A Weekend at Home with Monkey

Loving Life (and laundry I guess)!!!

Laundry Day! Hey I think I see a Cheerio over there!

Looks so innocent!

Toys...I'd rather play in a box.Acting out "Way up high in the apple tree" with mommy.

We didn't really do a whole lot this weekend except enjoy our time with Monkey (his new name because he is EVERYWHERE and EVERYWHERE fast).

We did go buy Cole some new clothes at the outlet mall and 2 different families asked if they could take him home with them...he likes to flirt with cute girls :) And we found out he loves cheese enchiladas with deluxe tomatillo sauce from Chuys...who knew? A lazy weekend but oh so perfect!

Our Busy Boy

Always on the move!

I swear I didn't put the book like that.

He was really laying there "reading".

The tongue is ALWAYS out!

Cole turned 9 months old today...to say that outloud just shocks me...9 months old??? He is such a busy boy. Cole is NEVER still, in fact Ms. Debra says that sometimes she just picks him up so he will rest for a few minutes while he is with her. He is crawling everywhere, especially everywhere he is not supposed to be. He likes playing with door stops and antagonizing the dogs the most. When I cook dinner, he rolls around on the kitchen floor with the dogs and "fights" with them over his toys. He is still combat crawling except when he doesn't realize he is up on all fours and he wants to get to something that is up high.

He is pulling up on all of the furniture, baby gates, and even his crib. This morning when we looked into the video monitor he was standing up in his crib. Needless to say I haven't seen Dan move that fast in a VERY long time. When I took Cole to his doctor's appointment this morning, Dan stayed home and lowered his bed to the lowest level :)

Cole is calling me MAMA and Dan DADA...he said MAMA first by the way...smart, smart boy. He has 2 more top teeth and is gnawing on everything. He is eating more and more "real" food every single day. His favorite meal is pancakes and scrambled egg yolks, but he likes sliced turkey, frozen veggies, and of course Cheerios and Goldfish. He has started sweeping his food off of his tray and to his dogs...makes for a fun mess to clean up. I let him try everything we eat, but tend to stick to the easy, soft things so far.

Cole is a BIG boy. He is 26lbs 12oz and 32 1/4 inches long. He is just starting to wear 24 month clothes. Dr. Millar said he is the size of most 15 month olds - thank goodness he is a boy!

Dan is starting to really enjoy his time with Cole because he is so active now. He wrestles with his dad on the living room floor and plays his games with him. As soon as the weather gets warmer, we can't wait to take him to the zoo, park, and all of the fun places around Austin. He is so observant and constantly in everybody's "business". His new favorite game is hiding things from us. He takes his little toys and puts them in places - like on top of the TV speaker, under his toy box, through the baby gates to the dogs, and even in the DVD player. I caught him with his little pointy index finger opening and shutting the DVD player one night, and then his little piggy bank coin was laying in the middle of it when I went to clean up for the night. BUSY, BUSY, BUSY!

I have a countdown ticker on my Facebook page that counts down the days until Cole's first birthday. It said 3 months today...how is that even possible?

Perspective

Yesterday Dan and I attended the memorial service of our friend's twelve year old daughter..if that doesn't put your life in perspective, I don't know what ever could. It was so touching, so sad to hear her middle school friends pay tribute to Shaylah. It was so tough to listen to her 3rd grade teacher talk of her former student, how so many students enter our lives each year and how sometimes we have to let them go - whether we want to or not.

Billy, Shaylah's dad, wrote a poem for his sweet girl and read it at her service...talk about tears...

I wanted to share it:

We cannot see you,

But we know you are here.

We cannot hold you,

Yet we hold you so dear.

You are our baby,

And always will be.

Now also an angel,

With your spirit set free.

There are no words

To describe how we feel.

How can this be?

Is it true? Is it real?

In our hearts and in our mind,

You will forever remain.

Rest in peace, we love you.

Shaylah Noel Dame.

