Girlymama

Sorry I haven’t written today! I’m selling gobbs and gobbs of toys at the Children’s Sale tonight, so I’ve been sorting through the kids clothes and pricing stuff like a mad woman. I have tons of stuff to sell and I have tons of shopping to do. Poor Gracie has only one summer dress. She wears a size 2, which Ellie only wore for about 3 weeks before she grew and suddenly everything was too small. So I went straight to size 3s. So I need major size 2 stuff, some size 5 stuff for Ellie. I’m also hoping for rainboots, a beach cabana, some Dora movies and a few outside toys – perhaps a small picnic table if I am really lucky.

This is one of my FAVORITE places to shop. A consignment sale in one of the wealthiest suburbs oh Philly. The majority of my kids clothes come from this sale, so I’m hoping to once again find some great stuff for super cheap! I’ll report later with my bargains. Hee hee.  Bargain shopping is my favorite sport 😉

Tonight Husband and I got to go on a date, as my mom is here for a quick visit. It was so fun! I love dating my husband. I wish we could do it more. Even if we’ve just had a argument or are totally annoyed with each other, we can go out on a date and come home completely crazy about each other once again. I love it. Even though we just spent a week together on vacation, we were… distant? Missing each other? Perhaps because we were with the kids every single second of every day. Even in the bathroom. (“What are you doing, Mommy?” “What does it look like I’m doing, Gracie?”) Even at night.
(If we let them share a bed, it was just giggles upon giggles with the occasional “She’s touching me!” thrown in for good measure. Ellie insisted on sleeping with Daddy and Gracie insisted on sleeping with me. I thought I was getting the better end of the deal, seeing as Grace is much smaller and is generally a much better sleeper then Ellie. But I was wrong. Grace sleeps sideways. I would move her during the night when I woke up with a foot in my ear, but she would move right back. Sideways. Oh well. It was heaven to get home and go to sleep alone in our own bed! And not to have anyone’s feet touching my face all night! Bliss! Too much family togetherness is not good for the family, I think. I ran away to Barnes & Noble to drink a coffee and read a magazine by myself last night when I realized I hadn’t been by myself in over a week.)

Anyway, we went out to this restaurant we’ve been wanting to hit. Its a place that I went frequently when I worked in the area, but haven’t been to in a long time. It was so good. SO. Good. I had grilled mahi mahi over a tropical salad (with pineapple, strawberries, nuts…) with mango vinaigrette dressing. I will be trying my best to copy this recipe, because it was one of the yummiest seafood dishes I have ever eaten. Ev-er. And I had a bing cherry martini. Which came in its own shaker. Which filled up my martini glass 2.5 times. Now that’s a $7 drink! We are sooo going back there!!

somehow my blogger password got changed or something, because I can no longer comment on blogger blogs. anyone have any ideas?

I resolved to absolutely, positively not eat any more Easter candy.

So what do I do? Bake cookies. Yeah. That will help. Way to avoid temptation there, girl.

Some thoughts that came to mind during our trip:

1. Deodorant. If you can afford tickets to Disney, you can afford deodorant. Period.

2. Just because you cuss at your kids, doesn’t mean everyone does. If you’re going to  swear at your family, please whisper those kind words lovingly in their ears so the rest of our kids don’t have to hear.

3. If you are over 30 – I don’t care how “young at heart” you think you are – you should not be wearing pigtails.

4. Everyone else paid just as much money as you did to get in. Everyone else waited in just as many lines. Of course its crowded. Its Disney! Deal with it.

5. The line at a children’s ride is not an appropriate place to make out. While you may see that as a fun way to pass the time, you are annoying the other people in line and causing their children to ask questions that their parents are not prepared to answer on short notice.

6. $3.00? For a freaking churro? Seriously?!?!

Our trip out to Disneyland was, in a word, magical. Wonderful. Amazing. We had so much fun. This was actually our first real family vacation. Husband and I traveled all over pre-kiddies. And since they were born, we’ve gone on vacation with family or friends, so this was our first time on our own. Our kids did great. I’m so proud of them. They loved the airplane, were barely jet-lagged, waited patiently in lines and didn’t whine or beg for treats.

