Stephanie Proule is a very Good Thing

   So you're probably (definitely) thinking, "Whoa Nicole, this blog is amazing and the layout is so cool i can barely even stand it!" I know. thats because my cousin Steph is good at everything she does and she also hated that i was using the default layout. She is the best kind of person. Also she is the only person who honestly told me my blog sucked...so thanks all you "friends".

   Now because i have a blog, that gives me full permission to complain about things and i've done a pretty decent job of not doing any of that...until now. Why? Because i have a paper and a presentation due in a week and i haven't started on either. Imagining myself sitting and working at a wooden Starbucks table next to creepy hipster strangers doesn't appeal to me at all. Okay, that's all i wanted to say about that.

   Tonight i babysat the Abbott kids again and they are the best! I love them so much! Tonight was another game of pirates followed by playing house. I learned that i really love pretending to be a pirate and that i don't love having to take a nap because Mamma Eden told me to. I taught Caleb how to make different things with his beads-you know the whole spider web trick. He's really great at it now and when i came over tonight he made up his own shapes-so now i can make my bead necklace look like a twistee treat and a tie.

   So basically what you should get out of this post is that i love my cousin, i love the Abbott's and if you want to hang out with me this week-i'll be at Starbucks.

Monday. Tuesday. Wednesday.

   Blog question: If someone spends the day with me and blogs about it, is it okay for me to just copy and paste their post onto my blog and put the whole thing in quotes? Or is that against blogging rules. I just feel like i shouldn't have to write it out when it's already been written. Moving on...

   Monday: Halloween day! I'm a child and on halloween everyone finds out. There is nothing i love more then getting all dressed up as something ridiculously wonderful and getting candy for it...yes, i still go trick-or-treating. Every year i try to take my costume one step further, but i feel like they've all been pretty even. This year me and Allegra were statues-NOT ghosts. I don't know why everyone thought that. I would have spent way less time on a ghost costume. We spent a great deal of time perfecting statue poses only to see people open their doors and say "How spooky!" It was a lot of fun though. Im really glad i have a sister who's always right there with me.

   Tuesday: We switched doctors and no one had been to the new doctor yet. Aaron was supposed to go and check this place out, but he had to work. So Dad called me and asked if i would go. I'm not sick. I went anyway. On the way over i tried to think of every possible thing that was wrong with me. I settled on the sore throat i had (that i was already on medicine for.) The thing i really hate about the doctor is that no matter what i go in for, i always feel way worse coming out. Every time they ask me a health question i feel like there could be a chance i have that issue. "No, i don't feel dizzy...well i might-maybe a little. Sometimes i feel dizzy-oh shoot i think im dizzy." "Nope, no terminal illnesses...wait, does this look like skin cancer to you?" "When you say 'head aches'..." So that was tuesday.

   Wednesday: Disney Day. It was a super good time, a real average day at Walt Disney World. We ate some food, saw some shows, and rode some rides. (this is the part where i just want to paste in Michelle's post...you would all like it a lot more.) I still have the small world song stuck in my head so thats a bummer-that ride freaks me out. I had a great time with all my favorite people and i learned that dreams really do come true! All you have to do is believe!

Mom's Speech.

   So today was Mom's long awaited graduation speech. She went back to school for her MBA at Webster University and graduated last June. They asked her to give a speech at the big graduation for over 1,000 people. So we've heard her speech a lot. She did a really great job and everyone loved it, but the part they were most crazed about was the fact that she has seven kids. Mom often compares herself to snow white and this speech was no exception. As soon as he said "Snow White looks after seven little people-so do I." The crowd couldn't control there shock. The thing about this speech is that she portrays us so well and makes us sound like a perfect group of respectable young adults. We figured as long as no one knew we were her kids then we'd be golden. But as soon as she finished Nathaniel yells out "That's my Momma!" and it was all down hill from there. Everyone there tried their best to not look like they were staring at us but it was pretty darn obvious. We were video taped on two occasions.  We put Mom right to shame. Hudson kept trying to start the clap before everyone else did, but this usually meant him cutting people off while they were talking which was bad. At one point he even lost his gum, but don't worry he found it...on the back of my dress. Nathaniel decided to wear a zipper tie which supplied us all with great entertainment as always. Evan FatBoothed everyone in our row and Jordan and Allegra recruited the lady in front of us to cheer for Mom when they called her name. Mom is a real champion for raising all of us the way she did. And for loving us even when the only contribution we could make on her big day was getting up early and putting on the clothes she laid out for us the night before. She's amazing and i love her and I'm so proud of her!

This was the best picture we got of all of us...it's so Kauffman.

Being a Kauffman

My cousin Stephanie told me she would like to read more blog posts about my family. So here is a little glimpse into the Kauffman family. I am going to warn you in advance that you're going to read things you cannot unread and see things you cannot un-see. If you've ever been over for dinner then you know exactly what i mean. Just before writing this i discovered a severe amount of blood in my sink (my nice clean sink). This probably means that Hudson had a nosebleed in my bathroom (my nice clean bathroom). Most people would be bothered by that-im not, or going to see if he needs help-im not. Im sure whoever gave him this nosebleed had proper motives. See, Hudson likes to do this thing where he hides in your room, sometimes for extended periods of time, waiting for you to come in so he can jump out and scare you. Last week he was in my closet. he scared me so bad i jumped up and accidentally kneed him in the face. So when people get hurt around here no one is really alarmed.

