Thankful Thursday: Christmas Edition Week 1

It's officially the first Thankful Thursday of the holiday season! This week i'm thankful for:

~Being done with my Christmas shopping! Last night's trip to finish up the kids was the last of it. I'm hoping that this means i'll really be able to relax and enjoy the rest of the season without the stress of shopping hanging over my head.

~Christmas decorations. I love that my house is decorated (except for the tree.) Whenever I come home it makes me happy to see the twinkling lights and whimsical knick-knacks scattered throughout our apartment. 

~Target. They have the best Christmas section, full of fun foods, gifts, movies, and household accessories to help brighten the season. 

~Christmas books. Stephanie and I snuggle up every night and read at least 3 Christmas books. She seems as enchanted with them as I am. (Be on the lookout for a list of our recommended children's Christmas books coming soon!)

~Christmas music. I love hearing it on the radio and listening to Stephanie sing along. We've been listening to it for so long now that she knows most of the songs!

~Mocha-mint coffee. Dunkin Donuts puts their bags of ground mocha-mint coffee out every year at Christmastime and I love it. It's just slightly minty and mocha-y, not too sweet and just...amazing. I always think I should stock up now for the rest of the year, but then I think part of why I love it so much is that it isn't available all year. 

I hope you are all having a wonderful holiday season so far! Let me know what you're thankful for, and link up if you have a Thankful Thursday post of your own.

*Thanks to Joanna from Baby Gators Den for hosting Thankful Thursday each week!

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Holiday Traditions: Toy Shopping Night

Tonight Dan and I are going Christmas shopping for our kids. This is one of my favorite nights of the year, and one I look forward to for a long time!

It's been our tradition for the past three years to pick one night after Thanksgiving and head out together. We ask my parents to watch the kids, do our shopping, and go out to dinner. We started it for Stephanie's first Christmas, when she was 9 months old. We went to Toys R' Us with no plan and a monetary amount that we agreed we would spend. We loaded up our shopping cart, and looking back it makes me laugh. All that for a 9 month old! But it wasn't only Stephanie's first Christmas, it was our first Christmas as parents. We spoiled her and had a blast doing it. After shopping for hours we went to a Mexican restaurant and enjoyed a rare dinner out by ourselves.

Last year we did the same thing, but for both kids. We bought a little less because, in an effort to save money I had shopped early and gotten deals on some things. But we went together anyway, getting enough to reach our allotted amount of money for each child. (We also Elf-shop for Dan's Grandma. She gives us money and we pick out things for them, from her.)

This year is different. We're really budgeting and cutting back to save for a house, so I have done almost all of the shopping already. But Dan likes to be involved in the picking out of the toys, so I saved one present per child that he can choose tonight. He can also choose the Elf-shop toys. We're also going out to the same Mexican restaurant we always go to. Have to stick with tradition after all!

Christmas traditions like this fill me with so much joy and anticipation. It's fun to get a night out in the middle of all the holiday chaos, and I love that Dan wants to be involved in choosing gifts for our children. Also, lets face it-picking out toys for your kids is fun. There's nothing like wandering through a toy-store to bring you back to your own childhood for a few minutes.

How do you shop for your kids? Do you have a plan? Shop online? I love to hear the different ways people get their gifts.

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If you take your kids dress shopping...

I don't think I've mentioned it on here yet, but I'm going to BlogHer12 in NYC in less than two weeks! I couldn't be more thrilled for such an exciting opportunity to network, learn, and, ok, have a LOT of fun. I'm heading down with a group of my local blog friends, and rooming with two of them. (I think the road trip will be one of the best parts of the conference!) Since I've been steadily losing weight, and the conference is a week and a half away, I decided it was time to go dress shopping.

I'm happy to report that today I happened to find two dresses at Target that I love and that fit great. But it was quite an arduous process to get there. Starting with last week's trip to Marshalls. I thought for some reason that it would be a good idea to bring the children with me. HAHAHA.

If you bring your kids with you to Marshall's to dress shop, here is what could happen:

-Your 2 year old daughter might use the pile of dresses you're collecting in the shopping cart as a comfortable place to lie down. Which might pull them all off their hangers so you have no idea how many you have. It also might bunch them up and cause them to wrinkle.

-The same daughter might ask you 500 times what you're doing, why you're doing it, and when can she hold another dress.

