Lucy's 1 on 1s

I don't normally do a separate post on 1:1s with the kids, but January has been so uneventful I decided to do one this time, haha.

So one-on-one's have kind of evolved over time. When we first started doing them, they were big activities (Larry would usually take them to an arcade, as an example), BUT after adding more and more kids to the mix I realized that's not feasible (or budget friendly), so I told Larry we had to tame it down to going out for a treat or something like that. Unfortunately, the kids still ask for an arcade trip so I feel bad bumming them out, but we take each of the girls out twice a year (Pierce will eventually join in when he gets older, but he gets a lot of 1:1 time with us since he only has 2 days of school during the week), so doing 6 arcade trips is just a little crazy. Besides, the point of the 1:1s is to have conversations or make sure the kids know they can talk to us about things or just have those moments of connection with them.

So with that, we used to both take them out for treats, but two treats in a week (because we try and plan the 1:1s within the same week) seemed a bit much, so I thought it would be fun to do something that's still low-key, but isn't necessarily a treat (and I try and change it up each time too). So for Lucy's, Larry took her to DQ on the 13th. She loves getting ice cream treats, so that was really fun for her. 

I told her I would take her to the soda shop and to Barnes & Noble to pick out a book (the girl really likes reading and is getting into it more). She was asking for soda all week long, it was pretty funny. So tonight, when it was my turn I took her out, and realized after a while that I probably should've stopped at the soda place first and we could drink them on the way to Barnes & Noble (since there's quite a bit of construction on the road to B&N and so it's a bit slower), but it was too late so we just figured we'd hit up the soda place on the way back home (since it's right across the street from our neighborhood).

So my plan was to just get her one book at the store, but I have such a problem at book stores and we ended up leaving with like 9 books, haha. We talked about silly stuff on the way there, but on the way to the soda place she just wanted to read all the books we got (which I loved). 

We got to the soda place, and they usually do a fun one each month for kids that has a gummy candy or a toy with it so I was starting to tell her about it, but she said she just wanted a root beer, so I asked if she wanted anything like vanilla in it and she said sure, as long as she gets a root beer (she just loves root beer). So I ordered her a small root beer with vanilla (apparently there are two small sizes, and so he asked me if I meant the 24 ounces, which seems like SO much soda, so I told him I wanted the smallest one they had, which is a 12 ounce). I got one that had orange Fanta, coconut, and mango in it - it was really yummy! We sat there and talked about some other funny stuff. I just love doing these things with the kids. I look forward to them each time they come up and I do look forward to Pierce getting them in a couple years.

So yeah, that's all I got, I'm glad I heard about this idea and we're able to do it as often as we do. I highly recommend them.