Monday, February 28, 2011

5th Birthday Day

Our morning started off pretty eventful, actually it was just a little after 12am when the sirens started going off. I had actually been watching the storms move across the two states and listening to all the warnings the Weather people kept giving us as Keree slept next to me. I decided since it was so dark outside to watch the storm through the bedroom window. Right as the storm was moving in, I saw the sky turn colors I had never seen before. First the sky turned a bright aqua-marine, then a bright red, that is when I scooped up my daughter and went to wake up my Mom. At first my Mom thought I was nuts but I pulled back the curtain and the sky was flashing bright red and it sounded like there was rocks being thrown at the windows. As we were running to the bathroom we heard the freight train sound. As we huddled in the bathroom, the house started to breathe, literally the ceiling tiles and walls lifted up, it did it several times. This honestly is the first storm that has ever scared me. I'm the type who usually loves to be in the thick of the storm, but this time I was just fine huddling in the bathroom. When the storm finally passed and we emerged, I honestly expected to see massive damage, trees down, damage to the roof, etc. There was nothing, no tree limbs down, no damage to the house, it was a miracle because all around us was damage of various degrees. Needless to say, Keree was restless the rest of the night. When we woke her up this morning with a wonderful rendition of Happy Birthday, she pulled the cover back over her head and begged for more sleep. Keree enjoyed some Crunch Berry cereal for breakfast. Then Keree put on her Birthday Girl shirt, which she has worn on her Birthday for her last 4 birthdays. The shirt started out being down past her knees and then this year it fits her perfectly. I'm a little sad that this is the last year she will be wearing this shirt but I guess I should be happy since it's a size 18mos. Before we left for school, I decided to take a few pictures. I also wanted to document the treats she brought to school, Blue and Yellow mini cupcakes, which Keree was so excited about because they are her favorite colors. Needless to say, there are more than 12 kids in Keree's class but she couldn't hold all of the containers. When we arrived at school, I was surprised when the Main Teacher actually wished Keree a Happy Birthday. I had taken the camera in because I wanted to take a picture of Keree making her Birthday crown but they were dragging their feet in getting it ready, so I ended up leaving without a picture. When I came to pick Keree up, she was so excited because they had lantern stickers and she put them on her crown. We headed home and while I worked on lunch, Keree got to open up her Birthday presents that she got in the mail and the few my Mom and I had tucked away. Keree's Great Grandma and YeYe sent her a new outfit, a lollipop shirt, some flowered tights and a white shrug. Next she opened up a card from her Great-Great Aunt F, inside was $10 and a bag of candy. Her next present was from her Godmother, I really wish I would have video taped her opening the present because she shrilled with excitement when she discovered that she got a "real camera" with Kai Lan on it. The last gift she got to open was from my Mom (aka Grandma) it was a clock of her very own. But the neatest thing we found was a Birthday card and what happens to be on front? Not only Rapunzel but also the number 5. How awesome is that. But what was even better, when you opened up the card it played a song. The lyrics are this "suddenly I see, standing here, it's all so clear, where I'm meant to be." Finally I had lunch finished, since it's Monday, I did a Birthday Muffin Tin. So I turned some cupcake liners inside out, I thought I had birthday themed ones but I couldn't find them, so I settled on the stripes. In the first cup, was a slice of cheese folded in half, I then cut out a salami cupcake and for the candle, I used a piece of licorice tie. The next cup is some cherry yogurt with small candy princess crowns. Keree was so excited about those princess crowns. The next cup is another piece of folded cheese and I cut out a 5 also out of salami. In the next row, the first cup is some pasta salad leftover from the weekend. The middle cup was two stonewheat crackers and then the final cup was the rest of the kiwi that didn't fit on the kabob. In the middle of the tin was a kiwi and marshmallow kabob. Keree didn't have a lot of time to eat but she did finish all of her kiwi, the kabob, and salami. She ate a good majority of the rest but honestly we ran out of time. We then headed out to my Mom's doctor's appointment. Luckily Keree fell asleep on the way there and took about a 1 1/2 hr nap plus the upside also was my Mom was only in the doctor's office for about 2 1/2 hrs. While my Mom was in the doctor's office and after Keree woke up, she was excited to play her new vtech game she got for her Birthday. It's rated for a 4yr-6yr old so I thought she would be challenged on the easy level but it was way to simple, so once I flipped it over to the difficult level it was a little better but honestly, she was breezing through it also. I'm thinking for next Christmas we are going to be looking for a more challenging learning game system. After my Mom was finished, I had to stop at HL for some supplies and then we had to head to Wallymart to get my Mom's prescription filled. Since my Mom wasn't feeling too hot, I told her and Keree to wait in the car and I would take care of it. While I waited the 15 minutes (ha, it turned out to be almost an hour) for the prescriptions, Keree and my Mom witnessed a lady hit the concrete pole the stop sign was on. When I finally got back to the car, that was the first thing Keree told me, she said it was scary and the lady kept going back and forth, back and forth and there was yellow paint up and down her car. Because Keree had cheerleading picture tonight, we had about 40 minutes before we had to be there. Since we didn't have enough time to really do anything, I let Keree pick a fast food restaurant for her birthday dinner. Not exactly what I had planned but it was that or nothing. So Keree picked McD's and got chicken nuggets and fries. Once we were at cheerleading, we changed Keree into her uniform. Tonight they were having team pics taken. It was a little disappointing that 2 girls didn't show up but for some reason that always seems to happen. Now my plan was to quickly have pictures taken and then leave, instead the Coach decided we should wait for the 2 girls who didn't show up, so we were there waiting for our entire practice. I was not happy but there was nothing we could do. When we were finally done and headed home, my Brother called to wish Keree a Happy Birthday and talk to her. They talked the entire way home (20 min) plus a good 10 minutes after we got home. This evening, we surprised Keree with a carrot cupcake, we sang Happy Birthday to her and then she got to blow out her candles. I asked her later if she remembered to make a wish, she said she did but couldn't tell me her wish. We also surprised her with some knock off dippin dots. She had seen them several times and wanted to try them, so what better time then a special occasion. Keree almost finished off the entire cup of cotton candy flavored dots. She ended her 5th Birthday by calling her Birthday Twin and wishing her a Happy Birthday and then talking with her Great-Grandma and YeYe. Right before bed, I asked Keree if she had a good Birthday, she just smiled. Happy 5th Birthday Baby Girl!

