She turns TWO!

Today we end the August birthday extravaganza, we celebrate our third and final birthday that comes in this month. Today we celebrate our babies birthday, Olivia turned two.



It is nearly impossible to believe that my baby is already two. I have been weepy and sappy for two or three days preceding this event. There is something about the baby in the family getting bigger that just tears at your heart. I love watching my children grow, and seeing the amazing little people that they are becoming. Makayla is 7 now, and that blows my mind. She is asking for a cell phone already (YES SHE REALLY IS!! Can you believe it!?) Cameron is 5 and is coming into his own, but still needs his mama to cuddle at night. Olivia...but Olivia...she is the baby...there is something about that position in the family. Every thing she does is cute, even though we have seen it done twice already. So to imagine that she is now a full-blown toddler just makes my heart sing and hurt at the same time. OK, enough reflection and self exploration, lets get to the fun of the day shall we?

Today we celebrated by ummm....staying home. Olivia spent her birthday much like every other day, she lounged in the morning watching "Sesame Street" and "Super Why" and the afternoon napping. Once she got up from her nap supper was almost ready, she ate her food, and we then gave her a cupcake shaped like a puppy dog, which she really enjoyed.


She has just given me such joy today saying "I TWOOOOOOO" and dancing around every time we would sing "Happy Birthday" to her. It was just a good day.


I will recap the cupcake eating for you in pictures;

Here is the puppy cupcake, with two candles in her bum...poor puppy.

Blowing out her candles, and she really did blow them out herself!

Makayla and Cameron enjoying the treat I made for the rest of us, chocolate cookies and pudding.

Olivia licking the icing off of her puppy.

Now....I have to end with my favorite....no kidding, I have it on video...she pointed to the puppy's tail and said, "see mama..puppy's butt"

I am still giggling........

Friends and fun! Birthday part three;

OK, so I lied last time, I did not add more birthday stuff "tomorrow" or even the next day. I am trying to make up for it, I am adding it on a beautiful Saturday morning!


We will spend today watching the fun that unfolded at the birthday extravaganza

First, this is one of our life guards, a very...VERY patient woman.


arriving friends...This is Gabe, he is the son of Ashley, remember her? the whiz with a camera? He really likes to play with Cameron, he is very patient with him.


Makayla waiting for the life guards to give the OK for them to get in the pool.



Makayla and her friends as they arrived.



Ben, running to join his friends, he was a little late.



Zoe getting in the pool.



Emma pushing Makayla around in a float.



The smaller kids in the shallow pool...see Olivia running towards the water? She is the one with the cute yellow butt.



Mayci, another of Makaylas friends.


Cameron and Seth...oh man...these two are a pair!


Seth and his brother River.


Cameron being cute.


Olivia "swimming"

There aren't more of Olivia in the pool because she spent most of her time being cuddled by grandma, or mamaw or papaw or Ashley...there was no shortage of people for her to cuddle with.

And last, do you want to make your grandmother fuss at you for the next week? If so, let her watch your seven year old do this:

Randomness......

I have a mish-mash of things that I would like to share tonight, so hold onto your hats...here we go!

I will start off by adding to my list of things that I thought I would never say;
*please don't feed the cat concrete (I will let you use your imagination on that one)
*why are you laying on the kitchen table?
*no, your new batman costume does make you fly....yes I know it has wings...no..you still can not fly.

Onto the English language according to Olivia...I love these!

Choop; those crispy potato snacks that come in a bag...a choop

woo-gum; it's minty, its chewy, and daddy keeps it in his pocket...woo-gum

no; this favorite means, yes...no...maybe...perhaps...absolutely not and YES PLEASE! depending on the tone.

leep; what you do at night when you are tired...you leep

enjoy! I will add some more birthday tomorrow!!

The Family Connection; Birthday part two

Tonight we will take a look at the many family and friends that came to celebrate the birthdays of our children.


Our families are so happy that we do not make them come to 3 parties in 3 weeks. They are happy that we only have one blow out party, so they all tend to show up to show their love.


Here we have MA and his brother...not that you could tell by looking that they are brothers (insert sarcasm here);

My grand parents...my grandmother fussed for most of the party because Makayla was allowed to swim and jump off of the diving board alone....not that there were not 2 life guards and that Makayla can swim...that was not good enough.

