bracelets everywhere

Our daughter has recently joined the Rainbow Loom craze. It’s entirely possible that we’re the last family on the bandwagon.  I hadn’t even heard of this thing until a friend of my husband was over and showed me one that his daughter had made for him. Then, of course, afterwards I was noticing them absolutely everywhere. It was only a day or so later when my daughter arrived home with one that a friend had made for her.

Eventually, I was given the ‘homework assignment’ (by my seven-year-old) to ‘google’ Rainbow Loom so that I could teach her how to make a fishtail pattern bracelet. Thank goodness for YouTube!! I found a tutorial there and Ashley did a great job with her explanation.

We are now bracelet-making experts…

a valentine kick-off

Just about every year we have company on Superbowl Sunday. Once our daughter was old enough I started inviting some of her friends as well…turning it into a Superbowl/Valentine’s Day party.

I usually set-up a separate table just for the kids and load it up with hearts and pinkness!!

They have crafts that they can work on together…

And during dessert I put out cookie pops for them to decorate. I found Gingerbread cookies at Christmastime and they loved it. So, I was very excited when I found a kit for Valentine’s Day too!

Of course, all of this means that I never…ever…actually sit down and watch the Superbowl. This year I had high hopes of at least getting to watch the halftime show. I even had a new gluten-free beer in the fridge that I was planning to kick-back with.

This didn’t happen. I was probably elbow-deep in dirty dishes at that point. The beer is still in the fridge, but I at least got to sit on the couch for about five minutes during the game. Just long enough to see the players stretching on the field during the power outage 😐

Regardless, when I woke up this morning I was greeted with an email from one of our guests telling me that her kids had a fantastic time! I know my daughter had a blast too…which makes me an extremely happy hostess!!

(fyi…Valentine’s Day Subway Art for the kiddie table found HERE)

royalty

Time for another break from my typical rambling running related posts! Yup, no running talk in this one. My husband thinks that it’s all I ever talk about, but that’s totally not true. I won’t mention at all about how crummy my 9-mile run was yesterday OR the fact that I am frantically trying to recover from my leg tweak that occurred…not while running…but while rolling. (Foam Roller = 1/Susan = 0) {Seriously. Don’t ask.}

Nope. Instead I’ll talk about sugar and spice and everything…royalty.

My daughter went to a Princess Party over the weekend. The ‘boutique’ that hosted it was so very cute! The girls started by having their nails done, then were brought into a dressing room where they were allowed to pick one of the many available dresses and some matching accessories.

Once they were all dressed-up, they jumped on stage to perform a show for the parents. Singing, dancing, girly-squealing and mass chaos followed.

It was a fantastic time and it further encouraged our daughter’s belief that she IS in fact a princess and therefore should be showered with attention, accessories and cupcakes with heart-shaped sprinkles…at all times.

there and back

We finally arrived home from Florida and it’s official…I am completely done with summer. We’ve had great times in pools and at beaches, but I’m looking forward to some nice cool weather, blue jeans and the smell of apple-spice cake baking in the oven!!

This definitely wasn’t a trip for relaxation. I was able to get about a half an hour or so at the hotel pool and one morning I walked along the beach with the baby for a bit before I headed back for her naptime.

You can’t travel with an eight month old and a six year old and expect a whole ‘lotta down time. Mainly, we went on this trip so that my grandparents could spend some time with our oldest and finally get to meet our youngest. It took a lot of effort. By the time we left we had run our little one (who held up great the entire trip) ragged, but it was without a doubt well worth it!!

On the morning before we left, I was up and out of the hotel room by 7:30 to do my very first vacation run. Our hotel was a block away from the beach. So, I headed towards the water and I was greeted with a whole TON of people. Walkers, joggers, (somewhat dangerous) cyclists. I couldn’t believe how many people there were. Up here I get excited if I happen to pass one or two runners, down there they were absolutely everywhere. The paths were completely and totally flat. The scenery was gorgeous…

It was fantastic! I ended up doing just over five miles and I was back in our room before anyone even noticed I was gone. That will definitely not be my last vacation run!

summer time capsule

On Monday, my daughter’s pick from the activity jar was a Summer Time Capsule.

It was a cute project and she enjoyed coming up with answers to the questions about herself…

…but my absolute favorite thing that morning was how we were able to get the baby involved too.  I wish I could’ve gotten pictures of them doing their first craft together, but with a seven month old covered in fingerpaint…my hands were a bit full!

We’ve already started gathering things that she wants to seal-up inside of the box…

Next week we’ll be at the shore and she’s planning to pick out two shells (one for herself and one for her sister) specifically for the time capsule.

On the site where I found the templates it suggested that you not open the time capsule for three years. Which to my six-year-old daughter would basically be the equivalent of telling her this thing will be sealed forever. So, I told her that we’ll close it up at the end of summer, she can re-open it next summer…add more things to it and then continue on each summer until she becomes ‘too cool’ for it. Until then it was a great activity and a lot of fun to come up with ideas for keepsakes to put inside!

birthday breakfast

As birthday week (month?) continues, yesterday was The Big Day. Our oldest is now six-years-old. From the moment she woke up she reminded me of this.

“Oh, I can do that Mom. Six-year-olds can handle it.”
“I can carry that for you, six-year-olds are stroooong.”
“Look at this dance I made up. Six-year-olds are great dancers.”

You get the idea. Very cute!

I decided to get the girls up yesterday morning and surprise her with a birthday breakfast. I gave her a choice of restaurants and told her she could order anything she wanted.