-When you get to the dressing room, the attendant might not like it that you hold out a pile of bunched up dresses to show how many you're taking in.

-The same attendant might also direct you to a family-sized dressing room in the men's fitting section. Which is fine, since there are no men around, and it's away from anyone else trying anything on.

-The attendant may fail to mention that there is a huge rack of clothing blocking the way. She might give you the hairy eyeball as she watches you struggle to move it, while simultaneously pulling the shopping wagon and instructing your children to put their hands and heads in the cart! (For the 15th time.) (Oh, but don't think she'll actually help you. That would be silly.)

-Once you're safely inside the fitting room, your daughter might demand to be let out, climb onto the bench and jump off onto the hard floor. She might narrowly avoid slamming her head onto said floor.

-She might also take all the clothes you just stripped off and smear them around on the piles of dust in the corner of the dressing room floor.

-As you throw the dresses on, decide they don't look right, and toss them off again, you might slowly start to feel like you will never find anything that fits or looks nice. You probably won't have a lot of time to dwell on that though, because your daughter might slam the shopping cart, with her baby brother inside of it, into the glass mirror on the wall. You might hold your breath as you wait to see whether the mirror cracked. (Miraculously, it probably won't.)

-As you put your own (filthy from the floor) clothes back on, your daughter might throw a temper tantrum because she is having so much fun in the fitting room that she doesn't want to leave. Since it's a large, mostly empty room, her screams will echo loudly, which might cause your uber-sensitive baby to start crying.

-You might feel the start of a headache coming on.

-You might un-ceremoniously toss your daughter into the cart, and leave the room. Where you might be met with the same rack of clothing. You will probably say a lot of bad words in your head as you struggle to move it again.

-The delightful attendant might sigh loudly as you hand over the dresses (which you've put back on their hangers.) She might also demand you give her back the "number of clothes I took in" ticket. When you explain that she never gave you one, she might glare at you like you're some kind of ticket thief (because who wouldn't want a souvenir from their shopping trip?), sigh loudly again, and huff off in the opposite direction.

-You might make it out of the store in one piece.

-You will probably need a large glass of wine that night.

-You most likely will laugh as you look back on the day and think "well, at least it's a topic for a blog post!"

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Successful Grocery Shopping With A Toddler And Baby

A few weeks ago a friend of mine asked how I manage two little ones in the grocery store. After I talked her ear off for awhile, I realized this was something worth blogging about. Because taking two kids (especially a toddler and a baby) to the store is not easy!

When Joseph was a newborn, I never took both kids with me when I needed to shop. Dan was home for 6 weeks, so I either went by myself, sent him, or just took Stephanie. Even when he went back to work, it was another few weeks before I ventured out with both little ones. (One of us would grocery shop at night or we would all go together on the weekends.)

Once I decided it was time to bite the bullet and take them both out by myself, I found the Ergo Carrier to be a lifesaver. I plopped Joseph in that thing, put Stephanie in the front of the cart, and was able to shop no problem.

If Joseph was sleeping, I kept him in his car-seat and put it in the back of the cart, with Stephanie up front. (This method doesn't leave a lot of room for groceries, but I can't bring myself to put the car-seat up front. It just doesn't seem safe, and our Combi Car-seat doesn't have the right ridges to fit correctly up there anyway.) On trips where I did this, I would shop several times a week and only buy a few things at a time. I was able to squeeze some things next to the car-seat in back, and put others up front with Stephanie.

Now that Joseph is older, he sits up front and Stephanie sits in the back. (Dan lectured me for this, saying the carts say right on them "Do not let children ride in the back." But you know what? It's the easiest way to shop, and she is super well behaved back there. It works for us for now!) This allows me to do a big shopping at one time, which is so nice because I don't have to run to the store 3 or 4 times a week.

I'm lucky that my kids are both typically well behaved in the store. Some of the things I do to stave off tantrums include:

-Timing it right. I go in the morning when everyone is rested from the night and has a belly-full of breakfast. (Joseph typically snoozes on the way, so he's extra rested when we get there. That's the one benefit of living at least 15 minutes from the nearest grocery store.) If we don't make it there in the morning, we go after naps. The same rested principle applies.

