About Daniel (updated 10/1/21)

Daniel was born in Utah in 2014 and has lived in Utah ever since! He doesn't have any siblings yet, but we're working on it - that's the purpose of this blog, right?!

Daniel is THE. BEST. KID. EVER.

He has brought joy and laughter to our house since the day we brought him home from the hospital. I am grateful every day for the miracle it is to be his mom.

I mean, look at those lips!! And those eyes!!!

He was the sweetest baby. He didn't cry much and when he did, we always knew how to soothe him. His first year was such a joy - and man, did it fly by!

In his second year, he started to have "things". Like, during that second year, he was totally into cords. Charging cables, vacuum cords, etc.

That was followed by construction trucks. And Blippi. And mega blocks. And sand. And garbage trucks. We would have trash day picnics and would sit out on the front lawn, waiting for the trash truck to come by. And it became very clear that his favorite foods were fruits and vegetables.

Soon his interests expanded to bugs and dinosaurs and sharks. I know more about them now than I ever did before Daniel!

Then he moved into a reptile phase. And he's still ! He specifically loves snakes, but he's interested in lizards, komodo dragons, crocodiles...you name it, if it's reptilian, he's fascinated.

But his current phase is law enforcement. And he has gone all-in here! He was a police officer for Halloween in 2019, which definitely started it all. We have a neighbor who works with the Utah County Sheriff's office and he helped to encourage this interest. By the time we got to Christmas in 2019, all Daniel wanted was a police car! So Santa obliged and he now has a cruiser to patrol the neighborhood in. His bike has also turned into his "police motorcycle". He is almost always wearing his official gear! For Christmas last year, he asked Santa for SWAT gear (he was a SWAT officer for Halloween in 2020, too) including a helmet and backpack and spy gear. Santa is pretty good to this kid, so he got it all and then some!

Through all his changing interests, Daniel has loved both of our dogs with all his heart. They have been his buddies and his playmates. I am grateful for our dogs. ♥

Daniel and Puga

Daniel and Mel

Daniel is in second grade this year and has such a great teacher! He loves her. He is constantly bringing her produce from our garden, including a watermelon! 

His reading is phenomenal and it's so much fun to do math with him. He has a creative mind, so when he's supposed to be writing the math fact for a word problem, I have a hard time convincing him not to draw the object that is being counted along with the number.  When he gets the chance to draw, he goes all out! In fact, his awesome teacher has encouraged the kids to come up with goals for the new year. Daniel's goal was to create museum art! He's had amazing artistic skills since he was tiny. And, as you'll see in the pictures below, he can work with many, many mediums. 

A mega-blocks creation - he made sooo many of these!

He made a "Daniel" out of his clothes and some paper he cut out and some crayons!

He took my lobster tail and remade the lobster with the rest of his food - our waiters loved him!

A play dough dinosaur, nest, and egg.

Dinosaurs. I love that he would put hearts in them!

A thank you letter Daniel illustrated for our neighbor after he had arranged to have a few police men come and show Daniel the cruisers and sirens and loudspeaker for his 6th birthday.

Daniel went through a phase where he was pretty scared at night. I would tell him to imagine a world made of candy, and he asked if we could make it. So, there's our frosting grass with marshmallow flowers, our lemonade river with Swedish fish, our cookie path with chocolate dirt and gummy worms, the Hershey kiss mountains with the sour patch rainbow, cotton candy clouds, and an orange slice for the sun. He was soooo happy.

He loves to draw with sidewalk chalk! This is a dinosaur. I love the coloring!

Sometimes we get him bath crayons and then the shower becomes his canvass.

This chalk snake is pretty amazing.

The kid loves the beach!! He drew sooo many things that day, and they were all very large. It's amazing to me that he has such a great handle on perspective.

Daniel is good and kind, smart and strong, brave and patient, and creative and truthful. And he really wants to be a big brother. He will be a great one, too. He has such a big heart. I can't wait to see  him in the role of protector, friend, teacher, and confidant that I know he will be to our next addition!! ♥

A few random, fun facts about Daniel:

• Daniel has lost six teeth so far! And only two of them have had permanent teeth grow in, so he totally looks like a jack o' lantern!
• Daniel loves music. He was in love with several Owl City songs a couple of years ago and that  year, Owl City had released a new album and was having a concert in Salt Lake! So we took little four year old Daniel to see Owl City - that was the best night!! He super loves it when we crank whatever his favorite song currently is and have a dance party in our front room - or even in the car!
• He gets cold easily and loves to "sun himself" on our deck out back with our dog, Mel or snuggle up in blankets with us.
• Daniel loves ice cream - vanilla and cookie mint in particular. His favorite meal is a German pancake with fruit salad and tater tots. He won't touch soda - at all! It's too "spicy" for him. But he loves lemonade!