Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you...My daughter!

The talent in my family is spilling over. (Please, hold your applause until the end-and remember, no flash photography). You can see by the wonderful technique used here, that my daughter is quite the budding musician. Yes, yes...she makes me so proud (tears are actually welling up in my eyes as I type). Now..I must say, I can't take all the credit for this beautiful musical display of epic proportions, as I believe it does in fact come from her fathers side. So thank you Nickles...thank you for teaching her well. Her talent will not be wasted.

(This is totally for you Liz!!!)

She's Crafty!

Attention all crafty chicas! Oh...wait. I'm pretty sure I'm the only one out of my family and circle of friends who actually likes to do crafts. BUT after I found this website, I just had to post it (just in case a few of you are closet crafters). Adorn is a magazine, but you can get free projects online:

http://www.adornmag.com/

Enjoy!

Happy Easter!!

When I was a little girl, my family made a big deal out of Easter. Out of all the Holidays, Easter was probably the family favorite. We always had Easter dresses, a few times we made our easter baskets, and we always went camping on Easter weekend (although, we never went too far). When we went camping, my mom would say something like "Oh, darn...I can't believe I forgot the matches! Now how are we going to start the fire. I guess I'd better run home and get them." Noone really thought this was strange because, well...of course my mom would forget something (as would any of us, for that matter. Forgetfulness is a dominant gene in my family). Well, when we'd get home after camping, all of our Easter baskets would be full and waiting on the kitchen table! But how could that be? We were all camping! Man, was I surprised to find out that it wasn't the Easter Bunny...but my mom.

The Nickle's had a pretty fun Easter this year. I really want to incorporate some of the same traditions with my little family. I made Mikayla's Easter basket out of a doily, glue, and a bowl. Next year she'll be able to help a little more with it. It was so cute when she found her Easter basket, she whispered "whoa" and proceded to climb onto the chairs to rummage

through all of her new goodies.However, besides the basket...this Easter wasn't the greatest. Mikayla was super rowdy at church, which mad Joel cranky...so I ended up taking them both home, then I came back to teach my class. PLUS...I have a super head cold and I can't breathe. So, instead of a fancy Easter dinner...we had frozen Pizza (which when I remembered that we had bought it, I almost cried I was so happy. I did not want to cook!) On the plus side..deosn't Mikayla look pretty in her Easter dress...awww...

We definitely had a fun St. Patty's Day! We had a fairly traditional Irish meal (with just a wee bit o' flare, hehe...) Shepherd's pie (with green mashed potatoes on top), green limeades, green rice crispy treats, and mint chocolate chip icecream...yummy! I really wanted to go to the Flogging Molly concert, but since it's a Monday, it was a no-go. Maybe we'll go next year..hmm..but then it will be on a Tuesday...so I guess we'll go in 2012? Hey, at least it'll be easier to find Mikayla a babysitter!!

I've Been Tagged

How long have you been together? Married 6 years (but our first date was on St. Patty's Day 7 years ago)
How old are you? too old... 26.
Who eats more? Joel.
Who said, I love you first? Joel. I was about to, but he beat me to it. That was about 3 days before he proposed.
Who is taller? Joel
Who sings better? I would say me, just because Joel doesn't sing, so I have no idea if he's good or not.
Who is smarter? Academically...me. However, I do have the occasional "blonde moment"..and I'm really forgetful..so I guess it really depends.
Who does the laundry? both of us...don't get me started..
Who does the dishes? I do most of the time.
Who pays the bills? Joel
Who mows the lawn? Joel. I'd probably lose a limb or run over the dogs.
Who cooks dinner? I do. Except when he makes pizza.
Who is more stubborn? We're both pretty darn stubborn, but I'd have to say that I am.
Who kissed who? He kissed me...and it probably wasn't the easiest of things. I made hime work hard for that first kiss.
Who asked who out first? hmm..that's a tricky one. Joel was down here from Utah to go to traffic school. He went out with some buddies to a YSAP dance. My friend Sarah wanted me to go with her to this dance so I could see the guy she had met and really liked- well, that guy happened to be the friend that took Joel to the dance. The next night Sarah asks me if I would go on a date with Joel, and Josh (Sarah's boy) asked Joel if he would go on a date with me...so....neither one of us asked the other one out.
Who proposed? Oh, dear..another tricky one. My sister? hehe...j/k. She just got the ball rolling. We'd probably still be dating if she hadn't asked Joel if he wanted to marry me. He said he did (but was a little guarded about why she was asking), so they went ring shopping. She told me he was going to propose, but if I wanted him to do it I'd better tell him that I loved him (hence the 3 days)
Who is more sensitive? Me
Who has more friends? We both have about the same.
Who has more siblings? Joel
Who wears the pants in the relationship? Depends on what the situation is. He thinks he does, but that's how you know I do..hehe..j/k

I tag my mom, Liz, and anyone else who wants to have some fun...