-Snacks. When Stephanie was younger, she always had a snack-trap during grocery trips. Now, she enjoys getting a piece of cheese and/or turkey at the deli. I don't typically bring a snack from home in for her anymore, since she doesn't really need it. But I plan to bring one for Joseph as he gets older and isn't quite as amazed by the lights and people as he is now. (I firmly believe that Stephanie is well-behaved because I exposed her to stores when she was little. She's always been in that environment, and has learned how to behave while I shop. I'm hoping the same principle will apply to Joseph as he gets older.)

-As I mentioned above, Joseph has so many things to look at that he doesn't get bored. I also chat with him as I shop, which keeps him entertained.

-Stephanie loves to be my helper. I hand her items and she stacks them, groups them together, and sorts them. She also helps me put things on the conveyor belt when we're finished. She always chats with the cashiers and baggers, and often charms them so much that they give her a sticker.

-Once in awhile we use the big cars for Stephanie at the store. (The "beep-beep" cars as she calls them.) She does great staying in them, but they are SO difficult to maneuver! I'm always glad when there isn't one available for our use.

-On the occasions that Stephanie (or Joseph) does get cranky, I use distraction as a technique. I hand Joseph something from my purse to hold, or use his pacifier as a last resort. With Stephanie, I can typically just talk her out of it, by reminding her that if she has a tantrum she doesn't get to help me load the groceries onto the belt. She loves doing this job, so that reminder is usually enough to curb the crankies.

-Lastly, I make sure to praise both kids for a job well done. On the way home we talk about what a nice pleasant trip it was because everybody was happy and nobody had a tantrum. I know Joseph doesn't understand what I'm saying yet, but it's never to early to talk things through with them!

If you take two or more kids grocery shopping with you, feel free to share some tips and tricks that you find useful!

This picture is from Joseph's first time in the front of the shopping cart. I thought this double seater cart at BJs was a great option, until Joseph pulled Stephanie's hair, grabbed her hand and just generally annoyed her the entire time. We haven't repeated this option since ;) 

-

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Wordless(ish) Wednesday

Happy Wednesday everyone! Yesterday was a gross, rainy and dreary day. So of course it was also the day Dan took a personal day so we could go outlet shopping out-of-state. After the smallest of discussions, we decided to just bite the bullet and go. Even though it was cold and yucky we had a fun family day and even managed not to break our budget.

Ready for the rain!

Daddy and Stephanie walking through the outlets

Her favorite part of the trip was riding the car

 *Joseph came with us too. When we got home, I realized I didn't get any pictures of him. Oops.

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We Saw A Helicopter

Last weekend we took a trip to the mall. We let the kids meet the Easter Bunny, then we stopped for lunch at the food court and did a little shopping. By the time we were done, we were all tired and ready to head home.

I held Stephanie's hand as we hurried along on our way through the mall to the parking lot. At the very last "middle of the aisle" vendor booth there was a man flying a remote control helicopter. I briefly glanced at it, but barely registered that it was there. All of a sudden I heard "OH Mommy, LOOK!" Stephanie had completely stopped walking and was standing in awe, finger pointing at the helicopter, mouth open in amazement.

My first reaction was to tug her hand and irritably say "come on, it's late, we're tired, let's go!" But something made me stop just as the words started to form.

Instead, I knelt down next to her, looked up at the helicopter and said "Wow! Look at that helicopter flying in the air! That is so awesome!" And you know what? From that perspective it really was. It had lights all over it, and from the level of a two-year old it looked huge, and it was flying all on it's own! She had no idea there was a man with a remote controlling it, in her mind it was magical.

She shrieked delightedly as it swooped and dove, and her eyes sparked with awe. A minute later, the man landed it, and we moved along. It took less than 5 minutes to detour, but it made all the difference in the world. Stephanie felt validated because I took the time to see what she saw, and didn't brush it off as silly nonsense. Dan and I were relieved because we hadn't had to deal with a shrieking temper tantrum because I dragged her away before she had a chance to watch for a few minutes.

This simple moment made me feel warm and happy, and that feeling stayed with me for the rest of the day. It can be so easy to rush through life as an adult, and expect our children to just go along with us. We snap at them, we hurry them along, we have our minds fixed on where we're going instead of the journey we take to get there. But one of the most amazing qualities of children is their ability to see the small things. To them, the journey is the important part.

I would never have thought that a remote control helicopter was special or fascinating. In fact, I would never really have noticed it. But to a 2 year old, there has never been anything as magical as this piece of metal, covered in lights, soaring through the air. I think we can all benefit from taking a few minutes to seize these small moments, and view the world through the eyes of a child. You never know...you might just find a helicopter flying through the mall!

