Nicole // 4 Years

Happy 4th birthday to the girl who made me a mama! Nicole is 1/3rd sassy, 2/3rds sweet, and 100% a blessing and joy to us. I've learned many valuable lessons (and grown in many ways) from being her mom. But this post isn't about my mama journey, so let's talk all about the birthday girl!

Nicole at 4 years old:

- Let's get the obvious out of the way first: homegirl loves to sing. Not only does she love to sing, but she also has a looooud singing voice and she has quite the memory for lyrics. Favorite styles include anything Disney (including live action films such as Newsies), anything Christmas-related, and anything dramatic/boisterous/catchy.

- She loves wearing necklaces.

- She is SO pumped to get the mail every day.

- She enjoys hot showers. The warmer the water, the better. The longer the shower, the better. I guess she's preparing me for the teenage years already.

- Her sass level is also very "teenager-esque" sometimes. She talks back to me a bit more often now, and I'm torn between annoyance at her attitude and pride at her learning to stand up for herself and speak her mind. Other times, the sass is just straight up funny. A recent example (I might be remembering the details incorrectly though) occurred when my brothers were staying with us for Thanksgiving. Nicole was eating something and I think she asked someone to fill up her water cup. One of my brothers told her she could go fill it herself, and she responded with, "Well, I don't see YOU eating anything..." because he was just sitting at the table on his computer (therefore he was available to go fill her cup). Oh man, we were dying.

- She does NOT put up with (for lack of a better word) crap from me or Doug. She does not hesitate to let me know if she finds my emotions or actions unappealing. "Mommy, do NOT hurt my arm! I DON'T like that!" if I snatch her by the arm too tightly when I'm exasperated, for example. Once again, I'm proud of her for taking charge of her own feelings, body, and personal space. It's important for a girl to learn the power of a strongly-worded "No!" in this day and age.

- Currently, we can hardly get through a day without her requesting to watch one of us play a game from the "The Legend of Zelda" franchise. Breath of the Wild is her favorite, but I've heard her request Ocarina of Time before (I played through it earlier this year) and she seems to really be enjoying Twilight Princess, which both Doug and I are playing through right now. We almost did Zelda-themed family costumes for Halloween instead of Peter Pan... but I decided it would be too much work, especially without a sewing machine.

- She will pick dresses over shirts/pants ANY day. Even now when it's snowy outside, she prefers to go around the house in short-sleeved, knee-length dresses.

- Just like Austin, Nicole will gladly eat a whole avocado by herself in one sitting. She also enjoys snacking on frozen fruits and veggies (particularly pineapple, mango, berries, peas, and green beans) and has an ever-enduring love for German Pancakes (aka Dutch babies).

- I usually put a hairbow in her hair when we leave the house, and she gets very annoyed if anything bumps her bow. She will claim that her bow "got messed up" even if it looks like it hasn't budged.

- She enjoys putting stickers all over herself and Austin. She's currently in the habit of taking any stickers she gets (from grocery stores, doctor offices, etc) and putting them on her back. Yes, on her back.

- Books are still one of her main obsessions. I'm excited for her to start learning to read. Meanwhile, she takes any opportunity she can to have Doug or me read to her.

- Coloring is another obsession. She prefers blank paper over coloring books.

- She has grown very proficient at writing her name. She enjoys practicing her letters on our magnetic drawing board. She is obsessed with writing the letter "H" for some reason.

- When she wakes up in the morning, she always gets out of bed and peeks her head in my room to see if I'm up yet (and to see if Doug is there). If it's a weekday and Doug isn't there, then she returns to her room, turns the light on, and "reads" books for a while until she hears me get up or hears Austin start chatting to himself. If Doug is there, then she comes on in and wakes him up because... Daddy.

-  She's a huge Daddy's girl, in case you didn't get that impression from the previous point. She'll pick Doug over me any day, honestly.

- She has high levels of empathy when it comes to people being in pain. If one of us gets an "owie" and needs a bandage, she's right there fussing over us and telling us it will be okay, saying, "Ooooh, I'm SO sorry that happened!" She actually held my hand when I had to get a shot a few weeks back.

