Go Red (and zebra) For Women

This was my second year participating in the Go Red for Women event in Columbus. Both years I've contributed by donating a custom piece of hand painted furniture to the silent auction. Last year I painted this chair for the winner. This years winner wanted a rocking chair to match her daughters zebra and hot pink room.

She didn't want a name on it so both daughters could enjoy it.  She chose a quote that was a little more grown up.  I thought it was a good one because I think it's inspiring for a young girl.

 GIRL POWER!!!

I did something different with this chair- I added a little flare! I hot glued some trim around the bottom of the seat.

I really liked the way it looked. Plus, if she hated it she could just pull it off.  I actually liked it so much that I added some flare to Nola's chair too.

Nola loves it but I'm not sure how the auction winner felt about her chair.  When I dropped it off yesterday she wasn't there. Her husband took it for her and didn't say much about.  I'm just going to assume she loved it so much that her fingers fell off.  That's probably why she didn't text me to tell me how much she loved it. :)

Hanging out with Kellen

Summer has started!!  Nola and I have loved our time together.  We have traveled around quite a bit.  We took a trip to Aurora to visit my college roommate who just had her second boy.  Her oldest son, Kellen, is eight months older than Nola.  They've met a few times but never really interacted until our visit last week.  They were pretty cute together and I think they loved each other even if Kellen pushed her down a couple of times.

Kellen said something and Nola thought it was HILARIOUS.  Or maybe she just knows that laughing at a mans joke will score major points?

It worked.  Nola has game.  Kellen was even checking her out during their rest break.

The lighting outside was perfect for pictures so I took a ton.  Here are a few more cute ones-

And a funny face-

Spring Art Show

The art show was this week and it turned out great but it made for a really busy week. Add interviews for a new teacher and seniors last day to the mix and I was dragggging by Wednesday. As I'm typing this I had to remind myself that today is only Thursday. Ugh. I'm 8 days away from a three month vacation so I probably shouldn't complain :). Enjoy a few pictures from the show:

Phoebe

Nola is so ready for summer.  She has been running around like crazy.  Apparently it's going to be nice out this weekend so hopefully she can get outside soon.  In the meantime she has been "walking" her trike around the house.  It reminds me of Phoebe on Friends.

While sitting on her trike she likes to wear her giraffe ears.  But only when she's on the trike.  So Phoebe.

And here is a video of Nola singing Smelly Cat.  Just kidding, she's just saying "Elmo."

Nap Time/Show Time

Nola has been napping like crazy lately.  2-3 hours at a time.  It's been awesome!  When she wakes up she has CRAZY bed head.

Also, she is a little cranky.  Here are a couple cute videos.  The first one makes me laugh.  I don't know why.  You can hear her say "please" in the second one, then she gets cranky again.

Also, this weekend I was in a staff vs. student Variety Show.  Our students have many talents.  Our staff has one- act like idiots to make people laugh.  We did an "evolution of dance" dressed in 80's workout gear.  It included a lot of famous dances- my favorite was "Bye, bye, bye" but the students really enjoyed Gangnam Style.  Not to brag, but I had 2 students tell me yesterday that I was the best dancer.  I gave it my all.  You should have seen my Dougie.  In the actual performance I had purple tights but was too lazy to change back into them to go to the bar.  Yes, we wore our 80's outfit to the bar.

In another skit we were acting like we were the CHS choir coming back for a reunion show.  We all wore black and white.  We sang "I've got Rhythm" and each of us had our own moment to scat.  It was very entertaining.  I decided that I was the old lady that still thought she was stylish.  You can't tell in the picture but my skirt has grey and black leopard print on it.

I also re-wrote the words and made a parody music video to "Thrift Shop" but can't put it on the internet.  We had a Harlem Shake incident a few months ago and I'm not getting fired over a music video.  It's a good one though.  

