Narnia Party!

Our girls, hubby and I went to a wonderful birthday party for a 4 year old yesterday.......it was a Narnia party. The party mom had really fun and easy crafts. She had pre-cut several crown's from white card stock using decorative scissors and punched holes in the ends for tying ribbon and using that to tie the crowns on the kids heads.

Next she had all kinds of decorations for the kids to use to decorate their crowns and make them their own, and they had a blast doing so. Their were jewels, glitter glue, crayons and the word Queen or King typed out that you could glue on.

There was also swords the kids could decorate and then use to sword fight. Don't worry, they were only newspaper wrapped up and tapped so it was totally harmless and tons of fun.

After eating, the kids played "Pin the Crown on Prince Caspian" or whatever prince they hit and pass the treasure (present) to music from favorite kids show.

I must say, I was very impressed. I am known for throwing some pretty nice themed parties and "going over the top" as some of my friends say but this party was awesome. I particularly loved the sword idea and may have to use that as my craft in my next eZine (my electronic newsletter that comes out monthly. Email me and I can send you 1 copy so see if you like it, then you are free to sign up for it.)

It was also nice for me to sit back, eat and talk with other parents and not run the show.....that is always fun!

Take Care,
Rebecca from Becky's World 101

Sarah Is Growing Up FAST!

No matter how I try, I cannot figure out a way to slow Sarah down from growing up! And believe me, I have tried, or at least given it some good thought! But darn that little sweet 3 year old is achieving new things every day. She has master the pee-pee part of potty training and working on the second one. She can do it if she is in the mood, if not, in her pants she goes, UGH! She gets great joy from putting on her own socks and almost as much joy from putting on her own pull-ups and pants. She LOVES painting and crafting with glue........truly my daughter!

We put shelves in her room, organized her toys and cleaned up her bedroom. She loved it and said it was "bootiful" (beautiful)!

I love how excited she gets about regular things.
Next it's off to Katelynn's room!

Take Care,
Rebecca in Beckys World 101

CONGRATS KATIEBUG!

The principal at our daughter's school started a new thing for her school, Student Of The Week. She purchased trophies for each class and presents a student each Friday with the trophy. The teachers choose who will get it for that week and this was the first week and guess who got it.......that's right, my Katiebug! She feels pretty special since she is the first kid in her class. As soon as I get it out of my camera, I will add the picture of my Katiebug and her trophy. The student doesn't get to keep it but they get to display it for a whole week on their desk, then pass it to the next studen. The principal will actually come around each Friday and announce the Student of The Week for that week. Pretty impresive considering how much this wonderful principal has to do! She is one busy lady!

CONGRATS MY WONDERFUL KATIEBUG!

Take Care,
Rebecca in Becky's World 101

The Dentist and Our 7 Year Old!

Well we had to visit the dentist unexpectedly yesterday. I was playing with Katelynn and noticed her upper gum looked puffy and inflamed. When I looked closer and touched it, I could tell she had her permanent tooke coming in! Eeeeek! Her big girl tooth coming in and nowhere for it to go! So off to the dentist we went.

Ther verdict was either wiggle it out in the next day or so or have them pull it out and I didn't want to take a chance, so I chose to have the dentist pull it out. Now for those of you familiar with me and my daughter, you know I am terrified of the dentist and Katelynn is terrified of needles.........not a great combo for this particular situation!

All I can say is this dentist is a genious, magician and a Fairy Goddentist all rolled up in one! They had on a great video (yes, dentistry with a movie...yeah us) and use the rubbing stuff to numb her and then gave Katelynn some "Sleepy Juice" and all in all, Katelynn never even knew she had gotten a shot in her mouth! I explained to the dentist and her tech of Katie's fear of needles and they had no problem with it. The dentist has several techniques like wiggling the lip, talking to the child, etc. It was truly magical. Wow, a visit to the dentist magical.....now that is saying something special!!!

Take Care,
Rebecca in Beckys World 101

Unbelievable Halloween Treat!!!

The audacity of some people! I was going though my daughters Trick or Treat bags and I could not believe what I found......A Vote No On Prop 8! The sticker went on to read....It's Unfair and Wrong!

