Why I will be running on...Coffee, Choas and Cuss Words

I feel like there has been so many posts telling you all just how busy this mamma feels when it comes to having three girls! 

This year seems even busier for some reason and I am unsure why but my poor planner seems to be a rainbow of colors trying to keep up with it all. 

This year the girls seem to be more and more interested in extra curricular offered through the schools and through their church and though this mamma seems to be booked solid most of the time I REALLY enjoy seeing them grow and learn on all these levels! 

Here are just a few things we have going on right now! 

One Million Minutes

It was announced last week that the Elementary school is challenging the kids there to read one million minutes this school year! 

As a minor book worm I LOVE it! 

The school has come up with ways to get the entire school excited about it too with weekly contests, prizes and a HUGE thing is being put together for the entire school if they reach it. 

I know Aaliyah will be doing her part to help and I can not wait to see how this goes for them all!

Caravan 2016-2017

When we moved into the house we are in now the girls started going to church on a more regular bases with our middle daughters bestie. Wednesday nights it is off to church on the church van and the girls have been very active this year! The church offers a caravan program where the younger school aged children learn not only about God and His amazing self but also about real life lessons. They have the program set up like a boy or girl scout and the kids earn patches, take field trips and have a ceremony at the end of the school year so show off what they hvae learned. 

I LOVE this idea and it gets my little one super excited about getting some Jesus in her life! 

The older two are now teens and they also learn, work and enjoy activities as they learn more about God. For instance the just had a field trip to our local Christian Music Festival and my girls REALLY enjoyed it! 

I am super excited to see everything that they learn and do this year for the Lord. 

One Million Words  

Dakota signed up this year to read ONE MILLION WORDS... 

by herself...

 voluntarily...

Though I know she can do it because she is a HUGE book worm I am just amazed she signed up for this. She is already jam packed with JROTC, band, Honors and Pre AP classes but what is one more... 

She was also very proud of herself that she was the first person to sign up for it too...

JROTC

As you all have seen here before Dakota is also signed up for her first year in JROTC. 

She has been thinking hard about signing up for some of their teams like riffle, First Aid, Color Guard etc and I am REALLY pushing color guard!

I think she would enjoy it and it would help her break out of her non social self but we will see what she decides if anything. I know we are 4 weeks into school and I am over the 5 am mornings to help get her ready for inspection though :) 

Elf Club

Alora this year has signed up for the Elf club this year and I have to say I am kinda excited for this. Dakota did not do any of these things when she was at the Middle School so I am excited that Alora is willing to get involved there. This is a club where they help others through out the year but their main goal is to raise money between now and December to purchase gifts for children in need this holiday season. Though it is a social club technically the purpose behind it is heart warming and helpful and I am super excited to see what all these kids accomplish in the few short months we have in 2016! 

Girls On the Run

Our youngest Aaliyah decided to sign up for a 5k this year! 

Now I am NOT athletic what so ever... period... I have not ran in YEARS and I will be the first to say this gene is NOT from me! 

BUT...

More power to Aaliyah and I am VERY excited to see her do this program!

They meet every Monday and Wednesday after school and train the girls for the big 5k that will be in November. They also have snacks, lessons and will teach the girls about a healthy lifestyle. 

This is the first year that the elementary has offered this and we have been VERY VERY blessed to have our school sponsored for these girls to enjoy and benefit from this! 

Though most of these extra curricular will be done with by the time the girls go on Christmas break I am SUPER excited to see them SO involved this year. I will gladly keep you all updated as these play out and progress!

XOXO

SJ

Prepping Season....

This time of year is always FULL blast and our lives feel like it is going a million miles per hour. Spring brings us warm weather which we all know this So Cal girl loves but when you live in Arkansas aka Tornado Alley you are ALWAYS on your toes and prepping for storm season. 

Not only to we prepare and freshen up the kids "survival" skills this time of year but we are also FULL swing into party planning. Today marks just a little over a week before the first birthday party of the 2016 takes place and the planning is no different this year than any other. 

We have hit Pinterest aka my LIFE saver hard for this year birthday themes 

(you can find them here) 

but I am also OVERLY EXCITED about them too. 

On the 12th we will be having my oldest daughters 14th birthday and she has gone with Horror Movie themed... we are talking food, decor and MORE! PLUS this year I am allowing here to gather a handful of friends to stay the night for a horror movie marathon! Can you hear the screams yet? 

