Two Years Old

Since Nicholas hasn't been to the doctor since last September, I don't have any legit height or weight stats.  I do believe that Mimi was right in saying that Nicholas was going through a growth spurt about a month ago.  His naps went from the normal 2 hours to 3 1/2 - 4 hours.  Now Nicholas can easily get off the beds in our house without having to hop down or anything.  Just recently Gabe weighed Nicholas and we think he is right at 30 pounds.  He wears 24 month - 2T clothes and size 6-7 shoes.  I was a bit late in scheduling his 2 year well visit check-up so we actually won't know how he ranks until July.  I'm just happy that he has been healthy and we haven't had to visit the pediatrician.  Here is the latest on what Nicholas is up to:

Sleep: Nicholas goes down for naps and at night really well.  It will be interesting to see if and how that changes when he eventually moves to a big boy bed.  He never makes a peep and is usually fast asleep.  At this time he usually naps for 2-3 hours in the afternoon with his bedtime being between 8 and 8:30.  He normally sleeps until 7am or so. Nicholas is starting a mother's day out program soon, so he will have to get used to starting his nap a bit later than normal.  Recently Nicholas woke up from a nap and (with his crib right by the door to his room) started knocking on the door and said "Hello" - like "don't forget I'm in here mama!" 

Nutrition: Nicholas is big on eating things with his hands (even though he is fully capable of using a fork).  Therefore if there is a food that he doesn't like touching (pasta, most veggies, etc) he pretty much won't eat it.  His favorites are hot dogs, chicken nuggets, pb&j sandwiches, grapes, yogurt, raisins (or as he calls them raines) and any kind of bread or cracker.  Nicholas loves dipping food in whatever kind of dip we give him - either ketchup, ranch, honey mustard, etc. 

Play:  Nicholas loves playing "ouside", but unfortunately he has been eaten alive recently by mosquitoes or other bugs.  Some even make him extremely swollen where he was bit, so I haven't been too enthusiastic about letting him play outside.  When he does play outside, he loves playing with berries, sticks or whatever he can get his hands on, his bubble machine, or  in his pool.  Inside he loves chasing Bama with his lawn mower (which Bama is deathly afraid of). 

Cute quirks: He will rub his belly and say "mmmm yummy". He throws anything that he gets his hands on. Very cute when he has toy balls, but not so good when he is holding sippy cups, cell phones or remotes.  He still LOVES his blankie and will suck on his fingers while holding blankie (mainly when he is tired).  Nicholas is very friendly to others, especially when we are at the store, saying hello to those we pass.  However, if someone comes up to him and speaks, he is extremely shy.  I suppose it has to be on his terms.   

Talk:  Nicholas vocabulary has exploded.  He will basically repeat anything we say.  The most recent words and phrases are:

• What's that?
• I love (insert word here)!   It's usually blankie, Mickey, etc.  But recently told Mimi that he loves TV!
• I don't know - so cute because he turns his hands up while saying this
• No I fine or No thanks 
• I did it!  or We did it!
• More please - sounds more like "mo pease"
• Yea - he has finally stopped saying "Set" for Yes 
• Look! 
• Come on Dada or Mama!

We celebrated his 2nd birthday the exact same way as last year, except this year was a Mickey theme.  Here are a few pictures from yesterday...

Mimi's beautiful Mickey cake

Nicholas and Anna playing with some ping pong balls

Birthday lunch consisted of Chick-fil-A chicken, homemade potato salad and baked beans

Nicholas rubbing his ranch dip all over his arm

Opening the Moseleys gift since Meagan and Abby had to leave early for their recital

Nicholas wasn't quite sure why everyone was singing to him

but he did try the cake this year...

Nicholas received about four Mickey birthday cards that sang the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse theme song.  Every time he heard it, he would cover his face.  It was too funny!

Reading some books that we bought him

Riding his tricycle that NiNi and Hollie gave him and also listening to one of his cards again

Happy Birthday Nicholas!  We love you little man!

