Olivia's 2nd Birthday || Disney Re-cap

Wednesday, March 18, 2015

Happy Hump Day!! Today, I am back with a photo re-cap of Olivia's 2nd birthday at Disney world!! The little miss had such a great time! We saw just a few of her favorite things ;)!! Anyways scroll down to take a look!! 




Pink Birthday Donuts for breakfast just as the Birthday Girl requested!! 




We has lunch with all of the Disney Junior Characters and the little ones LOVED it!! It was totally worth it!! The characters even sang happy birthday to her!! It was soooo adorable!! 





We stopped at Epcot for a little Nemo riding and Aquarium scoping!! 





Gus asked the Disney police if he could try on her hat!! 


We met Frozone!! I still cant believe he took a picture with him all by himself...Olivia wanted nothing to have do with any superheros!! 



xoxo

Elda 


A letter to Olivia on her 2nd birthday

Tuesday, March 17, 2015

Our sweet, sassy girl turned 2, Saturday!! We celebrated big at Disney over the weekend and made her birthday as magical as we could!! I'll post pictures recapping our trip later but I wanted to share this letter I wrote her on her 2nd birthday!! 




My sweet Olivia, 

The day I met you, my dream came true. I had always dreamed of having a little girl! God couldn't have been more perfect! 

You have been stubborn since the day I met you. I have never met a more stubborn baby than you. But you don't give up trying to do something until you've mastered it. Your dad and I were shocked when you taught yourself how to ride your cousin's scooter in a couple hours, just a few months ago! 

This year you have grown into quite an independent toddler!  We got you off your bottle and now only drink from a sippy cup. You will rarely allow anyone to feed you or should I say help you with anything! 

You have enough personality for about 5 toddlers (which hasn't changed since you were born). And with all of that sassy personality you make us all laugh so much!

I love that you are girly!! You love handbags, make-up (You've gotten into mommy's one too many times) and your Mommy. We've become the best of friends...until you throw a temper tantrum at Target because I left the iPad at home. That's the only I can run errands with you ;)

Some of your favorite activities include coloring, playdoh, painting your nails and playing dress-up. You have recently learned how to jump so that is also pretty up there! You love your princesses and you loved meeting them this weekend!! You also love watching "Dowa" and Tangled these days. 

You share your things with other children so well and you and Gus are the best of friends!! I love seeing you guys play so well together! 

Your favorite foods are mandarin oranges, tomatoes, spaghetti, marshmallows and cheetos! 

I can't believe you're 2 and I can't wait to see what this year has in store for you!! 

We love you sweet girl!! Happy Birthday!! 

xoxo
Mommy




Potty Training 101

Monday, March 9, 2015

With Olivia's 2nd birthday approaching, it's time for us to start potty talk. She has been showing interest, surprisingly, since we were potty training Gus. But I restrained myself from potty training her as well because I didn't want to potty train two little ones at the same time. Now that she is two...it's time to get more serious with it. 
We had a bit of a tough time training Gus---It took us a little while but after a few months he finally got it and he only wears a pull-up at night to go to bed. I can't even remember the last time he had an accident. So I am calling that successful. :)

If your child in school even if it only part-time, ask his/her teacher if they help out with potty training. Many do give that support to parents. We formed a great school/home team with Gus' teacher and helped a lot. 



+Buy a toddler potty and have it around for them to get comfortable with :This was huge for us. Gus wouldn't even sit on the potty when we first bought it. I suggest buying a potty with something that attracts them. We bought Gus a cars potty and he loved it! 

+Buying Undies/ Panties : Take them to buy their first underwear or panties and let them pick them out. Make a huge deal about how much of a big boy/big girl deal undies/panties are! They love that! 

+Choose a weekend to kick off the training and let them run around in their new underwear/ panties and shirt at home:  Quite frankly, I think pull-ups completely defeat the purpose of potty training. The little ones get smart really fast and know they can just pee in the pull up. (at least that's what my experience was) I really only used pull-ups if we were somewhere public. 

+ Roll up all of your rugs and block off areas with carpet: You don't want to find yourself scrubbing down your carpets every time your toddler has an accident. 