I was furious! How dare somebody have the audacity to put a political sticker in the trick or treat bags of little kids! It just floors me that 2 grown men think it's ok to shove their opinions on little kids or at least using the Trick or Treating of little kids to get the word out to their parents. Last time I checked, Trick or Treating was about kids dressing up and getting candy......not collecting stickers with political views. The dumbest thing about it, kids can't even vote and I bet it didn't help the issue because most parents probably didn't appreciate this act anymore then I and my husband did.

I hated that when our youngest daughter pulled out the sticker (she beat me to it), she got all excited and happily squealed, "I got a sticker!" and then she got unhappy when I had to take it away. She can't read (she is only 3) but I didn't want our 7 year old to see the sticker, she can read. (I didn't feel like getting into a discussion about prop 8.)

For those of you who don't know, Proposition 8 in California is about Same Sex Marriage. It was on a ballot in the past and was voted against, then 4 judges ignored the voters and legalized Same Sex Marriage. Many CA voters I think got extremely angry that our votes were ignored. Well anyway, no matter how you feel about Prop 8, I think most people would agree that putting any kind of political sticker (especially such a controversial issue) in a little kids Trick or Treat Bag is nothing short of tacky!!!!!!

Take Care,
Rebecca in Beckys World101

Children Naturally Love and Care

Wow, the natural ability for children to love and care is incredible and it's those little moments that make us smile!

Last night something happened and I got very sick to my stomach. I told my husband and the girls (my daughter's are 3 and 7) and went to lay down in our bedroom. It took a while but I did start to feel better and then I got a terrible headache.

The neatest things happened. though, last night, my daughters came in the room a few times to check on mommy and see how I was doing. This was very cool since they even interrupted their playing to do so!

This morning when my 3 year old called me (as she does every morning) to get her up and hold her. But this morning, when I went into her room to get her, the first thing out of my little darlings mouth was, "Your tummy ok mommy? You feeling better?" and she gently touched my tummy! WOW! How amazing that she would remember to ask mommy how she felt after a long night's sleep.

Makes you, as an adult, stop and wonder........We get so busy and wrapped up in what we are doing yet we probably still have these child like inherent abilities to be caring and loving, without stipulations. Where do they go?

When I grow up, I want to be just like my daughters!!!!!

Take Care,
Rebecca in Beckys World101

Alice In Wonderland

Tonight our whole family (me, hubby and 2 daughters) went to a play of Alice In Wonderland put on by a youth group. Our girls loved it and it was neat because it was their very first play. Our oldest, Katelynn is almost 7 and our youngest, Sarah is just 3. They were both captivated and I must say, for a local production and a youth production, it was quite great. "Alice" was fabulous as so was the King and Queen who really enjoyed saying "Off With Her Head"!

Some other very cool things were that our family were guests of some friends we knew that were running the box office so we got "Reserved" seats in the front row, awesome! The other very cool thing was they had the cast line up outside so we could get autographs in the back of our books. Sarah (and maybe even Katelynn) won't remember this special event the truly enjoyed but they will always have the book and autographs as physical evidence they were there.

Larry (my hubby) and I also truly enjoyed the play. It was awesome!

Take Care,
Rebecca in Beckys World101

Part-Time Single Parent, Full-Time Mom

Well the title says it all. I am a mom 24-7, 365 but I am also what mom's like me call a part-time single parent. And I don't know for sure but it sometimes seems like that is harder then a full-time single parent. Well at least one that shares custody like my friend. She has 50% custody of her 2 children and the custody arrangements are 1 week with her and 1 week with their dad. So at least she gets a weeks brake.

I am always with my girls and love it but it is challenging when my husband travels and then I am a single mom. I can't really complain though because we have it easy. My husband is no longer in the Navy (no chance of him going to Iraq or any other place I would freak out about) and he is usually not gone longer then 1 week at a time.

This trip seems to be a little more challenging, only because he has a few trips in a row and it all adds up. Especially for the girls. Katelynn cried when she found out daddy was only home for a couple of days and Sarah, well let's say when he leaves again things are going to be very unhappy around our household, at least for a while. As Katelynn put it, "I am only use to daddy being gone a few days or so, a few weeks seems like 90 years to me!"

