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I've been to three Mother & Son Dances so far: one on the East Coast and two on the West Coast.

I think I enjoyed my very first one the most because it was my first Mother & Son experience, food was ready right when the event started and there were a lot of activities for the kids. It felt like a party.

Even though I enjoyed my first one the best, I still appreciate it when organizations plan a Mother & Son event. From what I've seen in many cities, there are way more Father & Daughter Dances than Mother & Son Dances and if you even have a Mother & Son Dance in your city, I consider you lucky! Furthermore, any event requires planning, effort, time and money, As a guest, I have the easy tasks. I buy the tickets, dress nicely, drive there, find a parking spot and show up with my sons. For the organizers, it takes months of hard work and planning!

Tonight, I decided to create a table on Pros and Cons on Going to a Mother and Son Dance based on my personal experiences and feelings, and I hope this will help you if you're on the fence about going to one.
 

Pros

Cons

You get to bond and spend special time with your son(s). It can be fun to dress up according to the theme of the Dance or dress up nicely. The kids may really enjoy the Dance. You usually get to take nice pictures with your sons as a memory keepsake. If you're going with another mommy friend who also has sons, this might be a great night out of catching up with friends as well. If the event includes dinner, you get to enjoy a dinner that you didn't have to cook. They usually have a DJ playing fun and appropriate music at Mother & Son Dances so it's nice entertainment. There are usually fun activities for the kids to participate in besides dancings.

You may have to sit nearby strangers who you don't know, which could be unpleasant if you get anxiety in a social setting like this. The DJ may ask you to do the limbo. If you or your kids don't like to participate in a limbo, this can be a scary thought. Your kids might not have as much fun as you'd thought. Watching other moms have their mom friends while you don't have any with you can feel like a drag. People reserving seats for people who haven't shown up yet while it's not an assigned seating situation can be annoying. There may be bigger and aggressive kids there who you're afraid may intimidate your little kids. It usually costs money. If the event includes dinner and the food is not ready right when the event starts, you may have to wait around with a growling stomach until it's ready. (This is the case for any event.)

Judging by my word count between the Pros and Cons columns above, you may think that I'm leaning towards not going next year, which at the time that I am writing this post, I'm gearing towards not attending again. I've went to the Mother & Son Dance with both of my sons and created great memories from them but unless it's going to be extraordinarily different, like a video gaming type event for the next Mother & Son event, I think I'll figure out a Mother & Son thing to do on my own.

Most Mother & Son Dances take place in May, close to Mother's Day. See Upcoming Family-Friendly Events in San Luis Obispo County.

Here is a video clip of a past Mother & Son event.

There may come a time when your sons may not be interested in going to these dances with you as they grow up, especially when they'll have dances of their own in high school so enjoy it when they're little and still eager to go!

I hope you had a great Mother's Day!

Mother & Son Gifts:

Located on the corner of HWY 1 & Hinds Ave. in Pismo Beach is a newer boba shop named MilkT Society. I tried their boba for the first time today, on their opening day!

I was anxious and excited! Their sign isn't up yet nor is their kitchen ready but I already like the decor of it inside. I ordered the Black Tea with boba while my husband ordered the Iced Vietnamese Coffee with boba. 


I've been loyal to Fay's Fusion (read about Fay's Fusion), a boba place just down the street from MilkT Society, but since Fay's Fusion is only open in the evenings, I'm glad I can resort to MilkT Society for my day time fix!

A picture I took while sitting under Fay's Fusion's awning, waiting for my drinks while looking towards the ocean's direction in Pismo Beach is below:

See a list of boba shops in San Luis Obispo County.

See pictures on my instagram @sanluisobispomom.

Make Boba at Home:

When we want to go to the movies, we usually go to Regal Arroyo Grande as they have a lot of restaurants close by! The restaurants list that are close include: In N Out, Urbane Cafe, Poke Morro, Palo Mesa Pizza, Blaze Pizza and Jamba Juice.

If you have an electric car, they have Tesla Charging Stations right next to this Regal Theater, which makes it very convenient to charge up. The charging stations are located to the right side of the building if you're facing their entrance. (We don't have an electric car but it always fascinates me when I see charging stations.)

We typically watch new Marvel movies and DC movies here at Regal Arroyo Grande. For the last couple of years, since the pandemic, we've been having to buy tickets at the concession stand. You don't buy tickets at the window in front, even though it looks like you would.

You could probably save more time if you buy the tickets online instead. Exact seat selections have to be picked upon buying tickets so that is another step you have to consider now.

We have a Regal Cinema account and you can earn points for a free popcorn or other concession goods if you accumulate enough points. I think it's worth joining. It's free to join currently.

The seats are nothing spectacular than the usual fold up theater seats you would expect. They have a small arcade area that's kind of tucked in the far corner. They have about 10 different games, which is great for kids if you happen to arrive too early before the movie starts.

