happy 3rd birthday, nolan!!

Nolan turned 3 back in February, and we just had the BEST time celebrating him!!  Birthdays are SO special to me, I just love rejoicing in the blessing that our children are to us.

Nolan's birthday was on a Sunday, so I made him a birthday boy crown out of orange (his favorite color!) paper & we got him donut holes to share with his class at church.

One of Nolan's favorite things to do is art.  So on the evening of his birthday we did a family art project!  We went to Michael's and got 4 small square canvases, then everyone got to pick out 3 paint colors (because he turned 3, of course!) and we had to see what we could come up with using only our 3 colors.  Before we headed home to paint we stopped at BerryStar and got some frozen yogurt, & sang happy birthday to Nolan (very loudly).  Nolan picked Day of the Diesels to watch while we painted, and we just had the funnest time!  So fun, this is really the only picture I have of us painting (and I don't have any after pictures... Dathan just hung them on the wall so maybe soon!).

  

The next weekend we threw Nolan a little party.  I mean literally threw it together- like sent a text on Thursday night asking our friends if they were free Saturday morning for a party.  Total mommy fail.  What can I say?  It totally came up way faster than I realized haha!  My mom had the amazing idea to have his party at the park.  I don't know why that never crossed my mind (maybe because it was February?) but the weather was GORGEOUS and it was the BEST idea ever.  Nothing to clean up before or after, and no games/activities to plan for a bunch of preschool kids because the playground was enough.  We had cupcakes, bottles of water, & juice boxes- so simple!  And would you believe- we had SO many people show up!  Apparently, if you want a large turn out for your kid's party you just need to go ahead and plan it 2 days beforehand.  I DID make his cupcakes from scratch... he wanted red ones, so I made red velvet.  They were good, but I realized I am just not a fan of cream cheese frosting!

(In the top 2 pictures Nolan was trying to show me on his fingers that he was 3... hahahaha)

Then... if that wasn't enough celebrating... we had one more thing in mind.  We had decided that, starting this year, instead of getting the kids presents for their birthdays we were going to give them a gift of quality time- doing something they love with just momma & daddy.  The kids will get enough toys from their grandparents & friends, and we certainly don't need anymore in our house.  But the special, focused time with just mom & dad is priceless.  Since Nolan loves art, Dathan & I wanted to take him to paint a dream.  God is so cool- right around the time we were wanting to go, I receive an email from them saying that the first 30 customers on a particular day would get 50% off their ENTIRE purchase!  So we dropped Sean & Pax off with my parents and went.  What a blessing to do something we wanted to do already for HALF OFF!  

 

Of course Nolan picked a train to paint ;)

After we painted we took him out to lunch.  We ate at Panda Express, or "Polar Express" as he calls it... his choice.  Ahhh- he brings us so much joy! :)

10 on tuesday

Well, since last Tuesday I did 10 {fussy} faces of Paxton, I thought this week I would do 10 {ever changing} faces of Nolan. He's a crack up!

my handsomes

For years Sean would run from my camera.  The eldest son of a photographer and at 2 years old he had his fill of getting his picture taken.  But, being the loving mom & stalking photographer that I am I kept prying.  And now at 5 (and a half!) he poses for every picture! Sometimes I have to ask him NOT to pose if I'm trying to get an action shot.  He is SOOO cute!

And the reason Sean isn't running from my camera anymore is because I believe he has passed the baton off to Nolan.  On any typical day it takes great amount of bribery to get him to stand still long enough to look at me, let alone smile.

But as you can see, this day was different.  The boys humored me enough to get some adorable shots of both of them.  A little bit silly and a whole lot of cute, and it only cost me two little packets of Smarties.  I wouldn't trade them for the world!

exciting news + haircuts!

SO EXCITED!!!!

after 13+ months of having our stuff in storage...

5 months living at Dathan's parents house...

8+ months living at my parent's house...

if you ask me, far too long for a family of 4 (or the parents the family of 4 are living with, I'm sure).

But today, that all changes because...

WE ARE (finally!) MOVING INTO OUR OWN PLACE!!

Like right now.

Probably as you read this.

Imagine me lifting heavy boxes...

Ok, imagine me telling all of our male helpers where to place the heavy boxes.

It has been quite the year.  God promised us a year of change in 2010.  That's what happened.  We moved out of our house, walking in obedience to that change.  Then moved to California, also walking in obedience to that change.  This year, God has promised us that it is our year to plant our roots and grow.  7 days into the year I found out I was pregnant (the "grow" part of our promise) and now we are moving into our own place (the "plant your roots" part of the promise).  I love how God is always so good & faithful to keep His promises!  (as a side note, a few years back Dathan & I started asking God to reveal His promise to our family for the upcoming year.  Every year we have done this He has given us a promise, and every year He has been faithful to fulfill that promise.  He is SO good!)

