Nice to meet you!
Let me start by saying…Yay, you found me!! How exciting!! I’m sure you’re wondering who I am. Great question!
My name is Nichole, but I go by Nikki. Original I know, but it was the name I was given! I guess you could say I live the regular suburban lifestyle…married with 3 kids and a house in a manicured neighborhood. Again, really original! I’m a Special Education teacher by day and a wanna-be blogger by night. Oh, and I sell Rodan + Fields. Oh and I’m a cheer mom. I love my vacations!! And, I’m a Disney girl and I would go to Disney every 6 months if I could pay for it and if my husband wouldn’t kill me!! We will get into those last few things in future posts!
If I’m not so different than everyone else then why am I trying to blog? Another great question you guys!!
First a little more background…
My family tree goes back to Opi, Italy, a tiny mountainside village near Parma (of Parmesan cheese). Like most large Italian families, mine is crazy, but they are also very crafty and they LOVE to cook. My biological grandfather, Joe DeSanto, was a master set designer. He made sets for from plays and musicals, to little knowns shows like The Muppets. He left a warehouse full of things he made throughout his life. My cousin Keith runs an up-cycling studio and makes some pretty awesome stuff too. Side note: you should check out his website.
While the men were busy building and creating, the women were busy sewing and cooking. My aunt is a retired art teacher, my mom is a retired caterer. Lucky for me, I have learned from all of them!!!
In my house growing up we always ate home cooked meals. It’s not that we couldn’t afford to go out, it’s that my mom loved to be in the kitchen and wanted to teach us girls everything she knew. From the time I could reach the counter on a stool I was helping my mom cook. When we weren’t cooking I was crafting. I used to make crafts out of anything I could find. Sorry mom and dad! We took lots of summer road trips to New York to see my family…we were those people driving the minivan with the pod on top driving down the interstate making a million stops at rest areas eating our picnic lunches with a tablecloth and Tupperware plates.
As I grew older I continued to have a love for cooking and crafting. In college I used to make calendars for all my girlfriends, highlighting the dates when we would all be back together and mail them out to everyone. I would take tons of photos on spring break with my friends and then create a scrapbook (before scrapbooking was cool) for everyone. I even remember how excited I was when I got my first “digital” camera!!! We didn’t have all of these fancy smartphones and selfie sticks back then!! I would bake cookies for my guy friends and deliver them to the dorms. I’m pretty sure I was one of the few people who used the very tiny and ancient dorm kitchen!
Over time I started to become known as Martha Stewart/Betty Crocker/Suzy Homemaker (although to be honest I’m the first to admit that I lack in the housekeeping area). Throughout the years it’s stuck with me and I’ve embraced it.
Fast forward to motherhood. I’m glad I learned all of those skills growing up because they are sure paying off now!! That’s where you come in…and this blog. I want nothing more than to pass along the things I’ve learned to you by sharing fun crafts, recipes, activities and more. I want to learn from you and the things that you love to do too so I hope you’ll stick with me for the long haul!!
I honestly have no idea where we will go on our journey but this is real life. Things change all of the time and you have to adapt and make the most of what you are given. I can commit to sharing with you my REAL LIFE, not the best-foot-forward Facebook life everyone is used to seeing on their feeds. I’ll occasionally bring on some guest bloggers and I’m sure my kids and husband (who you’ll meet in the an upcoming post) will post some videos they make.
I may be a hot mess sometimes, but I own it and have fun with it.
