A Day in the Life

This blog has been sadly neglected lately.  I will be better, I promise!

Here is a quick snapshot of Cole.  This is pretty representative of our little 2 year-old right now.  He loves his cars and he loves his trains.  If you know Thomas, you know that there are tons of trains all with different names.  It is crazy, but he knows them all!  The worst is when he requests a certain one and I have no idea which one it is.  Thankfully they are labeled on the bottom. :)  This is a day in the life at our house...

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day from Cole and Mia!!

Playoff Football with Hendix

Yesterday Corey invited Cort down to the city to have a boys afternoon (with Hendix and Cole) and watch some football .  From everything I hear, Cole and Hendrix had a great time.  Marina sent me this cute picture of them enjoying some food together (thanks Marina!!).  Back in the day of Marina and myself playing intramural flag football together at Jefferson Junior High, I never imagined that one day our boys would be watching football together (allright, playing while the guys watch).  I love it!!!

Field Museum-Visiting Sue

Cort and I have really been enjoying our break. Being a teacher has its perks!  The first week of break was mainly prepping for Christmas, celebrating, and taking it easy (I still have Christmas pics to share!!).  This week we have tried to get the kids out and go some places we haven't been.

Today we hit up the Field Museum.  Another great perk about being a teacher is that it is free for us-yay!!  I had not been to that museum in several years (I don't think we had been there since before we had kids), so I was curious how the kids would be, and if there would be stuff Mia and Cole were interested in.  Let me tell you, it was a big hit!!  They had a special area for kids, The Crown Family Play Lab, so we started out there first.  There was a storytime of Where the Wild Things Are and a bunch of arts and crafts, and hands-on exhibits-very cool! We then headed to see Sue the T-Rex and several other cool exhibits (the stuffed, preserved animals is where we spent a good portion of our time!).  The kids passed out almost immediately in the car, which is always the measurement of if it was a good day!  :)  Here are some pics...

Mia's new best friend

Cole's not so sure....

Cole communicating with the pandas

His new buddy

Mia looks like she thinks the tiger is about to get her

Sue!!!!!

Cort, Cole, and Sue

Mia, Cort, and Sue

I need to buy a LOT of fake corn.  This kept our children occupied for an amazing amount of time!

Cole doing what he does best :)

Mia and Cole in the art lab

And I was there too-blurry with uncooperative children :) Ha, ha!

Santa!

The day before Thanksgiving Cort and I decided to take the kids to the Picture People.  While I am well-aware of the fact that I can take pics of the kids in the comfort of my own home, A) it has become increasingly difficult to try and wrangle and shoot pictures of Cole B) I don't have cute winter props :) and C) Santa was going to be at the Picture People.  The main intention was to get a cute pic of the kids with Santa like last year. 

Mission Accomplished???  Not quite!  See below:

Poor Cole was not a fan of Santa.  We tried a couple of times, but he was not having it, not even with Mia showing him that Santa is nice.  By the way, she chose her time sitting on his lap to share with him what Zip (our cat) wants for Christmas. :) 

Here's Mia's cheesy Christmas grin

It was not all a waste though.  Luckily before Santa arrived I had them take some pics of the kids individually and together.  Here are a couple of those...

My favorite of Cole

Sassy Mia

Cole's serious look (this look is so him!)

Mia

Overall I was pleased.  Normally going to the Picture People makes me want to scream, but it was a rather pleasant experience this time.  We were actually in and out very quickly (of course they were ready for us right when we got there and we had to still change the kids-they never run on time, figures!!) and got 2 free 8x10s for bringing a toy for Toys for Tots-yay!  I will say that I probably will not venture back until next Christmas though!

We have a breakfast with Santa coming up for Mia's school.  Wish us luck that we make it out of there without and tears!!! :)

Raking Leaves

Who needs to hire a lawn service when you have toddlers to rake your yard??

Actually I think they had more fun destroying the piles we raked and knocking over the yard waste bags, but hey, they had a good time! :)

Cole getting to work

Playing in the leaves
Love this because you can see a certain someone's hand dumping leaves on Cole :)

Cole attempting to knock over the bag of leaves

He did help gather some leaves though too

Someone was having a great time throwing the leaves :)

(10-26-09)

The Stitches are Out!