Gotta Love Free Stuff

Over the past year, Gabe and I have become much more coupon/deal crazy.  We both follow several blogs/websites that list daily coupon deals, drug store deals and freebie deals.  And it shows - we spent about $75 less each month on groceries last year than we did in 2008 (and that was also prior to Nicholas, so that's even with one more head to feed).  Usually several days out of the week our mailbox contains either free samples or great coupons for products. 
Well, Gabe and I recently hit the mother load of all freebies.  Over the past 4 years, the Birmingham office of MMP (my employer) has gone from 8 employees to one (yep I would be the last one).  Therefore they have finally decided to shut down our office, which I didn't really use all that much since Nicholas was born (yes I'm one of the lucky ones that gets to work from home).  It's sort of sad to see everything being boxed up and moved, but life goes on - and so does the furniture.  I was luckily able to score an executive desk, computer desk, computer chair, file cabinet and refrigerator (full size I might add) for FREE!!  I really was not planning on the refrigerator, but I guess corporate just wanted to get rid of it rather than haul it somewhere.  The beauty of this is we now have an ice maker!  Ah - it's so nice to have an ice maker again. 

Well, the free stuff has continued because I found out just several days ago that I won a $50 gift card (with free shipping) to Shutterfly!  How perfect is that since I've just had these wonderful pictures of Nicholas taken and now I can order as many as I want for free!  I actually won the card off another blog that I follow and love called Centsational Girl.  I've also become infatuated with decorating and DIY blogs that have cute ideas for cheap (I'm getting all my ideas for when we build our home).  Many of these have giveaways pretty frequently and for various items.  I'm obsessed!  Some people do facebook/twitter, some watch reality shows, I follow blogs.  For those interested here are some of the blogs I follow in my Google Reader:

Decorating:
Centsational Girl
Sawdust and Paper Scraps
Simple Organized Living
Frugal with a Flourish   
Thrifty Decor Chick

Money Saving/Coupons:
Krazy Coupon Lady
Money Saving Mom
My Frugal Adventures

Happy Mother's Day...

To Me!  I am so super excited about my mother's day gift that I just have to share it with everyone.  I knew with Nicholas' second birthday coming up at the end of the month that I wanted to get pictures taken.  However, I know how a two year old doesn't exactly sit still and pose, so I opted to have a professional photographer take his pictures.  My original intent was to do them at Grandmother and Granddaddy's house, but the tornadoes messed up my plan.  So instead, we hit up the big bustling downtown of Leeds.

Nicholas was not exactly in the mood to take pictures because mama woke him up from his nap and he had a death grip on some animal crackers and his juice cup.  We walked all around downtown and Erin did an AMAZING job!!  She was so good singing to him, chasing after him and taking some awesome pictures of a smiling toddler!  I can't thank her enough for these wonderful memories and highly recommend her - Lens Envy Photography.

And here are a few more of my favorites...

I hope all of our friends and family had a wonderful mother's day weekend.

Next 30 Years

Thanks so much to everyone for my birthday facebook wishes, emails and cards!  I had a really nice birthday.  Gabe and I decided to take the day off, and here is what my day consisted of...

The Birmingham Zoo
I have been meaning to take Nicholas here forever and we finally got him there.  We bought the family membership pass (really an early birthday gift for him) and headed down there this morning.  Nicholas enjoyed seeing the animals, but still seems to watch other people than anything else.  I must be sheltering this little boy too much...

My little monkey checking out some other monkeys

Sometimes I think Nicholas enjoyed the fake elephant more than the real ones.

He loved the giraffes, just like his cousin Meagan

For all the animals he said "HELLO"

Nicholas was just under the age cutoff to ride the camels, but I doubt he would be interested anyways.

Finally the real "elpant"

Our family package to the zoo includes a guest pass, so if anyone wants to join us either on a Wednesday or Friday (my days off) you would get in free.

