We Survived Our First Week Of Preschool

Just when you think you’ve mastered a routine, life happens — your baby grows up and goes off to preschool. Then it’s complete chaos for at least a week or so, trying to find the groove of our new daily M-F routine.

Preschool is a pretty big deal. Like MAJOR. I get 3 hours without a 4-year-old from 11:30am - 2:30pm... what the heck do I do with myself?! Yeah I know, I still got an almost-2-year-old to look after... I haven’t forgotten about her. But having 1 kid is a hell of a lot easier to manage than 2! And 3 hours may not seem like a lot of time so I’ve had to REALLY think about what I wanted to accomplish within such a short time frame.

Is it worth skipping Evie’s nap time to roam the aisles of Target and spend money you don’t have?! Should I risk putting Evie down for a nap? And if so, is it worth waking her up (if she’s not already awake) to pick Sissy up from school? Just an FYI, she’s definitely NOT a happy camper when she’s woken up earlier than she's ready to be. And if Evie DOES take a nap, do I take advantage of this ME time and binge watch Jane The Virgin for the millionth time and just chillax?! Maybe have a glass of wine — ok maybe not the wine. But still... should I?! Or should I be a responsible adult and use this time to do laundry AND clean the whole house all while baby naps? Maybe take a quick catnap myself? Sleep is obviously a VERY crucial part of our day as you can tell. Trying to figure out when that nap should take place can be pretty difficult! And on top of that, coming to terms with not wearing pajamas all day long has been pretty depressing.

So now that Ella’s been in school for 3 whole weeks now, I can tell you briefly how Everly and I spent our 3 hours a day of week 1.

Day 1 : It was orientation day so not much happened because Ella was there for 1 hour but parents were required to be there as well.

Day 2: We dropped Ella off at school and went to pick up our dog Tipsy from the groomers (hubby took her first thing in the morning). When we got home I did 3 loads of laundry. Ok ok, I’m lying. I started a load that morning before Ella went to school so I wasn’t that accomplished. And in between loads I did some dishes and cooked some meals and entertained Everly who seemed kinda lost that Sissy was not here. Evie napped after we picked Sissy up.

Day 3: I watched Everly run around in circles (literally) for awhile while I folded the clothes from the previous day. Yup, I totally didn’t fold them right away because I’m just not that put together. Then Evie napped after we picked Sissy up from school. 

Day 4: It was Back To School night so Everly had no choice but to take her nap right after we dropped sister off at school. Good thing she had woken up earlier than usual because she didn’t fight me at all. And while Evie napped, mama binge watched Season 5 of Jane The Virgin. If you haven’t seen the show, you need to! It’s SO good! 

Day 5: So we decided to make that trip to Target. More like attempted. Everly had a meltdown before we even made it into the store so there’s that. Maybe we’ll try again next Friday.

Now that it's been 3 weeks of preschool, I can tell you that I am already SO OVER IT. It dawned on me on day 3 that THIS is now my life. I am now a parent of a pre-schooler. My schedule now revolves around my 4-year-old's drop-off and pick-up schedule. And this revelation was pretty shocking at first. THIS will be my life until both of my girls have graduated high school! So yeah... I'm already over it and their first long break from school cannot come soon enough. And though preschool is only 3 hours long, the process of getting them up and ready for the day, fed and out the door by a certain time 5 days a week is not fun at all. Not that I was expecting it to be a party or anything. I'm seriously already missing the days where we could lounge in our pj's all day long and eat our meals whenever we were hungry and take our naps when we wanted to... yeah we are definitely spoiled.

*sigh*

In other news, Ella is lovin' her new routine. She loves to pick out her clothes and gets super excited to go to school so she can play with her friends (she's got like 4 of them now), play on the playground, engage in all the new things she's learning. I have to say, by Day 4 of week 1, she was already telling me "bye" and running off before I'd even signed her in. My mama heart kinda broke when she didn't even look back for me. These bittersweet moments just keep on comin', don't they?

So yeah... we survived our first week of preschool.

Have your kids started school yet? What grades are they in? Are/Were you excited about the first day? If this is your first time (like me), how were you feeling? More importantly, what did/do y'all do with your time while they were/are in school? Tell me all the things!!!

