Happy 4th Birthday Brooklyn

Four years ago God blessed me with an adorable, sweet princess named Brooklyn Elizabeth. I cannot believe this little girl is four years old today. She has gown so much over the last four years. On Friday we took Olaf cookies to Brooklyn's class to celebrate her Birthday at school.

Brooklyn had a Frozen Birthday party this morning at Urban Air Trampoline Park. We have never been to a trampoline park before so this was a new adventure for us. I stayed up until one last night making Brooklyn an Olaf cake for her big birthday party and filling goodie bags for the kiddos. This is the first year that Brooklyn has invited her school friends to a party so she was super excited.

 Our party favors were Frozen cups filled with Frozen candy, snacks and some toys. The girls got Elsa and Anna cups. Since the boys are not huge princess fans we got Sven and Olaf cups for them. The kiddos always love character cups.

 Here is the start to the Olaf cake. I used a small square for the head, a small circle for the middle, a bigger circle for the body and two cupcakes for the feet. Then I carved the square cake to make it look like Olaf's head.

 Here is the finished cake. I used York mints for the buttons and colored frosting to make the face and arms. The cake was a big hit at the party, everyone loved it.

                                               Here are the center pieces I made for the table

                                                      Brooklyn and her best friend Aalyiah.

                                                            Mommy and the Birthday girl.
Brooklyn's birthday turned out so good this morning and now we are having family over for a Mexican dinner. Two birthday parties in one day.....this girl is hyped up on sugar and spoiled with gifts. Thank you to everyone who celebrated with us and sent her messages. She had a blast today!! :) My little baby isn't so little anymore.

"Sometimes the smallest things take up the most room in your heart."

Happy Saturday

Target is like a a casino, you lose track of time and money. I can never run in and out of target. Today Brooklyn and I went to target for a birthday present....needless to say we came out with way more than we went in for and we were late to the birthday party. A little boy in Brooklyn's class turned four during the week and he had an Acrobatic Academy birthday party today. The kiddos in room 7 had a blast running, jumping, climbing and playing in the foam pit room.

                                                               Swinging into the foam pit.

 Brooklyn and two of her friends ran down the trampoline and jumped into the pit. Brooklyn got pulled in and face planted the foam cubes.

           The birthday theme was planes. Here bug is holding her blue and orange cupcake in a jar.
After the birthday party we had fun with our target findings. The dollar section got the better of my bank account and we bought some boards to practice writing numbers and letters. The boards were dry erase and frozen.... how could I say no to that?

                              Here is bug practicing numbers on the new target frozen board.
Needless to say we had a pretty fun Saturday. On another note.....I survived my first week of nursing school without throwing things, pulling my hair out or crying. So far I have loved every second of the program. My week was crazy busy between Brooklyn, work, babysitting, homework and class but so worth it. My agenda/planner is color coded and packed with information for school and home but it keeps me organized and going. Coffee is one of those things you either like or don't like and over the last year or so I have been teaching myself to like it because it keeps me awake for class. This picture explains my current relationship  with my morning coffee. 

 

If only I could find a mug that big. It is a good thing I am a morning person or else my classmates and coworkers would be in for a real treat because my schedule has me getting up at 5 something and not getting home until after 6 everyday.I cannot wait to see what this semester holds for me. Between juggling bug, work and school my social life is very limited but it makes the little bit of social life I do have that much better. 

"You are better than you believe, Stronger than you seem, and Smarter than you think." 

Frozen bike

Today we decided to take advantage of the beautiful weather. Since I have been sick all week with the flu and coped up in the house I decided to get some fresh air and take Brooke out to ride her bike. The weather has been cold and snowy for a while now so we haven't had a lot of opportunities to ride our Christmas bike. But today was a different story, the weather was in 60's and not a sight of snow. Noni and Popi bought Brooklyn a Frozen bike for Christmas this year. This bike was a huge upgrade from our tricycle. Brooklyn was very excited to head outside and ride her big girl bike. The first time we took her out to ride the seat and training wheels on her bike were both a little too high which made for a wobbly and scary ride. She got nervous and gave up on trying to ride that day. The next time was much better because we have everything positioned just right. Now we ride like a pro, we just need to work on our turning,

