First Day of Kindergarten

 You guys knew it was coming....biggest news in the Dale household since Emma was born, Addison's first day of Kindergarten.


What a day! And, what a big girl. This was a much bigger deal for Mommy and Daddy than Addison. She acted like she had been going to Kindergarten for months! So proud of our confident little girl....and proud of Mommy for holding it together (until we got back to the car).


Without further delay...

Addison's First Day of Kindergarten in pictures.

Backpack? CHECK! Lunch? Check! 

Silver shoes I wish they had in mommy's size? CHECK!! She is one stylin' little lady.

And....she's off!

                                                                                                    

 Daddy, wait! I have to fix my hair! Poor guy, in this house he is ALWAYS waiting on a girl fixing their hair. Okay, she's ready. CHEESE!

                                         

This is it....

I really wanted to take more pictures inside the classroom, but I showed some real mommy-restraint by not. They were all so happy and calm, I decided to let them be without blinding them with a thousand flashes. 

While Addison was at school, Emma caught up on her emails and texted a couple friends....

The Functional 5

So....I am not sure what happened here. Last month I was strolling along with my blog and the next thing I know I haven't updated in weeks. I guess life gets in the way sometimes but I thank you for reading and I'M BACK! My welcome back gift to you...five things in my life that make everyday things just a little bit easier:


Harris Teeter EXPRESS LANE

I use this service frequently....every week. One afternoon I go online, order my groceries then a couple hours later I pull up to the store push the little buzzer and out come my groceries. The whole process including online ordering and pickup probably takes me 30 minutes. The best thing is that it saves my sanity from shopping with my girls. Love them, but do not love shopping with them. In fact, I am not sure Emma will never see the inside of a grocery store and I can avoid those annoying balloon situations we encountered with Addison. I understand it seems like a good idea to give the kids a sugar cookie in the front of the store so they can be hopped up on sugar and bouncing off the salad dressing aisle. And sure...give the kiddos something that is sure to fly into the sky as soon as you hit the parking lot and they will cry like they had that balloon since they day they were born. I understand this sounds like great customer service for parents....but please Harris Teeter, spare us the torment of the sugar high and agony of the loss of the piece of rubber in the parking lot.
Back to the point...
This is a pretty widely known service now (since I have made it my mission to tell all mom's about it) but I thought I would share. One other little fun fact, every purchase you have ever made with your VIC card will show up in your cart once you link your card online. So, if you are like me and buy the same stuff every week, you can just pull up your list and start checking away. OR, Harris Teeter will actually email you "last weeks list" and you can just order that with push of a button. All for $4.95 ($1.95 during the summer). Honestly HT, I would pay a heck of a lot more for this amazing service.


Keurig Coffee Maker


I never understood how some people love electronics, until now.
That amazing piece of equipment is my BFF in the mornings. It is simple to use and makes a darn good cup of coffee.



DVR


I don't watch anything in "real time" anymore. I have no idea what days/times any of the shows (see CSI above) I watch are on but I do know they happen during the week and are waiting for me when I have a spare minute to catch up on my crime scene drama, or really anything other than the Disney Channel or HUB. It's also great for kids. When it's time to turn off the TV and Addison is so upset that she won't see the end of her show and vows she will never forget and won't recover from this injustice, we record it for her to watch later. She then forgets almost immediately and I delete it but it saves us a lot of drama and whining for sure.
Pause, rewind and fast forward are a perk too.



Remote start and push button close on rear hatch


When you are in the market for a new car, these are a must. I use the remote start more in the summer than the winter due to our BRUTALLY hot weather. I start the car and by the time the kids hit their seats it's a cool 70 degrees in there.
I have a larger SUV and god bless the engineer at GMC that thought of adding a button to close the rear door on your key fob remote. Not like the old days (2 years ago) you used to have to use your muscle (and a little hop if you are 5'2 like me) to get that door down. It looked like I was spinning the big money wheel Price is Right. 



I constantly have my hands full and have no time for spinning the wheel anymore. I can push a button on my remote and it closes for me. Very handy.




My IPHONE...


Oh wait, I don't have one (take this as a hint, Chris). But, my hubby does and boy does he love to tell me about all the AMAZING features on it.
Like KEY RING. You scan all those annoying customer discount key tags into your phone and save the info there and put the tags in the trash. BRILLIANT. I hate clutter and love to be efficient, so that is right up my alley.

Hope you enjoyed the Functional 5 and learned a little something. Next post is about VEGAS BABY...and what I learned there.

Good Old Fashion Summertime Fun

Addison sure is fun these days. She loves playing with her Daddy. Wrestling, racing and water fights are on the top of her fun list...and she is TOUGH.

This is from this past Sunday afternoon. Chris definitely got a bad deal in this water fight.

Addison=never-ending water supply from hose.
VERSUS
Daddy= re-filling every other shot.

This is how it all started. An unattended hose, while Daddy prepared the water guns.

 She was relentless...

Daddy got some good shots in, but he was no match for Addison and the hose!

Addison won, hands down.

We can't leave little Emma out...she loves the pool. Loves to float on her back and attempt to jump in from the steps. Yes, the pool is exhausting for us.

