For Young Parents...

...From an older parent, I guess...


The following is by Dianne Loomans:


If I had my child to raise all over again,

I'd finger-paint more, and point the finger less.

I would do less correcting and more connecting.

I'd take my eyes off my watch, and watch with my eyes.

I would care to know less, and know to care more.

I'd take more hikes and fly more kites.

I'd stop playing serious, and seriously play.

I would run through more fields and gaze at more stars.

I'd do more hugging and less tugging.

I'd build self-esteem first, and the new house later.

I would be firm less often, and affirm much more.

I'd teach less about the love of power,

and more about the power of love.

A Cinderella Flashback

It looks like Sleeping Beauty learned her makeup techniques from her big sis.  (If you missed yesterday's post, please see below for a laugh.)  Below is Cinderella at age two.

A Cherry Chapstick Incident:

And then there was a makeup incident:

 This was from some play makeup, I think.  Cinderella was two in both of those photos.

And another picture:

Today I am thankful for my ability to find a good bargain.  Also, because I forgot to add one thing I am thankful for at the end of my last post:  I am thankful for my mom and dad, who go above and beyond for me and my own little family.

Makeup Madness!

Yesterday I bought Sleeping Beauty a set of makeup brushes out of the dollar bin at Target.  She said she needed them for NEXT Halloween when she will be Belle.

I got them for her.  It was only a dollar.  No harm done.  She applied pretend make up all day yesterday and then I gave her a little bit of sparkly gold dust.  I used it on her for Halloween.  She loved it.  I dipped the brush in and gave her a teeny, tiny amount.

Today I had to run out and get her a refill prescription.  We have had colds, snotty noses and coughing.  Sleeping Beauty requires a nebulizer so I had to go pick up a refill of the Albuterol.  The King of the Crazies ran out to the car to stop me.

Him: "Did you give Sleeping Beauty makeup?"

Me: "No."

Him: "Well, she has some.  A LOT."

We race inside and she is in her room, *under the bed and cackling. 

 When she emerges I see she has a ton of the gold dust (or "Pixie Dust" as TinkerBell calls it) on her blush brush and it is EVERYWHERE.

 She continues to apply it all the while thinking she looks drop dead gorgeous.

 She has the entire container of it under bed.  Two lessons had to happen:


1. Don't take Mommy's makeup and use it without asking.
2. Never, ever, EVER apply makeup in the dark and especially not under a bed.


And I am also pretty sure she didn't mean to wear it on her sweater either...Hmmmm...

 :o)

*Side note: She has taken to hiding candy and batteries under her bed.  ?!

PuMpKiN TiMe

This is the last of the Halloween festivities posts.

Daddy helping Sleeping Beauty get started:

 Excited!  

 Sisters
(Love Sleeping Beauty's face here!)

I am not sure why Cinderella is atop her pumpkin.  Maybe waiting for it to turn into her carriage?!

We used these: The Kid's Fright Lights.  They are perfect for these two!

 Getting to work:

 Cinderella getting to work too!

These little pegs are great.  The King of the Crazies hollowed out the pumpkins and we helped them poke holes through the patterns and then we let them loose!  It is a great way to have pumpkins that the little kids can do!

Even the three year old can do it!

Her eyelashes are ridiculous!  :)

 Puppy friends:

CHEESE!

 Cinderella and her masterpiece (a big bat with little bats on the sides):

 Sleeping Beauty and her masterpiece (a scary face):

We had a great Halloween (month).  :o)

Sleeping Beauty says, "Jesus" and sometimes it sounds remarkably like "Cheez-Its."  And vice versa.  She was dancing and "spriting" about and singing about Cheez-Its the other night after her bath and then I realized she was singing about Jesus.  :)

I am thankful for my warm house.

Franken-Haunted Gingerbread Mansion

Before Halloween I let the girls make a Haunted Gingerbread Mansion.  To say that the entire experience was a big, disastrous mess, would be the understatement of the millennium.

Look at these two faces.  The mess they made was worth how happy it made them:

The candy decor:

This was the first year I left them completely to their own devices:

Her hands are closing in on the size of mine.  :o(  Mine weren't that big to begin with but it is still sad how fast they grow up.

Scary Princesses:

See the puddle of purple icing?!  And it is on Cinderella's face as if she was eating it.  Hmmm.

The front:

The back:

Yep, it's scary all right.

Yeah, it got busted before we even opened it.

Franken-rella!

Silly Sleeping Beauty

Rolling her eyes and having her Sleeping Beauty crown and the mask caught in her hair!   Silly bean!  She insisted upon the mask AND the crown!

Princess Franken-Furry Pants

Cinderella and the scarecrow dude she and her daddy made.  She added the brows and the 'stache.

I am thankful for fun times with my family.