+ Reward System: rewards or bribery tends to work great with toddlers. Encourage them to go to the bathroom in their new potty and reward them. Maybe a reward sticker chart would work for you? We rewarded with Dum Dum's. Gus would get a lollipop every time he went to the bathroom in the potty. (I may or may not use this tactic for everything ;))

Other reward ideas: 
stickers
M&M's 
skittles
gummy bears

+ Get some potty books, shows, games: I know Sesame Street has some good potty material. Here is a good Elmo Potty Game that Gus loved! 

+ Start regulating their liquid intake: Start out by trying to take them to the potty about 30 min after they've had something to drink. If nothing keep trying every 10-15 minutes. 

It's really quite simple. It just requires an extreme amount of patience and understanding. 

There will be accidents. Plenty of them. And you will be sanitizing your floors multiple times a day but just think about how wonderful it's going to be to not have a toddler in diapers!! yayyy! 

Let me know if you have questions or comments and if there is something different that worked for you I would love to hear about it!! 

Daylight Savings

Monday, March 9, 2015

We had a fantastic weekend of no plans. It was a nice go with the flow weekend It was probably for the better since the time changed. We did a lot laying around. Had a park playdate while daddy caught up on some work. Layed around some more. The kiddos got haircuts--this was Olivia's first haircut. She really didnt have enough hair for a hair cut before. poor girl. Facetimed with my in-laws since they are having a 3 month extended vaca in Italy. To say im jealous is an understatement. It looks like they are having a blast! 




Let me just say this...daylight savings you are a b. especially with kiddos. They woke up very tired yesterday. Refused to nap on a yucky rainy day. They had countless meltdowns. That's pretty much expected though with daylight savings and no nap. 

We took a little family trip to Party city to pickup some Sofia the first decor for our hotel room. I'm pretty sure I mentioned that were going to Disney this weekend for Olivia's 2nd birthday. We're excited! I'm sure she is too she just wont really get it til we get there. She's going to freak out when she meets Sofia and all of the princesses!


Olivia picked out these fab Sofia crowns!! 


How was your weekend?! 

xoxo

Elda 

I love a good sale.

Tuesday, March 3, 2015

It's no secret I have an obsession with baby and kids clothes....well so many places have such great deals going on right now...especially with Spring Break approaching...And even when Spring Break isn't approaching I rarely pay full price for Gus and Olivia's clothes because they grow so fast that it's almost not worth it. 

I just wanted to post a few of my faves that I couldn't not share...

Carter's is having a $5 tshirt sale...such a great deal for everyday wear / outside playtime. The sale is only today and tomorrow. 
 I love having separate outside play clothes for them!


Boys...



Gus is going through a "blue" phase...everything he wears, colors or uses has to be blue. ALWAYS. (I love 3 year olds) 
 So I will be buying every blue t-shirt they have in his size ;)

Girls...



And Zulily has the most adorable things right now...I LOVE Zulily for name brand things!!

This little store has the cutest things EVER!!!! So delicate and feminine...




You can find these HERE

I'll be posting a full Spring Fever Kids clothes post with my faves soon!! I just couldn't pass up these!! 

Hope you're having a fabulous Tuesday!!

xoxo

Elda 


Weekending

Monday, March 2, 2015

Happy Monday Friends!! How was your weekend?! 

Ours was sooo great!! We did all sorts of fun things!! One of the million things we did was head down to G's school carnival and it was a total hit. Well, for the most part. Gus loved it...Olivia was scared of everything. Here are a few pictures...




I love that last picture of my Gus with the little ones!! 

I took an unintentional blogging break last week as my hubby worked extra long hours. It was a little tough on me. I highly admire those women, whose husbands travel for work all the time. I don't know how they do it. 

I've been busy planning our Disney trip for Miss Olivia's 2nd birthday in a couple weeks! We are so excited!! The last time we went she was 6 months old so she doesn't remember anything from that trip. 

We've got a whole list of to-do plans for the weekend! I am certainly crossing my fingers that she loves everything and isn't terrified. After our little trip to a local carnival this weekend, i'm not so sure this is going to go as smooth as we are planning but we're hoping for the best. 

I cant believe she is turning two already.... She's really not a baby anymore and certainly doesn't have the size of one. I think her turning two and really not having much of a baby anymore is starting to give me baby fever again...uh oh. No worries...We're not planning on having another one anytime soon ;) 

oh yeah and happy March 1st!!! Spring is slowly approaching!! yay!! 


xoxo

Elda 

Proudly designed by Mlekoshi playground