these days

I think I know the reason why Mickey Mouse Clubhouse is now listed as most popular on my Netflix now:
Perry. He is obsessed with it and we have given in to letting him watch it multiple times a day. I tell myself it is good speech practice because sometimes he will imitate the words and phrases. At least now that our Frozen dvd arrived Monday he has let us mix it up a little and will sometimes watch that instead. The boys never got away with watching this much TV.  I guess I've adopted the philosophy of that song that we've all heard thousands of times, "Let it go!" Perry sure has turned our parenting style all around. I've definitely learned not to judge anyone with their kids. Every child is so different so while some parenting principles do stay the same, some things you have to do differently, especially with a child with special needs. E and I have lots of conversations about which battles to fight with him, what to let go of, what things do we stop doing as a family or be ok with getting a babysitter just for him, and what do we, no matter how hard it is, make him do and trust that with experience and time it will get easier. We are learning so much.

Kyler asked Eric to play ping pong with him one day. So they did. On the kitchen table with plates as paddles.

Every once in a while these two sit down side by side and play (for like 2 min). Layla with her Barbie's and Perry with his cars. That is, until he decides it would be fun to pop Barbie's head off.

Eric went to the parent teacher conferences this year for Kyler and Kacin. They are both doing well in school. Hooray! And a big hooray that Eric went and got to be there for his two oldest boys.

We had a day off of school so we spent the day having an early lunch with E at work, going to Perry's therapy, and playing at our favorite park.

The view out of our front window is so pretty.

Layla's broken leg means no climbing into a bathtub. We wash her from a bowl of water. And have fun playing with her hair.

Alice in Wonderland Performance

I got to help backstage during the dress rehearsal and the first performance of Alice in Wonderland. I was impressed with how prepared these kids were. I had never read the entire script before and knew nothing about their props and which side they should enter from, but these kids had it all under control.

My crazy two of hearts

And three of hearts.

Getting stage makeup on.

I snuck into the boys dressing room to take a few pictures of what happens backstage. The secret to those good looks is all the time spent in front of the mirror, and yelling at your mom to go away and stop taking pictures.

 The group gathered together to hear from their director right before the Friday night performance. The music director led them in an energy circle.

  
There was so much excitement backstage during this first performance. The kids were thrilled to see familiar faces in the audience and anxious for their time on stage. Kacin was glowing about the big applause and Kyler was having so much fun he told us he is already looking forward to next year's play.

On Saturday we were in the audience and I loved watching my boys perform. They were confident and cute.

Their bios they wrote up on their own for the program and their pictures hanging in the foyer . . .

Motherhood Realized book

I volunteered to be a Power of Moms ambassador for powerofmoms.com, which also means I've been part of the team for their new book Motherhood Realized.  I signed up because I love the Power of Moms website and listening to their podcasts. I believe in what they do--celebrate motherhood and support moms as deliberate mothers. I really enjoyed reading their last book Deliberate Motherhood so I was excited to hear that they were publishing a new book. I received a free digital download of the book so I've been reading the book from my phone and my ipad over the last few weeks. I love it! Seriously. I can't wait to get my hands on the actual book (digital is great, but nothing compares to holding a book in your hands and turning pages and marking passages). The book is a compilation of short essays written by real mothers. It's easy to read, gets you thinking, and is very inspiring. I know it's a book I will pick up to read often as I go through my own journey of motherhood. 

Pre-order yours on March 24th to help the book get to the bestseller list.. :) 

our trip day 6 and 7 and 8, disneyland

Disneyland!

three days of 

magical memories

(in no order whatsoever)

the parade! Layla LOVED the parade especially.

Cars ride!

One night we were about to go onto Indiana Jones, but we were pulled aside for a private tour on the Jungle Cruise ride (Disney Magic! And don't worry we got right on Indiana Jones afterwards) . . .

so worn out at the end of the day . . .

tired kids relaxing in Mickey's house . . .

Now over to Minnie's place .. .

The last night we were there, we rode the rapids ride. over and over again. and over. We got pretty wet the first two times, and then some people gave us their garbage bags and ponchos for the next few rides around. :)

It was so wonderful spending three days at one of the happiest places on earth with cousins and uncles and aunts and sisters and grandma (though I can't lie a group of 12 is hard to keep together;) ). It was waaaay more crowded than we expected. Thank goodness for our "Perry Pass", as it was fondly called (disability pass) or there is no way we could've ridden anything with Perry, or without waiting for an hour. Perry loved all the rides once he got on them.

I can not believe that we did not get a picture of it, but Jacqui and Josh got us set up for dinner at the Blue Bayou (the restaurant at Pirates of the Caribbean) and even watched our kids so we could have a romantic dinner for two. It was so nice for Eric and I to just sit there and relax after going so hard and managing everyone. And I loved my lemonade. Like a lot. It was wonderful. The dinner was wonderful. And my company was the best.

Everyone was so tired at the end of three days, which I think at Disneyland equates to the fact that lots of fun was had. (but I still think that next time we go for four days because we still didn't get to do everything we wanted to!;) )