Poor girls! Well we will see what some fun at the park and Mr. Chuck E. Cheese can do to help fix the boo-boos!

Talk to you all soon,
Rebecca in Beckys World101

Last Day Before School Starts

With the last day of Summer upon us and tomorrow being the first day of school for our oldest, I thought we would do a couple special things. I have taken over a local mom's group and changed it to be a playgroup. It was a group focused strictly on military mom's. I changed that too and opened it up to all Oxnard, Port Hueneme and Point Mugu mom's for the playgroup.

Since I did that, I scheduled a meetup today at the local McDonald's in Oxnard. The one on Saviers has an indoor play area that my girls seem to enjoy. We enjoyed a little lunch and the girls played for a little over an hour. Even though none of the playgroup members could make it, 2 of my friends and their kids made it and it was wonderful having "mommy time" while monitoring the kids in the play area. The neat thing is the play area is separated from the restaurant by glass windows and door with seating inside. What is even better, is there's a Starbuck's Coffee right next door.....YUM!

We were also going to go to the pool but plans changed, as they always do but the day was still fun. Tomorrow is another day!

If you are a local mom in the Ventura County area, feel free to check out our playgroup or even join. Visit www.meetup.com and the name of the group is the Oxnard, Port Hueneme and Point Mugu Playgroup.


Take Care,
Rebecca in Beckys World 101

Promises, Promises

When I started this blog I promised myself that I wouldn't let more then 2 days pass before I would blog. I even have a Blog Book to write my thoughts down. I often do this when I am holding our youngest at night for bedtime. My bright idea was to then take time and transfer all my thought into Word and then I could just copy and paste every few days.......Yeah, RIGHT!

As you can see by the date of this entry and my last, it's been a little longer then a few days. What's even worse, I have 2 blogs "in the works" saved here in my files, just haven't finished them yet. So much for "planning" ahead. LOL!

To make matters worse, lately things have been getting more and more hectic in our lives. Our oldest daughter, Katelynn has food allergies. The most challenging part is we don't exactly know what she is allergic to. All the test came back inconclusive and after a multitude of blood draws (5-6 within 1 year), a series of skin allergy tests and some various other tests, we (meaning the doctor, me and my hubby) decided it was time to give poor little Katelynn a break.

Recently, Katelynn has been getting stomach aches out of "nowhere" and then vomiting several times over the course of 2-3 hours to then later recover and seemingly be fine, until next time she does this. This past week, she did it twice within 4 days of each other. A painful thing to watch your child go through, to say the least. Especially difficult is knowing that you CAN'T make it better because you don't know what IT is and knowing full well that you little baby is going to have to go through another group of tests that most likely will include needles, which she is deathly afraid of.........UGH!!!!!!

Amidst all this "knowing" and seeing her go through this, all you can do as a parent is hold her tight, keep her hair out of her face, wipe her forhead and tell her it's going to be alright when you don't really have a darn clue IF it is going to be alright.......oh yeah, there is a whole lotta praying going on too!

You smile and tell her the bug will go away, that the doctor will help and we WILL find out what else is going on, while the whole time in the back of your mind is all the scary thought and terrible stories you have read, heard our been told about of little children being healthy one minute and sick the next and the parents of these children left to face terrible, unimaginable things like finding out their child has cancer!

That may sound over dramatic but it happened to some friends of ours and every time Katelynn goes through another bout of "problems" that little boy comes to the back of my mind. (The good thing is the little boy went into remission and is still alive and going strong today, 4 years later! YEAH!) Ok well enough yucky thoughts. It's time to go and work on some crafts for VBS (Vacation Bible School). That as well as the end of school is coming up and I am excited to have Katelynn home all day. Sarah LOVES when her big sissy is home. They miss each other terribly when Katie is at school and I love to see them two play together. I dearly hope these two will always be this close!

Take Care and See You Soon,
Rebecca in Beckys World 101

Having A Child After 40!

