A Weekend of One on One Time!

This past weekend was a "Girls Weekend" for my daughter and I, and a "Boys Weekend" for my husband and son.  My husband and son left Friday night for a weekend of guy time at my in-law's camp, and my daughter and I stayed home. 

My daughter had a birthday party to attend on Saturday afternoon, which was the original reasoning behind our family separation for the weekend.  However, we opted to maximize this time apart and spend some much needed one-on-one time with each of the children.  My daughter was beyond thrilled with the prospect of having Mommy to herself for the entire weekend, and my son (being only two-years-old) was rather oblivious to the matter. 

It amazes me how different my children are when they are apart.  I had grand plans for all the things my daughter and I would do, and while we did do many of them, she was most happy with the fact that she could play alone in her room and be uninterrupted by her little brother.  Likewise, little brother took advantage of his Daddy-time by playing quietly by himself without the interruption of his big sister. 

The boys left around 6pm Friday evening, and while I was ready to kick off our weekend of "girl time", my daughter quickly disappeared to her room to play with her babies.  Since she was content, and enjoying herself, I curled up with a book and waited, hoping that she would return shortly.  After an hour, or so, she did emerge from her room, and requested that we cuddle on the couch and eat popcorn.  Since this was her weekend, I quickly obliged, and she quickly fell asleep mid snacking.  Thus ended our first evening of our girls' weekend.

We awoke Saturday morning, ate breakfast, and she disappeared outside to play in the sand.  I attempted to join her, and was given an evil eye and told that I could go do something else.  She wanted to play by herself.  I was a bit disheartened, but recalled that I myself am always excited about doing things uninterrupted while I'm home alone.  I wrapped the birthday gift for the afternoon party, and enjoyed a cup of coffee as I watched her through the window.  The smile that alighted her face proved to me that she was enjoying her break by herself.  After a short time though, I was forced to call her inside so that she could shower and get cleaned up for the birthday party.

We attended the party, and she had a great time catching up with her pre-school friends that she hadn't seen in a few weeks (some since school ended, and others since the baseball season ended).  After the party we made our way to the city, went out to dinner, and the rest of the night was her choice of activities.  I found it highly amusing that after dinner the one thing that she wanted to do was to go to the dollar store.  In her eyes, the dollar store is the most amazing place on earth!  After walking the aisles of the dollar store, we went to look at the critters at Petco, and then went to Wal-mart.  During our shopping excursion, we picked up the new American Girl movie, "Saige Paints the Sky", and some snacks to enjoy while we were watching it. 

When we got home, we snuggled up in my bed with our snacks, and the movie.  The snacks remained untouched, and my daughter only saw about 10 minutes of the movie before she fell asleep.  Moving the snacks to the nightstand, so as not to have them crushed up in my bedsheets, I tucked her in tight, and shut off the movie.  She looked so tiny snuggled up in my bed, and it made me realize that despite being five-years-old, and defiantly independent, she's still such a little girl.

The next morning, I was awoken by my little angel pouncing on me, and demanding that we finish watching the movie while we eat breakfast in bed.  I turned the movie on, and made my way downstairs to make the requested toast.  We snuggled up and finished the movie, which was a really great movie!  I really like the American Girl movies, for the mere fact that I don't have to worry about there being anything inappropriate in them.  They are nice wholesome movies, and my daughter loves ANYTHING associated with American Girl.

My plan for Sunday was to take my daughter to the movie theater.  Having never been to the movie theater before, she was beyond excited to go!  Both my children loved the original "Despicable Me" movie, so "Despicable Me 2" was an obvious choice for us.  The movie theater experience was so exciting for her!  As we sat in the theater prior to the movie starting she was inundating me with questions about how everything worked.  When the lights went down, she could hardly contain herself!  It turned out that the sequel was just as enjoyable for us as the original movie (if not more so).  We had a wonderful time!

On our way home, my daughter confessed that she really missed Daddy, and little brother.  I assured her that they would be home shortly after we got home, and she sighed with relief.  When they got home, she ran and hugged them both, and told them about her "best weekend ever", then quickly declared that "next time we have a girls' weekend, it should only be for one day, so she doesn't have to miss them so much!"  I agree, it was a great weekend with my little girl, but I did miss my boys!!