Movie Care Packages:

There's only 6 weeks left for the school year and I'm starting to look back at how much has happened for my two kids.

For the first half of the year, all of the kids were required to wear masks. It feels like that was so long ago but it was only a few months ago that the masks mandate was lifted for the kids around this part of town. 

It never bothered my kids that they had to wear masks. Since the start of the pandemic, I sewed their fabric masks with 100% cotton fabric, as I've read it's a great fabric for filtering what comes in and still comfortable for breathing out. They've watched me used my sewing machine in the dining room (I have a small home) and used the clothes they've outgrown to size the masks to fit their little faces. They didn't like the disposable masks very much so I'm glad the fabric face masks worked out for them; and maybe they saw that I sewed them from clothes that they used to wear, so they gravitated towards the familiar?

After the masks mandate has been lifted, they welcomed the change as it's one thing less to remember to bring to school.

Interestingly, I had grown used to wearing a mask and usually have seasonal allergies. I think it has helped me so much in the last couple of years because I did not have hay fever from pollen in 2020 or 2021. Now that I'm not wearing a mask anymore, my allergy symptoms have been terrible for this spring of 2022! Read about my recent wheezing issues at night on my Madonna Inn Staycation blog post. However, I've adapted to not having to wear a mask and have less fabric masks to wash for laundry.

Now that my kids and I are mask-free, everything seems to be back to normal around SLO County.

Looking at the big picture, I'm proud at how much my kids have learned and grown socially this year. They've become adaptable. Watching them become better readers, spellers and problem solvers has been such a great joy! I'm hoping that after they've finished a full year of in class learning, they will become more mature and responsible little people next year. This will be the first time both of my kids will finish a full year of IN-class learning!

I'm excited for summer break, more beach days (see all local beach pictures that I took), special summer events and letting my kids have no alarms to wake up to soon. Most likely, I will be making another visit to Madonna Inn in the summer to eat or bring visitors to! Here is a TikTok video that I created during one of my older visits at the Madonna Inn property during the pandemic below:

Suggested Links for the Summer:

See a schedule of free concert series all around San Luis Obispo County.

See a list of 20 summer day camps for kids around San Luis Obispo County.

See a list of attractions around San Luis Obispo County.

Find suggested things to do for teens around San Luis Obispo County.

See pictures that I've posted on my Instagram @sanluisobispomom

Summer Activities At Home:

I was checking out my food items in my drawers earlier today and noticed that I had a can of pumpkin puree that will expire in about 5 months, which is still 2 months before Thanksgiving Day. I needed to make use it before it is no good and goes to waste so I baked a pumpkin pie today in the middle of spring!

I used this one recipe from Minimalist Baker that's vegan and gluten-free for last Thanksgiving and my older son liked it. I also enjoy it as I find that vegan recipes can be much better for my waistline! I don't always eat vegan but I do have a high cholesterol problem so I enjoy my vegetables and the art of different ways of cooking things. The link to the recipe is here: https://minimalistbaker.com/vegan-gluten-free-pumpkin-pie/ but in the event that the website is down, I'm going to list the ingredients down below too in this post.

What I especially liked about this recipe is it requires less ingredients than the typical pumpkin pie recipe!

For the crust, I used:

• 1.25 cup of gluten-free flour
• 1/4 teaspoon of salt
• 6 tablespoons of cold water
• 6 tablespoons of Miyoko's vegan butter. 

I knead that and then make it into a disc, wrapped it in plastic and chilled it in the fridge for 30 minutes.

For the pumpkin pie puree mix, I used just 1 can of pumpkin puree this time but the recipe calls for:

• 1.5 cans of pumpkin puree (about 2.75 cups)
• 1 teaspoon on pumpkin pie spice mix, 1/4 cup of maple syrup
• 1/4 cup of brown sugar, 1/3 cup of almond milk (unsweetened)
• 1 tablespoon of olive oil, 2.5 tablespoons of arrowroot powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

Mix all of that into a blender. (I have used a blender or a whisk for this part. If the puree is from a can, I just use a whisk to mix.)

After the crust dough has been chilled, I take it out and knead it a bit and used my rolling pin, using wax paper to cover the dough and roll on top of that to flatten it out. I have a square glass pan that I was using so I tried to roll it out to a square. With this gluten-free dough, it does break easily so I just try my best to shape it into the square to fit my pan but of course as I transfer it over to the pan, it broke in a few pieces. However, I just use my fingers to shape it back together. Then, I use a fork to crimp the edge of the dough.

After my crust has been shaped to my pan to my satisfaction, I poured the puree mix into the center of the crust and then bake the pie for 60 minutes in the 350 degree oven!

That's it! 

Once I take the pie out, I'll let it cool down for several hours before chilling it in the fridge.

See my instagram reel to see a video of when I baked this vegan and gluten-free pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving last year.

Ingredients that I used:


See a list of grocery stores that I've found gluten-free ingredients for cooking in San Luis Obispo County.