The Three Year Old Christmas List

My-Oh-My! Little P will be turning three in a little over two months! Time has certainly flown by this past year, and she has become an actual child. She has definitely developed an imagination and a passion for play. I am so looking forward to the holiday season this year with P. I can't wait to watch her Oooo and Ahhh over all of her gifts.  After some research and some investigation these are my recommendations for safe bets for the two year olds on your Christmas list.

1. A Doll House

Even boys develop a nurturing side as this age. I've seen some great tree house doll houses for boys too. But my girl loves princesses and Peppa Pig. So we will focus on girls for this part of the post. Piper is getting this Peppa doll house from a family member this christmas, but I am tempted to get her the whole set. There is a school house, a train, and a car and mat set that looked like hours of playtime for my imaginative girl! Check them out here!

2. Puzzles and flashcards to help with letter and number development

P has been hard at work learning all of her letters. She is doing so well, but still struggles with retaining the information from day to day. She has most of the letters of her name down now! I want to continue to work on this, so any puzzle with letters or numbers or even flash cards is a good gift in my book. Piper is getting a talking Melissa and Doug Puzzle in both ABCs and numbers from Santa this year!

3. Doctor Kit

Last year I bought P a cheap doctor kit from Wal-Mart on a whim and she loved it. But I am thinking she would love this Doc McStuffins interactive set even more. It's got a sick Lamb that talks and interacts as you use the doctor tools to make him feel better. I think P would love this toy for sure! She is constantly doctoring me at home!

4. Play-Doh

My 3 year old loves to play play-doh. We have tons and tons of colors already. What we don't have a ton of is fun toys and shapes for the play-doh. So a play-doh set is always a crowd pleaser. I found this Minnie Play-doh set that P will be getting from her parents this year. 

5. Dress up Clothes

My little girl's imagination is through the roof these days. She loves to dress up and act out. Therefore, dress up dresses, shoes, tiaras, or play jewelry is always a good option for a gift for my three year old. I went out and bought an Ariel dress and headband set after Halloween for relatively inexpensive. My girl is going to love it! I am hoping to create a whole dress up corner in het play room after Christmas if she gets a few more outfits to cycle through.

6. Books and DVDs

Lastly, but certainly not least my little P loves to sit and go through books. We have so many that we probably need a more proper bookshelf to house them all. I am thinking that when she gets her "big bead" this summer, then we will buy a bookshelf for one wall, but until then we will just have to find a place for them all.

Lately, P has gotten to the point where she will set and watch an entire movie. Hallelujah! The time has come. Since we also go on lots of long car trips throughout the year--DVDs are an awesome present for P. We are slowly trying to build her library. Right now she has, Frozen. Dumbo, 101 Dalmations, The Little Mermaid, and Aladdin. We are always looking to expand this library!

My Disney Bag!

Now that I am a Disney Pro (I might be a little bit too cocky) I think I have a good Idea of what to keep in my Disney bag for a successful trip.

Here is a peek into my Disney bag.

1. Toys for lines--even though we never pulled out a single toy--we came prepared. All kids are different and you just never know when they might come in handy. What types of toys did I pack? glad you asked. I wen to the local dollar tree and stocked up on mini coloring books with stickers, and a mini magna-doodle (which P plays with at home more than it's regular sized counterpart). I also ordered a light up Elsa wand. I also included her favorite lovey and blanket. Not really toys, but there in case she gets upset.

2. Ponchos--It always rains in Florida. Our first trip we didn't get rained on at all, but our last trip it rained every day at the park. I would also suggest keeping an empty ziplock bag or two in your bag so that you can put your wet ponchos in that once the rain stops. You might also consider a stroller cover. We didn't have one, but it would have been nice. Instead we used an extra poncho to keep P's seat dry when we were in lines.

3. Food--My bad was bursting to the brim with food and snacks. I also recommend bringing a cooler. We kept ours in the small bin under our stroller. In it I put our sandwiches, P's applesauce, and plenty of drinks. As far as snacks this was my list:

1. A ziplock bag of cheerios, goldfish, and chips each
2. A large ziplock filled with packs of peanut butter crackers, fruit snacks, rice krispie treats, and cookies.
3. A ziplock bag full of Dum Dums suckers in case of tantrums. We didn't have to use them, but I saw this on our last trip from another mom and thought it was brilliant. Her kid started to scream and she whipped one of those suckers out so fast. The kid was instantly silent. So smart!

4. Sunscreen, Sunglasses, and chapstick--DUH!

5. Bandaids--we actually needed one at the park. You can go to first aid, but who wants to waste time with that?

6. Hand Sanitizer and Santizing Wipes!--every time that P touched anything or rode a ride--we were constantly santizing her hands to prevent illness. Looks like we did a good job!

