Family

My mom came to visit last week so she could spend Halloween with my kiddos. Just two weeks before she came, our friends at Toyota asked if we wanted to try out the 2016 4Runner. It couldn’t have been better timing, as it is pretty tough to fit five people comfortably in our Camry, with the two car seats in there. Having the 4Runner for a long holiday weekend was perfect because we had more space for the five of us to cruise around Phoenix.

My husband and I don’t eat very much candy. Our kids don’t eat much candy either — not just because we limit it, but mostly because they don’t like it. Crazy, right? This lack of candy-eating means that trick-or-treating yields a ton of leftover Halloween candy that we don’t really want around the house.

Making DIY Halloween costumes is a for our family. In mid-September, my hubby and I started brainstorming ideas of what the kids should be for Halloween this year. Since Gigi is old enough to walk on her own this year (I carried her in the Bjorn last year), we immediately began thinking about ‘couples’ costume ideas — in the sense of having two children, close in age, of both sexes (in case you’re looking for couples costume ideas). We finally settled on a homemade lion costume for my son and a Dorothy costume for daughter.

When October rolls around, I’m so ready for fall and all the flavors fall brings — especially all the pumpkin spice recipes I can find. I like me some pumpkin. I’ve shared my favorite pumpkin spice cookies, pumpkin nutella bars, pumpkin scones and pumpkin pancakes before, but I’m always on the hunt for different pumpkin spice recipes.

I feel bad. I feel like the worst mommy in the world because I wasn’t in town for my son’s third birthday. I wasn’t there to wake him up, give him a giant hug, or wish him a happy birthday. I feel worse that we had to celebrate it on a day that fit better into my busy travel schedule.

There is a ton of potty training tips for boys out there, but a lot of those didn’t really work for us. I already wrote about our early adventures in potty training with our two and a half-year-old, Rocco. The standard ‘sticker chart’ was a big flop, and using a training potty seemed to inhibit rather than help Rocco learn.

I never thought this day would come, that my parents would sell my childhood home. Yes, my dad had been talking about it for several years, but something always stopped them from moving forward with the sale. This summer, they finally decided it was time to move into a new place, with less maintenance and more convenience as they grow older. I (not so secretly) hoped something would happen so they would keep our home, but the sale went through last week and they are closing on their new place later this month.

Since he first started solids, Rocco has remained a picky eater. We’ve tried our best to get him to try new things, and every now and then, he surprises us (raw broccoli anyone?). Most of the time, he sticks to what he knows.

I love my kids more than anything, but there are times when I miss some aspects of my pre-kid life. I try not to dwell on the negative aspects of parenting, but I got to thinking about this yesterday after one more absurd attempt to use the bathroom in private. Here are the 10 things I miss about life before kids.