Project 365: Week 4

20 Months

Dear Cooper,

You are 20 months old, and it’s been a while before I have written down what you’ve been up to.  I can’t believe that in just 4 months, you will be 2 years old!  But, let’s not get ahead of ourselves….

You have had a few rough months.  You have been sick with something or another, and teething, for basically the past 6 months.  First, it was ear infection after ear infection.  We finally got rid of those with your tubes, but then you caught a nasty upper respiratory virus, followed by RSV, followed by pneumonia.  Poor buddy!!  During those months, you were a lot to handle.  Pretty grumpy most of the time.  Who can blame you?  But, thankfully, you seem to be well for now, and we have started to see the happy little boy that you were before all of these sickies.  We knew he was in there!

Since you got your tubes, you have started talking so much!!  You went from 4-5 words about 2 months ago, to so many words, I can’t even count!  You say new words every day, and it’s so fun to watch you learn to communicate.  You have started saying “hi” and I’m pretty sure it is the cutest thing ever.  Let’s see, some of your favorite words are: no, uh-oh, Zo(For both of the dogs), mah(more), nigh-nigh, hot, and bubboos(bubbles).  Instead of saying “yes”, you laugh, which we find so funny!  You say “no” all the time, but you don’t necessarily always mean it.  When you say “hot”, you flap your arms like a bird.  You say “brrr” for cold and you clench your fists and shake your arms like you’re cold :)

You know how to sign several words.  When you sign “please”, you not only rub your own chest, you also reach over to whoever you are asking, and you rub their chest, too!  Haha!  You also sign “more” all the time.

For some reason, you love Taylor Swift.  If you are whining in the car, I can turn her music on, and you are so happy!  You always clap when she finishes a song :)

You can tell us the sounds that a horse, dog, cow, cat, pig, rooster, and sheep make.  You love animals!  Especially dogs and horses (which you call “neighs”).  Luckily our neighborhood is surrounded by lots of pastures, and you get to see horses and cows almost every day.  If we drive by and there aren’t any, you frantically say “mah!” and are very disappointed.

You are very loving, and will almost always give us a hug or kiss when we ask for one.  You also love to blow kisses.  When we say “I love you”, you blow a kiss to us, or you put your hand on your chin.

You are obsessed with the vacuum, wearing our shoes, Cap’n Crunch, and the dogs.  You love to help us to household chores like laundry, sweeping, and cleaning anything with a rag.  In fact, if you spill something, you will go to the kitchen, pull a towel off of the counter, and wipe it up.  Crazy!  You also love to help me cook, and often throw a fit if I won’t hold you while I’m cooking.

If I ask you where your piggies are, you point to your toes :)  You love to show us your belly, and if you show us yours, you go around and pull everyone else’s shirt up so we can see theirs.  Haha.

You are quite familiar with time outs.  You usually are in time out at least once a day.  Usually for hitting, throwing, or biting.  This weekend, you had your first time out for telling us no.

You love having company.  You get so excited when any of our friends visit.  You always think they are there to play with you, and you have no problem getting all up in their business.  Our builder (of the house we live in now) even came over one day, and you would not leave him alone.  You even cried when he left!  Hahaha!

You love love love your Grandma, Poppa (who you now call Boppa), and your Uncle Tyler.  You get so excited to see them.  Sometimes we FaceTime with Grandma and Boppa, and you incessantly blow kisses the whole time, it is so funny!

I am amazed at how much you pick up from our every day routines.  The other morning, I was putting mousse in my hand, and you started rubbing your hands in your hair, and flipping your head upside down, just like I do when I use mousse!  It is astonishing to me that you are able to mimic that.  You also mimic everything I do with all of my makeup and my curling irons!  I think your dad would rather you not mimic those things :)

You are a sweet, sweet boy, Cooper.  Your dad and I tell you every day how lucky we are to have you in our lives.  We love you so much!

Weekend Recap!

We had a great weekend!  It started out a little rocky on Friday, though.  About 2:30, I got a call from daycare saying that Cooper had a 102 fever :/  Womp womp.  The child had been well for 10 days, so clearly this was bound to happen.  So, my dad picked him up for us.  He had already planned to pick him up around 3:30 so that Lee and I could have a date night after work. Sadly, we cancelled our much anticipated night out to pick up our sick boy and cuddle him.  He seemed to be doing okay, not terrible, but he did go to sleep at 6 that night.  Lee and I had a crazy night of takeout and DVR watching.  We may or may not have gone to bed at 8:30.  I can’t confirm or deny.