Not that everything is about ME :), and what I have experienced, but when something like this does happen - it is only human to relate it to your own life. I think Billy took my thoughts and put them to words about our little girl that we lost almost 2 years ago...made me think of Brynn, made me kiss Cole, made me hold my husband's hand just a little longer last night.

And Yet...Another Month Older...

Eating apples and prunes...YUMMY! We often find him sleeping in this position when he first goes to bed (and yes...the flash woke him up...thanks Dad). Crawling in, out, under, over, and through EVERYTHING!

Cole is 8 months old this week...seriously...does it always go by this fast? Cole had a big month of firsts. In mid December, his two top teeth came in. The right one poked through first and the left one started to poke through not even a day later. He looks so cute when he smiles now - you can see all four of his teeth. Now that he has teeth and is able to pinch things better and better each day, we have started giving him more and more "real" food. While in Jackson Hole, he would hardly touch his baby food after he had pancakes, chicken nuggets, mashed potatoes, rice and beans. He loves to sit in his highchair in the middle of our living room, eating Gerber puffs or veggie chips, while watching the Penguins of Madagascar. He plays, sings, does his dinosaur screeching, and laughs a lot. He is such a good boy.

In mid December he also started crawling. He had been scooching around a little for months...but I am talking full COMBAT crawl. I was in the kitchen cooking and all of the sudden I heard this boing, boing, boing noise and it was him playing with the little door stop by our pantry door. I turned and asked my mom if she moved him there and she said NOPE! It has been nonstop movement since...you should see how fast he goes on wood floors :) He has started to get up on all fours and rock, but he doesn't move. I never crawled on all fours, I just did the whole combat crawl thing until I walked (at 9 months)...maybe he will be the same - although I am hoping he isn't a super early walker like I was...

We didn't have a doctor's appointment this month, but we don't think he has gained much weight due to the moving around. He is a lot longer though - the 18 month clothes are now actually fitting him in both height and weight - they were soooooo long when we had to move him into the 18 month clothes because of his little belly, but not so much anymore.

He waves bye-bye and plays patty-cake when he wants to and he smiles and laughs ALL of the time. He is an easy baby to make smile and laugh. He loves it when his mommy and daddy read him books at bedtime and he still loves to be rocked to sleep. He sleeps from 7pm to 6am - not bad huh? We wish he would sleep just a bit later, especially on the weekends, but we can't complain. He wakes up, drinks a bottle, and then wants to go back to sleep. His new thing is going back to sleep with us in our bed for a while (or in his GaGa and PaPa's bed).

We celebrated Cole's first Christmas, he played in snow, he saw Old Faithful, and took 2 plane rides. A lot of things that grown people never get to do and he is a whopping 8 months old. I look forward to another month of firsts and an even better year with my boys. I am blessed.

Another Year!

Lately I have thought many times..."How in the world did I get to be 36 years old?" I look at pictures and I think I look old and tired...and I see lots of new wrinkles every single day.

Each wrinkle on my face has a story, some are from laughing and some are from crying. I have experienced things in my life that I never could have imagined - most good, but not all.

This past year I mourned the loss of our daughter as I was pregnant with my son. I had so many mixed emotions, I sometimes wonder how we made it through the year. But I am stronger because of it all. I appreciate everything so much more. I am sure that I do not love my son anymore than any of my friends love their children, but I will do everything I possibly can to give my son the life he deserves to live. I will give him every ounce of everything I have until I can't give anymore...because I am his mom!

I have read this quote several times over the past few days...

I hope your best day of 2009 is your worst day of 2010...or something like that.

I wish all of you a blessed 2010.

A White Christmas (to say the least).

The best gift I have ever received in my life. Opening presents Christmas morning! At one of our stops on the Yellow Stone trip - a warming house/information center...with heated restrooms - the last ones before Old Faithful...popular stop! Cole enjoying snow for the first time...I had to hold him so he wouldn't sink.

