Trucks, Toys and Two Boys: January 2012

Sunday, January 29, 2012

My Coop

Cooper doesn't get a whole lot of attention on the blog these days! I guess because he's not hitting milestones like his little brother, but I definitely need to keep track of what's been going on lately! First off, Coop has caught the love bug!!! Emily June is a super cute little girl that he's goes to school with and he is totally smitten! Her mom sat in on their class not too long ago and told me that Cooper and Emily June were attached at the hip and acting like they were going to get married. EJ was playing dress up and had on a princess dress, but had to take it off so another little girl could wear it. Coop asked her why she took it off and she told him that she had to share. His response, "But you looked so beautiful!" Just the other night as I was tucking him in, I told him I loved him. He sat up and said in the sweetest voice, "But, Mommy, I just love Emily June." I giggled and said, "So you don't love Mommy anymore?" Again, his response was, "Um, I just love Emily June. I want to be her husband." He ended the conversation with, "I need you to call her mommy tomorrow so I can go to her house." The next morning, he came into our room while I was still asleep. He crawled into bed and the first question that came out of his mouth....Did you call Emily June's Mommy? I think he's going to be a heartbreaker (or have his heart broken many times), don't you?

He has another obsession. Shells! We have shells all over our house right now! I think this obsession happened after he collected some when he was at Nanny and Papa's lake house. Then DeeDee brought some pretty shells back from Hawaii. And now he has inherited a collection of big shells from Mimi. They often take on different personalities. A mean shell, a baby shell, daddy shell, mommy shell. They have conversations with each other. He puts little plastic bugs inside of them and calls them his "critters".

I am having a hard time getting Cooper excited about learning again! He had such a great learning jump so early on, and now he just isn't interested. He fights me tooth and nail and it makes it not fun. I know so much of it is his 3 1/2 year old defiant stage, but there are some things that we were making some progress on and now it's at a stand still! He's been able to identify numbers 1-10 since he was 20 months old, but it stopped there. He can count to 20, but can't identify the numbers. We finally mastered 11, and we are now working on 12. I have 12's hung up ALL over the house!!! We will get there, slowly but surely!

He was doing AWESOME with his pre-reading. We started with the -at family and he was making so much progress blending the letters together. Now when he sees me pull out the chart, he swears I'm about to poison his brain.

One thing that he is making progress in is writing!!! So far, he has only written his name (without any help at all...I didn't even have to tell him what letters to write)!

This was his very first time to write it!! Now that he's had practice, he doesn't write so big, He is actually coloring for the the first time ever, too! He's just never had much interest, and it's finally fun to him (kind of)!

He did great on his pre-k assessment. He missed the letter "I" and "U". He knows those letters. I don't know what he was thinking!!! ; ) I have a feeling he thought the "I" was a lower case "l". He also called a circle an oval! Silly boy!

There for a while he was NOT wanting to go to school. I think his teacher and I figured out that maybe it was because he got in trouble one day and it hurt his feelings. Mr. Sensitive is his middle name. He's happy now and excited to go. However, Mrs. Hullender came out the other day when I was picking him up to let me know that he didn't get a treasure because he bit a little girl. WHAT?!?! Turns out he and his friend Price were pretending to be sharks! When I asked him about it, he told me he was being a sweet shark. There were no bite marks, just a wet dress!! Fun little imagination!

Mr. Man sure has been a little defiant lately! He honestly is not horrible, but "no" or "I don't want to do that" is said numerous times a day. He's been bit by the "Little Stinker" bug, too! I'm hoping this stage passes soon!!!

To my sweet 3 1/2 year old! You are my bestest!!!!! I love you so much!

Saturday, January 28, 2012

**Originally written on November 10, 2010**

I go back and forth on whether we will have another baby! I know ultimately the decision is up to God, but that motherly instinct is still there and my desire to have another one is still so strong! One moment I feel that our family is totally complete! I have two amazing, healthy little boys who have totally surpassed my every dream of what having a child would be like! I honestly had no idea that being a parent could possibly be this wonderful! I remember holding Whitten for the first time(after 9 hours of not seeing him) thinking, "Oh my goodness, this can't be the last time I hold a newborn baby!"

