Happy Fifth Birthday to Our Olivia Cate

My Dear Girl,

Another year has come and gone and we have enjoyed every second watching you grow.  This was a big year for you – you left the comfort of a school you have been attending since you were just 12 weeks old, and you embraced your new school with open arms. 

You are still just the jolliest little girl we know, but this past year you have also started showing a hint of a temper when you get frustrated or mad.  Overall, you are just so dang happy, though.  You don’t worry about much, you don’t seem to care what other people think, and you pretty much walk around all the time just being jolly and smiling and shining your little light… 

…which brings me to your smile.  Yep, it still lights up every room!  You smile with your whole face – sometimes with your whole body – and we all can’t help but smile when we see yours.  You don’t have a serious bone in your body.  You are constantly joking around, laughing, and you are already even slightly sarcastic… but in a good way. 

You’re still as clumsy as ever, walking into walls, tripping over your own feet, knocking over drinks, and falling out of chairs.  But you’re always happy!  So yep, we are still calling you Drunk College Girl (or DCG for short) behind your back.  But we say it with only love and affection.  ;o)

You have been sassy pretty much from day one, but HOLY MOLY, has the sass really ramped up this year.  You basically think you’re 16 years old all. the. time.  You speak to Daddy and me like you’re a teenager sometimes, you’ve already started rolling your eyes, and you’ve recently decided to start calling us by our first names.  Yep, lately you have been calling Daddy “Brian” and me “Lindsay.”  And when we give you the side eye for it, you just give us your mischievous little grin that we can’t resist and then you egg us on even more by using our first names in yet another sentence. 

You are seriously a piece of work.

You still make noise constantly.  The only time you stop talking is to eat or sleep and even when you’re eating you’re humming.  Surprisingly you don’t really get in trouble much at school for it, though.  I have no idea how that’s possible.

Your love for princesses still runs deep, but they have been a bit overshadowed this past year by Hatchimals and unicorns… hence the unicorn birthday shirt.  You received the Hatchimals board game for Christmas and you literally ask us to play it every day.  You never tire of it.  And you carry the tiny Hatchimals everywhere with you.  I’m constantly finding them stuck in my purse, in your shoes, in the couch, and all kinds of other weird places.

Your growth appears to have plateaued a bit this year.  You have grown, but you don’t seem to be growing quite as fast.  You are still wearing 5T shirts, although you’re right on the verge of moving up to the next size, and you’re now wearing 5T leggings and dresses and skirts.  But PLEASE, DEAR GOD, DON’T MAKE YOU WEAR ACTUAL PANTS!  You HATE jeans or any pants with seams or pockets or buttons or zippers.  You refuse to wear them.  The only thing you ever wear is jumpers at school, and dresses and tunics at home with leggings.  And you hate socks with the fire of a thousand suns and it is a daily struggle to get you to wear them to school.  You have no choice since it’s part of the uniform policy, but do you care about a uniform policy?  Heck no. 

You are still the pickiest little eater I know and you would literally eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches at every single meal if we would let you.  And sometimes we do.  Oh wait, we can’t forget chips and cheese dip at Mexican restaurants, though!!  You would probably choose that over PB&J. 

You have stopped eating all fruit with the exception of raspberries and literally the only thing you drink is water.  You hate juice, you hate milk, and I don’t think you’ve ever even tried a soft drink.  But you know what?  I’m totally okay with that.

We are currently in the process of turning your room into a big girl room and while I love the excuse to redecorate a space, it’s breaking my heart a little because you’re getting so dang big.  You’re still creeping into our bed every single night and I still love it.  I’m so afraid that once we set up your full-size bed your midnight snuggles will cease.  I think that’s why I’ve been dragging my feet a little with the redecorating process.

You started ballet and tap at the beginning of this school year and I think we have finally found the extracurricular activity that you’re going to stick with!  You dropped out of “nastics” because it was too scary and you didn’t want to play a second season of soccer because you just didn’t like it, but girlfriend, you love some ballet and tap.  You’ve been asking us every single week when you get to perform on the stage.  Only three months to go!