My brother started talking about taking his kids somewhere that had "real" snow for Christmas. A lady he works with had just came back from Jackson Hole and talked about how wonderful her trip was...so our vacation plans began. Mom called Dan and I and asked if we would be interested in going to Wyoming for Christmas - I thought it sounded a bit odd, but sure...we would go.

I was really worried about flying with a 7 month old - I didn't want to have "that kid" on the plane. Cole was great. He slept a bit, laughed a lot, and did a lot of flirting. He also did his lovely dinosaur screech throughout both flights - pretty sure the people around us didn't think it was cute and funny like his mommy and daddy do, but better than crying right?

On Christmas Eve we had a sleigh ride planned. We started to take Cole, but it was just to darn cold, so Dan and I stayed at the house and then met everyone for a yummy dinner. Cole is great at dinner, sitting in his highchair, as long as you give him some "real" food. He had a lot of firsts this trip - including pasta, chicken nuggets, pancakes, and even a french fry or two...whatever it takes. He has four teeth now and is getting really good a pinching little bits of food, so we are giving him more and more finger foods. My mom gave him a pea and he yakked all over the table at this super-fancy restaurant...oh well! We spent Christmas Day at the house. Santa even found us in Jackson Hole. Cole got lots of cute things from his Ga and Pa and Uncle Skip's family. He was definitely more interested in the wrapping paper and ribbon. We stayed in our pjs all day (a Collett tradition) and my mom made chicken and dumpling soup. It was great! The next day we went on a 12 hour day trip to Yellow Stone...yeah...12 hours with a baby. We left at 6am and returned at 6pm. It was fabulous. Lots of great scenery, lots of snow, and lots of animals. I would say it is not too often that you are driving down a road and a gigantic moose is standing 100 yards away... I am not exactly "one with nature", but it was still pretty amazing. Dan and my brother's family went skiing a couple of times. We went tubing down a big hill. Definitely my kind of tubing. They hooked you up to a pulley system and pulled you to the top of the hill - no climbing. As we were sitting in the living room on Christmas Day I said, "Jeez, if this is Cole's first Christmas, how in the world are we supposed to top this?" Dan piped in with - "Ahhh, he won't remember this so it is fine." Only Dan. You go on trips and can only hope that it will be all what you expect - Jackson Hole exceeded any expectations I could ever have had. It was a wonderful place to visit and a wonderful way to spend the holidays with my family.

New Floors - YIPPEE!!!

Our living room with the new rug (I think the rugs cost more than the floors :)

What used to be our formal dining room...now Cole's (and Dan's) playroom.

Our office with the new black shag rug!

Our kitchen (after the New Year's Party...not too messy huh?).

I have wanted hardwood floors in our house since the day we signed the papers, but other projects seemed more "important" at the time. After Cole was born and the formula, spit-up, and just baby "stuff" started to be a regular thing at our house...we committed to saving for new floors.

Dan was determined to install them himself. I never doubted his ability, just the time it would take and then living in a house with cement floors as he completed each room...not really my cup of tea. Dan decided to take 3 weeks off of work and do the install - I thought that was a good compromise, I could live in a mess for 3 weeks (I think?). He started talking to his Dad and he offered to come and help, then all of the sudden Chris, our brother-in-law, was coming with him.

The three of them worked so hard everyday. I would go to work and come home to a completed room. It was awesome. I did all of the putting back together and all of the major DUSTING (not sure if we will ever get rid of all of the tile demo dust). I also made sure they had good food for dinner, until they started in the kitchen and I didn't have an oven for a few days...but Rudy's and Pizza Hut worked for us on those nights.

Our floors are fabulous and Cole scoots around faster than ever. I am so lucky to have a handy husband (and family) that tolerates all of my house plans. We have one more big project in the house over the next month or so and I think we are done for a while. I know "things" do not make a home, but it is sure wonderful living in a place that you love to come home to at the end of the day.