***Written January 28***

I am feeling that my life is quite complete with 2 beautiful, healthy, amazing boys! So...we are 85% sure that we are d-o-n-e having kids! But I can't get rid of that lingering smell of a newborn! It's my favorite thing in the whole wide world (minus the sleepless nights)! But for now...this is what I did today! I hate Dr. Brown bottles anyway...and we would need a new sterilizer! Right!?!?

Just a little spring (winter cleaning)! My excuse is, if we have another baby, we will NOT be using Dr. Brown!

Saturday, January 21, 2012

16 months!

Yikes! This one totally slipped up on me! We've had a rough last couple of weeks and I kind of forgot that my baby hit another month! Geez, Whitt's little personality is really coming out!

-Your little personality is completely polar opposite of your brothers! Case and point: If you are irritated, mad, sad, tired, hungry, anything....you would love to punch the lights out of anybody that crosses paths with you. I'm afraid that there are many fights that I might have to break up in the future! I'm scared you might have a little bit of a mean streak in you! We will cross that road when we get there! Coop didn't have this streak. He would cry, but he never attempted to knock me out!

-You are a picky eater and will still eat baby food! I'm about to put you through "big people food" boot camp! I am getting desperate for you to eat anything and you sure did gobble up a piece of pizza today! We topped it off with some baby food fruit. We shall see! You will eat chicken tenders, sometimes a grilled turkey and cheese sandwich. But your fruit and veggies still come from baby food! At least you are getting them!! You drink a cup of milk in the morning and a cup at night. You love Kashi cereal bars. If we stick something in front of your face that you have never had before, you will eyeball it for a while and just decide not to eat it because it looks funny...won't even taste it! You LOVE apple juice....which is new to us because Cooper wouldn't ever drink anything except for water.

-You love baths and scream when it's time to get out.

-You are sleeping through the night but will still wake up with the occasional screaming bloody murder episode. I rock you for a few minutes and you go right back down. You are down for the night between 7:00-7:30 and sleep until 6:30-7:30. You are still taking two naps. Down at 10:00 for about an hour. Second nap-down at 2:30-3:00 for about an hour.

-We finally got you into Mother's Day Out! You have only been twice, but so far so good! I have a feeling that this will help you transition into needing only 1 nap!

-You have FIVE teeth! Three on the top and two on the bottom!!

-MMMMOOOOMMMMAAAAAA'SSSSSSSS BOY!!! I don't know how else to explain it other than...you LOVE your momma!!!!!!!! I am your world and I am thankful. Other than a few occasional "geez louise moments" and "can I please just go to the bathroom by myself" moments, I love that you love me and want to be with me all of the time. As my mom would say, " You're payin' for your raisin'." I think I'm still a bit of a momma's girl. I can't say that it's a bad thing.....and I'm hoping that when you are 32, you still wants to hang out with me!

-You are still into ev-er-y-thing!

-You understand soooo much, but are still aren't talking all that much. You can say ba (ball), mo (more) , no-no-no-no-no, ca (car), apple (pull and sometimes you actually say it correctly), baba (banana). You sign more, milk and all done. You would probably sign more if I knew the signs to teach you!!

-You can make the animal sounds for fish, cow, elephant, giraffe, kitty, monkey, duck (sometimes).

-You can identify your belly, nose, eyes, ear, mouth, hair. My favorite thing that you do right now is when we ask you where your belly is, you will pull up your shirt and play with your belly button...giggle giggle giggle, and then pull down your shirt and sign "all done".

-You still love to play with your brother, but you are totally fine playing by yourself.

-You love puzzles, shape sorter, and stacking blocks, but get super angry if you can't figure them out.