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Always With Me

I left my babies at home with Dan yesterday while I went outlet shopping with one of my dearest friends. I was gone for six hours, and it was the longest stretch of time I've been away from them since Joseph was born. Leaving them was harder than I expected, and I not so eloquently handled it by asking Dan about three million times whether he was sure he could handle them both. (Turns out he can...)

As I got in the car and pulled away, I felt like I was leaving part of me behind. (I know, dramatic, right?) I've left Stephanie before, and for some reason it has never been as hard as this. I think it might be because Joseph has been attached to me for the past 2.8 months, more so than his sister was. When she was born, Dan did the majority of the baby care for the first few weeks, since I had such a hard time with my recovery. And whenever we were around family, she was passed back and forth between everyone, leaving me to eat, drink a glass of wine, and just generally enjoy having two hands to myself. But now that Joseph has arrived, he is usually in my arms while other people play with and entertain Stephanie. So having empty arms for six hours was a new experience for me. I also found myself acutely missing my adorable little toddler, who has been my sidekick for almost two years now.

Every stoplight I hit, I heard Stephanie's voice in my head saying "Ride, Ride!" (She hates when the car stops.) On the way home in the dark, I noticed each and every house that still has it's Christmas lights up, and (in my head, although a few times I almost spoke out loud) I would say "Lights, Mommy's side!" During the actual shopping, which was supposed to be about buying for myself, I couldn't help but purchase more clothes for the little ones. In my defense, Gymboree had a fabulous sale, and I stocked up on stuff for both of them for next winter. In a surprising twist on the missing them front, I actually found myself being glad that they weren't with me when I saw all the mom's struggling with their strollers. Trying to get those monstrous metal things through store doors is a challenge. It was also amazing to be able to chat and browse without stopping every 5 seconds to say "put your feet/arms back in the stroller, here's your water that you just threw for the 3 millionth time, eat your snack, we're almost done, we'll keep moving in a minute..." You know, all the lovely things that you have to deal with while shopping with a toddler. And, I didn't have to worry about planning our trip around baby feedings, or stopping every five feet to pop a pacifier in the crying baby's mouth, or strapping him in the Ergo when he got sick of the stroller. What a luxury!

When I finally got home, the house was calm. Joseph was sleeping in Dan's arms, and Stephanie was at the table eating a snack. (Right before dinner, but whatever. It was late, and she gets cranky when she's hungry.)  The house was actually neater than when its me home with kids all day, and he had even managed to fold and put away a load of laundry. I was (and still am) extremely impressed with and proud of my wonderful husband for taking such good care of our little family while I went out and took some much needed time for myself. It was a fantastic reminder of the fact that my family is always with me wherever I go, and it's ok (and necessary) for us all to have some time apart. I'm looking forward to the next trip! Who wants to join me?

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Boring Dr's Visit

I had another OB visit today. It's down to once a week, which is exciting, except that today's visit ended up being verrrrrry boring.

My blood pressure was slightly elevated (probably due to the fact that I had had only two glasses of water all day, along with two cups of coffee). My weight was up by two pounds, which is kind of a lot, since it had only been a week since my last weigh-in. But again, the lack of water could have contributed to that. Baby's heartbeat was nice and strong, thank goodness. That's always my favorite part of the appointment, and makes the boring parts worth it. :) Other than that, there was really nothing to report. She didn't check me this time for dilation or effacement, so I have no idea if there's been any progression. But I'll be there again next week, so we'll see what happens.

In other news, I went shopping with my sister the other day. At the checkout counter, the woman asked me when I was due, and then asked how old Stephanie was. When I told her, she said "wow, you're going to have your hands full." I so badly wanted to respond with "Better full than empty!" but I just didn't quite have to guts to do it. I wish I could be so bold!

Then today at the grocery store, I was chatting with the cashier and bagger, and after everything was rung up, I handed the cashier my coupons, said "thank you" and started to walk away. She called me back saying "Ummm, this is the part where you pay me for the food..." Talk about embarrassing! Luckily we had been having a friendly conversation, so she said it in a joking way. But still. I was pretty mortified.

Ahhh, I need this baby to come soon so I can start to feel like a functioning human being again. (After I get through the months of sleep deprivation that is.)

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