tooth fairy fun

I can't believe I'm even writing this but, Julianne lost her first tooth! I wish I would have recorded the whole thing so you could have heard me and Jules freaking out. Her tooth was barely hanging on and she was complaning about it bothering her when she ate, so I gave her a flossing pick. She was sitting on the couch watching tv flossing her tooth when the floss got stuck. She freaked. I freaked. We were both screaming because we couldn't get it out. She got so nervous she pulled back as I was holding the pick and poof the tooth fell out. We looked at each other and started laughing as she picked it up off her dress. Then she screamed with excitement and I cried. Literally balled my eyes out as I tried hugging her. She squirmed out of my arms and screamed again and again, and I cried more because she pulled away. lol 

As sad I was was, I had to do something special to celebrate! That joy you see in your babies eyes when something this magical and big happens is what I live for. It's one of my favorite things about being a mommy. Making memories with them and getting to experience all the magic again, only this time through their eyes, is just pure magic in itself. So I put on my tooth fair wings, set up the fairy door, glittered all my dollars and sprinkled her room with an obnoxious amount of glitter. Then I took an obscene amount of photos of my girls new, even cuter, smile.

What did the tooth fairy leave?

1. A sparkly glitter banner. Jules said she left that because it was her first tooth and she knows just how much we girls love to celebrate! Spot on girlfriend.

2. A little goodie bag filled with a new tooth paste and tooth brush. I will do this every now and again when a new brush is needed. 

3. A certificate where the tooth fair rated her tooth and noted which tooth she lost. 

4. A little envelope full of real fairy dust.

5. A miniature note from the tooth fair herself congratulating her on losing her first tooth. She also thanked her for setting up a fairy door because it made the visit super easy. 

6. The oh so sparkly dollar bills. For sure the biggest hit!

How did I glitter the money?

I honestly had no idea how to do this. I ran to target at the last minute and grabbed whatever I could find. I didn't think that the glitter I got would work but it turned out SO GOOD and was super easy. My one pointer would be to spray the money very lightly and make sure at least one glitter is super fine. The fine glitter is what stick on the easiest. Once you lightly spray the adhesive just sprinkle the glitter over the money and wait for it to dry. Super easy and so fun!

Where did I get the printable's?

Etsy! I found this bundle and knew Jules would love how girly it was. Karina, from WestieCrew, was super sweet and very easy to work with. The listing is non editable, meaning she adds in your Childs name and the date the tooth was lost. Since I ordered ahead of time I asked her to leave out the dates. This actually worked out perfectly since I can just print out a few copies at a time and stamp in the dates as needed. I also ordered this stamp to use for the dates. Ours didn't get here on time so I had to write it in this time.

Where did she put her tooth before bed?

Jules was so worried where her tooth would go. She did not want it under her pillow incase it got lost and wanted to make sure the tooth fairy would find it. I hit Etsy again, this time with Jules and let her pick her very own custom pillow. How perfect is this!? It just so happened to match the printable's perfectly! If you're doing to go this route too make sure to order ahead. Since they are custom they take a while to make. Unfortunately, we weren't able to use it for her first tooth because It didn't arrive on time.We ended up using this super cute glow in the dark tooth I bought last year.

how did the tooth fairy come in?

The tooth fairy door, duh! Isn't this thing the cutest ever? We have had this door since Jules started sleeping in her own room. We used it as a reward system, every night she slept in her bed a fairy would come in and leave her a little treat. Then Kourt came along and ripped it off the wall once she was mobile. Jules and I were so excited to pull it out and put it up on a shelf away from any babies! lol Here is the one we have!

Hope that was helpful for all those that asked. If you use any of these ideas I would love to see! Be sure to tag me on instagram, @alittlejandk. Oh, and for you pro tooth fairies, what do you do with their teeth? save them? I didn't have the heart to throw hers away so I stick it in my jewelry box. Id love to hear your ideas on that!  

m o r e  t o o t h  f a i r y  f u n :

p i n  m e :

Jackson's Disney birthday extravaganza

Your baby only turns one once, right?! Now throw in the fact that it's your first boy after two girls and you're bound to go a little overboard in the celebration department! You all know our love for Disneyland, so Jacks has practically grown up there and he LOVES it too! So we knew it was a must for his birthday. We also knew we wanted to continue the "breakfast with Disney characters" tradition (we've done it for all of Jules and Kourt's birthdays), plus Jules has been begging us to spend the night at Disneyland...and so Jackson's birthday extravaganza began! 