Overall it was a great night!  I love being involved in a show, especially since I never did it in high school.  I also love letting students see a different side of me.  Ok, it's not that different because I'm known to sing in class, but I do love being told that I'm the best dancer.  Fun fact:  When I spell check a document with my name on it it asks me if I meant "Mean Dancer."  Yes spell check, that's exactly what I meant....

Favorite Things

My favorite things- Nola edition

1. Nola is helpful

Recently Nola has started helping us with different chores around the house. She likes to pick her toys up, help load the washing machine, and get food out of the refrigerator. She loves to open the fruit drawer and grab a fruit cup then walk over to her booster seat and wait until someone lifts her up. WARNING: She is NOT patient.  If you ever see this child standing by her chair with a fruit cup you better get her strapped in ASAP or you will never hear the end of it.

2. Nola has pretty hair... and a new bald spot

I love Nola's hair even if it's a little mullet-y.  It's starting to get really long over her eyes and she will not keep a clip in so the other night I tried pigtails.  It took me well over 20 minutes to get her to hold still and she refused to look at the camera afterwards.  Although she hated the process of getting pigtails she didn't try to pull them out so on Saturday Robert and I held her head down so I could give her a ponytail in the front to keep her bangs out of her eyes.  Half way to Lincoln I turned around and she had ripped the rubber band out along with a chunk of her hair.  Luckily it's not too obvious!

3. Nola loves to sleep

Thank God.  Anyone who knows me knows I need 2 things to be a somewhat pleasant person: food and sleep.  Nola has slept through the night since she was 7 weeks old.  She rarely wakes up and takes a nap everyday.  Last Monday her nap lasted nearly 2 1/2 hours!  I don't know what I would do if she wasn't such a good sleeper.  I don't know what I'd do but I know how I would act and it rhymes with itchy. 

Nola is a great sleeper but not really a morning person.  We have to wake her up on weekdays to get her to daycare in the morning.  The picture below is one I took last week after I took her PJs off and laid her down on her back to changer her diaper. By the time I grabbed her outfit she had turned over and fallen back to sleep. OMG how cute is that?!?! 

4. Nola believes the impossible

Nola believes that she can fit in small spaces.  She believes that the vacuum in dangerous.  She believes that all remotes control the TV in the family room.  She believes Elmo lives in my phone and she believes that she is the center of our universe.  She may be right about the last one.

5.  Nola is passionate

This is what Nola did when I told her to kiss Elmo.  Eyes closed, open mouth.  Sometimes she does the same thing when she kisses us.  It's cute/weird.  I hope she is passionate about a lot of things in life, like art or music and learning new things.  But mostly I hope she is passionate about people.  I hope she has empathy and has a passion for helping people in some way that makes her happy.  Unless those people are boys and her way of helping involves closed eyes and open mouths.

Easter weekend

We had a great Easter weekend!  I spent all day with Nola on Friday while Rob went to work and a football game.  He had a great time and I loved spending time with the baby.  We got to play with the daycare kids next door and it really wore her out.  She took a 2 hour nap in the afternoon which gave me plenty of time to clean up before my parents came into town.  Grandpa and Gramcy got to town Saturday afternoon while Nola was napping.  It took her awhile to fully wake up so she snuggled with Grandpa for a bit.

Grandpa and Gramcy brought a lot of fun Easter stuff.  Nola especially loved her new book that made sounds. 

I really love this picture of Nola and Gramcy.

After Nola went to bed we "hid" her Easter eggs.  I was really hoping Nola would be egg-cited about finding eggs and she was!  She got the hang of it quickly and enjoyed finding them over and over again.

After saying good bye to my parents and another long nap we got Nola dressed in her Easter dress and headed down to Robert's parents house.

The Danner siblings

It was beautiful outside so we took some pictures.  And just a few hours later on our drive back it was SNOWING!  Nebraska weather is crazy.  I'm ready for summer!!!!

We had a great holiday weekend and were so glad that we got to spend it with lots of family.  Nola was happy because she ended with 3 Elmo's.  He is her favorite.  She talks about him all the time.