Shockingly, Cooper slept through the night and woke up in a good mood on Saturday.  Although he did wake up at 4:30am ready to get his day started.  He seemed okay, but still had a fever, and since he had just gotten over RSV and pneumonia, we wanted to be sure that those were all gone.  Lee took him in to the doctor, and he was fine, but we learned that one of his tubes is clogged.  Apparently this can be bad and cause the tube to pop out if it doesn’t get cleared up.  So we got some ear drops and an antibiotic.  He didn’t seem like he was feeling too bad though, so that’s good! 

While they were at the doctor, I ran a few errands.  Grocery store, paint store, and nail salon.  Yes, I went to the nail salon while my husband was at the doctor with my kid.  One of the signs you know you’re at the doctor with your kid too much!  Anyway, I got my nails did and it was fun to have some “me” time.

The rest of Saturday was spent hanging around the house.  It was a pretty gloomy day out.  Cold and rainy.  We did tackle some lingering projects in Cooper’s room though!  I hope to have it completely finished soon.  At least by his second birthday!  Ha!

That night, we had yummy homemade mac and cheese for dinner.  This is seriously the BEST mac and cheese!  It’s from the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook, I believe.  Talented photographer, I am not.  I know this is a horrible picture!

Sunday was a GORGEOUS day!  It was so sunny and warm out.  I ran a few errands in the morning.  Including another trip to the paint store where I actually purchased paint.  The first time I went, I made the mistake of asking for the paint guy’s opinion on how much paint to buy.  Htold me to measure the rooms and go back and he could estimate for me.  Well, I tried explaining that I didn’t think that would work for the areas we are painting, but I got nervous and said I would measure and go back.  Only to NOT measure, and go back anyway!  We are painting the common areas of the house: entry, living, dining, kitchen, hallways, upstairs gameroom.  None of these areas have 4 walls, and none of the walls are solid.  Most have a cutout or a window, or something.  Anyway.  Lee and I very carefully calculated how much paint we would need by staring at the rooms for a minute (you can see all of them from the entry), squinting our eyes, and agreeing to 6 gallons.  We’ll see how that works out!

That afternoon, Lee ran some errands and I took Cooper to the park.  I couldn’t believe how nice it was out!  We played at the park for about an hour.  Cooper has gotten SO much better about playing around other kids.  He loves to play with older kids, but he used to get too excited and would get too close, or try to hug (which really was more like a tackle).  Anyway, he is actually kind of shy now?!  If the other kids talked to him, he would listen, and then run to my leg.  He did end up playing with a couple of boys, and it was so nice that I wasn’t freaking out that he was going to tackle someone!

He also re-discovered the sand box.  Oh boy.  I’m not sure if I ever blogged about it, but Cooper has played in a sand box one other time.  When he was about 11 months old, there was a sand box at a friend’s birthday party.  Well, Cooper ate the sand.  And freaked out!  Screamed and cried.  He did that twice!  Two separate times of eating sand and completely freaking out!  I have some great photos, but not with me.  Luckily, this time, he just kept picking up handfulls and throwing it in the air.  Once he acted like he was going to eat it, and I said no, and he laughed and threw it.  Whew!  Such a jokester.  Anyway, he LOVED it!  I almost couldn’t get him out of there.

After the park, we went home and cleaned the house a little and did some laundry.  Cooper got to vacuum, so he had a blast.  That boy and the vacuum.  I’ve never seen anything like it.

After dinner, Cooper had a “bubboo” (bubble)  bath and went to bed.  Lee and I watched the Amazing Race and Celebrity Apprentice!  Anyone watch those?  Brendon and Rachel on Amazing Race…lordy.  Those two are crazy.  We started watching Celebrity Apprentice a few minutes into it, and they were showing the girls.  I had NO idea who anyone was, other than the girl from Wayne’s World, and the Real Housewives of NJ girl.  Ha!  Seriously, no clue about the others, until I saw some of their names.  I did recognize a couple then.  Aubrey O’Day.  That girl needs to get a clue.  I only recognized her name from when she won that MTV reality series with P.Diddy, or whatever his name was at that time.

Wednesday Randoms!

I cannot concentrate this week at work. I have a million things I should be doing at home, and that’s all I can think about. Of course, if I was at home, would I be completing (or even starting) one of those million things? No.

I wrote a 20 month post for Cooper. I’ve been waiting to post until I got a good picture. Despite participating in Project 366, I cannot for the life of me get a decent picture of him. He is obsessed with cameras and he refuses to sit in front of them. He wants to be behind the camera, taking pictures.

