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One of my very favorite things about Nicole is her sense of Wonder.  The fact that small things can bring her large amounts of joy and happiness.  The whole family enjoys her enthusiasm (most of the time).  Whenever we see an interesting bug or particularly sparkly anything, we call Nicole because she reacts with such genuine joy.

Last year Nicole discovered the magic of the 80s.  This year her love of the 80s has grown and expanded.  Her teachers have discovered that when she is starting to become “disregulated” at school, they can send her into the OT room with some headphones (buy here for the best quality) and an 80s playlist and she’ll come back to class calmed down and ready to work.  She loves to talk about how 80s music is so much better than the music of today and how people cared so much more about fashion back in the 80s.  She says the only downside of the 80s is that they didn’t have as much technology as we have today.

Nicole talks about fashion and style frequently.  She puts more thought into her outfit combinations than any of her sisters.  She’ll often pick a theme or a feeling for each outfit and tell me why she choose the things she’s wearing.  I bought her some new clothes and shoes recently and when she saw them she was overjoyed and declared “Mom! You’re finally understanding me!!”

Spring is the season of bugs for Nicole.  It’s not uncommon for her to be walking around with a handful of roly-polys crawling all over her or to observe her turning over rocks to see what crawls underneath them.  Nicole will proudly announce to me how many worms she saved by moving them off the sidewalks to safer locations or bring in an injured fly and ask us what she should do to help it. She likes to add bugs to her terrarium, but she doesn’t mind if they eat each other. She does get upset when people squish a bug or spider and insists that everyone give her a chance to save it first.  Charlotte recently squashed a spider without giving Nicole a chance to save it and Nicole screamed and cried.  She considers the time she killed an ant the “worst regret of her life.”

After years of having her own room, we moved Nicole into the girl’s room with her sisters this year.  We were concerned that isolating her didn’t give her as much social practice and we thought it was important to help her learn to share the same space with others.  She likes being one of the sisters.  For years she has looked up to Charlotte and sought Charlotte’s approval above all others.  This year she has shifted back and forth between connecting with Ila and Charlotte.  Nicole will be best buddies with Ila and the two of them will play happily together a lot for awhile.  Then Nicole will become a little clingy and hyper sensitive about sharing Ila with other siblings.  She’ll accuse Thomas or Charlotte of trying to steal Ila from her. At other times, all Nicole’s attention will be focused on Charlotte and she’ll become possessive of Charlotte’s affection.  Overall, I’d say integrating Nicole into the girls’ room has been a mixed bag. Nicole tends to make messes constantly and it’s been hard to reign that in while she’s sharing a space with her sisters.  When she had her own room, I could let it go for a few days because it only affected her, but since her messes are now in her sister’s space as well, I feel a greater need to intervene more frequently.  It’s also hard when Nicole has trouble sleeping or becomes upset in the middle of the night because her drama wakes up her sisters as well.

Nicole has several good friends at school.  She doesn’t really play with any of the children in the neighborhood.  Last time a little girl came over to play with her, Nicole was not in the mood to play with friends so the girl ended up playing with Ila instead. Nicole does get excited to have a friend over and she will put a lot of energy into being a good host. Nicole will often be so focused on making sure that her friend has a good time, that at times it’s as if she’s serving her friend instead of playing with her. Most of her closest friends enjoy going on bug hunts with Nicole and collecting handfuls of worms, snails, or other creepy crawly things. I’ve started to notice that while most of my other children can have fun playing with a friend all day, Nicole is done playing with a friend after a few hours and just wants to do her own thing by herself.

Nicole isn’t preoccupied with boys, but she does claim one crush on a boy at school.  She also said she thought Thor was handsome once while we were watching a movie.

Her biggest fears are the janitor at school and creamy honey.  She’ll scream if you bring up either subject.  She thinks the janitor at school is evil and she’s the only one who knows it.  She is convinced that he’s trying to use mind control on people at school.  One day she claimed to have proof that he was evil and she showed me pictures she had taken of full garbage cans at school. Because he is bald, she is afraid of all bald people and will often scream or cling tightly to my clothes if she notices someone bald.  Her fear of creamy honey makes no sense to me, but she will scream if she sees a container of it and and won’t enter a room with creamy honey in it.

Nicole is an unpredictable picky eater.  She will love a certain food and want to eat it for every meal then decide she doesn’t like it anymore.  She likes noodles, but not leftover noodles.  She once told me that if I was making a leftover that I needed to make sure she didn’t see that it was a leftover, so sometimes I pretend I made new noodles so she’ll eat the ones from the day before. One thing she almost always loves is  fruit. When I gave all the children a chance to pick dinner and help me make it, Nicole really wanted a fruit basket.  The rest of the meal wasn’t as important as the fruit and she really wanted to serve it in a basket made out of a watermelon.

Nicole loves to dress up in costumes or accessories.  She likes to do art projects and create things.  She likes to role play with her sisters.  She likes to watch YouTube and make videos on her tablet. She says purple isn’t her favorite color anymore, now she loves all colors.  She loves colorful things and random things.  She gets excited about things that are unique and rare.  She will talk or sing openly about autism and anxiety. Visit https://functionalspeechtherapy.com to know more about how to overcome it at its early stage.  She loves to sing and make up songs. She loves to bake.  She cracks us all up with her hilariously absurd comments or unusual use of vocabulary. She still prays when she’s anxious, often the very moment she feels worried. She loves tight hugs and warm blankets and I love her tremendously.

Here is what I wrote about her last year.