Some more adults standing around talking, these people would be my dad, my aunt, cousin, friend and her husband...who also happens to be my friend...I set them up many moons ago. Several years and three kids for them later....you are welcome Misty!

My dad, my brother (in the blue) and Son, the foreign exchange student staying with my parents. (this was after Will and Son took involuntary dips in the pool..with their phones in their pockets, and wallets, and shoes on.....)

Speaking of Will...here he is showing off his ummm.....talent?

Oh and lets finish with a special father-daughter moment shall we?



**I have pictures of MAs family but it must be on my aunts camera...do not worry! They too will get a place on here!**

Little Clown Babies With Pudgy Bellies.....Birthday part one

As promised, between myself, my aunt and my friend we took about 400 pictures. So I will post each and every one for your viewing pleasure...








yes, I am kidding.


Tonight we take a look at what happens when you turn two year old cuties loose with Hello Kitty cupcakes.

See, when you purchase a Hello Kitty cake from a store, they top it with the brightest pink frosting that you have ever seen. Oh, guess what? That hot pink frosting stains. It stains faces, bellies, clothes.........oh and bottoms *snicker snicker snort*

sorry...that was my ONE 14 year old moment for the day.....alright..second.....OK OK! third...that is all I am admitting too.......


Back to the pink frosting....


This pink frosting is piled high on the cupcakes and is very tasty (I know this because I am currently pink myself...mmm..) So tasty in fact that it requires two hands to eat as Olivia and Hayden will demonstrate;

Sometimes they are so good, they require that you smash them into your face...this cutie pie....Hayden is showing us how this is done;

And man! Are they finger licking good!

Or...arm licking good...which ever the case may be.

Hey Mom! Can I have another??

Boy, are we proud of ourselves when we are done! Sugar surging through our veins, as we look like a drunken clown painted our faces. Happy in a frosting induced smile...mommies wondering how many days the stain will last.

But who can stay irritated at the daddies who let this happen for very long. Not much is cuter that little baby clowns with pudgy bellies.

Birthday girl; Olivia

Benjamin; I think the clowns got him before they were too inebriated;

and Mr.Hayden...man oh man....I think the clowns had been belly up for a while when they found him!

IT IS PARTY DAY!!

In 3 hours I will leave my house and drop off a big bunch of balloons to be filled with floaty air. Go pick up three large birthday cakes, drinks, ice and order 10 large pizzas. Then I will go pick up the balloons and head to the pool where our friends and family will begin to gather to celebrate the birthdays of our children.

I am expecting around 50 people (adults and kids). After the party, Makayla has a friend coming home with her to spend the night.

Once we get home I will upload the 654,687 pictures that I will no-doubt take and attempt to post them tonight. However, do not send me hate mail if it is tomorrow before I get them on.

They will be worth the wait...I promise!!

Hmmm.....

I have been sitting here looking at this blank screen for a while. There are no words magically appearing on the screen. There is really nothing to talk about tonight. No great pictures to analyze.

I would ask you if you have any questions for me, but since the few readers I do have already know me intimately...so that would be short and a little boring.

I guess I can kind of give you a run down of my day...when put in writing...it can seem kind of interesting, so here goes.

This afternoon, after we had gotten home from picking up Cameron at Pre-K. I fed he and Olivia lunch and put them down for a nap, and they were SLEEPING. My grandmother calls, "Nicole, are the kids asleep?" "um..they are laying down" knowing that she wanted something and that if I told her the truth that she would not tell me what she needed. "Well, Papaw called me and I missed his call, and now I can't reach him, he is bush-hogging and I'm worried about him. Can you take me up to where he is, I don't know for sure where it is" "Sure" I answered, "I'll be right there".

I woke up.........WOKE UP sleeping children, you NEVER wake up sleeping children, but for my mamaw, I will do pretty much anything. Go get her and we head to find papaw. We locate him, healthy and working, he just was calling to tell her that he was ok.................*sigh*

So since we were out, we went to the Peddlers Mall (a local place that people rent booths and sell stuff, basically an on-going in-door yardsale). While we were there, papaw called back, he was done for the day and did not want to drive the tractor home and wanted to know if we would come get him. NO..no..you must walk home!