"Play is our brain's favorite way of learning." --Diane Ackerman

"We learn to do something by doing it. There is no other way." --John Holt

"While we try to teach our children all about life, our children teach us what life is all about." --unknown

Student Life

Tomorrow is my first day of nursing school. The past two years of College have been nothing but challenging and yet so rewarding. I am feeling about every emotion possible. I know this semester is going to challenge me in ways I have never been challenged before and I could not be more excited. So in honor of starting a new chapter in my life I wanted to share some of the things that help make nursing a little less intimidating.

In nursing school we all look the same. We wear the same black scrubs, hair is up and earrings are limited. There is limited space for expressing personality through style. Nursing is not a fashionable career but I found a few places to add a little personality. We are allowed to have any color of stethoscope so I got the famous Tiffany blue (like Tiffany blue) stethoscope. Blue has always been my favorite color so I was very excited to pick my own color. I also got a Tiffany blue watch for nursing. They recommend a cheap watch so I might not get to wear this particular watch very often. I am queen of organization. I love to have things in order for my classes. I have always used binders and kept all of my papers super organized. This little trait of mine will come in handy during nursing school. Over the weekend I got my famous binders all ready for class tomorrow.

These are the binder covers I scored on the Internet. Pinterest is the best website ever! I wrote all my nursing classes on the binder covers and printed off all my papers for classes. As far as intimidating nursing things go......BOOKS! My stack of books is heavy, expensive and scary. 

I have a feeling I am going to become a little to comfortable with these books over the next few months but it will be so worth it in the end. Chase nothing but drinks and dreams right?

"Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around." -- Leo Buscaglia

"Study while others are sleeping, work while others are loafing, prepare while others are playing, and dream while others are wishing." --William Arthur Ward

"The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others." --Mahatma Gandhi

Do you wanna build a snowman?

Tonight Brooklyn and I made birthday invitations for her classmates. This is the 1st year Brooklyn will have a "friends" birthday party. My original plan was to wait for her big 5th birthday but with all the kiddos having parties so young Brooklyn insisted she have one too. Brooklyn knows how to work her magic and get her way with mommy! Our big party will be on her actual birthday at urban air trampoline park. We have yet to go to a trampoline park so this will be interesting. She is super excited about her birthday and picked to have a Frozen theme. Woah! Big shocker she along with everyone else in the world is obsessed with the Disney movie Frozen. When the movie first came out we went to the theater 3 or 4 times to see the movie and watched it on the iPad every day for a couple months. Now we don't watch the movie as often but it is still a favorite. She has a million Frozen toys and we play with them all the time. We also dress head to to in our Frozen outfits. Over Christmas break we made a trip to build-a-bear to make a stuffed Olaf and bought Frozen jammies for a bear to match us.

Flashback

I have always wanted to create a blog about my beautiful daughter and our life. Being a single mom in school is not an easy task but we make the best of it. Since Brooklyn is four at the end of the month I thought my first blog post should be a flashback at her first three years of life. 

Brooklyn was born on January 31st 2011

 She was such a sweet, easy going baby. Here are some more pictures of her first year.

 Brooklyn's first birthday party was animal prints. She was very careful with her cake until we helped her dig into it. 

 Brooklyn's 2nd year of life was just as fun as the first minus the terrible two stage.

 For Halloween I made Brooklyn a peacock costume.

 For Brooklyn's 2nd birthday we celebrated with our family at our house with an owl theme. I made Bug's owl cake.

And finally the third year of Miss Brooklyn's life.

 For Brooklyn's 3rd Halloween I made her costume. She was a chicken.

 This year for our 4th Halloween Brooklyn was a flamingo. I made the costume.

Time flies when you are having fun and enjoying it. I cannot believe in two weeks my little bug will be 4 years old. She is stubborn, independent, beautiful, sweet and loving. She is becoming such a young lady. I have a girly girl on my hands and she loves playing with princesses.