How to dress like a one year old

Cooper and Charlotte are starting to get into dress up (as opposed to me dressing them up).  Their new game involves emptying their drawers and bringing item after item to me to put on them.  If I don't they either proceed to whine at me and/or bring me a different item and hand it to me over and over and over until I put it on them.  Charlotte will at least become pre-occupied with one item, but Cooper enjoys multiple items (all at one time, I might add) much more.  Here are the results:

Pants also make a good hat:

One of my black socks, one of my white socks, Charlotte's striped pants, a romper underneath it all, and his new sweater vest to finish it up.  Ridiculous.

Before this shirt, he chose one of Charlotte's sweater with hearts all over it.

Scout even joined in on the action.

And finally, prince charming to the rescue!

 

(p.s. I haven't been blogging much because I've been so tired lately.  Cooper's molars still haven't come in and sometimes he sleeps ok, but at least 4 nights of the week he wakes up either every hour, or gets up for 3-4 hours in the middle of the night.  This means we are running on just a few hours of sleep.  I've had to call in to work I've been so tired.)

Mysterious Gift Giver

Christopher would like to thank whomever sent him the NC Tarheels basketball.  All the receipt said was Happy Birthday, but he isn't sure who it came from.  Anyone who reads the blog the person who sent him the gift?

Zoo and the Beach

It was a really hot weekend last weekend so we got out and took advantage of the warm weather.  On Saturday I met several other Orange County moms at the Santa Ana Zoo.  My two were the oldest and the youngest baby was 5 months old.  There was another gal there who was adopting a family member, so it was nice to meet someone else 'in my shoes'.  Her daughter is just a few days younger than Cooper so we could also bond over similar experiences with 1 yr olds. 

All of the kids really didn't see much at the zoo.  However Cooper and Charlotte had their fingers nearly nibbled off at 'the Farm' from ducks, chickens, turkeys, ponies, and goats.  I let them out of the stroller for a bit to run around, which was a little overwhelming at first since I had to chase both babies.  The other moms couldn't believe I was brave enough to do it (everyone else had only one baby who weren't walking yet).  I figured it was better than them yelling the whole way home since they'd been strapped down for so long. 

I didn't get many pictures, but here are a couple.  They were obsessed with the fences.

Then on Sunday Chris and I took the babies to the beach because it was 86°F!!  That is really warm for us since we are used to 75° weather.  Cooper wasn't sure about the water, but LOVED the sand and we couldn't pry Charlotte out of the water.  We forgot the sand toys at home, but that's okay because watching the two of them was plenty of work.

 

We had to walk down a hill to get to the water and Cooper didn't like walking, so he crawled backwards.  Pretty smart if you ask me.

Serious Mom Face

Today I went to the Hyatt Spa after work for a few hours of me time.  It was nice to relax and read a book (Peony in Love by Lisa See).  The spa is participating in Spa Week, so I got the pedicure at a reduced price, plus I had a gift certificate to use.  All I had to pay for was tip!

I forgot to post a funny story from the other day.  The kids have taken to yanking on the living room blinds very hard and they've broken a couple of them.  We do 'hand timeout' with them when they do something they're not supposed to, like yank the blinds, turn the tv off, pull on the wall pictures.  We hold both their hands for a count of 10-15 and look them in the eye.  They don't like it and after a few 'hand timeouts' they listen to 'Don't touch' and usually leave it alone.

So Cooper was yanking on the blinds and I start hand timeout with him.  Charlotte crawls behind me and starts tickling my feet!!  The secret to hand timeout working is that we stay calm, don't laugh and keep a serious look on our face.  Yeah, that was impossible with Charlotte tickling me!!  I started laughing and then Cooper started laughing and I had to just move everyone to another room to stop the yanking on the blinds.  I am in trouble when they get bigger and team up on me!!