We arrived on Tuesday night, at our hotel right across the street from Disneyland’s entrance. (The kids still had no clue.) The next morning we told the girls where we were going.* They clearly still did not understand where they were. They finally got really excited when we were standing in front of the castle. Then we started going on rides, and it was all over! They were so into it. We met 3 princesses, Belle, Sleeping Beauty and Mulan. Then we saw the parade. And Grace got her first glimpse of Cinderella. She was screaming, shrieking and shaking with joy. After the parade passed, Gracie looked at me and said, “Mommy! My dream came true!” Seriously.

The next morning we won a “Dream FastPass” which got us on all the FastPass rides with no wait. Then we won two free pictures from the Disney photographers. Then we left and spent most of that day with my grandma, who was thrilled to see us and to meet Gracie for the first time.

The next morning (Friday) we were there when the park opened. Walked right in. And for the next hour, we did not wait in a line. At. All. Walked right on every ride in Fantasyland within an hour. Incredible! Then we went and waited for the princesses. Again. And Mommy’s prayers were answered. Who was there? Jasmine. Snow White. And Cinderella. After Ellie rode her favorite ride again (the roller coaster!), we headed over to California Adventure. It was sort-of lame, but there weren’t any lines. And we saw a celebrity. And Ellie threw a fit when we told her she was too short to go in this ride. Girl is nuts. Takes after her parents. Best part? Running into Cinderella again!! We were so excited!
Husband left that night at 4pm to head over to the bachelor party. So the girls and I went back to Disneyland. By ourselves. (Yes, I know I have a problem.) They did great and we partied on our own for another 3 hours, just us girls.

Now I’m trying to convince my husband that we need to go back. He says, “Sure! In 5 or 6 years.” I say sooner. I’m working on it 😉 Because it was totally, totally all worth it. Just look at this picture. That did it for me!

*Italic links are to videos.

You can view the whole Disney photo album here.

And I also uploaded a bunch of videos of our trip, which you can view here.

Unpacking, jet lag and kids got the better of me today. I was finally able to sit down and just spent about an hour putting together this awesome album for ya’ll to view. (Because you probably don’t want to see all 700 pictures. Or maybe you do.) Then I accidentally deleted it. To avoid throwing this computer out the window, I will walk away and try again tomorrow.

Sorry.

But maybe this will help ease the pain….

We had a fantastic, wonderful vacation! I promise, promise, promise to post some Disney  pics and share my 1846738 magical memories tomorrow!

For a preview, click here.

Tomorrow we leave for vacation! California, here we come!

The girls are really excited to fly on an airplane. And to go to Uncle Rudy’s wedding. They have all sorts of plans for Uncle Rudy. Ellie even offered to give Uncle Rudy* one of her two blankies as a present. (Seriously! I hope you realize how special you are to her, Uncle Rudes!) Ellie is super super excited to be a Flower Girl. We’ll get lots of pictures of that, we promise! They keep asking me if they can look out the window of the plane and see clouds. Gracie keeps asking if she will be able to see Cinderella’s castle over the clouds, because of this webpage. Hilarious.

And I’m a tad bit excited for our stop by Disneyland. I have the girls’ princess dresses and other treats hidden in our luggage, to pull out when we tell them where they are going. We’ll try to get that on video, since it will probably be pretty entertaining. Something along the lines of: “EEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” in that high-pitched scream that only little girls can make.

We’re considering bringing the computer with us, and if we do, I can post pictures while we’re there. I’m having a hard time convincing Husband that the computer is “necessary” since our luggage is already weighing in at about 17 tons, including car seats. We seriously have a ridiculous amount of luggage: 3 suitcases, 2 car seats, stroller, 2 backpacks…. Somehow we need to get all of that and two little girls from the van to the airport. Now that would probably be a funny video.

*Uncle Rudy is Husband’s college buddy. Ellie has met him… maybe 5 times. But she just loves him. She’s a sweetheart like that. 🙂