Happy 5th Birthday

5 years ago at 1:15am you were born into this world.
As I have done every year since your 1st Birthday,
this picture was taken at 1:15am.
Happy Birthday Sweet Girl!

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Tuesday

This morning, Keree was wide awake by 530a. So in an attempt to get a little more sleep, I flipped on cartoons. It lasted for a short time before she decided she was starving and needed food right now. Unfortunately Keree has been picking up some bad habits at school...especially demanding something or screeching when she doesn't get her way. She knows that I don't like the behavior and she has had time outs and lost privileges but it has only stopped when she's away from school for a period of time. It doesn't help that she sees these children acting that way at school and the school does nothing to correct or modify the situation. Now when the Substitute Teacher was there, we weren't having these problems because she didn't let the offending children get away with it but as soon as Main Teacher came back, those children are getting away with it and in some cases getting worse. What I am thankful for is I'm not the only parent who has noticed this with their child. Otherwise when I came to pick Keree up from school, there was no summary. Keree said that they ate crackers and played outside. More than likely that is probably all they did do. Since coming back from maternity leave, the Main Teacher doesn't want to do anything. As we were leaving, one of the boys who got sick and wasn't able to come, brought Keree her Birthday present. The Mom was super excited and couldn't wait for Keree to open it. Inside her present was a Barbie convertible. Keree thanked them and then asked me if she could open it right now. I told her, she had to wait till we got home. Once we got home, I took a few pictures outside of Keree in her new Rapunzel outfit that her Uncle got her for her birthday. We then headed inside and I let Keree fix her own lunch. She choose salami, square cheese and some applesauce. I then promised Keree that after her nap, she could open her new car. Once she got up, she had a blast putting all the stickers on her car. Because it only fits Barbies and we don't have any, but luckily she got her new Monster High dolls. So right now, Frankiestein is riding in style to the beach. I didn't feel like cooking tonight, so I ordered some pizza. We then spent the rest of the evening relaxing.