I have to say I am fortunate to have friends in the medical field. Venessa has checked the kids' ears on a number of occasions for me, and most recently Pam (Auntie Pam, Godmother Pam, Nurse Pam-she plays a lot of roles!) was kind enough to save us a doctor's visit and removed Cole's stitches for us. I cannot say it was pleasant, but she got the job done! I thought waking him up to do it would be more desirable since he would be drowsy, but apparently he had some vivid memories of what happened last time someone was messing with his head and he did not like it. Either way, they are out and his head is healing great! Thank you Pam! And of course, this post wouldn't be complete without a picture of Cole being restrained by Cort while Pam removed the stitches. :)

Cole-15 Months!

Well, it is hard to believe, but time continues to fly and Cole is 15 months old! He had his 15-month appointment last week and here are the stats:

Height: 32 1/2 inches (85%)
Weight: 21 lbs, 4 oz. (10-15%)
Head 18 1/4 inches (25%)

These numbers were not a big surprise since Cole is just a long little string bean. His little pants are always drooping down. :) I have a feeling that Cole will have a lot of adjustable waist pants in his future!

Cole is a busy boy at 15 months. I don't even know that I can say he is my mellow guy anymore. He is pretty wild and crazy, running around, climbing, throwing, trying to jump and generally making me chase after him because he is getting into something he shouldn't be. :) He is such a sweet little guy who likes to lay on you and suck his thumb when he is tired or has something soft and fuzzy to cuddle. He is talking a bit more (although still not a ton of words) and is a good eater. He has already figured out how to annoy his big sister (taking her sippy cup is a big one!) and has even started throwing some fits-yikes! He is a bit of a flirt and gives shy little smiles when he sees people. :)

Here is Cole at 15 months. This is the best I could do, he is fast and my other pictures of him are blurry from chasing after him!!

Cole's Initiation into Boyhood

One of the things about being a little brother is that you rarely are the first to do something. Well, today Cole took matters into his own hands and hit a milestone before Mia-first trip to the ER and first set of stitches-yikes!!

I should start by saying that Cole is VERY physical these days. He walks, runs, climbs, falls, and tumbles off of things with a ton of energy and enthusiasm. Lately he has been all about trying to climb on the sofa, coffee tables and ottomans. Well this morning, he climbed from the sofa, to the side table and promptly fell backwards on the back of his head. He hit the vent on the floor, mainly the part that sticks out that you open and close the vent with. I didn't realize this at first, and put ice on his head and when I pulled away the icepack there was blood. After a momentary freakout, I looked at it and called for Cort. :) While the area was very small (maybe 1/2 inch or so), it looked deep and had that gross flap of skin-ick! We decided that it would probably be best for me to take him to the ER while Cort stayed back with Mia.

The best part of the whole experience was the new Plainfield ER. They were so quick it was amazing. I left the house at about 8am and was home by 8:50, with Cole and 2 stitches in his head. The stitching part itself was not pretty. They wrapped Cole up so that he was restrained and boy did he scream when they gave him the shot to numb his head and actually stitched him up. Afterwards though, he was a total champ. The rest of the day he acted like nothing ever happened and resumed trying to climb all over the furniture. I should add that the end table he tumbled off of is now officially banished to the basement (at least until he is out of this phase!). :)

Here's a quick shot of his war wounds (really not so bad!)...

Cole's 1st Haircut

On Friday we took Cole for his first haircut. This was so crazy to me considering Mia just got her first haircut a little over 6 months ago. But Cole's hair has been getting longer and longer and looking sort like a mullet in the back, and was needing some work. :) I had been waiting it out since Mia had a haircut fairly recently and I wanted to take them together. But yesterday was the day!

We headed back to Kidsnips and I was a little nervous how he would do since he is quite a mover and shaker these days. He did awesome! He sat well the whole time (with a little help from an Elmo DVD) and really only started fussing at the very end when they take their picture for their official "first haircut certificate." The best was when the stylist started to trim his hair with the clippers after the initial cut. He whipped around and was very curious about the buzzing sound. :) I was actually surprised how much hair was on the floor after his haircut. I guess he really needed it! Here are some pics...

The Before-Shot-notice the LONG hair in the back (and in the front) Hmmm....Not so sure about this

Oh wait! I get to watch Elmo!!

(look at the rack of DVDs in the background-they get to pick out whatever they want to watch)

First snip
Eyes on Elmo

Looking shorter

The After Shot (should have got a better shot of the back, but you can still tell)He looks like such a big boy now! It's like he knows he looks cute :)

And his certificate