You know, I wonder if a women that is pregnant and in her twenties "does the math" to figure out how old she will be when her child graduates high school? Does a women in her early twenties every wonder if she will be around long enough to see her grandchildren or great-grandchildren, knowing that her children should be at least 20 (or older, hopefully) when they have their own children.



I did this when I was pregnant with our first child. It was sort of a sobering thought when I realized the age I will be when she graduates. Then we didn't have our second child until almost 4 years later. It has forced me to look at mine and my husband's health and how we live our lives. We haven't made very many changes but I am trying. Unfurtunatley we love our Starbucks coffee and it shows......on us! I also LOVE chocolate (almost as much as my family....LOL) and getting my hubby to eat healthy is like trying to pull teeth from an alligator!



But having children at an older age makes you look hard at what the long term consequences will be of how you eat, exercise (or lack of exercise) and generally take care of yourself today. We don't smoke, due drugs and I don't drink and Larry rarely drinks. So it's not that we live an unhealthy or destructive lifestyle, we just don't go out of our way to live a real healthy lifestyle.



We are starting to make changes though. We are walking much more often and have been spending quite a bit of time at the pool. I love that our oldest daughter is our little cheerleader and spurs me to get up and just do it which in turn makes me push Larry to get up and move also. You see, Larry and I's biggest fault is we are both work-a-holics. Before children we got ourselves into a habit of keeping each other on track of not over-doing the work stuff. However, as our family and financial need grew, our work-a-holic personalities came back into play.



The good thing is like I said, Katelynn and Sarah keep us in balance and they probably aren't even aware of how important their roles are to us. But it's funny, I can see my hubby and mine "always working" personality develop in our daughters. Which also makes you stop and think.....they won't want to sit on our laps forever, or dance in the front room with us to their favorite Cheetah, Hannah or Jonus Bros. song.



So what does this all mean? Our children grow up so fast and there will always be bills to pay. We as parents need to make sure we enjoy every possbile minute of their lives and keep good care of ourselves. Even people who become parents at a young age need to live their lives healthy. There is no gurantee that any of us will be here tomorrow either.



Take Care of yourself,

Rebecca in Beckys World 101



P.S. In case your are curious...I will be 55 when our oldest graduates and 59 when our youngest graduates. Larry will be 53 and 57 respectively.

Mother, Daughter and Friends Tea

What a special event my girls and I went to. We had a Mothers, Daughters and Friends Tea at our church today and me and my special little ladies went, along with my mother. It was wonderful having both my daughters and my mom enjoying this fun event together....just us girls!

My mom and I sat at a table I decorated while my daughters went back and forth between sitting a little at our table and a sittling a lot at the "little girls" table the was set up especially for the young ladies of the church. We even had the "teen" girls at a table where they could sip tea and chatter away, probably about boys.

My table was decorated in an old fashioned little girls tea party theme. I took a very old doll that use to be mine and dressed her in a dress that matched the dress my oldest was in (came with the dress.) Then I took my oldest daughters Butter Cookie Bear (from my Noah's Ark line) and my youngest daughters Pink Winter Dress Coat with Hat (also from Noah's) dressed Butter Cookie in it. Of course both the doll and Butter Cookie Bear had plenty of "bobbles" (a fancy word for jewelery) on to compliment their outfits! Last but not least, I added my youngest daughters Holiday Barbie doll. Both my girls have the Holiday Barbie Doll from the year they were born. Sarah's (my youngest) just happened to be dressed in a perfect matching outfit to my color theme....light and dark pink.

Both my daughter's were dressed in pink as well, of course. They had "bobbles" of their own on and fancy shoes to match. (Ya know the ones I mean.....the plastic flashy ones every little girl loves to wear!)

Well it's bedtime so I gotta go for now. I will post some pictures of the lovely and creative tables and some more pictures of my beautiful girls and mom. Unfortunatley, I may be in some of the pictures.....LOL!

For now, here is a picture we took at a station our organizers set up just for this occasion. You are looking at 3 generation of my family. If my grandmother had felt up to the event, we would of had 4 generations there. However grams is 95 years young and sometimes just don't feel like doing things, understanably so!

Take Care,
Rebecca in Beckys World 101