This morning on Twitter, Megan got me started on how Cooper’s daycare stresses me out. Allow me to explain. First of all, they don’t send any kind of information about activities or special days or anything home. They post everything at the daycare, in random places. So, when I show up for the 390^th time with Cooper in his regular clothes, and all the other kids in their jammies? Well, I feel like a loser and the unorganized, bad mom that didn’t know it was pj day. In my defense, who has time to sit there at the daycare and read umpteen flyers? I barely have time to brush my child’s hair in the mornings. Sometimes, I don’t even have time to do that. Put that shit in an email or in my kid’s backpack. Do these other people not have jobs to rush to in the mornings or families to get home to in the evenings? Isn’t that why our kids are in daycare? Because we work?! And don’t get me started on holiday treats and teachers gifts. Yesterday I saw a million tweets and facebook pics of valentines for classmates, and even teacher valentine goodie bags. What?! Was I supposed to do that? Good thing Cooper only goes 3 days a week and Valentine’s Day fell on a day that he didn’t go this year. There are other stressors, but I’ll stop there.

Remember when I wrote that post about how much I had been struggling with Cooper lately? Well, the boy must have read it and felt badly for his mama. Because for the past week and a half, he has been his old self. And I mean, his ooolllllldddd self, like from 6 months ago. Happy, fun, pretty easy going, sweet baby boy. It can only mean that he was feeling miserable for those 6 months because he had been sick with one thing or another that entire time. He is finally not sick and not teething. That’s the only explanation I can come up with. I hope this sticks around for a while! We might even try to, oh I don’t know, take him on an errand! Gasp!

Things are starting to slow down at work. PTL!! I am so ready for some calm days. This also means that I can start up the Great Curtain Fabric Search that promptly ended when we had a large change in our company last year, thus all the busy days. Not that I would search for things like that while I was at work. No, never.

I am supposed to be on a diet. In the past 7 days, I have eaten: the majority of a batch of 40 m&m cookies, a bag of Worther’s (sp?) green apple-filled caramels, 2 Starbucks white mochas (non fat, no whip) at least one bag of haribo peaches, countless Snickers cream hearts, and half a bag of Hershey kisses. And I haven’t even gotten to the bottles of wine or take out dinner from Charleston’s and the other “regular” meals I’ve eaten. What diet? I really, really love food. Mostly, food that really has no nutritional value.

And on that note, should I join a gym or buy a treadmill for the house?  That is the question.  I love spin class at the gym, but would I really go?  I feel like I don’t have time to work out until after Cooper goes to bed.  I wake up at 5, and get home from work at 5-5:30, then cook dinner/hang out with Cooper until 7 when he goes to bed.  So really I can’t work out until after 7.  I wanted to start going to Crossfit, but the times of the workouts don’t really work with what I would want/be able to do.  Lee will NOT be on board for a treadmill at home…

Project 366: Week 3

Time for some catch up!

Some Randoms For Ya

I have been super Debbie Downer on here lately, haven’t I? I hate being Debbie Downer! Rest assured I have been using this blog as a place to vent. I do not hate life, and I am actually HAPPY the majority of the time! :)

I turn 30 this year. I wanted to take a trip somewhere with just Lee. Actually, I wanted to go to San Francisco, and we started planning it. And then we thought about ALL of the other things we could do with the money we were spending. Like buy a new couch and other things for the house. And then I started having anxiety (shocking!) about whether we should take the trip or buy furniture. Then yesterday I suddenly made the decision to take a small trip to Kansas City or something AND buy furniture (or something for the house). And now I have no anxiety. Whew. Clearly I stress myself out about really important things.

Last weekend, I picked up 2 prescriptions. I had to wait forever so that the pharmacist could check them to make sure they were correct. Then, I got home, and they had reversed the labels on them!

Cooper is not really doing much better. We can’t get his fever to go down. It’s usually around 103. Yesterday I couldn’t stand being at work and not with him, so I left work and picked him up. When we got home, he refused to nap even though he was (literally) closing his eyes and swaying every few minutes, then I started feeling sick and running a fever, then the dog threw up. So that was fun.

We started working on some long overdue projects for the house last weekend. I can’t wait to see how it turns out!

I had my hair dyed back to its original color sometime around Christmas, and my old highlights have been peeking through for a couple of weeks. I don’t mind, I was just surprised at how stubborn the blonde is. I have no plans to start coloring it again anytime soon. I suddenly decided that it was a waste of money. After about 16 years of getting it highlighted, haha!

I am really enjoying this non-winter winter we are having! It’s is often in the 60s around here and I love it! Although I am nervous for summertime if this continues.