Happy Birthday Nicole!

Today we celebrated three years of this cutie pie blessing our lives!

She was excited from the second she woke up and was ready to party! If you ask her how old she is, you have a 50% chance she'll show you anything besides three fingers and an 80% chance she'll tell you she's six...and all of this while a sneaky little grin is on her face. And then she'll tell you the right age with three fingers :-)

Nicole wanted a beach, castle, chocolate birthday cake! So I made a sandcastle with seaweed on top in an ocean with coral and shells.

3 cake mixes and 2 bags of powdered sugar help make up this tasty treat!

Although the night before forecasted 80-90% chance of rain...this morning it was back down to 10% so we went to the neighborhood park! It misted a little, but was still great!

The kids LOVED the cake and I enjoyed giving the kids second helpings too! A few of the kids insisted they get the "blue" frosting, so they got some pretty big slices...and ate most of it too!

Michael got a whole piece of cake courtesy of Lora Leigh :-) and was wired for the rest of the party! He would not stop moving, wiggling, and exploring.

We drew a target with chalk on the wood wall and then had kids throw water balloons at the target. We also had a major bubble blowing party! I've never seen so many bubbles!

Nicole and Michael ran around catching and stomping bubbles.

Nicole is at the funniest stage. She opens presents by tossing the paper behind her, throwing presents on the table with scarcely a glance, and just looks for more things to take out of bags. Someday we'll help the "grateful for my gifts" stage kick in!

Nicole with Collin, Owen and Wesley. Opening presents is serious business!

Michelle and Nicole! Nicole barely took a second to stand still for anything, Jim had serious skill to catch this smile!

Nicole and Wyatt. Nicole can't get enough of her cars. She took them to take a nap with her today!

No it's not a giant chicken leg...it's a bat and ball! Jim said, "Michael's life will never be the same."

We didn't have any more wrapping paper, but the tin foil was just as exciting for her!

Nicole playing ball with Wyatt (apparently she wanted to bat the hard way) Watching bubbles and water ballons with Anna. We had so much fun with everyone- neighbors, friends from church and friends from work. We are truly blessed to be friends with such awesome people!

Katrina and Bob got Nicole her first pet, a beta fish that Nicole named Carrots. He will be the preschool classroom pet :-) so I'm sure you'll see pictures of him soon.

Here is some video of our day. I love the precious excitement on Nicole's face as we are singing "Happy Birthday" to her!