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Ways to Save When Shopping on Amazon

Living in rural Vermont, our shopping experiences are limited.  Not only do we not have a vast assortment of retailers in the area, but a trip to the store is an excursion.  Our small town does have a small general store that serves us in a pinch when we run out of a staple item like bread or milk, but the nearest large grocery store is 14 miles away and the nearest department store (a small Walmart) is 15 miles away.  Given the distance, and limited choices with local shopping, I find that I do a majority of my shopping online.  For the most part, my "go to place" is Amazon.com.

There are many features of Amazon.com that I love.  I love the vast selection, the customer reviews, and the ease of placing an order and having it delivered to my door.  I pay special attention to prices though.  If there's a particular item that I know is available locally for a lesser price I'm willing to forego the instant gratification of buying online, and visit the brick and mortar store in the area to make the purchase.

Beyond the listed prices, Amazon offers a number of different ways to save you money when shopping through their site.

Amazon Prime:  Amazon Prime is a paid membership program.  The cost of Amazon Prime membership is $79 a year.  At first, this cost deterred me, but after having Prime for the past few months, I'm convinced that it's well worth the upfront cost.  This membership entitles you to free two-day shipping on Prime eligible items (you can refine your Amazon searches to only show Prime eligible items), as well as Prime Instant Video, and access to the Kindle Owner's Lending Library.

There are a number of movies, television shows, and other videos available on Prime Instant Video, all of which are free for you to view with Prime Membership.  My family has enjoyed countless free movies this way, providing us with hours of quality family time on rainy evenings.

If you own a Kindle, the Kindle Owner's Lending Library is an amazing deal.  While there are already a multitude of free books available for the Kindle, the Lending Library offers you the option of borrowing an e-book for free every month!  These books are more mainstream than many of the other free books available for Kindle.  Books like "Hunger Games", "Water for Elephants", and "5 Love Languages" are all available to be borrowed from the Kindle Owner's Lending Library when you have Amazon Prime membership.

Subscribe and Save: Subsribe and Save is a program that offers you discounts on items that you have automatically shipped to you on a regular schedule.  There is no cost to take advantage of this program, and no commitment.  You can cancel your subscription or adjust the frequency of deliveries at any time.  The discounts vary by the item purchased, and prices are based on the date that the order ships.  If the price an item on your Subscribe and Save list changes (either by going up in price, or down in price) the current price, less the discount, is what you will be charged.  At present, I only have a couple of items on my Subscribe and Save list; diapers and cat food.  I've been receiving these items monthly for the past 6 months and things have worked out great.  As I determine the cost effectiveness of having other items on my Subscribe and Save list, I plan to add more to it.  In the meantime, I'm enjoying the fact that I don't have to worry about running out of either of these items, and the fact that they magically appear on my doorstep when they are needed.

Amazon Mom: Amazon Mom is a program for parents with young children.  When you initially sign up for Amazon Mom you receive a free 3-month membership to Amazon Prime.  This free membership entitles you to the benefit of free 2-day shipping, as well as a 20% discount (5% Subscribe and Save, and 15% Amazon Mom) on select diapers and wipes, and you can also save an additional 20% (15% Subscribe and Save and 5% Amazon Mom) when you subscribe to a total of 5 Subscribe and Save items (the diapers and wipes count towards this total).  There is a catch though... In order to continue receiving the benefits of Amazon Mom, you will have to join Amazon Prime after the free trial expires.

Amazon Student:  Amazon Student is a program for college students.  With this program you get 6 months of free 2-day shipping on Prime eligible items.  You can also upgrade to Prime membership for a cost of $39 per year (A $40 savings over the normal cost of Prime membership).  Once upgraded to a paid Prime membership, you'll be able to take advantage of Prime Instant Video, and the Kindle Owner's Lending Library.  Amazon limits the use of this program to 4 years only.

**I am in no way affiliated with Amazon.com.  Please check the links to each program for further information and restrictions.**