- She went through a phase for a few months where she asked almost daily if we could go through the car wash. She still loves the car wash (but asks about it less often now) and so we went through one today for her birthday. She was pumped!

- She's been obsessed with The Greatest Showman for most of the year (it was the 2nd movie she ever saw in theaters). She has all the songs memorized, and often sings them to herself when she's trying to fall asleep at night.

- This has been a big year for Nicole to get over some of her fears! At the beginning of the summer she freaked out over being in water any deeper than her belly button; now she'll go vaulting over the side of the pool into the lazy river without even informing me first (while wearing floatie wings). She also finally got over her fear of the foam pits at gymnastics places. Her increased bravery lets her climb to new heights (literally) and try things she wouldn't have even half a year ago.

- If you ask her who her best friends are, she'll respond with her cousins Eric and Claire.

- She likes playing "house", which mostly consists of eating pretend meals at the little play table and going to bed while she turns the playroom light off and closes the door.

- She's very "schedule minded" -- in other words, she appreciates knowing what's on the agenda for the day/week/month. She'll recite what events are happening during the week, along with which days they're happening on. She loves to anticipate big holidays or events.

- She also appreciates procedures. Bedtime routines. Keeping track of whose turn it is to hand the receipt to the lady at the exit of Costco. Making sure we all take our multivitamins every morning. Stuff like that.



I could go on and on, I'm sure, but we'll stop there. We love our little preschooler! And, just out of tradition, here are pictures of her from each of her birthdays. So big, so fast!

 ^^^3 weeks old

 ^^^1 year old

 ^^^2 years old

 ^^^3 years old

And our current happy 4-year-old! Happy birthday, Nikki B!

Austin // 2 Years

How is my baby not a baby anymore?!?!?!?! Stay little forever, please please please!

My emotions aside, Austin honestly just gets better with age. These days he's a robust, rough-and-tumble little butter ball. He's always smiling, laughing, and chattering away. I'm pretty sure that it would be impossible for anyone to dislike him. He has aaaaall the charisma and cuteness and jolliness that you could ever hope to squish into one tubby little body.

Can you tell I'm wrapped around his finger?

Some tidbits about Austin at 2 years old:

- He loves to play "Stop, Go" (everyone runs around until he says "Stop!" and we all freeze, then unfreeze when he says "Go!") and to have Doug chase him and Nicole around furniture. They call it "Tiger Chase" because Doug growls while he's chasing them.

- In the past month he has developed a love for toy cars, trucks, trains, and planes. We've always had some on hand, but he's just now really getting into them. He'll spend a good 20 minutes driving his trucks and cars over various surfaces in the house. He got mad at me when he had to stop playing with his new train set to take his nap yesterday. He rarely fights naptime, so those trains must be cool!

- He's a tubby little tater tot (91st percentile for 2-year-old boys), especially considering the fact that his height is average. He's losing the baby chub, though.

- While he's generally a people-person (and a bit of a flirt), he has his days where he's shy. Once he warms up to you, though, you'll feel like you're his best friend in the world.

- He enjoys a good game of "peek boo" (how he pronounces peek-a-boo).

- He still sucks his fingers. I'm finding it less and less cute as he gets older, but many "reputable" things I read tell me that he'll grow out of it and that I shouldn't try to force him to quit with things like bad-tasting nail polish and whatnot. We'll see. It's not causing any dental problems (yet). He reeeeeeally likes those fingers though...

- This kid loves to throw/kick/roll/bounce balls. He'll probably be into sports because goodness, he loves to chase a ball around and has quite the arm already. He's pretty good at kicking too, and can run so fast, especially down ramps at the park!

- He loves attending nursery at church. He makes a beeline for the room as soon as he hears that final "amen" from the pulpit.

- Daniel Tiger is his favorite thing to watch. I catch him singing songs from it regularly.

- Speaking of singing, it appears we have another singer on our hands! He often sings to himself when he's playing, and the melody we hear out of him most often is "Yo Ho, Yo Ho, A Pirate's Life For Me". He only knows the words to that line, so he just repeats it over and over. He's fond of "The Greatest Showman" songs, too.