You have the biggest heart and you are still a sucker for Maui and Toby and any other pets and animals that you’re introduced to.

YOU ARE READING NOW!!  You started reading short words early this school year and you have quickly progressed and are now reading full sentences with occasional help from Daddy and me.   

You love popular music and you know all the words to every Ed Sheeran, Taylor Swift, and Bruno Mars song.  Your current obsession is with the song “Without Me” by Halsey and you and Jacob call it “The Feet Song” just because she says the word “feet” in it and y’all think that’s funny.  Lol. 

You gallop wherever you go, you are always up for an adventure, and you’d have a dance party every single night if we’d let you.  You are just the brightest little light.  We love you so incredibly much, Olivia Cate, and we are so glad that you are ours! 

Happiest of birthdays, my dear girl!

Love,

Mommy

Birthday Letter - Age 2

Birthday Letter - Age 3
Birthday Letter - Age 4

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Five on Friday - Curtains, A Genius Product, Brian’s Birthday, and Other Faves

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Hey y’all!  Happy Friday!  I have a lot to write about today so let’s just get right down to business!

O N E – Curtains

B and I made a stop at IKEA when we were in Atlanta last weekend for the Michael Buble concert and I picked up another pair of the RITVA curtains for our dining room.  They have completely transformed the room!!  Prior to having these curtains up, I had a swag (is that what you call them??) that was closer to the window, but I recently had Brian move the curtain rod higher, and ever since, I couldn’t get the swag to look right. 

Since we had the RITVA curtains in the front room right next to the dining room, I wanted to have the same thing in the dining room anyway, because it gives the house a more cohesive look. 

If you have an IKEA nearby, I highly recommend these… they are so inexpensive but the quality is excellent and they are so flowy and bright and airy!  I have them in my office, too, and they completely transformed the room!  And if you don't have an IKEA nearby, you can get them on Amazon here, but they are slightly more expensive.

I kind of want to put them in every room in the house now.  Haha.

BEFORE

AFTER

T W O – Museum Putty

Did you catch my Instagram story earlier this week about museum putty?  I had an overwhelming response to it so I thought I’d share the product here on the blog, too, because it’s just so darn awesome.

A little back story first – we have drawer organizers to keep items tidy in many of our kitchen and bathroom drawers throughout the house.  While I absolutely couldn’t live without the organizers in the drawers, they are unfortunately a source of pain as well.  Every single time I open and close the drawers the organizers slide all around in the drawer (usually to the back) and I have to adjust them every single time I open the drawers.  Soooo annoying.   

Well, I came across this museum putty and it’s pretty much the best thing ever.  For only $5 they send you a little brick of putty and you can use how ever much or little you want for many different projects around your home.  It is perfect for stabilizing the drawer organizers because it won’t damage the drawer or the organizer (or anything else it touches).  I just pulled my organizers to the front of the drawers, put a couple of dots of the museum putty under the back organizer, push it down to make it stick, and voila!  The drawers stay in place!!!!  So good, right?

And this stuff isn’t just for stabilizing drawer organizers, it’s also perfect for protecting knick knacks and valuables.  You can stick it underneath them to stabilize them on shelves and tables if they are prone to falling over.  If someone bumps into them they won’t fall over and break.  (Hello, families with small kids!!)  A bunch of people in earthquake zones were also mentioning in the Amazon reviews that they stick the putty under pretty much everything in their house in the event of an earthquake.  That way their stuff stays in place.  GENIUS! 

I love it when I find such a simple (and cheap) solution to a major pain point! 

T H R E E – Brian’s Birthday

*This portion of the post is sponsored by Victory Tailgate. 

Brian turned 41 earlier this week and I’m officially married to someone who’s not just 40, but to someone who is in their 40’s.  Sigh.  Where is the time going?  Anyway, we spent Wednesday celebrating our favorite guy! 

