Morning Snuggles

I am not a bedtime cuddler, never have been never will be.  To put it bluntly, I hate cuddling in bed.  I like to stretch out and get comfortable and have no one touching me.  On the couch sure cuddling is awesome but in bed I need my space.

That changed somewhat once we had kids.  After our oldest was born and I was on my own during the night (breastfeeding) I quickly learned that having the baby right in bed with me was a million times simpler than having her sleep somewhere else.  Co-sleeping quickly became the norm for us. Our oldest slept with us until she was a week shy of 15 months when we weaned and moved her into her room all in the same week.  I was shocked at how easy the transition was.  Even though after I got pregnant a second time
 I vowed to never co-sleep again (the successful move out was probably our 3rd or 4th attempt at getting her out of our room) old habits die hard and our son quickly ended up in our bed as well.  He lasted until his first birthday when he night weaned and moved into his crib.  Our youngest was the about the same and moved out shortly after her first birthday.  Our room has felt empty without them, but I must admit, it's been amazing having my space back.

Shortly after our youngest moved into her room (which is shared with big sister) she got sick and things quickly spiraled downhill.  Baby would wake up crying not feeling well and big sister would wake up crying because it was noisy and she couldn't sleep.  It was a vicious cycle I didn't have the emotional patience to deal with so big sister ended up back in our room.  She has a twin mattress on our floor where she sleeps but recently she has started making her way into our bed in the early hours of the morning.  I forgot how much I loved these snuggles!!

One of the things I remember the most about my childhood is snuggling with my mom.  I remember in 8th grade when our beloved dog Elliott died I started having pretty bad anxiety.  It started one day around the time of his death when I was in my dad's office in the basement eating a twinkie.  I'm not sure what exactly happened but I think a portion of the plastic wrapper went down my throat as I inhaled to take a bite.  I didn't swallow it or even choke really, but I had that split second of panic where I thought the plastic was stuck in my throat and I wasn't able to breath.  After that I constantly felt like I couldn't breath and was always in a state of panic.  Thoughts of death consumed me.  I remember several nights being extremely anxious and just laying with my mom and her warm embrace being enough to calm me down.

I know my daughter isn't dealing with anxiety like this and I pray she never does, but her coming to snuggle with me started when she got a cold too and wanted some comfort.  It has now become a daily thing and I seriously love it.  It makes me so happy to know that I can provide for her the same loving comfort that my mom provided to me.  Up until this morning though I didn't realize how much I relied on her for comfort as well.  My husband made her promise she wouldn't come into our bed until after he left for work.  I found myself lying awake around 3:00 am feeling nauseous and the only thing I wanted was her in my arms.  It was impossible for me to fall back asleep.  I've noticed that I could lay awake half the night unable to sleep but as soon as she's all snuggled up next to me, it's so so easy to drift off.

I absolutely love this bond we have and with kindergarten just around the corner I often wonder how much longer this will last.  Soon enough she'll be a "big girl" and cuddling with mommy will be so uncool.  As it is, the younger two are not big on cuddling so I will cherish every cuddly moment I can get.

Kindergarten Jitters...Still

The first day of kindergarten is all too quickly creeping up on us.  We have just two weeks left until the first day of school and I am still nowhere near ready.  Over the past week, first day of school pictures have been flooding my facebook newsfeed and each time I see one my anxiety creeps just a little bit higher with the thought that soon enough, that will be us.  Cliche as it is, it really does seem like just yesterday I was in the hospital giving birth and now here we are, off to school.  Where have the past 5 years gone?!

I think one of the biggest (though certainly not the biggest) contributing factors to my anxiety is the lack of being able to plan.  School is two weeks away...TWO weeks, and we have yet to learn who her teacher is.  We don't know what bus she will ride or what time she needs to be at the bus stop.  I don't know if I'm allowed to pack peanut butter sandwiches in her lunch box.  I just feel so under prepared.  When it comes to mentally preparing for things, especially when it has to do with my kids, I like to have everything laid out for me.  Here, it simply isn't there.  I am hoping the assignments come this week so that we can start talking about her teacher and remembering his or her name and start getting excited.