7. I pad or tablet--this we used for breaks and lunchtime for P. It was a great way for her to unwind while Mommy and Daddy rode Space Mountain!

8. Mister fan--I actually forgot ours on this trip, but I will definitely remember it next time! I noticed it was gone. It's great to keep your little complainer cool on those hot afternoons.

9. A spare change of clothes or two in separate gallon ziplock bags. Just in case your little one has accidents. Our girl was not completely potty trained, so we did this. However, I ended up putting her in a pull up each day. She kept it dry too! I didn't trust her.

10. Hair ties--can't leave home without these

11. Minnie ears and bow! I made my own for P instead of buying them there. So much cheaper. I'll do a post on those eventually.

That's about it. I really do think being organized like this has made us prepared for whatever comes our way!

What was in your Disney bag?

The Happiest Trip on Earth

That's right, this post is going to be about our second trip to Disney with a two year old.

It never ceases to amaze me how much my child changes from week to week, and even daily. The last time we went to Disney, she was 27 months old. This time she was 32 months old. While, you might not think it would make much of a difference. The whole time I was walking around the parks--I was remembering all of the baby things we still had at the last visit that we no longer are using.

The last time we were at Disney, P carried her Paci, Bunny, and Blanket into each park every day. AND she was in diapers! She was also still sleeping in a crib at home and a Pack N Play while were were in Orlando. This trip we were sans Paci and she slept in a Queen sized bed all by herself. She did ask for Bunny once or twice, but really didn't care much once we bought her a Flounder. The whole trip, if nothing else, reminded me of just how grown up my child is becoming.

During this trip she had not only matured in the the physical sense like above, but also emotionally and psychologically. On the last trip she was terrified by many of the rides, and was unable to understand that the rides could not hurt her, and that they were not scary--no matter how many times I reassured her. This time--she totally got it. She was able to go through all of the rides for kids her age. She even rode her first roller coaster! The Barnstormer.

She has also become a pro at waiting in lines. Granted, we didn't try any that were longer than 30 minutes, but she did excellent in every line we took her in.

Just like last time--she loves meeting the characters. This is why we enjoy taking her too. There is nothing like seeing your child meet Mickey. She actually believes that she met the Mickey that she watches every afternoon on Micky Mouse Clubhouse. It is real to her...the magic is real. I always get a lump in my throat watching her give Mickey and Minnie hugs and kisses. I am so thankful that I was able to take her to Disney while she is young enough to still believe in it all.

Last time we went to Disney I wrote a post about how we survived. So I thought that I would add some updates!

1. Get there 30 minutes early
I still stand by this. You want to be driving in the park (particularly Magic Kingdom) 30 minutes before it opens. This is because it takes you a ridiculous amount of time to park, ride the tram to the gates, take the monorail or ferry to the park entrance, and then go through security. The first two hours that the park is open are the shortest the rides will be all day long. You want to take advantage of that!

2. Bring in your own food
I stand by this one as well. We did not eat lunch in the park on most days. It is just too expensive. P wont eat much anyway outside of PB&J, so there is just no point. J and I packed a sandwich for each of us and plenty of different types of snacks. I mean snack overkill--just in case. It saves so much money. We did however, spring for ice cream each day. It was a welcome break that we all needed.

3. Take small breaks
This time we did not take P back for a nap mid-day. I was terrified of her missing her nap. I was sure that she would become really cranky. BUT she was fine. Yeah, I know--I always doubt her. Instead of a nap we gave P lots of mini breaks here and there. We took a long lunch each day. We would take breaks here and there where she would just sit in the shade and watch the Ipad while mommy and daddy got to ride something they wanted to ride. Then we would have our ice cream break each late afternoon.

Overall, I really think skipping the nap allowed P much more time to enjoy the park without the hassle of trying to get out of the park, eat lunch, and take a nap. Instead we went strong from 9-5 and even 9-7 the last day (although I do think that was definitely overkill for her).

4. Be flexible
This is a huge one. Since the lines were short (September is a great time to go to Disney!) we really let P lead our time at the park. If she wanted to ride something multiple times--we let her do it. There were times we bribed her away from something with ice cream or food. For the most part, we did what she wanted to do. We even pushed her to try things that I was sure she would be scared of. Turns out, she loved Pirates of the Caribbean. Who would have thought? I still stayed away from the Philharmagic--April's experience scarred me from that one.

Heading to Disney? Hit me up for more details.
Caroline

How I Survived Disney With My 2 Year Old

Hello Lovlies!