Jacob had his first soccer practice at 5:30 so we didn't have time to go to a sit-down restaurant, but we did pick up Chick-Fil-A (you can never go wrong with that!), had carrot cake (one of his favorites) from our favorite bakery, and then we showered him with gifts.  I always buy a new beer for him (us) to try, so there was a six-pack in the fridge, and for his main gift… a cornhole set with all of the bells and whistles!!  As you all know, we love college football and we have season tickets to the University of Georgia football games, so we are no strangers to tailgating and tailgating games.

We’ve always loved the idea of having our own cornhole boards, but it is really hard to find ones of good quality.  I had a co-worker whose husband makes GORGEOUS boards, but I never had the chance to get him to make some for us before they moved away.  I have searched on the internet for several years now for a good pair of boards, but all of the ones I was finding online were either not full-size regulation boards or they were made of cheap wood or had tacky design options.

I came across Victory Tailgate recently and I knew immediately that these were the quality boards I had been searching for.  We ordered one of the University of Georgia sets, 8 all-weather bags, and a Georgia carrying case… SUCH A BONUS TO HAVE A NICE (AND FESTIVE!) PLACE TO STORE THEM!!!! 

The boards arrived in record time and they are just stunning in person.  The quality and craftsmanship can’t be beat and I just know that we are going to have a blast with these for many years to come. 

Thank you so much, Victory Tailgate, we love them! 

F O U R – Unicorn Birthday Goodies

Olivia’s birthday weekend is officially on and popping and we cannot wait to celebrate our girl!  She requested unicorn themed stuff for her birthday so it should be extra magical.

This will be her last year to get a birthday shirt (tears!) and I found this beauty on Etsy.  It’s even more beautiful in person, too!

I ordered her cake earlier this week and this was the picture I gave to the bakery for inspiration.  I can’t wait to see how it turns out!

F I V E – Gallery Timeline Wall

I used to have a gallery timeline wall to the left of my desk in my office.  I recently took it down to paint, and I decided not to put it back in the same place because it was really too “heavy” for the small wall that it was on. 

I ended up putting it behind my door in my office, but I scaled it back a bit and just kept a few of my favorite things.  It has all of my adult life’s biggest events right there in one place, and I love looking at it while I work. 

Finally, a few more funnies before I go!  

If this isn't the truth!!!!  They would eat all the snacks all the time if we would let them!

This is awesome!  And I cannot wait to see this movie!

Right?!  And then I just clean anyway...

He brought a PONY IN THE HOUSE!  I would diiiie if that happened now.

Just change the word "Alabama" to "Georgia" and we're all set.  What is this weather?

I second the use of this scale.  Hahahaha.  #ThatsMyJam

Happy weekend, y’all!

*Linking up with A Liz Adventures and Carolina Charm for Five on Friday, A Little Bit of Everything for Friday Favorites, Meet @ the Barre for Friday Favorites, and By BMG for High Five for Friday.

This is Five… Olivia’s Birthday Interview

Before I get into all things Olivia, I want to give a shout-out to the hubs because today is HIS birthday!!!!  Happy birthday, my love!  Next year if you’d like, we can do a birthday interview for you.  ;o)

So, our jolly gal will be FIVE next Monday, so this past weekend I interviewed her for her annual birthday interview.  In the past she has always been pretty goofy for these interviews, but for some reason she took this one very seriously.  She thought very carefully about each answer and barely showed her silly side, which is very unusual for her… just one more sign that she’s growing up.  Cue all the tears.  :o(  She does, however, still start nearly every sentence with a nice long, “Ummmm…” as she’s thinking.  :o) 

Ladies and gentlemen (well Ladies and Brian and my Daddy… the only two gentlemen who probably read my blog – haha), this is FIVE...

1.      What is your favorite toy?  “Ummmm… hmmmm… that’s kind of hard because there’s lots of toys.  That Minnie Mouse thing where you call Minnie Mouse on the phone that Grandpa gave me today for Valentine’s Day.”  (She literally just got this about an hour ago so it’s fresh in her mind.)

