Girl's Weekend!!!

Blogging, what's that?  Clearly I have been the world's worst blogger this year.  I'm trying really hard to get back in to posting updates, so for the 2 of you that still read here we go...

Last week I went away for my very first girl's weekend since becoming a Mommy!  That's right, in 3 years I have not been away with my girls at all.  It was much needed and much deserved if you ask me!

Myself and 4 of my wonderful friends decided to go away for a weekend in Myrtle Beach.  We're all 5 married to police officers and 4 of us are Mommy's so we were beyond ready for a vacation.  To say that we were excited is probably an understatement.  I mean on the drive down (at 9am) we were jamming out to old school Ja Rule, Ludacris, Usher and Boyz II Men ready to get our party on.  We were a little nervous about the weather since it kept changing from day to day, but we were blessed with sunny 72 degree weather.

We spent the entire weekend laying out by the pool (it was too cool on the beach), sipping on drinks, going out to eat, sleeping in, going out at night and shopping....it was WONDERFUL!!!

Easter Photo Dump

Randoms

I've really become such a slack blogger over the past few months. I can't think of anything too earth shattering that has happened since my last post.

We celebrated my Mom's birthday, which is on Valentine's Day. We had the family over to our house for dinner and just hung out. I love when everyone comes to our house, it's so much more relaxing. Peyton can run around and play and we're able to actually talk to people!

We also had a decent snow the other weekend. Only about an inch or so stuck, but boy did it snow hard for a few hours. The snow had lightened up by the time Peyton woke but we still had fun playing in it.

We had a date night scheduled the same weekend it snowed , so we ended up canceling. But the hubby surprised me last week by sending me a text that said he had made dinner reservations and picked a movie and it was all a surprise. We ended up going to an AMAZING French restaurant and then went to see Dark Skies. If you haven't seen that movie, I highly recommend going!!

Poor girl had a nasty cold all weekend, so we didn't make it to church. We spent time together and took it easy...it was much needed.

Bullying....Myself

Lately I've been beating myself up on a pretty regular basis and today my husband finally told me it's time to quit that crap.

It all started when we had Peyton's first dentist appointment about a week ago.  I expected her to cry or scream (which she did) but I wasn't mentally prepared for the dentist to tell me she has a cavity.  Yup, my almost 3 yr old already has a cavity.  I know she loves to brush her teeth, she lets me brush them 2-3 times a day and lets me floss her teeth.  I also know she did not hit the genetic jackpot in the teeth department from either side of the family.  So why did I immediately feel like a complete and total failure as a parent?  He told me we possibly caught it early enough to where we won't have to fill it, and we'll find out at her next appt in 6 months. 

Tantrums have been back on the rise in our house as well, which exhausts me to my very core.  If you've followed my blog for a while, you know my child is EXTREMELY strong willed and stubborn as hell.  In the long run these are qualities I'm going to be glad she has, but for now they're killing me.  I feel horrible when we go to friends houses and other children are playing well, then you see my kid with her hands on her hips yelling "NO" any time she's asked to do something.  Or when we physically have to drag her out while she kicks and screams.  Granted this doesn't happen every time...OK it only happened once, but even once feels like a million times.  Again, why am I beating myself up over this?  I KNOW every other 2-3 year old has tantrums and times when they're defiant, but I'm not witnessing it so I feel like I'm the horrible Mom with the unruly child. 

Which brings me to today.  My Mom called to tell me Peyton had an "incident" on the playground at preschool and her teacher sent a note home.  Break.my.heart!!!!  She may throw tantrums and have an attitude, but she's never hurt another child...until today.  Apparently she gave a kid a pretty nasty scratch.  We don't know what happened before, maybe it was self defense, but it doesn't matter. 

So it's just been a week of what feels like failure after failure.  After talking to my husband I decided I'm going to stop bullying myself because my daughter is acting like a normal almost 3 year old!  OK she has a small cavity....at least she has great hygiene and healthy eating habits.  OK she has crazy temper tantrums...at least she's loving and sweet the majority of the time.  OK she got a note sent home from preschool...we'll work with her and try to be sure it doesn't happen again. 

