Happy Fall Y'all!

It is officially fall and I am SO excited for the holiday season this year!  As I mentioned in my previous post, we moved in June, so this will be the first year celebrating the holidays in our new home.  Isabella started preschool and, thank God, it has been a smooth start.  I prepared her for weeks by role playing (I pretend to be the child and she leaves me at school, etc.) and I can't begin to tell you how much this helped her.  I also made a photo book of her classroom prior to the school year and we looked at the pictures each night and talked about it.  Lastly, we read a bunch of books about starting school and being nervous. 

My absolute FAVORITE thing we did was our Kissing Hand necklaces.  We read The Kissing Hand and retold the story with our felt board a million times.  The night before her first day of school I gave her a special Kissing Hand necklace. 

It has her name on the back of her's and mine says Mommy on the back.  I purchased it from this wonderful Etsy seller HERE if you are interested.  Speaking of the night before her first day...we had our School Year's Eve party!

 Her Magic School Year's Eve pillowcase designed to bring her sweet dreams and take away her fears.  The racoon is Chester from The Kissing Hand :)

The Kissing Hand felt pieces.

 



Her first day of school was awesome!  There were tears when I left, but she did not cry long.  We had a blast in the moring!  She had heart-shaped waffle pops and got her Shultute.

 

She came home with a smile on her face and very proud of her first day certificate and coloring.

 She called Daddy and then Grandma :)

 She had a First Day of School lunch!

 And for dessert we celebrated with cookie-brownies and sparklers!

We have only had tears on two other occasions.  I am so proud of her!  Her time at preschool allows me to get some stuff done around the house or time to read my Bible and devotionals.  The best thing is that she has the opportunity to socialize with other children her age. 

School Year's Eve & First Day of School

It has been a while since I posted...we have moved into a new house and we mostly settled in now :) I can hardly believe it myself, but I resigned from my teaching position and I am officially a SAHM for the time being. Isabella is 39 months and we are going to give Preschool another try this year. She will go five days a week in the mornings from 8 to 10:45 am. I am VERY nervous! We tried Pre-K two days a week when she was two, but she cried and cried. My mother was watching her full time and could not handle watching her precious granddaughter cry and call for her...so Pre-K was short lived. The decision to enroll her now is primarily because she has no playmates her age and she really wants to play with other children. My main concern is that we are in a new home, she finally potty trained, and moved into a big girl bed over the short course of six weeks. I worry that all this change will cause her to just fall apart when school starts and she realizes Mommy can't stay at school with her. On a lighter, and much more festive note, I can't wait to have a School Year's Eve celebration again! Here are some pictures of what I did for her last Pre-K stint:

 What would any Back to School or First Day of School event be without the book The Kissing Hand by Audrey Penn!?!  They also have an adorable cookie cutter that makes a perfect cookie treat for during or after the story.  I also purchased the felt pieces for the story :)

 Our School Year's Eve dinner table.



Placemats I made at school...the perk of being a teacher myself ;)

 These are actual School Year's Eve pajamas!  Adorable (although costly for PJs) ~ you can buy them at Chasing Fireflies



She loved her hand cookies!

We had a blast that night!  The next morning was fun too, but I was really anxious.  We started with a her getting her very first Schultüte (German School Cone) and a  First Day of School breakfast:

This school cone is adorable!  We purchased it from KinderCone.

The First Day of School plate is a treasure we will use every year on the first day of school.  That was an Etsy purchase.  So was the First Day of School banner below.



Her First Day of PreSchool outfit!  Another Etsy purchase ;)

Bella with her cousin who was also starting Pre-K, but one year older.

We continued the celebration that evening after dinner with a cake that was baked in a loaf pan and inserted into her Littel Poeple bus.  We added pictures of her in the windows.  It came out so cute!





For now, I am going to try and focus on the excitement of a new schol year and push my nerves and fears aside.  Any advice for a mommy with a child starting Pre-K?



A Fruity Elmo Cake

I do my best to make every day a little special for our daughter, but when we have a holiday or an occasion I really go all out.  We took our daughter to see Elmo live and I made sure it was ELMO day!  She had an Elmo dress and Elmo purse too.  I also made an Elmo cake for when we came home.  Our Pickle doesn't really like sugary sweets like icing.  She does like cake and, in particular, she loves banana flavored cake.  So I baked a banana cake and instead of frosting I used fruit to make Elmo's face.  I was really happy with how it came out and she ate it up!

Our princess!

A Valentine Treat Bag Topper Freebie!

Valentine's Day is right around the corner!  I created this sweet little "Nuts About You" treat bag topper as my TREAT to YOU :)  I hope you love it!  I suggest filling your treat bag with...NUTS! 

For the BOY squirrel click HERE :)


For the GIRL squirrel click HERE :)

Groundhog Day!