Baby block cake

Okay.. last night, on the Food Network channel, there was a baby shower cake decorating Challenge.. Let me just say, I totally would have won that cake challenge! Okay, maybe not, but after watching it I wanted to show off my baby block cake. I love watching the cake decorating shows on the Food Network. I can't get enough. Two of my favorite things are home decor and cake decorating. But it's so much work! I know a couple of my friend's like to decorate cakes as well, so let's see your favorite cakes ladies!

St. Patrick's Day is Almost Here!!

I love Holidays and one of my top 3 faves is St. Patrick's Day!! My mom is about a quarter Irish, but I claim to be 100% Irish. So, in honor of this fun festive day where you get to wear green, kiss people, pinch people, eat green food, and play pranks...I've decided to add a bunch of Irish music to the top of my playlist. I know not everybody likes my kind of music, but I love it!!

Playdate

Yesterday Mikayla and I went to a friend's house for a playdate and we had a blast! Mikayla had fun with the 2 older girls playing upstairs in the loft and outside while I was able to get some "grown-up" time. I was telling Mikayla that the stairs were a "no-no", but everytime I went and knelt down beside her and tried to act firm she would grab my face and squish her cheek against mine and laugh and give me kisses- how am I supposed to sound mad when I'm too busy laughing! It was so cute. I love my little girl!

Adventures in Texas

Okay, so now that I've had a week to rest and recuperate from my trip to Texas...I guess I can tell all ya'll (see, I even picked up some of the dialect. I'm just a "yeeha" and a "howdy" away from the real deal) about it. First let me say to my sister Liz, who will most likely read this, that I had a wonderful time while I was there!! The part before and after were a little crazy, but I wouldn't have missed it for the World.

Day 1:

wake up at 5 am..finish packing (I know, I know...I'm a procrastinator. Always have been always will be. What can I say, I like a thrill- or rather to stress half to death).

Wake Mikayla up at 6, get her ready..or try to get her ready. She didn't like waking up that early. I tried telling her that made two of us, but you just can't reason with the girl. My plan was to wake her up, keep her awake until our 9 am flight and then she would drink her bottle on take off, then drift peacefully off to sleep to the hum of the plane (of course I would never have to drug my child to fall asleep!-ha, riiiight.) So, between nervous glances at the clock as we sat in rush hour traffic, I tried diligently to keep her awake by playing peek-a-boo and tickling her and dancing...I'm sure I was a great source of entertainment not only Mikayla, but the other cars that were stopped in traffic along with us. We eventually got to the airport, got checked in, I went to the restroom- you know what they say about going the bathrooms on planes! Planes are bumpy and men aren't that accurate. And I changed her diaper right before we went through security with Joel standing guard over my luggage. It was difficult to maneuver through the security having to place everything on the conveyor belt (stroller, diaperbag, carseat, teddybear, blankets, my shoes and belt) one handed as I now held an extremely tired and cranky baby in the other. I stopped at a little shop to get water for the bottle and she soon became even more restless...then all heck broke lose and she was in full rebellion mode, screaming at the top of her lungs as I stood in the line to board, trying to look nonchalant as if I didn't know what everyone was looking at. You see, Southwest no longer does preboarding for infants...isn't that nice. She cried and fussed and refused to take her bottle for half of the flight, then fell asleep for the next hour and a half. I was happy, all-in-all, but I couldn't wait to hit the road and get to my sister's house. I had told her that I would meet her in baggage claim. Well...this airport happened to be ghe-to! As soon as I got off the one grimy elevator they had I walked straight into the dump that was the "baggage claim". After retrieving my luggage, I was glad to be getting out of there....if only I could spot my sister. Well, Mikayla was at this point pretty ticked off at the world and wanted to run around like crazy, and me being the germ-a-phobe I am, tried to run after her to make sure she didn't touch anything (or anyone) while trying to keep my baggage in clear view-I couldn't afford to lose anything in them, and I'm sure I saw a few devious glances in their direction. I called my sister to see where she might be..perhaps she got lost in this vast airport of one terminal, but the more likely scenario was that she was just moving slowly (just having had a c-section a few days prior). I called her and she told me they were running a little behind and they would be there in about a half an hour. I sighed and continued to run after her, germ-x in hand. Thirty minutes later I called again, to see if I needed to wait outside...she told me that would be a good idea...but I'd need to wait another 30 minutes. By this point I had exhausted all my arsenal of toys and food, so I just continued to chase her around and play until I had to figure out some way to take all of my junk out to the curb. With the help of a nice stranger I had made it outside. She came 5 or so minutes later and we started on our 3 hour-well, more like 4 after stopping to eat, journey back to her house. I give my sister and her family a lot of credit for making the trip out there. It couldn't have been very comfortable to say the least. And all in all, Mikayla did very well for such a long trip.

hehe...now time for the trip home..fun, fun. But I'm too tired to write about it now, so I'll wait until another day.