Tomorrow I'm taking them to the Santa Ana Zoo by myself to meet some other OC moms and young babies.  I think my two will be the oldest, but there is another mom going who is also adopting a family member (small world!), so I'm really looking forward to it.  It's supposed to be really warm this weekend (in the 80's!) so we might take them to the beach on Sunday and let them play with the new sand tools and bucket Cooper got from Mikael, Che and Maile.

Bubble Machine

Cooper got a bubble machine from Grandpa Walt and Grandma Toni in North Carolina.  They also got 'bubble eaters'.  When you squeeze the plastic toy animal's tummy, the mouth opens, tongue pops out and it counts the bubbles it eats.  It also burps and says funny things like 'I have a bubble in my tummy!'.  Who comes up with these awesome toys?!?!  Anyhow, here are some great pictures of the kids LOVING the bubble machine.

LOVE this one...you can almost hear Cooper laughing

They also love Cooper's train toy from Grandma Jacqueline.  So much that they even SHARE it!

The only annoying thing...both the train and the bubble eaters start making noise after 15 minutes of inactivity.  Which means it reminds the kids to go back and play with them again and start the loud/annoying sounds (especially train) all over again!  This is a must.figure.out.how.to.break.that.functionality because it's the worst.idea.ever.for.parents'.sanity.

Charlotte is sporting some new futuristic sunglasses (aka Mommy's headband).

Cooper is almost starting to get into putting hats on.

Happy (belated) Birthday to Chris!!

Yesterday was Chris' birthday and I'm just now finding the time to blog.  (I don't have any pictures of him from his first birthday.  I'll see what I can get from his parents.)  I worked a half day and came home to help with lunch.  Then I dressed the kids in Carolina Tarheels gear and had them carry his half opened (never trust a toddler after you've taught them to open a present) birthday present out to him--a NC Tarheels basketball.  He loved it.

Then we had to go to the doctor.  Argh!  We don't wait at all to be taken back, but once we're in the room we're there for about 2 hours between waiting and getting the appointment done.  That's just entirely too long!!  I think you can guess how much fun it is to keep 2 mobile toddlers entertained for 2 hours in a 7 x 7 room.  Yikes!

Everything looks good for both kids.  I posted their stats on the right.  Charlotte is still in the 50th percentile and Cooper is still off the charts for height.  The top line is 97th percentile. 

 

 

Charlotte is only slightly delayed in speech since she doesn't say any clear words yet, but the doctor things it's fine that she says almost words (ah-da for all done, tout for Scout, hi-da for hi daddy, ya-tu for your turn) and she comprehends what we say (she'll sit when we ask her to, or go get something, or take turns) and she has 'conversational' jibber-jabber (intonation). 

She said not to worry about Cooper's sleep habits that he'll change them eventually as long as we are working toward it.  The shots were awful again and now they are pretty strong and fight back, so it's tough to hold them still.   I'm glad it was a clean bill of health!

We went home and ordered dinner from Claim Jumpers since we felt so rushed and need to go grocery shopping.  Good day and evening though!

Birthday Party Fun

We had Cooper's party on Saturday, April 11.  We invited the Sperber's over for snacks and cake.   After eating some great fruit and chips and guacamole, we had cake and Cooper dove right in!  Then we opened presents, and Cecily helped out.  Charlotte tried to horde all the presents for herself so we had to really work on sharing.  The party was simple and fun, just like we wanted.  Here are some pictures (Caren was nice enough to play photographer!).  I've put Chris in charge of the video...but he still hasn't finished Charlotte's first birthday video so you can email him at cldace@gmail.com to bug him to finish both videos.

Enjoy!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Happy First Birthday, Cooper!!

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Dear Cooper,

It's been a year already?!!?  It seems like yesterday we saw you for the first time!  You are our first born and our baby.  You are the light of our lives and we love you so very much.

You are such a happy little boy, full of laughter and smiles.  You give the best hugs and can turn any bad day into a good one.  You absolutely love the dog, Scout, and you adore your big sister Charlotte.  You are very laid back and go with the flow, but you are determined, persistent, and fiercely independent.  You spend much of your day figuring out how to do something new, which usually means we are barely keeping one step ahead of you.  You are walking and nearly running and you love to reach higher and higher...climbing is second nature to you.