- Also in regards to singing: sometimes he'll be singing along to something in the car and I'll start singing too. He says, "No, I sing!" because apparently both of my kids like to sing solo. He picked it up from Nicole because she's always telling him not to sing along with her...... my "family of singers" is turning into a family of soloists who don't want to share the spotlight, hahahaha!

- He really likes to side-chasse around our family room. I think that started from watching Nicole's dance class. (For those who don't dance, a chasse is kind of like a gallop, but smoother. Austin's chasse is definitely a bouncy chasse.)

- During this year's Primary Program (which is one Sunday every year where the age 3-11 children take over our church meeting to sing some songs and give short "talks" in the microphone) he was bummed he couldn't go up to sing with Nicole, so he just sang a bunch of the songs anyways from his seat in the congregation.

- Any time he gets even the tiniest cold, he gets a walloping cough with it. All thanks to that dratted bronchiolitis that he got back in February. I keep his nebulizer at the ready whenever I see a runny nose start. He knows the drill now, after having to use it so much, and is very willing to sit with the nebulizer mask on his face for 10 minutes because he knows he'll be able to breathe better afterwards.

- Bubble baths are a trump card. He will drop whatever he's doing if he can take a bubble bath.

- "Bankie" (a white blanket with elephants on it) and "puppy" (black Labrador stuffie) are still his best buddies, and are his favorite things to snuggle up with at bedtime.

- He is still a robust sleeper, but is starting to skip his afternoon nap some days. He'll just lie in his crib and chatter to himself for an hour or so until I give the nap up as a lost cause and go get him out. Nooooo Austin, not yet!!!

- He is quite the talker! His most-often-used phrase is "I see it!!!" and variations thereon. In a hilarious recent incident, he wanted to watch some bacon cook and screeched about how he could see it when I turned the oven light on for him. He then carried his puppy over to the oven, saying, "Bacon! Puppy, bacon! You see it?!?! I see bacon!!!!!" So apparently, he already has quite the obsession with bacon.

- Also in regards to talking: he loves to repeat things I say. He has quite the vocabulary developing because of it! Simple phrases/sentences tumble out of his mouth daily now.

- While not as obsessed with books as Nicole was, he will bring books over to me every now and then. We always make sure to read a book before bed, which he loves.

- He is STILL my snuggle bug! He loves to cuddle and gives me the sweetest hugs. On rare occasions he'll even grab my face with both hands and plant a big ol' kiss on my cheek. He's a mamma's boy through and through. I love it, but I have a feeling he's going to have a hard time adjusting to having to share mom with a little sister in a few months...

- Still a foodie! I never worry about his eating habits because he'll eat (or at least try) almost anything. Some favorites include any type of fruit, corn on the cob, soups and chilis of any variety, burritos, yogurt, pasta of any variety, chicken enchiladas (obsessed), crackers, any dessert, and avocado. He will eat an entire avocado plain in one sitting. He's not a huge fan of sandwiches, though, but he'll eat them if he's in the right mood. Oh, and he still has a banana almost every day.

- He is so low-maintenance. For example, when he wakes up in the morning or after naps, he just talks to himself and chills in his crib until someone comes to get him. So chill.

- He hates getting his hands/face washed after meals. He moans and complains like it's the most annoying and pointless process in the universe.

- He loves making pancakes and waffles with Doug on the weekends.

- He LOVES playing outside. Usually it involves chucking a ball around or digging in the dirt. He also LOVES slides. He will spend his entire time at a park going down different slides and be perfectly content with that. Perhaps with one break to go on the swings, because those are fun too.

- He has no reservations about being in pools and loves swimming. He goes down water slides with Doug and already tries to "kick kick kick" in the water even though he's still a little too short for his floatie wings to keep him upright properly, so we mostly keep him in a tube. Little fish.

- He usually pronounces his sister's name "Cole" and she is his best buddy and partner in crime. Even if she bosses him around a lot. He doesn't really fight back, so I guess he's a pacifist? Haha!

Oh man, we love this little dude! I thank my lucky stars that I get to be his mama. He brings so much joy and light into our lives. Here's to another year, chub chub!

Nicole // 3 Years

Another year with this sweet, lollipop-loving, imaginative little gal! She has been so excited for her birthday, and has waited SO patiently for her special day to come so she could be the one to blow out the candles on the cake. Rainbow confetti cake with chocolate frosting, to be exact. She was grinning ear-to-ear when we sang to her, and blew her candles out like a pro!