2.      What is your favorite stuffed animal?  “Mmmmm, that doll that you smell her face and it smells like vanilla.”  (It was a gift from my mother-in-law and she’s had her since she was born and she really does love it but I wouldn’t say that she has a favorite… she’s more of a flavor of the week kind of person.  Haha.) 

3.      What is your favorite game?  “Um… hmmmm… Candyland.”  Me: “Not the Hatchimals game?!”  Olivia: “Oh yes, the Hatchimals game!!”  (We have literally been playing this game one to multiple times PER DAY since she got it for Christmas.)

4.      What is your favorite sport?  “Ummmm… ballet!” 

5.      What is your favorite book?  “Mmmm that one’s kind of hard.  Um, that big Anna and Elsa one.”  (She’s referring to her Frozen 5-Minute Stories book and she does love it!  We’ve been reading it most nights for the last few weeks now.) 

6.      What is your favorite TV show?  “Um, True!”  (A Netflix original and she does love it.) 

7.      What is your favorite movie?  “Um… hmmmm… I guess Frozen.”  (Even though she hasn’t watched it in probably over a year because she doesn’t like conflict between the sisters and is terrified of Marshmallow.  Haha.  She is obsessed with all things Frozen, though, so I suppose that’s true.)

8.      What is your favorite song?  “Um, my favorite song is Moana soundtrack.”   

9.      What is your favorite band or singer?  “Um, Elsa.”  (She said this last year, too!  Lol.)

10. What is your favorite holiday?  “CHRISTMAS!”  (She didn’t even hesitate with this one!  She is her mother’s daughter.)

11. What is your favorite season?  “Um, what are the seasons?”  Me: “Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall.”  Olivia: “Winter, because that’s when Christmas is.” 

12. What is your favorite color?  “Um, red.”  Me: “HUH?!”  Olivia: “Because of PJ Masks.”  Me: “So it’s not pink anymore?”  Olivia: “Yeah, it is pink.  I like all of the colors.”  (I like that answer!  I like all of the colors, too.  Oh, except orange… I’m only an orange fan when it’s on a fall leaf or a pumpkin.)

13. What is your favorite animal?  “Ummmm, not scary stuff.  I guess giraffes.  Oh wait, I mean hippopotamuses because remember when we saw that one at Disney World and it was tee-teeing?!”  *Laughs her head off*  (First of all, she means rhinoceros.  And y’all, if there is ONE THING that our kids remember from Disney World, it is literally this – the dang rhinoceros peeing in its natural habitat on the Kilimanjaro Safaris ride in Animal Kingdom.  They still talk about that a whole year later and any time the subject of Disney World comes up, this comes up in the conversation, too.  That rhino really made an impression on them.  And I think I inadvertently got it on video.  I should really show it to them sometime.  Hahahaha.)

14. What is your favorite shirt?  “Um, shirt?  The one that has those flowers on it.”  (She’s not wrong, y’all.  She’s referring to a shirt that she’s literally been wearing since she was two years old and she still won’t give it up.  It started out so long that it was pretty much a dress, then it slowly became a tunic as she grew, and now we’re dealing with a very short shirt.  We really got our money’s worth from that one!  Haha.)

15. What is your favorite fruit?  “Um, raspberries.”  (Literally the only fruit she will eat right now so I would have been giving her the side-eye if she didn’t say this.)

16. What is your favorite vegetable?  “Probably, um, carrots, because I used to eat them.”  (Lol.  Sounds about right, she hardly eats any veggies.)  Me: “What about okra?”  Olivia: “I like okras and carrots.”  (Girlfriend does love some fried okra… she’s a good little southern girl!)

17. What is your favorite snack?  “S’mores Goldfish.”  (Both of our kids love these!)

18. What is your favorite treat?  “Treat?  Wow, this one is hard.  I guess bubblegum.  Mmmm yummy, bubble gum.”  *starts making up a song about bubblegum and singing it*  (And she’s totally right.  She is completely obsessed with gum right now and will choose it over anything right now.)