You are a bit picky about food, but you still LOVE nursing.  Your favorite toys are balls, tools, and dog toys.  You can throw, roll and bounce any ball that comes your way.  You often take Scout's toys and play with her with them.  You love to carry things in your mouth.  Your favorite tv show is Handy Manny.  You are loud and talkative.  You are a momma's boy, and you think daddy is just a big toy.

We can't imagine our lives without you.  Happy Birthday, baby boy.  We love you!

love,

Mommy and Daddy

Random Pictures

Teething babies are the absolute worst...it makes me want to never go through this with another child ever again.  Cooper is getting his molars and Charlotte is getting her I-teeth.  Cooper wakes up and stays up for 2-3 hours in the middle of the night.  Charlotte cries/whimpers throughout the night.  We give them pain medicine and we've tried homeopathic remedies.  We are just surviving through it.

This is what I want to do all day:

Cooper being so cool in sunglasses:

 

When I think of Charlotte's toddler years, this is what I will always picture.  This is a classic stance of hers, mouth open and yelling.

Messy weekend

I will post pictures and blog about Cooper's birthday party in another post.  I need to get all the pictures from my friend Caren (who was so great to snap them all for us while I was doing the behind the scenes for the party and Chris was videographer). Instead, here's the recap for rest of the weekend:

Friday

Chris had to take Scout to the vet to get her a couple of shots she needs updated on, and to check her itchy feet.  She's been scratching and chewing on her feet like crazy and benedryl wasn't helping.  The vet said she just allergies and to gave us some medicine for it.  So far her feet are looking better and she isn't itching as much.  A few hours later Chris went to his guitar lesson and I took the kids shopping by myself.

It is always so much work to go out alone, so I don't do it much.  I took them to Children's Place because there was a great sale going on and I had a 15% off coupon for Cooper's birthday.  We got a lot of cute clothes!  I tried going to Target after that to get some miscellaneous items, but Charlotte had a melt down so we just left.  I decided to just head home and see if she needed a second nap.  She cried most of the way, then suddenly stopped and started laughing and playing.

I decided we could make our last stop and buy Cooper's birthday cake.  Then we went home and I put the  kids down for a short nap anyhow since they were both so cranky (teething is killing us all).  After the kids went to bed for the night we wrapped all the presents and got their Easter baskets ready.

Saturday

Post coming soon...Cooper's birthday party.

Sunday

Easter!  We gave them their baskets after about an hour after getting up this morning.  This is how it started, Cooper and his basket on the left and Charlotte and her basket on the right.

And these are the baskets they really wanted:

 

Cooper liked his sword (it's nerf):

Charlotte loved her necklace:

Neither of them liked the feather boa, so we tried it on Scout and she kept trying to eat it so Chris had to hold her head up:

After I went to the store to buy stuff for dinner (totally last minute...sooo busy!) we dyed eggs, er, babies.

Just starting...notice how clean they look.

Charlotte double fisting.

Mmmm, tasty eggs.  So glad I left out the vinegar in the dye.

Cooper listening to mommy.

Charlotte listening to mommy.

Cooper banging the hard boiled eggs together.

Mmm, eggs.  Look at Charlotte balancing the dye. 

That didn't last long.

Drinking the dye.

Or chew on the cup.

The aftermath in the tub.

Love their faces: 

And the works of art.  Notice the smushed egg.  They sat on it.

Charlotte took a nap.  We are never able to take a picture of her sleeping because she is such a light sleeper and wakes at the sound of a pin dropping.  She stayed sound asleep even with Cooper peeking in on her and laughing:

We had a great dinner.  The kids know how to get through the baby gate/proofing and made big mess:

And now we're going to try to scrub some of the egg dye off and put them to bed.  Now to start another week...we have Chris' birthday this Thursday (and Cooper's is on Tuesday), plus we also have their well baby check ups and we're going to the zoo on Saturday.