She woke up this morning to a bunch of balloons in her room. She cheerfully paraded into our room with a balloon in each hand and refused to let Austin touch them, lest he pop any. To add to the birthday excitement, there was snow coating the ground outside--the first snow of the season for us! We spent part of the morning outside, and Nicole made tracks around and around the yard.

The cool swirly pattern on the ground was all her!

Oh man. Three already. She's going to be a Sunbeam in just a couple weeks! Crazy. For my non-Mormon readers, "Sunbeams" is the youngest class in Primary (which is Sunday School for 3-11 year olds.) I can't really call her a toddler anymore, but it feels weird to call her a preschooler since she's not attending preschool yet--should I call her a "threenager" then? Haha! I have noticed the beginnings of some sassy rebelliousness, but in general she hardly warrants that title. She's my helpful, good-tempered, book-loving Nikki B! She can get a little hyper if the situation is right, and emotions run high every now and then, and she's more likely to give me a defiant "No!" than in months past, but she's such a great kid. She brings so much light and joy to our family. We love love love her!

^^^Like I said... she's super silly!

Some little tidbits about Nicole at age 3:

+ Our neighbors across the street have a cat who visits us a lot, and Nicole firmly insists that the cat's name is "Cookie"--a name inspired by a book we have about a cat by that name.

+ Based on the order in which she consumed her Halloween candy, she seems to favor actual candy over chocolates. This hurts my chocoholic heart a little! Haha. Her favorites are lollipops, followed by tootsie rolls.

+ She listens to her Disney playlist on Spotify on the daily. Multiple times per day, actually.

+ Moana is her favorite movie, and she acts out scenes from the movie every now and then. She stole one of my round, clear magnets from the fridge, broke the magnet off, and has been using the stone as her own little "Heart of Te Fiti" for weeks now as she acts out her favorite scenes. So... we got her an actual glow-in-the-dark stone for her birthday, shaped and inscribed just like the Heart from the movie. She's barely let it go all day. You can see it clutched in her hand in the snow picture above. She took it to bed with her, as a matter of fact. She's obsessed. ;)

+ Sometimes, she lies on her tummy and wiggles her legs around. When I ask her what she's doing, she says, "I'm swimming!" and flops around some more like a dying fish. It's kind of hilarious.

+ If our house were on fire and she had to grab only one item, it would most likely be her blanket with purple flowers.

+ She used to watch an episode of "Jake and the Neverland Pirates" almost every evening on Doug's phone before dinner. Ever since returning from Disneyland, though, she's more likely to request watching ride-through videos of her favorite rides off YouTube. Her top picks these days are Peter Pan's Flight, Pirates of the Caribbean, and (even though she has never been on it) Frozen Ever After.

+ She's picking up on the lyrics to Christmas songs very quickly. She often sings them to herself when we're out and about. There are few things cuter than pushing a cart through the aisles of Target while your smiley kid belts "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" at the top of her lungs.

+ She sleeps with her door cracked open now. She has always slept with it closed with no nightlight, but a month or two ago she started getting nervous with it closed and would get out of bed, open it a smidge, and then fall asleep on the ground by it. We started leaving it open a crack for her, and that was all she needed. Now she's back to staying in bed and falling asleep quickly.

+ She likes to take my Julep nail polish collection and line all the bottles up in rows on the tank of our main upstairs toilet.

+ She loves to get the mail. She loves it even more when there's mail for her, such as a new "Friend" magazine or new hair bows I purchase from various small business shops.

+ Favorite place to play: the All-Together Playground.

+ Favorite store: either Macey's (grocery), Target, Costco, or the Disney Store.

+ Favorite shirt: her maroon tee from Target that says "This is what an awesome sister looks like" in sparkly letters.

+ Favorite pastime: reading, hands down. She has a daily ~45 minute quiet time during Austin's afternoon nap, during which she takes a huge stack of books up to her room and spends the entire time "reading" them. It makes me a proud mama.

***I have a little birthday interview video that I did with her, but I haven't pieced the segments together yet, so I'll share that in a separate post.