It wasn’t a big surprise when she picked the restaurant that serves her favorite…rainbow pancakes. She orders them every time we go there.

The little one was a complete and total angel at the restaurant. Perfectly happy sitting with us and looking around at all of the activity.

Afterwards, we ran a few errands and stopped at the bakery for birthday cake #2.  This one she was allowed to pick out herself.

I had hoped that I would get them to the pool yesterday afternoon, but the storm of the year came through and put a stop to that plan. Still, we had a great day together.  After my run last night, she opened the rest of her birthday gifts (she’s been getting a couple every night since her party over the weekend) and she got to dig into her Tinkerbell cake.  She was up way too late last night playing with her new stuff, but I think it’s safe to say she’s had a fantastic 6th birthday!

the pink pirate

A few weeks ago, my daughter decided that she wanted a pirate-themed 6th birthday party. I absolutely love that she picked this theme! Not only was it so much fun to plan, but it was extremely easy to accommodate both the girls and the boys on our guest list.

I think we ended up having around 15 kids, it was total chaos and at one point I had no idea how many people were here because they were scattered all over. Some inside, some in the front yard, others out back.  I literally didn’t stop all day. Constantly moving and making sure that things were moving along. It was a huge effort, but it was absolutely worth it…

I’ve decided that dailymile really needs to add both ‘Birthday Parties’ and ‘Amusement Parks’ to their workout options. I am way more exhausted and sore today than I was after running 13.1 miles!?!!

hard at play

It was another day spent outside enjoying the weather.

We headed over to the park with friends.

Spent some time brushing up on soccer.

And no summer afternoon, spent hard at play, would be complete without a stop for ice cream…

After my husband got home tonight, I headed back out to take care of a million errands.  On the eve of this week’s long run I certainly have not been resting.  In fact, not only was I running around pretty much all day, but it’s already well past midnight and I’m still awake.  Apparently, I’m not in the least bit concerned about my energy level for tomorrow’s 13.1 mile run?!  This should be interesting.

photo walk

A few weeks ago, while I was perusing Pinterest, I came across a link for a Summer Activity Jar.  The idea is to fill the jar with fun things to do.  Each morning your child picks one piece of paper and whatever is written on it will be the activity of the day.  Holy Spontaneity! I loved this idea, so of course I stole it.

I decided to use popsicle/craft sticks instead. Most likely because for some strange reason we have a surplus of them in the house?! Oh, and I jazzed up the jar with some pinkness because my five year old’s happiness depends on being surrounded by PINK at all times.

Today she picked ‘Photo Walk’ and I was just as excited about the winning activity as she was.  Since before the baby arrived, I’ve been using my real camera far less than I used to.  In my defense, the arrival of my iphone earlier this year had a huge impact on it as well.  The quality cell camera on it and my love for Instagram definitely hasn’t sent me rushing back to lugging around my heavy dSLR. However, I have been missing the time I used to spend taking pics of randomness, playing around with various lenses and post-processing the best of the bunch in photoshop.

We headed out and surprisingly our photo walk lasted over two hours.  It was fantastic!  The weather was gorgeous and we took our time strolling around the neighborhood.  We always seem to be in a rush, so it was such a relaxing way to spend the afternoon.  We both took a million pictures (she was using an old point and shoot camera) and we definitely enjoyed exploring the woods together.

Update: I put some of my daughter’s photos from our walk into the below storyboard.  We have some of them printed out and they’re hanging in her room.  There were a ton to choose from, it was hard to narrow it down to just a few!!

something fierce

I’ve been doing considerably less updates on the baby than I thought I would.  I think there’s a lot of factors going in to that, but mainly it’s probably due to this being the second time around for me.  That’s NOT to say that I don’t find every single thing she does to be absolutely fabulous, because I do!!  It’s just that I’m not obsessing over milestones, timing and whether or not I have the biggest/brightest/most advanced baby in the world.

Obviously, I’m making sure that her development is moving along at a normal pace (it is), but mostly I’m just enjoying her!!  I love my girls somethin’ fierce!!  I don’t need to track her every soiled diaper, the date/timing of every move she makes nor compare her to all the other babies in the nearby vicinity.  Instead I’m practically smothering her with affection and attention. I’m trusting my own instincts and have faith that the loving environment she’s been welcomed into is all that she needs right now.

I’m also sitting back and loving the relationship that is developing between her and her big sister.  It is beyond gratifying.  My oldest has been in summer camp this week.  On the first day when she got home, her little sister was frantic to get into her arms!!  So very sweet…

summer happenings

We’ve had a full and relatively busy third week of summer vacation.  Our six month old has developed a love for park swings…

Our five-year old for kites…

There’s a wonderful, carefree feeling that comes along with watching a child fly a kite. She had such a fantastic time with it. A reminder that sometimes it’s the simplest things in life that bring great happiness!

Speaking of great happiness…we also made a stop at Cold Stone Creamery this week.  Unfortunately, very little of it looked gluten, dairy and soy free…

However, they do have Sinless Smoothies.  The sweetener they use adds a bit of an artificial flavor to it, but it was still pretty good.   It was nice to be able to order something, so that I could sit with my girls and enjoy a bit of a treat too.

Tonight my daughter has her last Girl Scouts outing…a pizza party and then off to Build A Bear.  I have about 200 patches that I should have sewed onto her uniform by now (with my limited ability), but I guess I enjoy the challenge of last-minute scrambling!