(insert evil laugh here)

On TOP of all of this this week is Read Across America and the elementary school girls have this week JAM packed with fun days to participate with each day to show off and celebrate Dr. Suess!

Yesterday we got to wear many colors as they shared his book My Many Colored Days followed by today being crazy sock day of course in spirit for The Foot Book! 

Tomorrow is Cat in the Hat so naturally it's crazy hat day and Thursday is  Hooray for Diffendoofer Day! as the kids get to wear their school colors, but we are all stupid EXCITED for Friday's theme as they will be sharing I am NOT Going to Get Up Today!  and the kids get to dress up as their favorite Dr. Seuss Character and OF course Aaliyah and her bestie JUST HAVE to go as Thing 1 and Thing 2 and it fits them PERFECTLY! 

I started working on these things over the weekend and I just have to say if I was smaller I would TOTALLY be stealing these costumes!!! They are ADORBS if I do say so myself :)

 And because that is NOT ENOUGH this Thursday the Middle School and the Junior High kids are out of school that day for CAPS which is the day that they get to pick out their classes for the 2016-2017 school year....

UGH! 

Of course THIS morning is the morning that it HIT me like a TON of rocks that I will have a "HIGH SCHOOL" student next year....

#maniamfeelingold

But there of COURSE THERE IS MORE!

I am sadly having to get ready to go back into the work force and to make it SOOO much better it will be overnight yet again for at least 6 months. I will be shooting for a department manager's position which will take me to days and a pay increase so here's to hoping! 

Which means I have to swap my sleeping schedule... yet... again... 

Does your house have a crazy prepping season too or is it just me?!

While We Were Away: A Weekend Recap

When I left you all Friday I figured we would have one of our typical weekends where we really didn't do much but relax and get ready for another week ahead. 

BOY WAS I WRONG!

FRIDAY:

Friday evening was actually not so bad, we spent the evening watching movies as a family and enjoyed some good ol Taco Bell together before Alora was off to her friends house to spend the night. 

SATURDAY:

Saturday morning was pretty relaxed as we hung out at the house and did a little cleaning up here and there. The three girls had a birthday-costume-slumber party to go to that evening so our main focus was putting the last minute touches on costumes, getting them packed up and ready to go and gift shopping...

 Needless to say I STILL FORGOT the gift at home when I dropped the kids off... smh..

This weekend was the grand opening for our highly anticipated Outlet Mall!

It is located off the I-30 right next to the Bass Pro Shop

 

As a California girl... I AM IN HEAVEN!

Since the hubby and I were kid free and we knew that it would be a MAD house we took the opportunity to check it out kid free PLUS my hubby has NEVER been to one  (GASP!) and I  thought he would enjoy it better without trying to keep up with the kids too. 

We took a few laps around the outlet featuring 75+ stores and since the lines for most of the stores were out the doors and wrapped around we didn't grab any deals but decided to go grab dinner in Little Rock since we were close by.

(I will share more about the Outlets soon!)  

The hubby is a HUGE Chinese food fan, as for me... I like it but I burn it off so fast I am hungry again WAY SOONER then it is worth. 

Since we don't go out often we decided to go to his favorite, Panda Garden.

Panda Garden is located in Shakleford Crossings off Shakelford.

It is a buffet style establishment and the family loves it!

I am more of the seafood buffet options that are on the weekend (which then of course adds to the price) 

Me and the hubby got the seafood buffet and 2 sweet teas for right at $30. 

After dinner we headed home for a movie and crashed like all old folks do. 

Yeah we are some REALLY HAPPEN' FOLKS

SUNDAY:

 Sunday morning me and the hubby decided  we would go ahead and do our weekly grocery shopping since the kids did not have to be picked up til after 12. If you are a mom like me you know how much FUN grocery shopping can be with kids...

After we got done I ran and picked up the girls from their party and I even remembered to take the poor birthday girl her gift!

That afternoon was Aaliyah's Fall Festival  at the school and of course that meant for more dressing up! 

I took the three girls for a while to the school function where they played games to win candy, meet and pet some horses (Aaliyah was in heaven) and say hi to their friends!

Even Dakota ran into her boyfriend who was working the haunted house!

While us girls got into the Halloween spirit the hubby was over at our landlords helping her change out her locks on her house and avoiding the fall festival :)

We rounded off the evening with our normal routines and getting things ready for this week where we celebrate our move-a-versary, get ready for Spook City and still on the path of cleaning out the house... 

Did you do any pre-Halloween festivities?