And now, because I can't resist, here are some pictures of Nicole on each of her birthdays. Kids grow and change so fast!

 Newborn

 First birthday

Second birthday

Third birthday!

We love you to the moon and back, Nicole Brielle! Thank you for your smiles, laughter, hugs, jokes, and the random times you say, "I love you, mom/dad!" You're my favorite silly goose!

30 Before 30

Well folks, I just had a birthday. I'm officially a quarter of a century old. Halfway to fifty. Able to rent a car. I have a single white hair on my right eyebrow as a testament of my increased age and wisdom. Haha!

I had a good birthday week, complete with: a kid-free night out with my man, finally watching Fantastic Beasts, the arrival of my new double stroller (which resulted in several long walks over to the nearest park with the kiddos), watching plenty of General Conference, birthday dinner at the in-laws, and breaking my 2-month chocolate fast. I requested brownies and ice cream for my birthday dessert; brownies have never tasted so good, folks! Oh chocolate, how I have missed you!

Now that I'm halfway through my 20s, it seems like an opportune time to make a bucket list to work on over the next 5 years. Soooooo here are 30 things that I want to do before I turn 30 years old:

***EDIT: I will write a blog post each time I accomplish a bucket list item, and I'll link all of the posts on the master list below! And I'll mark the ones I'm currently working on.***

1) Add a fur baby to our family. Okay, let's be specific... a cat. I want a cat.

2) Travel outside of the continental US.

3) Master at least 5 classic piano pieces. (in progress)

4) Take our kids camping.

5) Get a bike, along with a bike trailer to put the kids in, and go on family bike rides. DONE

6) Learn to love running and set a new personal best mile time. DONE

7) Become flexible enough to do the splits. (in progress)

8) Visit the ice castles in Midway. DONE

9) Go on a cruise.

10) Take the kids horseback riding. DONE

11) Take the kids ice skating. DONE

12) Get professional family pictures taken. (We've never done this, aside from a small wedding shoot.)

13) Read the entire Little House series to Nicole, just like my mom read them to me. (in progress)

14) Find the joy in yard work and get our yards looking picture perfect.

15) Take the kiddos to Disneyland. DONE (3 times so far!)

16) Get the courage to finally dye my hair. DONE

17) See a favorite musician live in concert. Either Michael Buble or John Mayer. Both would be nice. Or see "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child" now that it's in the states. No, that's not a concert, but I think I would pick it over John or Michael. (tickets purchased!)

18) Have my home cohesively decorated. This means I'll have to learn some interior design tricks because my eye for balancing home décor and picking out the perfect pieces for a space (as well as how to arrange those pieces) is nonexistent.

19) Participate in a fundraising walk.

20) Get a manicure or pedicure. (I've never had a professional one!)

21) Start the tradition of an annual Galentine's Day party.

22) Visit Doug's grandmother in Arizona.

23) Home reno project: add doors in our kitchen leading out onto a new backyard deck.

24) Read Jesus the Christ in its entirety.

25) Finish decluttering the house. (I've been stuck at about 3/4ths of the way done for a while now.)

26) Stay in one of the rooms at the Anniversary Inn. After some research, I've decided I don't want to go there anymore. Now, the goal is to stay at a 5-star hotel. (was in progress, but coronavirus postponed it)

27) Go on a Girls Trip. With what girls? I don't know (Carissa, ya with me?) but the point is, go on a multi-day trip with no kids or men. (was in progress, but coronavirus postponed it)

28) Learn basic coding and programming. (in progress)

29) Learn a new instrument, and be able to play it adequately. (in progress)

30) Become a certified Zumba instructor.



Bonus items: see a musical/play on broadway, go on a family vacation to Yellowstone, maybe even go to my 10 year high school reunion. :P It looks like a perfectly manageable list to me! Time is ticking... ready, set, go!

"Feed The Ducks" Party

Today was my one-and-only nephew's third birthday, and so we did what any three year old would be excited to do... went to the park to play and feed ducks! A couple of nesting mama ducks may or may not have gotten terrorized when we all came traipsing over the rocks, but overall the party was a fun success for all the little ones. Nothing beats fresh air, hungry water fowl, and birthday cake!