So anyways, I don't have any pictures (yet!) of the new place (an adorable townhouse!), and obviously of us moving in, so today I am leaving you with pictures of the boys haircuts they got last week :)

The place we take them to gives them the option to put color in their hair after it's cut (just the spray-on washable kind).  Sean was not about it, but Nolan was all for it, and he picked orange.  He is so funny!

Silly faces!

Sweet brothers!

Stay tuned for updates! :)

nolan's "choo choo" birthday party

We were so excited to throw Nolan a birthday party, especially because his birthday was on a Saturday so his party could be on his actual birthday!  So last Saturday we threw him a Thomas the Train "choo choo" party (that's what he calls trains).  Nolan LOVES trains.  Absolutely is obsessed with them.  So there wasn't really another option to do his party in.  The night before the party I made his cupcakes, and I made them from scratch.  They were So yummy!  I made these cupcakes but instead of using the icing in that recipe I used this icing recipe.  YUM.  The boys loved "helping" me bake.

I know this photo is hard to see because the sun was blaring in through the window behind the table, but here is the cupcake set up.  We had a Thomas Happy Birthday sign, Thomas rings to top the cupcakes, a newborn picture of Nolan, and a train track with a train "pulling" the #2 cupcake.

We had a fun little party with pizza, a few friends, and of course the cupcakes. Minor setback- when Dathan went to pick up the pizzas, he paid with his debit card and then the power went out at the pizza place.  They couldn't refund his money because the registers were down, and they couldn't make any pizzas either.  So they had to transfer his order to another branch of the same pizza place about 5 miles away and Dathan had to drive there to pick it up.  Poor guy.  What was supposed to only take about a half an hour took over an hour!  

It ended up that there were ONLY little boys at the party (yes, Sean has his Robin costume on).

Of course we had presents!  Nolan did SO good opening them and was so sweet & excited about each one.  He's such a great kid :)

Singing "Happy Birthday" with his very enthusiastic older brother ;)  What was funny was whenever we talked about Nolan's party all he could talk about were the cupcakes, but then after blowing out his candle he wanted nothing to do with the cupcake... he only wanted to play with his new toys!

SO happy to be playing with his new Thomas set!

We try to take a family picture on every birthday.  This one cracks me up!

We had a wonderful party for Nolan & are just so blessed that he is in our lives!  He has such a sweet heart and fun spirit!

happy 2nd birthday nolan!!!!

Two years ago today our sweet & precious 2nd blessing, Nolan Richard, joined our lives!  At 10lbs & 23 inches he sure made an impact on everyone around him as soon as he was born ;)  He has filled my heart more than I could ever explain.  My love just overflows :)

The top left picture is when we were leaving for me to get induced.  If you ever wondered what a 10lb baby belly looked like, there ya go! Ha!  The picture next to it is when Sean first met Nolan.  Then the bottom left is one of Nolan's first pictures taken at the hospital, and the bottom right is when he was 1 day old.

And here he is (a couple months ago) all grown up!  So handsome & so sweet!

We had several friends over for a lunch of pizza & cupcakes to celebrate Nolan's birthday today, and of course there was plenty of Thomas the Train to go around.  I will definitely have to share the pictures with you.... as soon as they are edited ;)

ouch! (not for the faint of heart!)

Never a dull moment in the lives of boys!

On the eve of my birthday, Nolan was playing in the family room.  Dathan had just left to return a movie to Redbox, and we were having a relaxing evening at home with my parents, waiting for dinner to be done.

All of a sudden Nolan falls over, hits his head on the brick fireplace, & begins to cry.  As a mom, I am familiar with my kids' cries.  I knew immediately that he was hurt, and not just fussing.  I rushed over to him to check him over, and when I turned him around I saw some deep red blood gushing from the back of his head.

I brought him in the living room where I tried to calm him down, my dad rushed to get his EMT kid from the garage, & my mom hurried to get a warm washcloth for me.  I am so thankful they were there to help!  As we began to look we could tell that the gash was pretty deep, and that he would probably need stitches.

I call Dathan and tell him to immediately come home because Nolan needed to go to the ER.  I'm sure that freaked him out!  He got home & we rushed Nolan to AV Hospital, leaving Sean with my parents at home.  Now I have heard horror stories of people waiting for hours upon hours in that ER, so we were prepared to wait.  Well, probably because he was so young and had blood coming from his head, they rushed him right in.

The ER Dr came in & said that he would need staples.  STAPLES?!  That made it sound really bad to me!  But we soon realized that it was actually a faster, more efficient, & cleaner way to take care of it.  If he had stitches they would have had to shave his head, then stitch him up, which would have taken awhile.  But with the staples they literally gave him a numbing shot & immediately after gave him 2 staples, and they were done.  No more than 5 seconds.