We live about 25 minutes from Disneyland so we've never had a reason to stay at any of the hotels nearby, but we always drive by the Howard Johnson Anaheim (aka the water park hotel) and think it's so cool, so we looked that one up first! The price was a steal, the new renovated rooms were so cute, it's a short walk to Disneyland and that water park sold us all! 

Here are a few reasons why we loved the Howard Johnson:

1. It's kid friendly! With three kids 5 and under that is important. They have a convenience store by the lobby full of everything you can think of from sunblock and floats for the pool, to snacks and Disney baby clothes! The rooms are fun and colorful, my kiddos loved the Disney feel. They also have Netflix! There's even a little arcade where the kiddos can go wild. Plus, they have a mini water park!

2. Castaway Cove! AMAZING! This is that mini water park we had driven by all these years. Let me just say that my kids were obsessed! It is made for littles. Kourt walked in, splashed into the toddler pool and swore she could swim. We couldn't get either of them out of there. My super cautious, "don't splash my face," Jules, was riding all the slides, splashing in the water fountain and dunking her face into the pool! Even Jacks had a blast in the toddler pool. It has a beach style entry so he was crawling in and out on his own. They loved it so much they begged to leave Disneyland early just so they could spend more than half the day in the pool! Jason and I loved how kid accessible it was. My girls had no problem climbing up the stairs to get on the water slides. They were able to do everything on their own without our help and they loved that! We may just skip Disneyland next time and go back just for Castaway Cove.

3. Food and fun. You can basically say that they have Mc.Donalds and Panera Bread on site. They are walking distance from the hotel and came in handy with the kiddos. There's also a themed buffet down the street that looked fun. Downtown Disney is also a short walk away and full of so many places to visit. One of our favorite places is Tortilla Joes. The kids love going there because there is a balloon artist that walks table to table. There's also a Starbucks, a few fun shops, live entertainment and a movie theater. Anaheim GardenWalk is also close by, not walking distance but worth the super short drive. We love P.F.Changs so we went there one night. Theres a super cool shaved ice place called, Snowopolis. SO FUN! They have shakes (look here) and so much more yumminess. 

4. Convenient and budget friendly. As a family of five this is another important thing we look for when traveling. You can't beat the price or location of the Howard Johnson. It is literally across the street form Disneyland. The walk is eight minutes. Eight! That is less time than it usually takes us to walk or take the tram to Disneyland from the Disneyland parking structure. We were so shocked at how quick we got there. Plus with all the food spots close by it was easy to walk and grab a quick bite before heading into the park. My kids couldn't hang for fireworks so we watched them from our hotel balcony with Coco playing on Netflix in the background. 

They made sure our time spent there was special. When we first walked into our room, we were greeted with the cutest little setup for Jackson's birthday! It was the perfect way to kick off his birthday weekend, full of fireworks, mickey magic + splashing!

I got a lot of questions about Jacksons's character breakfast. And to be honest, part of me is hesitant to share this because one of the things I love about it is that it's less crowded than the others. Ha! We used to do Goofy's Kitchen at the Disneyland Hotel but it was always crowded and booked, then we stumbled upon, Surfs Up! It is in the Paradise Pier Hotel and I swear it's 100x better than any of the other character dining experiences. My kids love the main characters like Mickey, Minnie and Daisy and we always get to see them here. I found that Goofy's Kitchen didn't always have Daisy and most of time, had characters that my kids didn't really care for. Plus, the vibe here is just more fun. They have a little dance party with all the kids and since it's less crowded the characters interact more with the kids. The last time we were there my kids brought their own Mickey and Donald toy cars and both Daisy and Mickey loved it so much that they took extra time to play with them! My kids loved that and they are still talking about it.

Now for the huge birthday photo dump... enjoy!

s h o p  t h i s  p o s t   h e r e :

Mickey Mouse pacifier clip / disney bows / yellow bow socks / black and white outfits / similar mickey tee