A couple photos from our morning at the park (I was going around in short sleeves! At 10 AM! Glorious! ALL the exclamation points!)

 ^^^Another terrorized duck for the scoreboards today ;)

 ^^^Balloon ducks lined the ground in front of our pavilion

 ^^^Nicole was more content to eat the bread than to give it away to the ducks ;)

 ^^^Messy, drool-covered toddler faces! This is my life right now.

Nicole // ONE YEAR!

Happy birthday to the sweetest little daughter a mommy could ask for! My baby girl is ONE! I'm officially the mother of a toddler. That's ridiculous, you guys. I could say so many sappy things in this post, but we'll save that for another time. For this post, I want to focus on the birthday girl!

We'll start with new developments:

+ As you can kind of see in the pictures, she's walking now! Her record is around 20 steps, and it's so fun to watch her gain confidence and improve.

+ She has a total of 6 teeth, and in the past few days she has started drooling like crazy, so we might have some more coming in really soon. No rest for the baby!

+ She loves to click her tongue, especially when you do it back to her.

+ This week, she's decided to start being a little picky about food. Happy birthday? Ha.

+ We're officially, exclusively down to one nap. That makes me sad, but sometimes her nap ends up lasting 3 hours. I do not complain when that happens.

+ She loves to "help" with the dishwasher. In fact, she can recognize the sound of the dishwasher being opened from the other end of the apartment and will come speeding down the hall as fast as she can to come pull the silverware out. She always grabs a knife first.

+ When she's done eating, she violently yanks off her bumbo tray and tosses it to the floor. Clearly, we need to upgrade to an actual highchair with a tray that firmly attaches to it.

+ Her vocabulary consists of: Mama, Dada, Hi, Hey, Yeah, and every now and then I hear her say something that sounds like Thank You.

+ There's a little sparkly purple bear that I've had since sometime in my childhood, and I passed it on to her. She loves carrying it around because it's so easy for her little hands to hold.

+ She went through a short phase where she would pat her head during "5 Little Monkeys" every time a monkey fell of the bed and bonked it's head... and then she stopped doing it recently. It was cute while it lasted!

+ We put the Christmas Tree up last night after she went to bed... she saw it for the first time for her birthday this morning. She couldn't care less. At least I won't have to worry about her messing with it!

^^^Not pictured... her crying once she realized how cold the snow was. I had to stop taking pictures and warm her hands back up for her. She stayed away from the snow after that ;)

NOW let's take a look at some of the things she's experienced in the first year of life.

At the age of 1, Nicole has:
- Been in 3 states (4 if you count driving through the top corner of Arizona)
- Been to the beach twice
- Traveled on 6 planes
- Gotten sick only once (a cold at the age of 1 month)
- Attended a football game
- Attended a ballroom dance lab at BYU
- Tried too many new foods to count
- Had one bloody nose
- Gained roughly 11-12 lbs and grown 7-8 inches (we'll find out for sure in a few days)
- Met her first Disney Princesses (Elsa and Anna)
- Thrown up once... because she over-indulged at dinner time. This happened earlier this week, by the way. AND she didn't let me know when it happened, so I woke up to find a baby with up-chuck crusted into her hair because she just slept in it. Baby don't care! Gaaah, sometimes this child confuses me.

I really don't know what words I can use to accurately capture Nicole's personality. She is curious, fun-loving, happy, determined, caring, concerned, smart, and manages to give me plenty of snuggle time while still being excellent at playing by herself. I have seriously been able to go about the apartment cleaning and doing things for over an hour without needing to hold her or entertain her... she entertains herself. Not always, but fairly often.

And now... let's look at a progression of pictures to see how much she's changed in one year ;) I got very nostalgic looking at all her monthly updates... I included the links for the updates under each picture.

Newborn (5 days old)

1 month 

2 months 

3 months

4 months 

5 months 

6 months

7 months

8 months

9 months

10 months 

11 months (the vampire teeth!!!)

12 months

Nicole, thank you for being our sweet little girl! Your daddy and I love you more than words can describe. You bring us so much joy, and we wouldn't trade you for anything in the whole wide world. Happy birthday, my dear little girl! Here's to many, many more!

(And don't worry, dear readers... cake smash pictures are forth-coming ;)