Nolan was such a trooper.  He cried, but I think it was more because we were holding him down than anything.  When the Dr explained what they would have to do, I almost started crying & thought for sure I wouldn't be able to stay in there while they did it.  But I did good, I am so proud of myself! :) 

That's a pretty nasty wound, isn't it?  He did great, we were so proud of him.  I just know as the mom of 2 boys I'm sure I have plenty more of this to look forward to in my future....

i'm the mom of a kid in school???

It can't be true.  I surely am not old enough to have a child in school.  Granted, Pre-K (3 half-days a week) is not the same as all the other grades, but still.  I just didn't think I was ready to go through the whole "first day of school" thing yet.  But yesterday was Sean's first day of Pre-K, and I did a lot better than I thought.  No tears (from me or Sean!), although I did get a little teary eyed driving away from his school after I dropped him off.  Sean was so excited it was just too cute.

Isn't he handsome?  I mean, I know I have a biased opinion, but have you seen this little stud?  So ready for school!

When he got to school I wanted to take a picture of him in his classroom, so he chose to stand by a little poster on the wall.  Then he proceeded to stand next to each poster on the wall and ask for me to take his picture.  It was hilarious!  He has great teachers & I think he will thrive in a social/educational/structured environment.

When I got home from dropping Sean off at school, Nolan was still sleeping (my dad stayed home with him).  It gave me some time to read my Bible uninterrupted, which was fabulous!  After Nolan woke up we watched his favorite show, Thomas the Train (he didn't have to share the tv with Sean!) and then played a whole lot of "I'm gonna get you."  I don't know if Nolan even noticed Sean wasn't there! Ha!  At least until we drove to the school to pick him up & Nolan heard some kids playing in the playground and said "Non-Non!" (aka "Sean Sean")

Sean will be going Mon, Wed, & Fri for 3 hours each day (they had him go to the Tuesday class yesterday since Monday was a holiday).  I am looking forward to some special time with just Nolan & I at home, as well as watching Sean learn & grow at school!

10 on tuesday!

and i would like to share with you... 10 pictures of nolan eating!!
(formerly titled "8 pictures of nolan w/ cheese balls + 2 pictures of nolan w/ kix = 10 on tuesday)

1.) here, mommy, you want one?

2.) "i would like to show you my cheese ball mommy"

3.) "ok well if you won't eat my cheese ball do you want some of my water?"

4.) "i AM awesome like mommy- i love cheese balls & am a mess!"

5.) ha. ha. ha. ha. ha. ha. ha. ha. ha. ha!

6.) (cue another day) me: "sean, would you please share some cheeseballs with nolan?"

7.) me: "sean, i didn't mean the whole tub!"

8.) sean: "is this better mommy?" me: "sure honey."

9.) (please note: same day) apparently 68 cheese balls wasn't enough to fill him up

10.) hopefully an entire box of kix will do!

wordless wednesday

ok ok last one, i promise :)

i know, i know, there have been a lot of posts about nolan and his first birthday lately... this one is basically for my own memory of how he is at this point in history :) these are some pictures from his 1 year photo shoot i did. you can see some more of them here

at his one year well child check up he weighed in at 24lbs (75th percentile) and measured 29.25in (25th percentile). that means he gained 14lbs since he was born and grew 6.25in. the dr said she was not worried about his weight because 1) he is not walking yet and 2) he has not gone through a picky stage yet. literally that night after his appointment nolan decided to be picky and throw everything we gave him to eat on the floor. i guess he was being obedient... or something ;)

nolan is not quite walking but loves to cruise around the furniture and stand up all by himself. he can also walk using push toys, but gets ahead of himself & falls (usually laughing) on the floor. he is a speed crawler and loves for us to chase him down the hall while he tries to get away. he gets really determined to go fast & starts crawling with his head down, which is so funny, because it only lasts a little bit before he runs into something! ha!

i nursed nolan until about 1 week before his first birthday. when we gave him whole milk for the first time he scrunched up his nose, spit it out, & threw his sippy on the floor. it was funny (don't worry, now he loves it)! his favorite things to eat are: bananas, diced pears, nutri-grain bars, apples, cheese, and chicken. at least his favorite foods are healthy ;)

nolan can say: mama, dada, byebye, hey, wow, & nigh-night. there are several words that we think nolan says like: hello, look, & more. he loves playing with his older brother & going outside. he drives around toy cars and says "vroooom." he just started giving kisses. he usually sleeps from 9:00pm-9:00am. he takes a 1 hour nap in the morning & evening and a 2 hour nap in the afternoon (what can i say, my boys love their sleep!). he can wear some 6/9 month sized clothes still but is almost fully in 12 month. he wears a size 3 diaper & a toddler size 4 shoe. i love watching him learn & grow. we love him so much!!! :)