That Time Courtney Cooke Came to Visit/My Longest Post

   The always wonderful Courtney Cooke came to Orlando this past weekend for a wedding and stayed with us. She is a splendid human being and if i could be with her all the time i would-she's great! On Thursday i picked up Michelle and we drove to New Smyrna Beach to meet up with Courtney and her traveling buddy Bethany (who is also the best!). We had a beach dance party, played some soccer (kind of),  and found a dead crab. It was a classic beach day. On the way home me and Mitch stopped for some Frozen Gold and payed in all change-that's what they get for only taking cash! We had some really great car conversation and car karaoke, followed by 45 minutes of traffic on I-4. Worth it.

   After the extended drive home we were off to a much needed bible study at the Graham's. I'm glad Michelle got to come with us-i always love taking her around with me so she can see my life. She is so much like her mom-feeding me snacks while i drive, not letting me stay up too late,  making sure i eat breakfast. I love it!

Lizzie Reads My Blog Now

Hey Friends, my life has been crazy exciting! Every moment is a sheer thrill! So much adventure that i haven't been able to blog about any of it! This picture pretty much sums up the last month...

I Have Two Blog Followers

This past saturday we went to Wet 'n Wild for Nathaniel's birthday. "We" meaning my family and about five of Nathaniel's strangest friends. I had the sheer joy of driving them there. Conversation covered a variety of topics-we discussed which of his friends could chug water the fastest (it was the asian kid), why Tommy knew all the words to "Baby", farting, a girl named "Yasmin", football, more farting (for some reason it's funny every time.) and dating. I thought the dating topic was particularly interesting because these kids are in middle school. I never dated in middle school, or

     Blogging is a lot of hard work and i still haven't figured out if i like it or not...im leaning towards not. Half the time i can't even remember my day and when i do remember and start to type it out it just sounds way less exciting then i thought it was. But maybe someday someone will ask me what i did on the first day of September in 2011 and i'll be able to say "i blogged about it!". So basically i force myself to type out my life so that on the off chance someone cares about my thursdays i can accurately fill them in.

     I guess i'll start with Tuesday...Allegra has been looking for a job for a while now and i was able to get her an interview at Plato's Closet-the only problem was that we both have medieval Humanities on Tuesday nights and it was the same time as the interview. So i told her to just go and that i would take notes for her and catch her up later on. Allegra is usually the one that does that for me..even when i come to class. I tried to make sure I got all the information i needed so that i would be able to

It's been less then a week and i already forgot i had a blog. I am such a disappointment. Now i guess i should do one of those really long posts where i sum up my week using vivid detail and several pictures so that you (mom and michelle) feel like you lived my life with me. But i honestly can't remember a whole lot so i'll just give some bullet points.
          - Thursday was my last day teaching swim lessons for Swimkids USA. I love the job but Winter Garden is too far of a drive for me to make. The whole day was pretty bitter sweet. A lot of these kids started when they were babies, so i've watched them grow up and they've been apart of my life. Today i watched little Mia swim freestyle across the pool-when i first met her she was a 2 year old girl who was afraid of the water. I am really going to miss all my little kiddos! What i wont miss is all the kicking and punching and screaming and "i hate you Mrs. Cole"'s (i dont understand why "nicole" is so hard for them to say...and why the "Mrs"? im not married!). But i loved that job while it lasted and i'll miss it for sure.

Let's talk about my day. I went with Michelle to get her all moved in to her fabulous new apartment. She had an orientation that lasted about three hours and she had to go to it all alone (welcome to the real world little lady!) so that left me and my Aunt with some serious bonding time in the Florida heat-on the plus side we got "Friends and Family of a Disney Cast Member" bottons. Talk about exciting times! You know i wore mine all day long! There was also a man that came around with cookies and at one point he set his tray down to go get a drink-we ate every last one of them :) <- first blog smily face! After regretting my outrageous cookie consumption i got to meet Michelle's tragic roommates. these girls must be possessed with Disney magic, they were CRAZY! And one in particular-at first i thought she was just really excited, then it just got ridiculous..."OH MY GOD WE HAVE BOWLS! AHHHHHH! FREAKING OUR BOWLS!!!!!" and about every 5 or so minutes she would come into Michelle's room to say "we live here! we LIVE HERE!" she was bundles of joy. I'm just waiting for one of the other girls to take her out. All of her energy really wore me out-i am so ready for bed. Goodnight everyone reading my blog...so goodnight Mom and Michelle.

Nothing happened today.

So, I blog now. I don’t really have any special reasons for it though. I’m not moving, I didn’t get married or have a baby and my life is not that exciting-I just really like talking about myself and for some reason that’s more acceptable to do in blog form. I’ll probably be really into it for about a month and then never be on it again until something really crazy happens or I stop having friends and I'm forced to spend my life on facebook and watching youtube videos. But until then this is what its going to be, I’m not sure what the blogging rules are and even if I was I’m not sure if I would follow them. I don’t know if I should look at this like a journal entry or just a really long status update…but then again what’s the difference? So here it is. My Blog. Appropriately titled. 

Now let's get down to blogger business, i'll tell you about my life. My cousin Michelle is here from Maryland for the next 6 months-which means my life just turned into a 6 month party and I have a new sidekick slash best friend! I can't wait to take her everywhere with me and blog about it afterwards. There are going to be lots of movie nights, car dance parties, starbucks dates, mall trips, and afternoon naps. She's crazy and I love her and i'm ready...for all of it!