We, as parents, put too much blame on ourselves for things outside of our control...especially us Mom's.  We're not perfect, our kids aren't perfect and that's OK.  It's been a rough week emotionally for me, but I have  beautiful little girl that's incredibly smart, happy and healthy.  I need to count my blessings and stop wallowing in self pity! 
 

Dance Party

My almost-3-yr-old is a serious dancing machine.  Those of you that know her well know exactly what I mean, she was born to be a performer!  Our days are never lacking continuous singing and dancing.  Lately she's been big on us turning on a music channel on Direct TV and having a "dance party" in the living room. 

Monday after work I had to run some errands and came home to this....be still my heart!

Christmas Recap...Finally

I've been such a horrible blogger lately and, yes, I start every post with this same phrase!  The truth is, I don't give myself much time to update my blog anymore.  Running after my almost 3 year old takes most of my time and energy...throw in a full time job, run of the mill house chores, any amount of quality time I can get with the hubby and I rarely feel like writing about anything by the time 8pm rolls around (or 8:30 by the time Peyton has called me back in her room 20 times to do random things so she doesn't have to fall asleep). 

Either way, Christmas has come and gone...unfortunately so have my decorations :(  I was so sad to take them all down.  My house feels so boring now.  But we did have an amazing Christmas and I suppose it's finally time to post some pictures of my child being ridiculously spoiled!

Christmas Eve day my Dad came over and hooked Peyton up with everything "Tangled" that they make.  She acquired a new Rapunzel doll with color changing hair, a Rapunzel dress with a tiara and jewelry to go with it of course, Tangled paint book and a massive Disney princess sticker book since 5 stickers books are NEVER enough in our house...and I'm 100% serious about that, the kid has an obsession. 

Christmas Eve was the annual Killette Family Oyster Roast.  I didn't take any pictures that night, but we had a good time as always!  When we got home we put out the cookies we made for Santa and milk, after tasting them both to make sure they weren't bad.  Then we went outside and sprinkled our reindeer food in the grass.

Christmas morning we raced out (after making Peyton lay in our bed a good hour after she woke up) to see what Santa had brought.  Out of everything, our favorite gift was a beautiful piece of furniture my sweet husband MADE for her.  He built a wardrobe for her dress up clothes, shoes and accessories so they're not scattered randomly throughout the house and boy did he do it right.  He installed lighting and a mirror, it's pretty bad ass if I do say so myself!  We filled it with new stuff and put her old stuff in later. She loved it almost as much as we did...but not quite as much as her new Leap Pad, or "HER tablet" as she calls it.  Later my in-laws came over and I cooked breakfast and we had more gifts.  By this point my house looked like Disney Princess had vomited everywhere!

After a MUCH needed nap (sweet girl definitely got overwhelmed and over exhausted) we walked over to my Nana's house for one more round of presents and dinner.  She slept like a log Christmas night and Wednesday morning we went to Nonnie and Papa's for Christmas with them. 

Despite a few (highly anticipated) meltdown's it was a fantastic Christmas!

Another Catch Up!!!

I've been an absolute horrible blogger the past few weeks...well months really.  Same old excuse, life has been busy and when I get some free time I've preferred cuddling in my bed watching Christmas movies! 

Here are a few things we've done in the past 3 weeks...

1.  Had family pictures made!

2.  Went to the Holiday Express...rode the carousel and visited Santa (a success this year!)

  

3.  Peyton had her very first preschool Christmas program!

*I was soooo nervous about this (especially since she was fussing when I dropped her off) but she did AMAZING!  She loved being on the stage and sat through the entire performance without a hitch!

4.  Battled a nasty cold while cutting 3 of her 2 yr molars...very pitiful! 

5.  Just enjoyed time together and getting ready for Christmas!!!!