19. What is your favorite drink?  “Um, water, HAH!”  *starts making up a song about water to the tune of “Part of Your World” and singing it*  (And she’s totally right.  She literally only drinks water… she’s not interested in milk or juice or soft drinks or anything else.  I can’t even remember the last time she drank anything other than water… it’s probably been over a year.)

20. What is your favorite thing to eat for dinner?  “Um, homemade waffles because sometimes you make breakfast for dinner and you make homemade waffles.”  *starts making up a song about homemade waffles and singing it*  (I can’t believe she didn’t say peanut butter and jelly.  She chooses it over any food every single day of the week and would eat it for every single meal if we would let her.  She pretty much has at least one per day.)

21. What is your favorite restaurant?  “Um, that shop where you get pancakes… Cracker Barrel.”  *starts singing her class behavior song that goes, “Criss cross applesauce, hands in your lap, bubble in your mouth, chomp.”*  (Random.  Lol.)

22. Who is your best friend?  “Becca.”  (This is true.  It’s pretty much the only person she talks about every day when she gets home from school.)

23. What makes you feel happy?  “Um, happy Valentine’s Day.”  (Can you tell that we celebrated hard this week?  Ha!)

24. What makes you feel sad?  “Um, that someone hit me.”

25. What are you afraid of?  “Storm and thunder and lightening.”  (True story, she also said this last year.)

26. What are you thankful for?  “My friend gave me, um, toys.”  Me: “What else?”  Olivia: “Um, that she bes kind to me.”  (I don’t even know how to spell “bes” but oh my goodness, I’m going to be so sad when she starts using the correct past tense verbs!)

27. What are you really good at?  “Mmmm, doing mazes.”  (Both kids have been on a maze kick lately… especially Jacob!)

28. What is your best memory?  “Um, that one day that I throwed up on the couch and the floor a little bit.  I never throwed up in a long time.”  Me: “That’s your best memory?!”  Olivia: “Uh huh.”  Me: “You know what best means, right?”  Olivia: “Mmmm hmmmm, that means you’re the best.”  Me: “Best means good… so you like throwing up?!”  Olivia: “Noooo…”  Me: “Okay, so what’s your favorite GOOD memory?”  Olivia: “About the Daddy Daughter dance.”  (Every single time we talk about memories, both kids always mention that they remember when they had stomach viruses and threw up.  Apparently they hate it so much it leaves a huge impression because it’s always the first thing they remember from the past.  Lol.)

29. What do you want to be when you grow up?  *without hesitation*  “Elsa.”  (She said this last year and it’s so true.  She talks constantly about how she’s going to be Elsa at Disney World one day.)

30. If you could have one wish, what would it be?  “Um, that I was dreaming about the Daddy Daughter Dance.”  Me: “That’s not really a wish.”  Olivia: “Oh, I don’t even really know what wishes are.”  Me: “A wish is where if you could have anything in the world what would it be?”  Olivia: “That I could float in the sky.”  (Lofty goals… literally.  Hahahaha.)

Happy almost birthday to our girl!  Just five more days!!  We’ve been counting it down since, like, November!  Haha.

Birthday Interview - Age 3

Birthday Interview - Age 4

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Our Weekend - The One with the Michael Buble Concert

It was a great three-day weekend, y’all!  Friday we kicked it off with pizza and craft beers at our new favorite place.  After dinner, we went back home, snuggled up on the couch, and had a family movie night to watch The Little Rascals.  It was one of my favorites growing up and my Momma and Daddy gave the DVD to the kids for Valentine’s Day, so they were ready to watch it.  The kids ended up LOVING it.  And I loved watching it again after all these years.  It is just so stinking cute!

Saturday B picked up donuts for breakfast.  It had been quite some time since we’d had them, so we were long overdue.  I worked on a few projects around the house after breakfast.  I finally, finally got my entertainment center shelves styled the way that I want them and I also started moving around some things around on our walls.  B had an afternoon tennis match, so the kids and I stayed home and did a couple of loads of laundry, Olivia and I did her five year old birthday interview (coming later this week to the blog), and then we all played princesses and Legos and a bunch of other stuff in the play room.