I realize that few people truly celebrate Groundhog Day, but I absolutely LOVE it!  Did you know that Groundhog Day was actually Candlemas?  Candlemas is a Christian holiday which celebrates one of the earliest events in the life of Jesus Christ ~ his presentation at the Temple 40 days after his birth.  This was also the time that Mary was "ritual purification".  Jesus was presented to Simeon.  The significance of the presentation to Simeon in particular is that it was prophesied that Simeon would live to lay eyes on the Savior.  


In older times Candlemas was a day to have your candles blessed by the priest.  This is connected to the fact that Jesus is known as The Light of the World.  Candlemas was also a day that was to foretell the weather.  This is a traditional German poem about Candlemas Day:

If Candlemas be fair and bright,

Winter has another flight.

If Candlemas brings clouds and rain,

Winter will not come again.

The Germans used a hedgehog, but when they came to America, they had to settle for a groundhog.  So, what exactly should one do on Groundhog Day?  Well, first the day should be spent by candlelight!  Kids, especially, will have a ball with this, but who doesn't love to have dinner by candlelight?  Since it is still so dark in the morning, a candlelight breakfast is a must! Now, I have read about many connections between pancakes and Groundhog Day, but I have yet to understand exactly WHY pancakes are traditional on Candlemas/Groundhog Day.  But, since it is a celebration, why not go all out?  I found this post about Groundhog Pancakes that I thought was adorable:

Alison, the author of the AMAZING blog HowDoesShe has some great ideas too!  And how can I talk about Groundhog Day without mentioning Secrets of a Super Mommy's blog!?!  She does an awesome Silly Socks Valentine Day Advent/Countdown that includes lots of Groundhog Day fun!  They dined on the floor and ate a groundhog-shaped meatloaf!  

I decided that I would extend the fun to my students this year and made them Groundhog Grub treat bags filled with gummi worms.  I really like how they came out:

Last year, we planned on attending the Groundhog Day ceremony at the Staten Island Zoo to see what Staten Island Chuck's prediction would be, but we had a bad snowstorm!  So we didn't attend, but we did stay home and have fun anyway!  We cooked chocolate chip pancakes and I picked up a store-bought cake that I decorated with a groundhog statue that I have and buried him in graham crackers to make it look like he was coming out of the ground.  It came out cute!  And our daughter had a lot of fun too :)

I would love to hear about any fun things/traditions or ideas you have for Groundhog Day!

La Befana

Befana comes tonight!  This holiday really involves very little as far as preparation.  Befana comes and leaves a basket of goodies (and some small toys if you wish).  I made a broom bag with candy that I saw on Pinterest.  I also left a poem/letter from Befana.  Lastly, our daughter is getting three more animals to add to her Little People Zoo Talkers.  Here are some pictures:

 This is the broom bag filled with candy :)

 Close up of the poem...please note this is an original work protected by copyright :)

Have a blessed Feast of Epiphany!

Christmastide

Very few people celebrate what was originally the Christmas season of Christmastide.  This time was traditionally celebrated from December 25th through Epiphany on January 6th.  I always feel so sad when all the Christmas decorations come down and I really prefer using Christmastide to gradually take down the decorations.  As I blogged about earlier, our Christmas tree is transformed into a New Year's tree.  I decorate with clock faces and these adorable little ornies I purchased from Etsy last year:

I also purchased some silver glitter butterflies and snowflakes as well as purple icicles that were on clearance this year.  The tree topper was a party hat.  I thought it came out really nice this year!  


I have been using the Twelve Days of Christmas muffin tin that I made to teach our daughter twelve different names for Jesus.  I am always amazed by how much she absorbs.  I realize that she cannot fully grasp the magnitude of these names and their meanings, but I am laying the foundation for future teaching.  On the eve of Epiphany (January 5th) Befana will come as part of our Christmastide celebrations and in honor of our daughter's Italian heritage.  I have been reading the book Old Befana by Tomie dePaolo to her at night before bed and she loves to tell us all about Befana sweeping and flying and carrying her basket.  Befana will bring Bella a few small toys and some treats (oranges mainly.)  Epiphany is also the day we celebrate the arrival of the Three Kings/Magi to bearing gifts to honor Jesus.  I'd love to do a Kings' Cake this year, but it may have to be a Pillsbury version ;)




On Sunday we are going to a storytelling event that we attended last year as well.  It was a fantastic free <3 event hosted at Staten Island's Snug Harbor Cultural Center.  Last year was fun although our daughter was afraid to go anywhere near Befana (as I suspect she will be afraid this year as well.)  I hope it is the same woman though because she did a fabulous job!

Oh, before I forget...the one thing that I did not get to post a picture of for Noon Year's/New Year's was the Oreo cookie clock platter that I made.  Our daughter loved it!

Happy New Year!  I wish everyone a GREAT 2012 filled with fabulous memories!