Monday, February 21, 2011

President's Day

This morning, we had to wake Keree up at 730a. From what we knew, they were suppose to have school today to make up a snow day but when we arrived, school was closed. The sad thing, I wasn't the only parent there with their child. So our next stop was suppose to be the bank, there was a huge fiasco over the weekend, they had to cancel our cards because they had been hacked. We were concentrating so much on the fact of everything that happened, that it didn't hit us until we were almost at the bank that it was also closed because of the holiday. We then ran to the store because we really needed a few groceries and Keree wanted to look around to see if she was going to spend anymore of her Birthday gift cards. I was surprised when Keree suddenly spotted a pair of fuzzy jaguar spotted blue pants, blue top and stuffed jaguar. She feel in love with the gift set plus it was on clearance, so that is what Keree decided to spend some of her money on. She looked for a new pair of shoes but didn't find any that she liked. Once we got home from the store, she wanted to change into her new clothes. All day, she kept coming up to us going feel my pants, they are so soft. Keree ended up taking a long nap and even though I had no intention of falling asleep, next think I knew Keree was waking me up. Before we knew it, it was time to leave for cheerleading. I honestly am over this league. Keree is not enjoying it as much as she did with OLPL which makes me sad. The girls on the squad are super cliquey and Keree is treated as the odd girl out even though they preach the whole togetherness and inclusion of the league. When we got home, I fixed Keree a Muffin tin dinner. Since it was Presidents day, I decided to try and go with a Americana theme. So I used baseball themed liners, which I turned inside out so you could see the pictures. I then decided on a Mickey Mouse theme because honestly when I lived overseas everyone equated the USA with Mickey Mouse, Hollywood & New York. So in the first cup is some cheddar Mickey Mouse shaped cheese. The second cup, I cut some hard salami into Mickey Mouse shaped heads. The third cup also contained some mozzarella shaped Mickey Mouse shaped heads. The next row starts with some cherry tomatoes, just because I had them in the fridge. The middle cup then was some cherry yogurt...I was thinking along the line of apple and cherry pie because that's pretty darn American. I needed something for the final cup, so I decided on one of Keree's favorites, green olives. We spent the rest of the evening watching documentaries on tv before finally heading to bed.

Saturday, February 19, 2011

The Birthday Party

This morning, Keree woke up super excited at 4:30am, yep you read that right, 4:30am because number one, her Uncle was home for the weekend and secondly, it was her Birthday party. We didn't know exactly what to expect because we had won her party over the Summer from a Martial Arts dojo. Basically the only thing we had to provide was the drinks and cake but of course we always go a little overboard. Because of the Dojo's schedule, we couldn't have it on her birthday weekend (her birthday is the 28th) because they had a competition. After loading the cars, our first stop was Cheerleading. I had really hoped Keree would nap for a short time on the way there since she had been up so early. She feel asleep for about 10 min but that was it. When we arrived, Keree was ready to cheer. Her Uncle enjoyed watching her and she really loved that he was there just for her. After the game was over, they passed out their stars. Keree was awarded her effort star today. We stopped for a quick lunch before heading over to the Dojo. We got there early but there was no use in heading home before we were allowed to set up. We started setting up at 230p, the Instructors were super helpful and very accommodating. They only had one table, so I was thankful that we had brought ours. After moving the tables to the nicer wall, we placed the table clothes on the tables. The table clothes were white with little pink and red hearts which we got on 90% valentine clearance. We then set up the Rapunzel tower we made with Keree as Rapunzel. On each side of it was the Cupcake cakes. In front of the cakes were 3 little bowls that housed the decorated kisses and a single bowl of spring colored tootsie rolls. On the left end of the table was some Vietnamese coconut cookies (in the bear jar), they are sort of like meringue. On the right end of the table was the basket of decorated water bottles, there was additional decorated water bottles in a box below the table and as it got depleted in the basket, we added more. In the front of the basket was two cupcake boxes, in the boxes were single servings of crystal light and Hawaiian punch to be mixed into the water. On the second table we set out all the gift bags for the guests and the Thank you candy bars. We were so pleased with ourselves when we finished with time to spare. We had planned on taking pictures of Keree by the table, with us, etc. But that plan was spoiled when guests started to arrive almost 25 minutes early. As guests arrived, the Instructors played games with the kids until we gave them the go ahead to begin the Instruction in Karate and Ju-Jitsu (which was about 15 minutes after the party start time). It was amazing to watch the focus and excitement on all the kids faces. They learned 6 key words (please, thank you, your welcome, yes sir, excuse me and I can't remember the last one). They then taught them the ready stance, which was to stand with their hands in a fist by their sides. They then showed them how to place their feet and hands to do a front punch. Finally, they taught them how to correctly high kick. It was so adorable watching all the kids try and to perform the tasks. A few of the kids that are high strung, we were amazed at their complete focus and concentration. After the instruction, we gathered almost all the kids over for a group photo. We were only missing one because he is super shy and the other little girl who is super shy is actually starting to run off in the picture. Otherwise I don't think it's too bad of a picture, most of the kids are looking and some are actually smiling. After the group picture, they gathered the kids around and sang Happy Birthday to Keree. Then as in tradition of their dojo, the Head Instructor walked into a back room and returned with a Samurai sword. He explained that Keree was going to get to cut her cake with the sword. Keree's eyes got super big because this sword was a good foot taller than her. The Head Instructor helped her hold the sword and they slowly made a cut into the cake. I love the pictures of her cutting because she has such determination and concentration. After cake cutting, luckily I had some extra help (thank you G) as we passed out the cupcakes, drinks and drink flavors. I was a little surprised by the parents lack of helping their children carry their cupcakes or mix up their drinks, so again the Instructors stepped in to help. While the children were finishing up their cupcakes, we let Keree start opening her presents. Usually the kids spend at least a 1/2 hr or more eating but they worked up quite an appetite because I swear they all inhaled their cupcakes in less than 5 minutes. Keree actually opened up her presents quite quickly also. She got a wide range of presents mostly Disney Princess related, I was a little shocked that she got nothing Tangled/Rapunzel related. She also got Monster High dolls, Squinkies and Zoobles. Once the presents were open, it was time to play games. The first game to play was spoon balls, basically you place a ball on a spoon and hope it doesn't fall off. Anytime their ball fell off the spoon, they had to start back at the beginning of the race. Keree did so well and she made it completely around the room at a pretty fast pace never once losing her ball off her spoon. After everyone made it around the room and claimed their prize (a piece of candy). It was time for Simon Says. They played 4 rounds of Simons Says and Keree never made it past the 4th or 5th Simon Says command. The final game they played was Duck, Duck, Goose. Some of the younger players weren't sure how to play so anytime they saw someone start running, they started running too. It was hilarious to say the least. After they were done playing, it was time for Keree to say Thank You and then we passed out the treat bags and candy bars. Keree gave most of her friends good-bye hugs, which are always sweet. After we packed up everything, it was then time to head out to eat with my Step-Mom P and her Mom S. We decided to go to O'Charley's because we knew their menu was reasonable and of course they have good bread. I know my Step-Mom wasn't too thrilled because we had my Mom join us but I really don't care. We ordered our food and then just enjoyed visiting together. Keree spent the majority of her time drawing in the menu activity book but after awhile she got hungry. She looked at us and goes "where's are food?". Usually she gets shrimp because she loves it but she surprised me this time by wanting chicken strips. Then after we were finished with dinner, they brought out a slice of turtle pie for Keree's birthday. We sang Happy Birthday to her and then she took a huge bite. She then passed it around and let everyone take one bite but she wasn't going to share any more than a bite. Once we were finished, we headed to our cars. My Step-Mom P didn't bring in Keree's presents, so we stood out in the windy cold and she opened them in the parking lot. Keree was excited because she got a Rapunzel lantern that lights up and plays music, which is fitting since all Rapunzel wants to do is see the mysterious lights on her birthday. My Step-Mom also gave Keree money to buy tickets to a baseball game. The sad thing, is she thought we could buy 3 or 4 tickets and instead, it will barely cover a child's ticket. We finally headed home and even though Keree was tired she didn't go to bed until almost 930p.

