For years, my husband and I have hosted sleepovers for my nieces and nephews. We have sleepovers several times a year and always look forward to the jumping, yelling and laughing that takes over our house for the weekend. For the past two years, sleepovers have been pretty limited because of the pandemic, so each time we get together feels like a big event!
This past weekend, we had all six kids over for a sleepover extravaganza and it was wonderful. Our families keep getting bigger, the kids keep growing, and we also added another dog to the mix. So, needless to say, it was a really active house!
We started off by going for a long walk. This was strategic on my part because we knew that the kids could use a bit of “loud time” and the dogs would love to be able to run around outside with them. Luckily, we live in a really quiet neighborhood where there are barely any vehicles on the roads ever. This means that we never use the sidewalks, which is a good thing, because in the winter, the sidewalks are piled high with snow. We would never be able to roll down them anyway. The kids loved running up and down the snow piles just as much as our dogs did. The big kids were in charge of running the dogs to the street corners and back while the little kids were in charge of seeing how many steps it took them to get to the top of the snow piles!
When we got back home, we sent the big kids off to play video games while we taught the little ones how to make waffles! Our niece, Cassidy, is four and our nephew, Luke, is two. So, we thought this would be a fun activity for them to help us with. Cassidy grabbed her special stool while Luke sat on my lap and we got to work. Cassidy was very proud of her egg-cracking abilities and Luke was simply happy to stir just about anything.
Later that night we all snuggled in to watch Encanto before passing out. The next morning, we were still singing Encanto songs while eating our waffles and planning our next sleepover before their parents picked them up!
About Stephanie Woodward: Stephanie is a brand ambassador advisor for Quantum Rehab® and works as a disability rights activist. She has received many awards for helping communities become more accessible, as well as for her actions in fighting for the rights of disabled individuals as it relates to Medicaid and other support services. Click here to learn more about Stephanie.