Happy Summer!

Procrastination Station

I read an interesting article on procrastination the other day in REAL SIMPLE* magazine. I meant to read it a week or so ago but put it off....:).


Anyway, I am the absolute worst....full blown procrastinator. Lucky for me (and everyone else) I work well under pressure.

A couple things I took away from this article:

1. Do the worst thing first
Um, what if they all seem like the worst thing, then what?

2. Start your day over at 2pm
They say, assess what you have done already that and make an action plan for the last couple hours of your day to tackle the most critical tasks.
I am pretty sure this why babies/toddlers take an afternoon nap...they need to refresh before tackling those tedious tasks of the afternoon like pooping, crawling, crying and eating. I wonder what Emma's critical task for this afternoon is....ah, whining. Mystery solved. Way to tackle the most annoying thing first!

3. Create an audience
Simply, this keep you accountable. A friend of mine started a blog so he would be kept accountable to stay on track for weight loss. It worked...he is down 87 lbs!

4. Don't Interrupt Yourself
This is the most amazing thing ever. I have put this into practice and it works. I can be a bit ADD and try to do 4 tasks at once. Concentrating on one, putting phone on silent and ignoring distractions (like kids calling my name....jk). It works.

Finally, my favorite. Plan an UNPROCRASTINATION Day.
Put together a list of all the errands, tasks and basically anything you have been putting off for too long and do it all in one day. I put this into practice today. I call it a mini-unprocrastination day because I did all the tasks that have accumulated in a pile on my desk that "I will get to later-don't want to deal with now".
I feel like a weight has been lifted. That to-do stack is gone and only one task left for the day, file away that big stack of papers on upstairs desk. I hate filing...I should have done that first.

After reading that article I thought, "Great idea, I will do an UNPROCRASTINATION day every month". After my mini one, I am more realistic...one every quarter should suffice.

 If you want to read more, check out this great article:

http://www.realsimple.com/work-life/life-strategies/time-management/avoid-procrastination-00000000055282/index.html



What will you do on your UNPROCRASTINATION day?

The Fab Five

My first post of my favorite things....the FAB FIVE. This post snowballed quickly from researching 5 different things in all different interest to some online shopping...oops! Which leads me to #1 of the FAB FIVE....



It is part of the GAP, OLD NAVY, BANANA REPUBLIC brand, but is exclusively online and for good reason. It features designer duds of all styles, brands and price range. Most people think it is shoes and handbags only, but no, they have it ALL! I really cannot even imagine how they would do a store front due to the inventory they hold. My favorite thing about this website is trying designers brands I would have never been exposed to otherwise (Tinley Road) and have quickly become my faithful go-to's everytime I need something and don't have time to browse the whole site. Which brings me to #2 of the FAB FIVE (which can all be found on Piperlime):

Tinley Road (affordable and so fun). Here are a couple of my favorite pieces by them:






#3
Espadrilles (fun and functional for moms like me)

#4 Hive and Honey
They created these shoes that look amazing and were comfy for an entire night out  (even though they look like they would hurt after 5 min)

And check out this bracelet!



Finally, #5 of the FAB FIVE (I need a better name for this list because there will be many more....any ideas?)

The BEST thing about Piperlime?

I love some online shopping...and this was the #1 reason I gave piperlime a chance for a place in my coveted "favorites" of online shopping sites.
So, happy shopping and remember, when your hubby ask you if that dress hanging in the closet is new....you say, "I've had that for some time now". Some time now, being the subjective term here....for me, "some time now" may mean it just arrived this morning, which technically is some time.

Happy Mother's Day

At the dawn of Mother's Day (and I literally mean the break of dawn). I was greeted with "Mommy, Happy Mother's Day I am going to do everything for you today!" Pause..."Mommy, can you get me some breakfast?".  And so starts the Mother's Day. Before I was a mother I thought this was a day of pampering and relaxing for mom, but once a mother you know that relaxing and pampering are not part of the daily ritual. Making breakfast, lunch, potty breaks, changing diapers and soothing boo-boo's are more like it.
I realize now that no matter what day it is, it's always mother's day because as a mother, we are always on duty. The best present doesn't happen on Mother's Day neccesarily, it happen on any ordinary day when your children tell you what a great mom you are or when they do something (like using good manners or making a good decision) to let you know without saying anything at all, that you are a great mom.
To all the Mama's out there....
Happy Mother's Day (today and everyday)

Time Goes By

Addison is really growing up these days. It seems she has gone from a little toddler to a little lady in a blink of an eye. Today she told me she is going to marry her friend Holden when they are "adults". Apparently, he asked her to marry him today. *sigh*
How did she go from this....

To this....

So quickly?

So, in honor of her being 4 going on 14, let's take a trip down memory lane....

Side note....a shot of daddy after addison was born:

Parenting is exhausting....and he has been a daddy all of 1 day at this point!

Back to the memory lane....

6 months

1 Year Old

2 Years Old

3 Years Old

And now...

Love my sweet Addison Taylor. She is growing up (and I don't like it one bit) but I know no matter how old she gets (or acts) she will always be my little girl.