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Tags: #school #preschool #firstdayofschool #backtoschool #momdiaries #momlife #motherhood #parenthood #milestone #toddlermilestone

Self-Care + At-Home Teeth Whitening = Mom Win

My life at home with 2 kids can get pretty crazy busy. Which makes it difficult to find time for myself. I have admitted before that I kinda lost myself to motherhood after having my babies. And it's even harder now that I'm a stay-at-home mom. So I have been trying to get back into the habit of practicing self-care more regularly -- like waking up a little earlier to get a good workout in or occasionally putting on a pretty dress and doing my hair + makeup just so I can feel a bit like I haven't completely lost who I was pre-baby.

One thing that I have recently decided to try is teeth whitening. I have never had my teeth whitened before but it's something I've always wanted to have done because my teeth has definitely stained over the years and has made me a little insecure especially when it comes to taking pictures -- I blame my love for coffee and almost 2 decades of drinking it daily. But who has the time to sit in the dental office for hours to get this process done? Definitely NOT me.

So, as you can imagine I was super excited when Smile Brilliant reached out to me and asked if I was interested in trying out their teeth whitening kit! Their whitening process takes about 45 minutes a day and can be left in for up to 3 hours. It still sounds like a HUGE chunk of my day but the fact that I could do it AT home while doing all the mom things was a major WIN for me. They recommended that I do this every night before bedtime as part of my routine -- which I did implement. But I loved that I could do it at any time of the day, even when I'm playing with my babies or doing chores.

If you were wondering, this is what comes in the kit: the molding paste to make your teeth impressions, tubes of whitening gel and desensitizing gel, and detailed instructions on how to make your teeth impressions, as well as instructions on the whitening process. On average, you will see results after 7-14 daily applications. It took me a little longer than usual to complete my whitening process because I experienced some teeth sensitivity within the first couple of days, so instead of applying the the whitening gel for 14 consecutive days, I did it every other day. And the in-between days, I would only apply the desensitizing gel to help with the sensitivity issue.

My overall experience with Smile Brilliant has been amazing. Their kit is very easy to use and if I had any questions or concerns, they were there to help me every step of the way. I am also very pleased with the results. At first, I didn't think it was really working but my husband was the first to really notice the difference. My teeth have definitely whitened some and the staining is not as noticeable which makes me feel much more confident to smile BIG and fearlessly for the cameras and...just because. Check out the results!

Oh and guess what?! Smile Brilliant has decided to give away ONE teeth whitening kit to one of YOU! How awesome is that?! All you have to do is click here to fill out the entry form. But if you're kinda impatient (like I am) and want your whitening kit NOW, you can always use my code "thatplainjanelife15" for 15% off your entire purchase!

Also be sure to follow both Smile Brilliant (@smilebrilliant) and me (@thatplainjanelife) on Instagram and tag/share with your friends who would also love a chance to win!

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Do you or have you ever whitened your teeth? Have you tried Smile Brilliant? If not, would you be willing to give it a try? Tell me your thoughts in the comments below!!!

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Disclosure: This is sponsored by Smile Brilliant. I have been compensated to create this post, however all opinions are my own. I only recommend products I’ve personally used and love! This post may contain affiliate links that earn me a small commission, at no additional cost to you. 

Tags: #smilefearlessly #teethwhiteningkit #teethwhitening #smilebrilliant #selfcare #momlife #athometeethwhiteningkit #affordableteethwhiteningkit

Ramblings of This SAHM

Holy cow! Did anyone else notice I was gone from the blogging world for nearly 2 months?! I honestly did not mean to take that long of a break but geez... how in the world did 2 months fly on by?!

You're probably wondering what happened. Or maybe not. But even if you weren't wondering what happened, you're gonna read about it anyway because I'm gonna tell you. Just an FYI, this is probably going to be the most random thought-filled blog post I have written to date so just humor me and read along and tell me your thoughts at the end, k? Even if you think I'm too crazy for you... just give me some feedback!

Okay, so after my last couple of posts, I kinda developed writer's block. Which usually is no big deal because it happens to me all the time - life happens and my blog usually gets pushed to the side because priorities, right? Well that wasn't the case this time around. To put it simply, I was just feeling uninspired to write anything. I was definitely in a funk and I just couldn't get out of it.

This is pretty much how this particular case of writer's block would go for me...

