There Are Far Too Few Of Them

In my opinion, there are far too few celebrations going on these days.  I remember Hubby's family always had something they wanted to celebrate and that was how we would all come together to reminisce and spend time with other.  We are all busy but we would carve out the time to attend a celebration, a baby shower or a birthday party, because we wanted to see one another.  We could go months without any correspondence but come a party, we were there to spend the few hours together as a family, having a blast.  Times have certainly changed.

Everyone got even busier and the celebrations became few and far between.  Almost no one hosts parties anymore and we see each other even less.  There are a few family members I haven't seen in over a year, people I used to  see at my kid's birthday parties I don't get to see much at all.  If the celebrations stop, so does the togetherness and we lose sight of what is important in this world, spending time with family.

Now Hubby has a large family and they all have their own families that, of course, they spend time with on a regular basis.  But I have no family here I can count on seeing except my kids and the hubs.  I liked spending time with extended cousins and aunts and my kids enjoyed seeing other kids their age.

It gets even worse with friends, who have their own large families to tend to.  We try to make time for each other as well, but it gets harder as the kids get older.  So I was extremely happy when my friend invited all us 'amigas' to her son's baby shower.  It was a celebration we could all attend, coming together to spend the day with each other and catch up on the 'news'.  It reminded me of the good old days, when baby showers and birthday parties were the norm and we had one almost every other month to attend.  I soaked up the chance to just be in the moment with friends and hope it's not the last celebration we have to look forward to this year.

Time For Expositions

How do you teach a 4 year old to do a presentation in front of their entire class?  I had the hardest time with this very question.  My preschooler was given an animal to 'research', the goat.  He had to do a short presentation in front of his class, explaining everything he had learned about his animal to his classmates.  All the kids had to do one and each child got a different animal. 

We did our research on the goat and tried to keep it simple and short.  They are 4 year olds after all, not a very long attention span nor do they have the capacity to explain fine details.  I kept it to just a few fun facts my 4 year old could 'explain' to his class and a few objects he could present, like show and tell.  I found a goat among our many toy animals and printed off a picture of the goat, showcasing the importance of this particular animal in our lives.  I practiced a few times with my preschooler, going over basics, like where goats live and what they eat.  And according to his teacher, my 4 year old did an amazing job with his presentation.  I only wish I could have seen it first hand.

The First Field trip

A child usually always remembers the first time they do something major, especially if it's something they did without their parents present.  And so I do hope my 4 year old will remember his very first preschool field trip.  It was Friday, May 12 and he was headed to another school to celebrate Agriculture Day, a day dedicated to all the farmers and their hard work.  It was the first time he would be given his own money to purchase whatever he wanted to purchase, mainly fresh produce in support of our farmers.  These are the pictures his teacher shared of the special day. 

There was also an Agriculture Day celebration the following week at the kid's school.

Celebrating Mother's Day

Things don't always go as planned.  As the saying goes, "Life is what happens when you're busy making plans", which basically means life doesn't stop just because you have things you want to do.  Sh!t still happens.  No pun intended.

And so it was that on Mother's Day, we had to improvise and come up with a back up plan.  It still was a pretty amazing Mother's Day.  I started the celebration early on the Saturday before with a date night.  The hubby and I decided to have dinner at our favorite Japanese restaurant.  We were supposed to do that on Sunday but I thought Mother's day should be spent with the people who made me a mother, my kids.  So we made other plans for Sunday.

On Sunday, we decided to take the entire brood, all 4 kids, to Sabana Park and we were all pretty excited.  I even packed a picnic lunch.  We had big plans of what we wanted to do that day at the park: play soccer, go skating.  But as we got to Sabana, it started to downpour.  We didn't even have a chance to get out of the car.  The rain made us rethink our plans and we started brainstorming alternate things to do.  Eventually we headed back for home and as luck would have it, the rain stayed in Sabana.  By chance we passed a park in San Pedro and our day was decided for us.  We stopped at the park and made the most of our day with the boys playing soccer and my daughter on her roller blades whizzing around the park.  After a fun filled afternoon, we had all worked up an appetite.  We'd eaten our picnic lunch in the car so we decided on pizza for dinner at Family Pizza, an Italian style restaurant not too far away.

It was a pretty great day even if it didn't go as I had planned it.  And most importantly, everyone had fun.

Orotina Waterpark/Villas Fantasia

Why would a country famous for it's beaches need to have a waterpark?  That was a question I used to ask a long time ago.  Seems like a pretty dumb question seeing as going to a waterpark and going to the beach are two separate and different things.  Not everyone likes the beach first of all.  And a beach trip can be pricey, not to mention it takes time to travel there.  Whereas going to the waterpark takes almost no pre-planning at all.  When you just need a day to get away but you need to stay close to home and you're looking for a water escape, the waterpark could be for you.

We decided to celebrate my daughter's birthday at the waterpark in Orotina called Villas Fantasia.  It was the perfect little activity for our family.  Just an hour and a half away, it provided the perfect escape on a Saturday.  And the weather in Orotina being usually on the hotter side, proved the perfect place for a waterpark outing.