Chickfila
Nicholas loves playing in the play area at Chickfila and today when we went there were two sweet girls (probably around 10 or so) and they just loved Nicholas to death.  They played with him and encouraged him to climb and slide down the slide.  It was all we could do to get him out of there to eat.  Whenever Gabe or I attempted to get him out, the girls would just say "He is the cutest thing!"  No argument from us...

Shops at Grand River
I am loving having the new outlet mall less than 5 minutes from our house.  While Nicholas napped I hit up a few stores and was able to get some desperately needed updates to my wardrobe (thanks to my b'day gift from Grandmother and Granddaddy - Thank You!)

STIX
Gabe asked me about going out to eat somewhere and it has been forever since we've been to a Japanese restaurant.  So we decided to go to Kobe off 280.  Well that place was completely boarded up (and didn't even say so on their website - thank you very much).  So we headed to Stix over by the Galleria.  Even though it took quite awhile to get served, I always enjoy how entertaining the chefs are.  Our chef tonight particularly wanted to pick on me, so we had a good time and good food - minus Nicholas (I think he would have had a meltdown when they light the grill on fire).  Afterwards my birthday dessert consisted of a stop by the Krispy Kreme for a chocolate covered crueller (is there really anything better than KK's?!?)    

All in all, I had a great 30th birthday and will leave everyone with my song of the day that is so appropriate...

Tornado Destruction

First off, I want to thank God that all our friends or family were safe after the horrendous tornadoes and severe weather that central Alabama experienced yesterday.  Secondly, I am praying for all those who lost loved ones due to these storms (as of tonight the death toll was almost 200 just in Alabama alone) or experienced damage to their homes.

I have said this several times and others from Mobile agree...  Give me a hurricane any day of the week over a tornado.  Ever since I moved to Montevallo for college, I have been extremely uneasy whenever any of those tornado sirens go off.  Granted we had a few scares with hurricanes in Mobile, but they just don't seem to cause the extreme damage that tornadoes cause.  I can't thank God enough that my family and home were left extremely unscathed compared to just about everyone else in the area.  We were without power for about 12 hours on Wednesday, but that is the extent of damage.  We didn't have any trees down or hardly any limbs down in the yard.  It was a wake up call when Gabe came home early afternoon yesterday with pictures of his grandparents yard or to see all the amazingly scary pictures posted on Facebook, etc.  I'm stealing a few pictures that Beth took of Grandmother and Granddaddy's yard.  Those massive beautiful oak trees they planted so many years ago were knocked down, but luckily didn't damage their home.     

With Pop in this picture, you can really tell how massive these trees were.

It's crazy to think that Gabe, Meagan, Abby and I were at the Krispy Kreme in Tuscaloosa just a few weeks ago and now there is nothing left of it.  I spoke to a friend of mine who lives in Northport and luckily they are fine, but she knew a girl who lived right behind that Krispy Kreme that didn't make it.  Gabe said there were several Regions employees that lost their homes completely.  It's just so surreal to look at the pictures on CNN and other news websites to realize that those pictures could have been of Leeds/Moody if the mile wide tornado had taken a path about 15 miles south of where it hit.  This whole thing has been a sobering experience.  All I can do is just pray...

Happy Easter!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter weekend!  Ours was filled with Easter egg hunting, playing and visiting with friends and family.  Mid-day Saturday was spent at two Easter egg hunts.  We visited Mimi and Pop's church hunt first and then headed over to U-Ba's and Aunt Beth's church hunt.  I had envisioned Nicholas searching for eggs, really wanting to hunt them down and put them in a basket.  No such thing occurred.  At both Easter egg hunts he was more of a people watcher than interested in hunting down any eggs.  Here are a few pics from Saturday.

Checking everything out before the hunt

 Looking cool in his shades

 Even with Mimi and Daddy pointing the eggs out, he was just NOT interested

Cute pic with his cousin Meagan

Of course you know he loved the bubble machine at FBC Moody.

