Did You Ever Get the Feeling?.....

Noella's sense of humor gets better each day. She genuinely makes us laugh all the time. Some of her original jokes are as follows:

What does a pirate Santa say?
Yo Ho-Ho!

What does a sad owl say?
Boo Hoo-Hoo!

Now, I will admit she had a bit of help formulating those.

We recently checked out "There's a Wocket in my Pocket" from the library. This family loves them some Dr. Seuss. We all have begun a fun game to randomly bust out our own creative prose in the true Seuss form. Out of the blue, Noella will say "Did you ever get the feeling there's a boap on the soap?" or "did you ever get the feeling there's a gubaru in the subaru?". And so on, and so forth. We just go on and on, and it is hilarious (to us).

Did you ever get the feeling there's a glog in the blog? Me too.

Somewhere Over the Rainbow

Noella's big thing this year was rainbows. Last year, it was pink and purple - this year, she's upgraded to rainbows. So, we went with it and gave her a rainbow party. It will be her last birthday as an only child, so I tried to make it a little extra special. She loves parties and birthdays, so it really was a must. So, onto pinterest I went to get the birthday party ideas flowing. NoJo also really loves arts and crafts, and there's really not much else you can do at your home birthday party at the end of December. Therefore, a rainbow craft party it was. 

Rainbow cupcake display

I tried to get a shot of everything, but it didn't work out like I'd hoped

Craft table

Rainbow fruit and vegetables

Just waiting to be decorated (not the pizza peel)

So excited for her friends to get here

Three candles on her cupcake. I can't believe it.

I've got a similar picture from last year:

Abby, and her green cupcake

Georgia with blue

Hannah with blue

Ruth with pink

The girls! (No, Noella did not get an LG 3-D flat screen for her birthday)

The girls (minus Georgia) with their beautiful creations (rainbow crowns and wands, necklaces and bracelets)

There's the Fab Five!

Happy 3 years baby girl! We love you to the moon and back and I can't believe how bright, sweet and lovely you are. While it hurts my heart to see you grow up so fast, we are so proud of what you are becoming!

Three.... It's the Magic Number

And just in case Christmas wasn't overwhelming enough, we move on to Noella's 3rd birthday: 

Birthday Cake Pancakes: complete with frosting glaze and sprinkles

Noella woke up to the house decorated in rainbow streamers and rainbow balloons filled the hallway leading to the living room. She had a special breakfast followed by, of course, more presents. I actually couldn't have planned it better if I had tried (as far as the gifts go). I bought her this Angelina Ballerina book, because she loves the character. It is Angelina's Birthday and on the cover she is riding a bike. It just so happened that's what Angelina received (complete with a basket, a horn and streamers, just like Noella). It was the perfect lead in to present her big kid bike.  

Pretty excited about the book

There's the bike hiding behind the shed

Pretty cool

EVEN COOLER! 

She just loved it and has been pedaling it around the house since. Daddy did such a great job fixing it up (it was given to us by a generous family who was done with it). A little elbow grease, new tires, grips, basket, streamers and training wheels were all it needed!

New birthday dress

Jewelry box from Nana and Papa (the kind that has the ballerina spinning inside when you wind the music up)

So precious

Cupcakes from Meems. This girl loves her treats! Now she can make her own!

SANTA!!! I Know Him! I KNOW Him!

Christmas was super exciting this year, as Noella is now old enough to care about presents, and get the gist of Santa. She could hardly stand it when she saw all of our presents under the tree prior to Christmas. She asked every morning if she could open one. She is persistent and tenacious, if nothing else. The first few presents that appeared under our tree were just for her from family, sent by mail. A few days later, there were some more from us for everyone in the family. After that happened, she replied, "Mom, I'm glad that you and dad have presents under the tree". Yeah, Noella, because that would have been so awkward if they were all for you! 

Christmas Eve was relatively laid back. Adam made shepherd's pie (now becoming our family's tradition of Christmas Eve meal), we went to the children's mass, we each got to open one present and then we went for dessert at our neighbor's house. Noella loved the children's mass (particularly the little girls dressed as angels and the kids in the choir singing Christmas songs. 

Poor little girlie was sick a few days before Christmas, and was getting up at night with a yucky cough (feeling uncomfortable). She woke up Christmas Eve night and ran to our bedroom, past the lit tree full of presents and stuffed stockings! I was so paranoid that would happen, and of course it did. Luckily, she did not even notice. In fact, the next morning, we had to tell her twice to check the living room to see if Santa had come. 

Santa's big deal this year: a special baby for NoJo to take care of. So far, she's doing a great job with "Polly"

A rainbow flower crown, some bath crayons (and new jammies that got put on right away)

Unicorn towel

New ballerina pictures to hang on her wall

Action shot.

An easel from Nana and Papa. An instant hit

Headlamp from Santa, backpack from Uncle Alex

Another action shot

Meems sent the stroller for the baby. How did she know Santa would bring a baby?

Fancy rainbow lollipop from her stocking. 

Trying out her new bath color tablets from Mom and Dad

It was a great day. One for the books for sure. It blew snow all day long and could not have been more picturesque. Even though I felt as if we had maintained a little self control and did not go overboard, somehow, it was still way too much and a tad bit overwhelming. Luckily, she  thoroughly enjoys and is using everything she received, so that makes me feel better. 

Fresh croissants baked that morning were our special Christmas breakfast (courtesy of Sparrow Bakery). We hosted our neighbors that evening for a little appetizer open house. I think we made up for not being back in Missouri with family. While it was hard to be away (we were definitely missing and thinking of everyone) - it was nice to experience Christmas with just our little family. We all need that once in a while - right?