-Major texture boy! You love the velcro on your shoe. I often give it to you while I'm changing your diaper so that you will stay still. You LOVE LOVE LOVE eyebrows and will just rub on them all day long. You also love beards. You pretty much dive into Grandpa's arms when you see him so you can rub on his beard. You still put your arm to your mouth and suck away on your tongue when you are tired!

-You love books and will bring them to me all day long. I often find you in the front room flipping pages of your favorite books.

-You are quiet most of the time, but can jabber up a storm when you are in the mood!

-18-24 month clothes. Size 6 shoe. Size 4 diaper.

-You have been pretty sick lately and are looking rather bony. As I type this, I am listening to you cough in your crib. Yikes. First it was a double ear infection, croup, tummy bug for several days, another ear infection, and now you are snotty and coughing. It just never ends!

You are hilarious and so much fun to be around!! Daddy and I are just so in love with you!!! Slow down big boy! It's going too fast!

Mad you can't go outside!!!

Wanting to knock me out for taking your picture when you are mad!

Coop at 16 months!

Thursday, January 12, 2012

Sick Sick Sick

WARNING.....nasty pictures of what my strep throat looks like will be available for your viewing pleasure if you're into that kind of thing! As sick as I feel, I think it looks kind of cool! So don't scroll down to the bottom if you have a weak stomach!

Sooo...our little family has always been rather healthy. After we figured out that Cooper's chronic croup was allergy induced, we've been good to go! It wasn't until Josh started his new job that we started having some sickies! He is in an out of hospitals all day long and I'm sure he's exposed to quite a bit! We've joked that I am going to have to put a shower outside so that he can disinfect himself before he comes in!!! It started out with....Whitten having a double ear infection, then croup, then a throat infection, then a 5 day tummy bug (that everyone got except for me) and now Josh and I both have strep! I am praying with every ounce of my being that my boys don't get it! YUCK!! I don't know how they can avoid it because I was kissing all over them the day before I tested positive! Oh, and that was fun!! Josh brought a strep kit home to test me AND a shot!! Well, it was obviously positive, but when he was going to give the shot, he couldn't find the needle. Cooper kept saying, "Give Mommy a shot and I'm going to laugh at her." Oh the sympathy! Anyway, he had to go up to the local drug store to get another needle! He didn't tell me this before he actually gave me the shot, but he had to use an 18 gauge! He explained to me that the lower the number, the bigger the needle! A 21 gauge is usually used for this kind of drug, but I guess they didn't have one available! To tell you the truth, he did a great job and I didn't really feel a thing! Well, I felt a little bit, but I guess I have enough cushion on my tush that it helped soften the blow! I looked at the needle afterwards and I almost threw up!! That sucker was big!! It's been a little over 24 hours and I still feel awful! Hoping that in the morning I feel much better!

So here are the nasty pictures!! The first one was taken at 9:00 this morning. The second one was taken at 9:00 tonight! It's amazing how fast this bacteria grows!!

Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Update

I had my appointment yesterday and there is not a whole lot to report. I go back in 8 weeks. We got a few questions answered...kind of. There are a lot of "unknowns" but I feel safer knowing that he is watching me closely and will probably be for several years to come. It also helped to have Josh there because he is able to help me decipher what is really being said. I obviously interpret what is being said differently than he does, so it's nice to have him put it in laymans terms for me!

Thanks for your prayers. I certainly had a calmness and felt more at peace when I went into the appointment....which never happens! So, the prayers were felt! ; )

Thursday, January 5, 2012

Christmas in Midland!

Wow! What a great time we had with all of the cousins in town! 6 boys and 2 girls! Cooper is finally at the age where he isn't just an annoying little baby to his older cousins and he was able to play right along with them! Whitten and Everett (birthday twins) interacted a little! Mostly Whitten just took things away from Everett! He learns from the best!! I'm still waiting on some super cute pictures that my mom has on her camera! But for now, I will share the few that I have!

Starting with Christmas morning with our little family of 4!!