I'm the king of the playground!!  Or as Nicholas says "Ta-Da!"

 
Saturday afternoon we headed over to Nini and Hollie's house for a visit with Nicholas' third grandmother.  I forgot to take any pics, but they just love Nicholas to death and we enjoyed spending time with them and had a great dinner.

Sunday morning the Easter bunny did stop by our house.  Nicholas of course was a big fan of the Mickey bubbles.  We were pleasantly surprised to have the 9:30 church service not super packed (thanks to the church adding an extra service today).  The ladies of course love having Nicholas in the nursery.  They consistently tell us every time we pick him up that he was so sweet and good.  I did ask if he socialized much and they confirmed what I thought and said that he mainly keeps to himself.  We can hopefully get him into a Mother's Day Out program at some point so he can get used to being around other kids his age.

Still has a bit of bed-head in this picture

Then Sunday evening was spent having dinner with all the Davenport clan up at Mimi and Pops.  After dinner we attempted the egg hunt yet again and despite Meagan and Abby's help, Nicholas still wasn't all that interested in hunting down any eggs.  

And to end the evening, Nicholas put himself in Sadie's cage.  For whatever reason, when Sadie is out of her cage, Nicholas likes to climb in and even shut the door.

Happy Birthday Granddaddy!

We want to wish Clayton Martin (aka Granddaddy) a wonderful birthday!  This loving and generous patriarch of the Martin family is 87 years young today.  We hope and pray that your wish comes true and you beat your sister past the 90 mark.  We love you!

 All of the Martins gathered last night to celebrate.  We had a great time and good BBQ.  Nicholas really enjoyed chasing after all the girls.  He was also a fan of Sam (as you can see below) and kept wanting to rub his head, tickle him and also enjoyed a few of his toys too! 

The funniest thing happened to Nicholas.  He had on these cute overalls.  Well he was playing with Abby and Ava in the other room and he walked into the room where all the adults were chatting to discover that his diaper was around his feet (and yet his overalls were still fully in tact).  He had wet his clothes and unfortunately part of the bathroom floor.  No one knows how he managed to get his diaper off and around the overalls.  (My guess is that he is not used to wearing overalls and was pulling on them and somehow caught one side of the diaper to make it come loose).  So the rest of the night Nicholas went pant-less.  Ironically, Gabe purchased a package of the "Jeans" Huggies diapers (you know the commercial "I poo in blue") earlier that day and if we had put them on him, he would have looked completely normal.  So here is what he looked like for the last bit of the evening.   

Here is Anna sweetly wanting to "share" Janie's new duckie stuffed animal.  She is so close to walking and before long she'll be joining the other kids in running around everywhere. 

Nicholas is a hoot in so many ways.  He loves being outside and playing with sticks, berries and especially his bubble machine.  He has no fear for any creatures including bumble bees, lizards, ants, etc.  We were walking to the car on the way to the birthday party and Nicholas proceeded to immediately find an ant and squish him with his finger.  Nicholas has also discovered the art of procrastinating at bed time.  After his bath, we normally will drink some milk and read a book.  When I pick him up to put him in bed, he will suddenly want to read a different book or drink more milk.  The cutest thing is when I'm holding him and we are telling daddy "nigh-nigh" he will use another procrastination method of putting his hand behind my head and Gabe's head, push our heads together and a say "pease".  So we kiss and then he will just say "gain" and "gain" over and over.  It works a few times, but not for long.   I will definitely praise him because once he is in his crib there is no crying or fussing - he either goes right to sleep or just plays/talks quietly (except for the wrestling maneuver he did a few weeks ago).            

Nicholas also has the ability to get into trouble.  However, I was surprised at what happened just a few minutes ago.  Nicholas climbed up on the coffee table (which is a no-no).  I spanked him, pulled him down, told him no-no and just a few seconds after that he said "Sorry Mama".  Granted I would prefer that he not get into trouble, but at least he has a conscious about it (or pretends to ;-).