The creative juices start flowing and the ideas would come to me while I'm NOT sitting at my computer. At the most inconvenient times. Like when I'm doing chores. Or when I'm taking a shower or even when I'm giving my kids their baths. I'd get my best ideas for blog topics while I'm doing the dang dishes. The "old" me would have stopped what I was doing to jot down some notes. Maybe even do it in outline form. Because I used to be such an annoyingly organized multi-tasker who enjoyed writing lists. With fancy pens on pretty stationary. Ok, maybe that's a lil bit of an exaggeration but seriously... the "pre-baby" me used to be effing annoying. Because "me" now? The "hot mess scatterbrained mom" me is less organized and is always trying to do a million things at once trying to convince myself that multi-tasking is NOT a thing, that it does NOT exist, and that people who believe it does? They are the crazy ones. When really, multi-tasking is just about making a mental to-do list in our head, then starting on project #1 and not fully finishing it before getting distracted with project #2-gazillion and before you know it, we've started a million projects with every intention of finishing them but not really. Because by the time you come back to tackle any of the projects on the list, you find that it's evolved into something else. Anyway, I digress. As I was saying... the "mom" me is always trying to hurry up to get some chores done before my stage 5 clinger (AKA Everly) realizes that she no longer wants to play independently or with her sister anymore and comes looking for me. Because who keeps pen and paper near the kitchen sink anyway? Apparently NOT me. Then I forget that mom brain really IS a thing (like every single time) and I think to myself "you will remember your thoughts. And you will write up this post when Baby's asleep because you're a badass and YOU GOT THIS." If I could insert an emoji right here, I so would. It would be this guy right here....

Because we all know that once I sat my ass down to hash out a badass post, nothing came to mind but a huge question mark. And then I'd just sat there hoping that it would all come back to me. Hoping that the blinking cursor would just start spitting out words. Instead it just blinked. And blinked some more. Until I couldn't take it anymore and ultimately I just gave up.

Sad but true.

I found myself searching for inspiration and motivation from other blogs. Instead I found myself comparing my content to theirs. Which then spiraled into negative thoughts and I began to ask myself questions like: "Do people actually like reading my blog?", "Are my pictures and stories appealing to my readers?" And then I started wishing for things: a better camera, a better wardrobe, a new house! It's so very easy to get caught up in the comparison game! Especially with so many awesome blogs out there!

Once I caught myself falling down that rabbit hole of nonsense, I just decided to step back and just not think about my blog for awhile. It was actually starting to stress me out and I just didn't want to deal with it until I was ready to write again.

So.... what exactly have I been doing for the past couple of months? Well, since I've rambled on a bunch, I'll give ya an update. The cliffs notes version goes something like this: In March we celebrated Daniel's birthday on the 11th and mine on the 13th. Our 10th wedding anniversary was on the 12th, and we celebrated that by bringing our girls to Disneyland. We're not annual pass holders yet (waiting for the girls to get a bit older to really enjoy going more often) but we took full advantage of purchasing the 3-day passes because there was a deal for SoCal residents. We went to Disney California Adventure Park at the end of March. April, we went from Winter to Spring to Summer triple digit weather within a span of 2 weeks because SoCal’s weather is bipolar like that. And that means we have been spending a lot of our time outdoors! We celebrated Easter and had a blast... and we're still kinda recuperating from all of that. I have been going to the gym as consistent as I can get - going anywhere from 2x/week up to 5x/week. I think I've only accomplished a 5x/week once in the last 2 months though. It's been more like 3x max per week most weeks. But at least I'm still going!

And now here we are. Already in May. And I’m back and super excited to get back into the groove of blogging again! Do I have some great ideas planned? Sure do! Will I have the balls to actually come through and execute these posts? Well.... I am definitely hoping I do! So I guess we'll just have to wait and see! I mean, I just renewed my blog’s hosting and domain fees so I’m committed! And probably a little broke but hey, it’s an investment right? 

Anyway, if you’re still reading this, bless your sweet little heart. I know it was a bit random and all over the place but I needed another outlet for my thoughts because I think my husband is kinda over my ramblings by now. And my 2 minions just don’t quite get it... so for me blogging was the next best thing. 

Tell me in the comments below what topics you’d like for me to write about! I’d love to hear your suggestions! 

Tags: #parenthood #motherhood #Easter #momdiaries #Disneyland #DisneyCaliforniaAdventurePark #momfashion #momstyle #todderfashion #toddlerstyle #lifewithkids #california