It's Dress Up Day!

So I guess one of the benefits of Mommy being a dance teacher to little girls is that Kayden gets her pick of pink, fluff, tutus, fairy wings, wands, tiaras, and dresses to try on at her whim. I happened upon the Disney Store closing sale yesterday at Dulles Town Center to find an enormous selection of Cinderella dresses at $15 a piece. Anddd...they just so happen to work with my summer camp theme this year so away to the counter we went...12 dresses in hand:) Of course we had to pick up some other Disney paraphanalia...I mean, it was all on sale...right? Here are some of Kayden's adventures this morning dressing up as Cinderella, playing with her tinkerbell bracelet and necklace and drinking from her first big girl cup (Cinderella of course!).

Drinking from my first Cinderella Big Girl Cup!

My New Tinkerbell Necklace and Bracelet

Cinderella Kayden

And there goes the Princess

I hear that the Children's Place is having a crazy $2.99 sale....may have to check that out today to get ready for next winter. She's already a 2T so I think I'll be looking for the (gasp!) 3T's.....Ahhh where did my baby go?

Well, the week came and went...just like they all seem to be flying by anymore! Kayden went to swim class and loved it again! She practiced going underwater and sang a lot of the songs (in her own little language). She's repeating almost everything we say to her and her vocabulary is growing by leaps and bounds! She's up to about 50 words and counting! Oh yea! She's counting! She can say One, Two, and Three!
The "terrible twos" are also starting to creep up on us.....she's being fussy about eating, sometimes not wanting to take a nap and having random outbursts about absolutely nothing!
Above is a picture of our once good eater, picking away at food she used to love! What the heck!?

I had a good meeting last week and should know more this week about the future of TTDA! Also have had some interesting requests for TTDA to grow in some unconventional ways...more to come on this as well!

Kris had a long and stressful week, but keeps plugging away. His company got their first royalty check for the lacrosse DVD that they made - about 50 have sold already! woohoo! Their soccer video has finished production and should be out on the market within a month or so!

I made some progress in the loft this week - all cleaned and organized! And I'm all ready for my taxes to be prepared for both businesses. On deck for this week: Organizing eBay items and getting our home finances in order.

Hope everyone has a great week and gets a lot accomplished!

~The Johnsons

The First Week Came and Went.....

.......and we survived! The first week at Tiny Toes was full of wonderful little ballerinas, new and returning! So good to see everyone again and get back into our routine of classes! Kris has stepped back into another busy winter training at his 2 locations in addition to traveling to schools and organizations. He has also hired a bunch of interns that started this week so he has been busy working with them to get them up to speed.
Kayden is really starting to put together two word sentences and is adding "please" when asking for something (yay! finalllly!!). Kris took her to swim lessons at Ida Lee on Saturday and she loved it! She was taking direction from the teacher and actually kicking her legs and paddling with her arms! I am hoping this doesn't detract from her love of ballet haha! (A new word of hers this week!!)
Friday Kris and I went out to P.F. Chang's in Fairfax thanks to Taylor and Hilary, two of my dancers, who so generously gave us a gift certificate for dinner. We really enjoyed spending some time together, away from computers, phonecalls, iPhones and Blackberrys. Afterwards, we met up with an old friend of mine, Sarah Davis - it was wonderful to catch up and reminisce about old times! I hope to take some dance classes again with her very soon:)
I definitely need to get back into the classroom....really missing being challenged physically and mentally through dance. Teaching the babies at Tiny Toes is wonderful and a stress-reliever. As rewarding as teaching my older and advanced students can be, it leaves me drained and frustrated at times. I need some classes to spark my creativity and re-ignite my love for dance!!
Up this week:
-Looking forward to meeting up with Val Cavalheri tomorrow about Tiny Toes and Kayden's Closet photography!
-Have some more financing meetings for Tiny Toes - Friday is a big one!
-Should have a design meeting - tbd
-Researching Teacher conventions and figuring out where my trip will be for this year.

Kris and I sat down after another amazing Church service at Cornerstone Chapel and had our monthly Johnson Household meeting. This really helps us get on the same page about monthly goals in our businesses, personally, and financially. We're both very excited about January!

Looking forward to warmer temperatures this week and getting some answers by the end of this week:)

~The Johnsons

New Year for the Johnsons

Well, Here we are! A new year filled with new ideas, resolutions, ambitions, hopes and challenges. Kris and I have a lot of expectations for this year and cannot wait to get started on our projects! We really enjoyed the holidays, spending almost a week in IL with Kris' family and a few days in VA with my family that came to visit and ring in the New Year. Kayden made out like a bandit - now we're challenged to find space for it all! She is really enjoying Santa's, Mom-Mom's and Nana's gifts and amazing us day after day with all of her mini accomplishments. She starts swim classes this Saturday with Daddy - should be fun since the kid LOVES the water!

Here are some of our goals and resolutions for 2010:

Do more with Less
- Create healthy meals on a budget (We do a pretty good job of this now, but really digging deep to fine tune our diets)
- Get creative with leftover foods
- Re-purpose current furniture and unused items in the house

Become a bigger part of our church, Cornerstone Chapel


Be the BEST parents to Kayden

Grow and Grow with our Businesses
- Tiny Toes is growing each session and I have some big decisions to make about the future of the business this year.
- TrueAP is busier than ever and is creating more partnerships than they ever though they could...expanding to several locations and reaching more of the NoVa market.
- We are both eager to tweak our marketing and customer service skills to make 2010 the best year for our businesses!

Workout!
- Or at least try to incorporate it into our day.....I'm home with a basement full of workout stuff and Kris works in a Gym setting.....I mean really, neither of us have an excuse!

Take one trip to a new place this year

Re-kindle bonds with old friends

So that's it! Our short list of some of the things we'd like to tackle as a family :) Looking forward to a prosperous, happy and healthy New Year!!

~The Johnsons