Saturday evening we went to 5:30 mass as usual, and then we went to our usual Mexican place with my mom, dad, uncle, brother, and his family.  I got lots of baby snuggles in while I sipped on a margarita, so it wasn’t too shabby of an evening.  ;o)

The kids were off to bed shortly after we got home and then B and I settled in to watch Jurassic World… AKA Lindsay got in a good couch nap.  ;o)

Sunday morning we were pretty lazy until it was time to go to my MIL and step-FIL’s for lunch, and then we spent a little bit of time in the back yard at their house afterward.  It’s been rainy/dreary here for weeks with only a couple of sunny days sprinkled in here and there, so I feel like I’m starting to go into a bit of an end-of-season funk.  I’m ready for spring!

My MIL came to our house around 4 Sunday afternoon and B and I took off for a rare (if ever) Sunday evening date night!  Michael Buble was playing in Atlanta and it has been on my bucket list to see him for about 15 years, so we bought tickets the second they went on sale a few months ago.

Since we were in Atlanta, we stopped at IKEA on the way to grab another pair of my favorite curtains, and while we were there I ended up grabbing a couple of other odds an ends… a faux fern for the living room (that looks AMAZING!), a frame for my office (so I can finally get it completed!!), and two more frames that will possibly go in the living room… we’ll see. 

After IKEA we headed straight to the venue in Duluth.  It was raining (yet again) and the traffic was way worse than usual (probably because of the rain) so we ended up getting in the door with just enough time to run to the bathroom, grab a couple of hot dogs and beers, and slide into our seats about ten minutes before he came out.  Whew.  There was no opener for him, and they had announced that he would be out promptly at 8, so we were sweating it there for a little while.  I would have been so sad if we had missed the beginning!

The concert was AMAZING… even better than I had hoped for.  He had a 35 piece orchestra behind him along with three very talented back-up singers.  He sang all of my favorites of his as well as a lot of my old favorite standards that he does.  Our seats were INCREDIBLE.  We were in Row R (18^th row from the main front stage) and our seats were right by the catwalk portion of the stage that leads to the middle of the venue.  Therefore, he kept walking right by us and we even made it up on the big screen for a second when he walked by us and the camera followed him.  I mean, he was RIGHT THERE.  It was so cool.

Many people got out of their seats to stand right along the catwalk, but I stayed in my seat.  I ended up kind of wishing I had gone to stand over by the stage, though, because he interacted with the audience a ton – high-fiving, shaking hands, taking selfies with people’s phones, and even getting down and dancing with one lady right next to us.  He was HILARIOUS and told some funny little stories in between songs, and it was just an all-around enjoyable evening.  Made me love him even more! 

We drove home after the concert and headed straight to bed since it was super late.  We ended up sleeping in until about 8:45 Monday morning, which was nice, and then we bummed around the house all morning.  The kids were out of school for President’s Day and B took the day off so it was nice not to have any where to be after having such a late night. 

Monday morning I sold the kids’ old stroller (cue aaaallll the tears) on our neighborhood Facebook page, so one of our neighbors came over to pick it up.  It was nice to have that big thing out of the house, but man, does it make me sad to know that our babies are so old that they don’t need it anymore. 

I also worked on rearranging a few more things on the walls in the house to get them DONE (my word for the year) and to finally have them the way that I want them, and then we headed out for lunch at Five Guys!! 

The rainy morning had turned into sunshine (mostly) by lunchtime, so afterward, we went to the playground to let the kids run around.

Olivia’s ballet/tap class was still on Monday, so she and I headed there for her 3:45 class while B and Jacob stayed at home playing video games, and then just as Olivia and I were getting home, B and Jacob headed out for Jacob’s first spring soccer practice at 5:30.

We are officially back in full swing with all of the extracurriculars, so it’s gonna be a flurry of activity for the next three months until the kids are officially out of school for the summer.  EEK!

Happy Tuesday, y’all!