Eating Machine

Recent Activities

We are FINALLY having some very wonderful, beautiful, warm days up here in Siberia! So we've been enjoying a lot of time outside during the day and a family walk almost every evening.
Most days our lunches get moved out to the patio.
It's so nice to be out! Having survived our first Wisconsin winter, I will say that we loved it. We loved last fall. We loved this past winter. What we did not love were the months of April and much of May. Ugh. Spring does not exist up here! But now that it's warming up, all is forgiven.
In honor of the warm weather, the garage sales are in abundance these days. I made some large-item kid purchases, including a bouncing pony for Owen. We have a bouncing jumper that hangs in the doorway...but we have no trim on our doorways.
He gets very excited about his new role as cowboy. Ava also had to get in on the fun.

That little peanut. She cracks me up.
The other garage sale purchase consisted of a hot wheels play table with a bunch of hot wheel sets included in the storage bins underneath. My intent was to make this a basement toy, but while the novelty is still in play, we've left it upstairs for the time being.

There were a lot of different sets in those drawers, with no instructions or picture of what they could potentially become. I've never put sets like this together, so trying to figure it all out has become a family adventure. Last night during Ava's bedtime prayers, she said "Thank you, God for the hot wheels table," followed by "please help us with the hot wheels table." There you have it.
So in other news, life keeps clipping along at the Cooper house. Last week, for the first time ever, Ava cut with scissors. For all my OT friends out there, I know: shame on me. But here's a pic of her first attempts at using scissors.

Luckily she's right-handed and will not have to endure all of the hardships and discrimination that her left-handed mother had to face as a child. Oh, the trauma.
For some Mommy-Ava time last week we baked some "shining star" cookies. I think they are meant to be made at Christmas time and hung on your Christmas tree. This would explain why they didn't taste that good. But Ava picked this out of our big kid-activity idea book, and we had all the ingredients, so we went for it. Please ignore the pasta sauce all over the chin.

We had to use up the Lifesavers that Steve had purchased to help his sore throat. Sorry, Steve. I thought that if he still needed one he could just eat one of the cookies. ew.
So there's a few random happenings! We miss all of our friends and family south of here! Owen says "goodbye" and "ba-ba-ba."

Date Night!

Steve and I went out by ourselves to a restaurant and had dinner. I know. It's amazing! After the babies went to bed, a wonderful college gal in town came over to babysit and Steve and I went out. It was such a nice mental health break! In the last 8 months, the only other time we have been out together without our kids was in December when my family was in town. Now that Owen goes to bed easily and at a consistent time, we hope to do this MUCH more often!

sitting up. almost.

A moment of confidence.
He fakes right.
Back to the left.
And he's down. Boy meets floor.
But with a little support, he has a great time.

Hey, I've got skills! Check me out!
He got so excited.

He got so excited that he just had to spit up a little.

Good job, O-Boy!

Good Morning, Spring!

Wow! It is so beautiful outside today! I think we're supposed to get into the 60's! It takes a long time to warm up in Wisconsin, but now that we're pushing toward May I'm hopeful that more and more days will be nice out. We're finally seeing some buds on the trees as of last weekend!
Here's how Ava's hair greeted the day:

Isn't that amazing?
This evening the neighbors were all out chatting while someone donated a box of Popsicle to all the kids. This was Ava's first Popsicle, so I had to document. She handled it like a pro, and even managed to climb the ladder up into the club house with all the big kids while holding on to her dear treat.

After the frozen novelty, she watched a couple of the kids play in the sand box a while and then decided that she, too, should experience the sand between her toes. She peeled off her sandals and jumped right into the action. Last year, she wouldn't touch the stuff.




It's been a while since I've put an update on the blog. This is partly because I don't always get around to it, but mostly because our desktop ran out of room. After 7 years of photos stored, it finally said enough is enough. So since I am a know-nothing when it comes to computers, it took a while to remedy the problem. But now all the pics are moved to a secure and non disclosed location, and I can finally get the photos off the camera memory card and onto the hard drive.
So there are lots of fun pictures from the month of April to add to the blog, but now it's time to wrap up and go to sleep. Maybe tomorrow. But for now, I must include a little something about Owen. So here's O-boy's new high chair. Steve and Ava put it together last night, and as soon as we stuck the kid in the thing he got super excited.

And tomorrow: Owen's attempts at sitting.

6 months old today!

Happy Half Birthday, little Owen!

To celebrate, Owen made motorboat sounds all day. Excessive, persistent and exuberant raspberries with joyful facial expressions. If he liked something, "ssbbbtt." If he was interested in a toy, "sbbbt, sssbt, sbbbt." If he was watching his sister play, "ssssbbbbt." When eating rice cereal, "ssbbttt!" All day. It is so funny to listen to.

Ava also got into the spirit of the day by dressing up as a puppy for the morning.



For his 6-month gift, we got Owen a water softener and a new dishwasher. He's thrilled. Coop did the install on the dishwasher himself this weekend. We now have clean drinking glasses in our house for the first time since we moved up here. It's the simple things.

Zoo Trip!

Last Tuesday, the sun was shining and temps hit the low 70's, so we packed up and spent the day at the Milwaukee Zoo. It was so beautiful out and we had a really nice time. Ava's favorites were by far the monkeys, with the dairy cows in a close second. In Wisconsin, there are cows at the zoo.
Ava really liked watching them.

The little play ground was super duper crowded. We weren't the only ones with the bright idea of going to the zoo on that nice day.

Ava faced this bridge with much trepidation, but she was determined.

Look at that concentration!

Here's my attempt to take a picture of us together!