Of course we will go get him. So back across town we head, when we get almost there, he calls back, I changed my mind, I'm just going to go ahead and take the tractor home. *sigh*

By now it is time to get Makayla from school, and we go do that, and no trip to town with mamaw is complete with out ice cream. So off to Baskin Robins. mmmmmmmmmmm.........

But, normally I do not buy Olivia her own ice cream...you know...because she is TWO (almost). I just get Makayla a large scoop and she shares with Olivia. Mamaw decided that was not fair, and insisted that I get Olivia her own. I did....do you know what kind of mess a two year old makes with an ice cream cone? Eating it un-assisted? In a car? Lets just say she needed a bath when we got home, along with the teddy bear she took with her and her car seat.

So arriving home with three sugared up kids and a sticky baby....I knew any more sleeping would not happen until bed time, I tried to get them to take some down time and watch a movie. However the sugar was running thick through their system, so they ran and chased each other in circles until Makayla had scraped her back, Olivia threw her sippy cup at...and hit Cameron with it......three times. In retaliation he took away her "Bippo" and a screaming fit followed. Bed time never looked so good.

***aaah...quiet***

I'm off to watch Michael Phelps win another gold now! Good night all!

The most patient man on the planet.......

and he is ALL MINE! I do not know what I did right to find him but I did. God gave him to me because nobody else on this planet would put up with me; and then he chose to reproduce with me and make more little people just as demanding as I am!


Of course, I am quite certain that nobody else on this planet would put up with him either, he is not with out fault...or dirty clothes in the floor...God knew what he was doing when he put my highly animated personality with his laid back to-a-fault personality, together.


But that is not the point of this ramble session. No, his easy going-ness (is that a word or did I make it up?) is the point today.


Case in point;

See this adorable little baby...she has climbed into the dog kennel and is having a lot of fun playing. She has been barking like a dog, going in and out of the door for almost 20 minutes. (why didn't I think of a dog kennel before!)





However, playing alone is getting boring, so now she is hollering for her daddy to "GET IN!"



My bossy little clone has now convinced her very tired daddy, who just got home from working nights, to "GET IN"! (never mind the nasty, water filled sand box in the back ground, I promise we don't make them play in it, actually it is now cleaned out)

He sat there patiently while she would come in and say "goooood ruff ruff" and pat him.......

......and then go out, shutting the gate and saying "bye bye ruff ruff".

repeat........

until daddy talked her into letting him out, with the promise of a cookie. Nothing like bribery!

MA is a great daddy, probably the best one I know...not that I am partial or anything.

Birthday pictures...you know you wanna see 'em!

I have been neglecting my blogging responsibilities....for this I hang my head in shame. For all 5 of my readers (yes! I have picked up a new one!) I know that you have been lost, wandering in a field of emptiness, waiting for my blog to give your life meaning once again...never fear! I am resuming today, I will spend the next few days catching you all up!


Today I will once again THRILL you with the rest of our birthday pictures, taken by the amazing talent of Ashley Goomey at http://www.sweetreflectionsphotography.com/ Have I told you lately that I *heart* you Ashley???

We will start with lil' Miss Olivia;

sitting in a box...do you think I could get a box like this and keep her in it?

awww...this is one of my favorite series of pictures ever! There are more like this one but I wont subject you to them all. Does she not look like a forest fairy princess?

Can you stand it! She is so sweet.


Makayla being her little prissy self...look at that smile...how can you not love her?




hmm...I got my pictures out of order, so we will move on to Cameron.
Cameron and his hats. I can not tell you how many he has, every time he and his daddy go somewhere, Cameron comes home with a new hat...it is a good thing he looks so handsome in them!



Could you love him more?

Yes, I think I can............


Ah, ok...back to Makayla
She was cracking up at Ashley who was at this moment, throwing bugs on her mama....so I'm not so sure I love Ashley as much at this moment.

Those eyes....how can you turn away?

TURN AWAY QUICKLY! She will reel you in and then you will be required to take her shopping! My girl has GOOD taste...TURN AWAY! TURN AWAY!

It is too late isn't it? You are drawn in.......I told you to turn away.

One more...I will not subject you to all 54,684,387,464 pictures that we took that morning, just a nice sample, ending with this bit of adorable-ness.