Friday, February 18, 2011

Sunny Friday

This morning Keree was up by 6a, which didn't surprise me. Between her getting within a few inches of my face trying to see if I would wake up and bouncing on the bed....I didn't get any extra sleep time. I've been trying to break the bouncing on the bed habit but it's hard since when she was little we actually encouraged her to jump to her hearts delight because it was good therapy. Thank goodness I did score the mini trampoline last year because Keree loves to jump! So after getting her some breakfast and getting dressed, we headed out to school. After dropping Keree off, we went and picked up the birthday cupcake cakes from Wallymart. I have to say I wasn't too impressed by their work, actually I was downright disappointed. I have always either made my own or only bought last years from Sam$. I've decided that next year we will probably be going back to Sam$ because I know their quality and work. And honestly, the reason why I've bought the last 2 years is because I'm not going to make cupcakes for 50-70 kids and adults. It's a personal preference because it's one less thing I have to worry about. After picking up the cakes, I headed home for a short time and ended up having to handle some business. Since I was stuck on the phone, my Mom ended up picking Keree up from school. When Keree and my Mom got home, I was still stuck on my call. Keree was antsy, so while I talked on the phone, we went outside and she rode her bike up and down the sidewalk. Once I was finally finished, we headed inside, where my Mom told me that she was bombarded with questions on what to get Keree for her birthday. I thought adding helpful hints on the back of the invitation on what Keree liked would help to head off the 100 questions that happened last year. My Mom said that actually quite a few Mom's also go, didn't you read the invitation she's likes anything Disney, games, workbooks, etc. I'm glad that most of the Mom's liked my idea of adding her likes onto the invitation. We spent the rest of the day making sure everything was done, packed and ready for the birthday party tomorrow. It's going to be a crazy day with Cheerleading, Party and then dinner out with my Step-Mom.