Christmas

We had Christmas photos taken this year and I love how they turned out! I thought I would share a few of my favorites.

I sure love this little family of mine. I ordered Ben's shirt from a shop called Ezra + Eli on Instagram. I thought it was perfect for him! He was on vacation when we had these done, so he was taking a break from shaving. He wasn't thrilled about doing family photos again so we compromised and I told him he didn't have to shave if he would wear the shirt haha! Married life, right?

Ben has to work on Christmas this year so we actually did Christmas yesterday. Our kids don't know the difference yet, so we can get away with moving it to his day off. We had so much fun! The kids were a blast this year. I've never seen Allie so excited, she was too much fun! Austin was a little overwhelmed but he loved all of his new toys. I made an effort to spend the day enjoying time with the kids and playing with them, and not focusing on cleaning and everything else. Our house was a total disaster by the end of the day, but my heart was so full.

The best part about doing Christmas early, was I was able to take down the Christmas decorations today and work on getting my house back to normal. I don't know about you guys, but I start to feel like my house is too cluttered with all of the Christmas stuff.

 I hope you all have a Merry Christmas!

Our Preschool Room

The kids and I are starting a new preschool curriculum at home this week!

Since Allie will be 4 next month, I've been wanting to get her into preschool to prepare her for kindergarten. When I researched preschools in our area, I found they were way too expensive even though I only wanted her to go 2-3 days a week. One of the reasons I stay home is so we don't have to pay for daycare, I didn't want to spend almost the same amount on preschool. My husband finally said, you almost finished your teaching degree, why don't you just teach them at home?

So after searching around online, I came across this Letter of the Week home school curriculum from Confessions of a Home Schooler. It's pretty awesome and seems really easy to follow! I paid for it and was instantly emailed all of the files to download. I did have to print A LOT of stuff out, but it was pretty cheap to print all of the black and white documents at Staples and the color pages I printed at home. I also bought some self adhesive laminating sheets, although I may end up buying a laminator. (I'm only telling you all of this in case someone is interested, I definitely am not getting any sort of reimbursement for this, ha!)

I decided to turn our loft into a little preschool room. It was an extra living space before so we have a sectional in there and we also have our computer desk with our desktop computer. I just switched it around a little to make room for their school stuff. I have a few more things to add, but here it is so far. The kids love it!

I got the wall posters from the Dollar Tree and am planning to add a calendar above the weather sheets. I was shocked how much stuff they have at the Dollar Tree for preschoolers! I bought almost everything I needed for the curriculum there.

I will update on how this goes. I'm worried I won't be able to hold their attention as well at home, but hopefully they prove me wrong!

My First Post!

Before I start this new blogging journey, I'd like to introduce myself and tell you all a little about why I decided to do this.  

I'm a stay at home mom to two children, Allie and Austin. Allie is almost 4 and Austin is 2 1/2, they're 17 months apart. 

When they were babies, I was overwhelmed and exhausted and couldn't imagine taking on something like this. But now that they are getting more independent, I felt this would be a great way to share my life and connect with other moms and fellow law enforcement or military wives. I have so much I want to share, and I hope to encourage women going through a deployment or while their spouse is in the police academy. These were all rough times for me and it helped to lean on other women who could relate. I also plan to share my family's favorite recipes, diy projects, and tips on homeschooling preschoolers.

I look forward to this journey and hope to meet some amazing people along the way!