A Penny & Cooper For Your Thoughts: October 2014

Tuesday, October 28, 2014

Goings On in October

We have had a busy month! A few highlights...

We took a quick trip to the ranch!

Cooper and Penny are ready for Howl at the Moon! We attended a fundraiser for Cooper's school and had so much fun! Penny got her face painted, Cooper enjoyed the "big kid" playground and we even won two goldfish! Welcome Goldie and Peach to our home!

We visited the local pumpkin patch! Cooper pointed out,"Hey! This is Ellie's first Halloween!"

Party of five.

We celebrated Mama's birthday! (Hello, 35.) Penny and Cooper both made cards for me. Penny's was a "pink princess" card. Cooper drew a picture of him and I and told us it said, "I love you Mama. We never get mad at each other. I would do anything for you. Love, Cooper."

Soccer and more soccer. Penny is really enjoying playing and runs around the field with enthusiasm.

This guy is enjoying soccer too and is really starting to get the competitive part of the game. He really like his friends on his team as well. Two of his teammates are also in his kindergarten class!

Ma-mas visited!

Uncle Clint came over and helped us enjoy what is probably our last swim for the year.

And the month isn't even over yet! We are excited for Halloween!

Thursday, October 23, 2014

Ten Months Old!

New this month for Ellie:

weighs 18.4 lbs and is 27 and a half inches long.
suffered her first illness! Poor baby had a viral respiratory infection (had to use a nebulizer and everything!) followed by an ear infection that she is still getting over.
is sleeping through the night! For weeks we had fallen into a pattern of her waking up every 1 to 3 hours every night. We were beside ourselves. Then we figured out that her acid reflux had flared up, probably because of all the different foods she has been trying. Reflux means she needs to be upright, so back to the car seat to sleep she goes. We are all feeling much better now that we are sleeping!
now has six teeth, all on the bottom. Thankfully the teething has quit for now, since we had to endure an illness!
crawls and pulls up on furniture! Just days after she turned 9 months old, Ellie turned her scooting into crawling. Now she is FAST! We have to work to keep her out of the playroom where all the big kids' legos are.
has gotten really vocal! She loves to growl and sort of yell "AAAHHH" and babble "ra" "mamama" "bababa" and "wawawa" to name a few.
has turned into such a little stinker! She gets an ornery look on her face whenever she pulls books off the shelf or pulls paper out of a trash can and she loves to shake her head "no."
Ellie has been to the ranch and met lots of new people. Our family has been meeting lots of our neighbors lately. She also accompanies Mom EVERYWHERE, has been to all her siblings' soccer games, and even went to a carnival fundraiser for Cooper's school.

Ellie follows a Kirk kid tradition by playing trains on the ranch cabin porch.

Poor baby got sick for the very first time. She stayed true to herself though and didn't really fuss too much. Such a trooper!

Tuesday, October 7, 2014

Cooper is Six!

This past Saturday was a BIG day for us. Cooper turned six! I can barely wrap my head around the idea that we became parents that long ago! This is one cool kid we have on our hands. Cooper is still the sweet and sensitive easy-going dude he has always been. He is always having fun and almost always happy! We enjoy his eagerness and joy that he approaches life with because it is so contagious!

Big changes have occurred for Coop in the last year. He is now in kindergarten, which sort of marked a passage out of baby/toddler/preschooler-hood into running with the big kids. This feels so epic! He is adjusting well to the new town, new school, and new routine, even if he is still really tired from all the change. He likes school, but doesn't enjoy waking up early! We are excited with all that he is going to learn this year and he is too!

Cooper's favorite two things in the world right now are Legos and Daddy...he loves building things, especially if Daddy is there to help him. While he still has a special place in his heart for Mama, Daddy has become the hero of his world. He is always asking for Daddy to pick him up from school, sit by him, sleep in his bunk bed with him, play with him, etc. (Daddy of course is in heaven.) One of the biggest reminders that we don't have a little boy anymore still sits in the playroom. For YEARS Cooper loved nothing more than he loved Thomas the Train. Now our train tables sit empty and unplayed on most of the time. It is still strange that something that dominated our time and thoughts is now no longer. Legos it is!

We celebrated Coop's birthday all weekend long! On Friday Cooper and Mama had lunch together at his school and he shared cupcakes with his class at recess. On Saturday after the kids' soccer games, we met Ma-Mas, Pa-Pa, Steve, Mary and the Naisers (!!!) at Random Beer Garden. The adults got to watch Aggie football and the kids played and played on the bounce houses. On Saturday night we went to dinner with Ma-Mas, Pa-Pa, Uncle Clint, and friends in downtown San Antonio. We stayed the night in a hotel, which Cooper loved! Finally, to top off the weekend, our friends the Naisers stopped by for dinner on Sunday evening. It was so fun to be with our friends again! Cooper got several Lego sets, clothes, Aggie gear, a cool truck flashlight and binoculars for his birthday. He was one happy guy!

Lunch at school! Cooper was thrilled to have me there to help him figure out how to get his treat on ice cream Fridays. (Kindergarten is complicated!)

Cooper, Penny, and Carson check out the birthday cake.
(This was the first time EVER Mama has bought a cake for a kid's birthday...with soccer games, soccer team pictures, friends and family in town, and just plain having three kids, something had to be simplified. Coop wasn't disappointed...there were Legos on top!)