Next week we have Kindergarten Orientation.  I am not sure what all that entails but I'm excited to go.  I know we get to meet the teacher and see the classroom.  It will be nice to hopefully meet some other parents and start making friends.  I went out on a limb a few weeks ago and sent a facebook message to a mom I saw on our schools facebook page.  She had commented on a post that she was sending her son to kindergarten and upon visiting her profile I saw that she has 3 young boys.  Perfect right?  Unfortunately she read my message but never did reply. :'(  Hopefully that isn't a foreshadowing of how our making school friends is going to go.  As far as I know, there are no other kindergartners in our neighborhood so I really do hope that we are both able to make some friends at school.

As far as us, all we have left to do is finish school supply shopping.  We've purchased 5 (FIVE!!!) pairs of new shoes.  I don't think she has ever owned that many pairs of shoes in one size in her life.  Plus she has 2 other pairs that we got earlier, but not specifically for school.  We've gone clothes shopping and gotten her an entire new wardrobe.  She picked out her first day of school dress all by herself (sort of)!  We have a backpack and lunch box.  I can't think of any other things that we need.

If you have a child that has already gone to kindergarten, what advice would you give to a mom that is sending her child to school for the first time?  Seriously, the first time.  We have done 3 summers of VBS (one week, 3 hours a day) but other than that, she has never done a school, class, camp or ANYTHING where we have been apart so this is going to be a huge huge huge adjustment for us both!

FunBites Challenge

Our Good Morning America FunBites bundle arrived just 2 DAYS after placing my order!  What amazing service!  We chose bundle B that included minions, squares, triangles, and hearts (in a different color than what we already have!).  Personally I think I'm most excited for the squares because of all the different things we will be able to build.  All three of mine are wanting to use the minions cutter first so I think we will try it out at lunch today.

Either tomorrow or Thursday we will do our big grocery store run for the week.  So, I'd like to take some requests.  Leave a comment with what you'd like to see us cut up or give us something to create!!  I will post each of the creations you suggest on our facebook page and then at the end, make a blog post to feature them all.

FunBites!

With kindergarten just around the corner for my oldest daughter one thing that is very daunting to me is packing a school lunch.  I've never really been a food planner and for breakfast and lunch it's usually just a spur of the moment decision as I'm getting ready to cook.  However I know for school I'm going to need to be more on the ball and most likely even prepare and pack her lunch the night before.  With social media as big as it is these days I can tell that some parents go ALL OUT with their kids lunches.  I'll be honest and say that with 2 other young kids at home my time is valuable and fancy lunches most likely aren't going to happen.  Or so I thought!  A few months ago I came across FunBites!  These food cutter sets make creating a fun lunch SO easy.  FunBites was nice enough to send me their pink hearts set to try out and we have absolutely loved it.

The cutter is a two piece set which is great since you don't have to fiddle with getting your cutouts out of the mold once you are done pressing them.  There is one open piece that has the openings to cut your designs and the second piece is all the shapes filled in so once you press it down, the cutouts easily pop out. Super easy!

What I love the most about FunBites is how versatile they are.  I have tried other brands of sandwich cutters before and they are just that...sandwich cutters.  FunBites, however, are made of a super hard plastic which allows it to cut more than just bread.  It can cut cheese, fruit, sandwiches thicker than a generic pb&g.  Seriously, this can get through anything!  To add to the versatility as you can see in the picture the heart cutout is made up of hearts, half circles, and triangles!  This allows for so much creativity when making your designs.  My kids loved building circles and castles.  The possibilities are endless.

Here are examples of strawberries, cheese, and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.  I tend to prefer using it to cut out fruits/veggies/cheese and other things that are either very thin or very hard.  I noticed with the peanut butter and jelly that the cutter is so strong that it almost squished the sandwich down to nothing.  The kids didn't seem to mind it though, so it's still a win for me!

Now here is the best part, FunBites are normally $9.99 each.  Today though FunBites has teamed up with Good Morning America and they have a deal that can't be beat!  If you visit THIS link there are 3 different sets of four FunBites for just $18!!  (Shipping for me was $5, not sure if it is different depending on region)  I'm excited to have so many options for making lunches this upcoming school year.

Also be on the lookout because this fall, FunBites is releasing a PAW PATROL cutout!!!  My son is going to be so excited to try them and I am too!