Green Monster

Nolan can be a bit of a picky eater. It is just about impossible to get him to eat vegetables (just like most 2 year olds I hope!), but he is all about fruit and loves smoothies. Thanks to pinterest, oh how I LOVE pinterest, I discovered the green monster.

The green monster is a smoothie loaded with fruit and spinach. You aren't supposed to taste the spinach. I thought to myself this is too good to be true and how haven't I known this all along?? After looking at a wide variety of green monster recipes and each one being a little different, I whipped up one for Nolan and I to try. He loved it! I loved it! I was sure I would, but with Nolan you never know! Fresh spinach will now be in regular rotation at the Lynch house and at least I know he is getting some greens now and again, along with those dino nuggets he loves so dearly.

My version of the green monster:

1 banana

1 cup mixed berries (not necessary if you don't have)

1/2 cup vanilla yogurt

1/2 cup orange juice

some ice

1-2 cups of fresh spinach

2 tablespoons ground flaxseed

Copy Cat

Nolan watches us so closely these days and likes to do whatever we are doing. Nate was putting together an IKEA desk (always a fun task!) and Nolan decided he would help out!

Winter Wonderland...or not

Normally I would be extremely excited about snow. I love it. Skiing, snowball fights, building snowman...all of it! But not so much this time. It started out innocently enough. Cold, but not frigid, temperatures and a few inches of the white stuff. It was Nolan's first time experiencing it and he had a lot of fun (see pictures below) until his hands got too cold.

Well, later that night the temperature starts to drop and the wind picks up. (Another topic, but we did NOT realize how windy it gets around here...a problem when you are surrounded by trees.) Right as we are putting dinner in the oven the power goes out. Not completely uncommon, thanks to the wind and trees, but this time it was out for 20 hours. And it was freezing. Like 10 degrees outside freezing. Our house was in the 50's. I'm cold pretty much all the time, so this certainly didn't help things, plus I'm pregnant and still dealing with morning/all day sickness...it wasn't a good combination.

Around 11 am I got desperate and starting calling hotels in Gig Harbor because most of the town still had power. I found a couple of rooms (Nate's parents were visiting for Thanksgiving) and started packing. Literally the car was packed, and we were about to climb in and head out when the power came back on. Praise the Lord! I turned the thermostat up to 80, took the hottest shower and crawled into bed for a nice warm nap!

JUMP!

Gig Harbor has an indoor bounce house place that Nolan loves! We have been a couple of times now and he just has so much fun. The best part is that kids under two are free! We plan on spending some time here now that winter weather has started to settle in. Nate was able to go with us and Nolan loved having Daddy around to play with!

Look at the smile on his face!

Life with a toddler

Nolan is routinely pulling stunts like this! He is able to get into so many things now and he does it so fast! He's so cute though, we can't get mad at him!

And look, he's so proud on himself!

Halloween

We dressed Nolan up in his monkey costume and headed to Gig Harbor for Halloween. Most of the businesses in the harbor pass out candy and a lot of families head down there. Nolan was sure what to think at first, but pretty quickly he figured out how to play along so he could get candy! It was a little on the cool side, but we had a great time! Nolan even stopped on the walk back to the car, plopped down and started eating candy out of his basket. He was in heaven!

Spooner Farms

My dad came up for a visit in October and while he was here we headed to Spooner Farms to pick out some pumpkins! Nolan had a blast looking at animals, climbing on pumpkins and exploring the pumpkin patch.

We ended up leaving without getting any pumpkins, but we still had a great time! We will be back next year!

The big move & a trip to Bend

On June 9th we left California for Washington. Nolan and I were in one car, Nate drove the HUGE truck and my dad drove our other car. We made it to Redding, CA the first night and the following night we arrived in Gig Harbor, WA. It was quite the journey! Once we moved in and settled into our new apartment (I took zero pictures during this time...we were a little busy!) Nolan and I headed to Bend, OR to meet up with my mom and sisters.

This is Sarah. She dresses like this often. Awesome!

Nate was able to come down for the weekend (well 36 hours) but we made the most of it!

The girls attacked him!

Nolan loved the dishwasher

We went to an indoor bounce house place and Nolan had a great time! We will have to go back next time!

Friends

The Mommy & Me class that I was a part of in Manhattan Beach was one of the biggest blessings during Nolan's first year. It gave him ample opportunity to be around other kids and gave me a chance to talk to other mommas going through the same things I was. One of the hardest parts about moving was knowing that Nolan and I wouldn't be around that group any longer. Here are some pictures of Nolan hanging out with his buds during his last few weeks in California.

Daddy & Nolan

You have no idea how happy this makes Nate!

Center of attention??

At a friend's birthday party they had a singer come and perform for the kids. She brought all sorts of instruments and toys. One of them was a big drum that the kids loved hitting and banging. Except Nolan, he loved sitting on top of it!

Buried at the beach

During our last couple of month in California, Nolan and I soaked up as much beach time as we could. We would often head to the beach after his morning nap and go for walk and play in the sand. He loves playing with the sand and especially likes when he can dig his feet into the sand. So I decided to bury the bottom half of him and he loved it!

San Diego Zoo

In my continued attempt to catch up...

Realizing we were leaving California in just a couple of weeks we decided to squeeze in a trip to San Diego and go to the zoo! My dad came down for the day to join us and we headed down to SD. The zoo was great! We saw all the animals we read about to Nolan all the time and he seemed to enjoy it. He especially liked all the birds and was constantly pointing them out!

Daddy and Nolan; He's probably pointing at birds

Being silly

Grandpa Rick came and joined us for the day

Our future scientist

Where's Nolan?

Splash Park

One hot day Nolan and I headed out in search of a splash park. There are quite a few in the greater Seattle area, so we didn't have to drive too far before we got to one. It was a bit crowded and he didn't know what to think of it at first, but soon he was having a great time! We look forward to finding more of them this coming summer.

Doing the chicken dance??