 

 We offered  our guests cowboy hats, badges, and hankies. I found them all here.

Each kiddo was given a stick horse as a party favor. Thanks to my wonderful mom I had a lot of help making these. They were a huge hit.

 

I found this super cute menu board at my local Hobby Lobby. (Of course I used my 40% coupon which made it even better.)

We had to move the Waterin' Hole under the tables to keep the ice from melting so quickly.

This is not one of my best creations, however I went out of my comfort zone and I'm satisfied with the end result. The boots are made of sugar cookies, the rope is made of modeling chocolate. The paisley design is piped on with butter cream.

Our birthday girl hit the jackpot with all of her birthday loot.

 

Sophia is so blessed to have such a large family (and great friends), all of whom are supportive and so loving. I want to thank everyone again who came out to celebrate my baby girl's special day!

Here's to the start of Summer

I am so thankful to have the opportunity to be a stay-at-home mommy this summer! When I start my full-time nursing school this upcoming fall I will be grateful for the memories and time I got to spend with Sophia. To kick off summer, we decided to enroll her in swim lessons at our local pool. 

I had a hard time deciding whether to put her into parent-tot (that means I have to bare my mommy-body in public, in a bathing suit…yikes) or level one swim lessons where she would be in the water without me, and instead have two teachers. I was going to take the plunge and enroll her us into parent-tot, but after talking to one of my best friends who is a lifeguard there I decided to enroll her into level one. Why? Sophia is familiar with water now that we got her a kiddie pool for the backyard, so getting into the water would not be an issue (Parent-tot aims toward making your child less freighted when in the water), and after-all we enrolled her in swim lessons because we wanted her to learn how to swim. So level one it was.

I was a nervous wreck today when the lessons began. I know that lifeguards are certified to keep our children safe, but that doesn’t untie the knot a mother feels in her stomach when her child is sitting on the edge of a pool, near water that is deeper than said child’s height.

 The kids get to go down the "big slide" after each class.

 I was just as nervous, if not more, than  Sophia was.

 Thankfully all went well and Sophia had a great time. I am excited to see how much she learns in the next two weeks and to watch her swimming improve as well.