I know, I know, I have been gone a long time. I know. I am sucking at this whole blogging thing lately. I mostly only write when I am inspired to share something that happened in my life. Over the last 6 weeks I have been planning a disney vacation for my family. We are now back from the happiest place on earth, and I want to share with you all how I survived with my two year old.

First of all, let me say that this is not really a how to post. Since all kids are different, and there were definitely moments that I could have planned out better. More than anything this is just a play by play of what worked for my 2 year old and our family. In the hopes that it might help you.

So... here it goes. 5 things about Disney with my 2 year old

1. I learned so much about my child.

Holy bananas! She was so much better than I expected her to be in so many ways. She was also different than I expected her to be in many ways as well. Overall, it was a great trip, but she was definitely surprising overall. My child HATED taking pictures with Santa. In fact, she refused to take photos with him. So I was very fearful that she would react the same way to all of the disney characters. Boy, was I wrong. SO WRONG! This was by and large the best part of our trip. She loved the characters the most. She would wait patiently to see Mickey and Minnie. In fact she met them at every park that we went to. She met them three times. That was about the only thing that she wanted to do. I think that this is mostly due to the fact that she was prepared and comfortable with each of the characters we met. I showed her lots of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and she loved Frozen and has a Belle Lego Figurine. She knew them. They were real to her. Which was the whole reason I wanted to take her. To see that was a once in a lifetime thing.

I thought that she would love rides like Dumbo and Triceratop Spin. Again, a big WRONG! While she did pretty well on Dumbo. She was constantly saying, "I'm done." By the end of the week she was saying firmly, "NO MORE RIDES, MOMMY." Eventhough this hurt my feelings a bit--ultimately I still felt that it was a good trip overall. If I had it all to do all over again. I would show her videos off of YouTube of each ride I plan on taking her on. I have read since our trip that this fact really helps!

2. It doesn't take much to scare permanently scar a 2 year old!

Before our trip a read a lot of posts on other blogs about rides that were best for 2 year olds. I read about rides that might be scary, and I avoided those. However, my child was scared of even the tamest rides. I made the rookie mistake of thinking that a 4-d show like Mickey's Philharmagic was a good idea. (SO STUPID) Like any toddler would be ok with have water thrown in their face in the dark, and having pictures jump out in their face. I wish with everything I have that I didn't take her in that theater. I truly believe she would have been open to more rides if that hadn't been the third thing I took her to on the very first day. The rest of the trip she didn't trust me when I said, "no scary."

3. Three days with a two year old is more than enough

I signed us up for 4 days, and by the end of the third day it was clear that P could not take much more. On our last day, we only brought her in for the last two hours we were at the park. That was fine because she was free. I will tell you though, I secretly was done too after three days. I didn't want to go back for the 4th day, but I was NOT free. So I had to go. It is a lot for the littles. The stimulation they receive there is unlike any other. AND the great thing about Disney is that they will always prorate another day for you. Next time I will book 3 days, and add on a 4th if she seems like she can take it. Same price, but you aren't married to it.

4. Take the big stroller if you dare!

At first, I was just going to bring a very lightweight umbrella stroller to the park. At the eleventh hour, I changed my mind and brought both the lightweight umbrella, and our gigantic jogging stroller. Both were used, and both served great purpose, and both were not without their downsides.
Here are the pros of each:

Umbrella--lightweight, easy to take on the tram and monorail, each to maneuver.
Jogging--reclines, has canopy, has cupholders, has storage

You can see my dilemma. what ended up happening was that we usually took the jogging in the morning because it was the longer stretch at the park and brought the umbrella back in the afternoon after nap. The jogging stroller did not fit on the trams and was hard to maneuver on the monorail even. So I was mostly walking to the park from the car and back with it. Which is fine until you have walked 20,000 steps in one day. That is not an exaggeration either! I didn't want to buy a mid-weight umbrella stroller just for Disney, but I probably should have.

5. Stay in a Disney Resort if you can

We did not stay in a Disney Resort. My mom has a timeshare and traded it. So technically we paid very little to stay in Orlando. The problem was we were about 6-8 miles away from the parks. This may not seem like much, but it became a 45 minute to 1 hour ordeal every time we went or came home. I have a 2 year old who loves to nap, and who becomes a devil without sleep.  AND she will no sleep anywhere like some children. I wasn't willing to keep her there without a nap. So we spent a lot of time traveling to and from the parks. If we stayed in a Disney Resort that time would have been cut in half at least. We could have taken a bus to and from the resort (this also saves $20 a day in parking)! It's the best way to go with a napping child in my opinion. DO IT!

That is it for now. I will be posting more posts on Disney soon. Check back here. I would love to hear about your little ones and how they have done on Disney trips. I know that we are not the norm in many cases.