Our Gangsta

Thanks to my wonderful husband, he put together this great video of our little gangsta.....Cole. He LOVES music and we got him to "raise the roof" this morning.
If you are wondering what that giant thing is in our family room, Nick was blowing up the swimming pool. :)

(Oh, and don't forget to pause the music on the right side so you can hear the music to the video)
Enjoy!!!

Tornado

When I was little, my nickname was Tornado. There was one time that my mom came up to my room to help me clean it and about 2 hours later, my grandpa came up to my room and said, "have you even done anything"? For some reason, I had to have every toy and piece of clothing on the floor, even if I didn't want to use or wear it. I was notorious for just dropping things on the floor as I went from one thing to another. Even when I came home from college, my mom just dreaded it because she would say "the tornado is home". She would always ask me why I had to have all my clothes on the floor when I could put them nicely in my dresser. I'm not really sure why I insisted on having everything out...hmmm.

Now that I'm an adult and have my own things that I have paid for, I've gotten way better at clutter. In fact, I HATE clutter. Unfortunetely, my dogs and Cole did not get my new found hate of clutter.

My dogs have always insisted on going to the toy box and not being satisfied till every toy was on the floor. Benson always wants whats on the bottom so we have to get out every toy.

Cole....he is the same...we have to get out every toy, every crayon, every card from the deck and throw it all over the room.

Example 1...and this happened in about 1 minute from walking in the house

"What mom?"

I thought I would get a close-up picture of his nice war wound on the top of his nose. Andy and Teresa aren't real sure how he got it. They said he didn't cry or anything, just came in from outside and had a big scratch. Since it's right in the middle of his face, we've really been trying to keep neosporin on it so it doesn't scar. A few months ago when he slipped in the bathtup, he got a nice scar under his chin and I'm afraid there will be a permanent mark. So we are trying to not let that happen to his face.

Cole even insists on climbing up on the chair and making a mess up there. He had to pull every single flashcard out and throw them.

I have been searching for some "water shoes" for Cole for the summer. We have several pairs of crocs, but for some reason he always trips when he wears them (shoot, I trip when I wear crocs). Andy and Teresa have banned crocs because all the kids fall when wearing them so we wanted to get him some tennis shoe-type shoes that could get wet. I was so excited when I found these shoes at Lands End! They have them in all different colors and I think they are just adorable. I also can't believe that I got Cole a size 7!!! These shoes will be great when we go on our vacations this summer.

So excited about a 3-day weekend, it's been a long time since we had a break. I'm getting so annoyed with all my teacher friends that are out of school already or only have one more week! I hate you all! :) ha! This year just needs to end...for many reasons. I'm so excited to have the summer here, play with Cole, hang out with friends by the pool and not think about Hebron or school.

We have a fun weekend planned....spending time with relatives, friends and lots of pool time! Who knows, maybe Nick and I will go on a date or something :)

Sprinkler Fun

Where are these two cute boys headed???

Our sitters told us about this fun park down the street from us that has a great little water park and water fun for the kids. If you know Dallas, you know that right around this time of year, it is almost unbearable to be outside in the middle of the day and the only way to stay optimistic about this heat is to go to pools, water parks, and play in sprinklers. :)

We headed to Kiddie Korral to experience this new park, unfortunetely, the actual water part doesn't open till next weekend, but while we were there we took advantage of the great playground and had fun just walking around.

This playground was perfect for Cole, perfect size for him. Oh, and as you can see, he has his swim suit on ready for some water action....bummer that the water park wasn't working yet!
He had so much fun playing at this new park. We are lucky in that we have some awesome parks so close to our house, so of course we are excited to find even more!
These horses were pretty crazy! You can see the coil at the bottom and when Nick was on them, he could get the tail of the horse all the way on the ground. I'm not sure who had more fun with these...Nick or Cole. I think Cole and I had a lot of fun just watching Nick play on the horses!
Cole wanted to give it a try, but he kept hitting his mouth on the back of the horses head so he didn't stay on for too long.
Again....Nick playing around

Cole and I finally got a picture together :)

Since we were all a little disappointed that the water wasn't on at the park, I had the idea to get a sprinkler head and then we could see if Cole would enjoy playing in the backyard with the sprinkler. We hooked up the sprinkler thinking Cole would just run away from it, but looking at this following picture.....do you think he had fun!?!

He would get up super close to it, but then run away flapping his arms and giggling.

I don't think Nick or I have ever laughed so hard

What was especially funny was after we decided to go back inside, of course we stripped him naked out in the backyard so we didn't drag grass into the house. We always joke about hosing him off after meals because he gets so dirty, but we literally did that this time. ha! I'm sure our neighbors would have gotten a kick out of looking out their window, seeing a naked baby run around the yard with 2 parents chasing after him and then using the hose to clean him off. Nice!

Here is a video of Cole running through the sprinkler

(Make sure you pause the music on the right side of the blog so you can hear the sound from the video)

Unplugged Play

I am so excited about my new purchase! I have been wanting to buy this book for quite awhile but when I went to buy it at Barnes and Noble, it was almost $30! Yikes! I held off for awhile on getting it but then I was looking online and I found it on Buy.com for $4!!! It is a used book but in brand new condition. There are no creases or anything, it seriously looks brand new. I was so excited about it because it has all these different craft ideas for your kiddos. They have different part of the book for different age groups and some of it is still a bit advanced for Cole, but I did get some good ideas.

The first one we tried was to get an old shoe box, cut a slit in the top of the box and give Cole a bunch of different "old" credit cards or playing cards, whatever would fit through the hole.

It took him a little bit to figure out how to get the cards to fit through the hole, but once he figured it out, he had such a great time and it captured his attention for almost 45 min. If you know toddlers, 45 min is a LONG time!

After he put all the cards in, then he would take the lid off, and dump all the cards out and would start over...

It's so fun to watch them figure things out...that's why I'm excited about this book because it gives you all kinds of things you can do with your kids, just with stuff you already have in your house. Like making puppet socks, car ramps, etc. There is also great ideas for when you are out to eat a restaurant and you are trying to keep them entertained. Cole loves to play with Nick's wallet, so it said to get one of dad's old wallets, put coupons, fake money or anything in it and that will keep them busy for awhile. It's just a lot of things to teach kids how to "play" and not just sit around watching TV. :)

Last year I went to a friends baby shower and they made these hats for all the girls. I must have stuck it somewhere in the garage. I honestly don't know where I put it but Cole managed to find it. I went out to the garage after putting some things away from the car, went back outside and he had this hat on his head. Nick calls him Driving Miss Daisy!

Sneaky Sneaky

Cole has gotten really good at opening doors lately. He's gotten especially good at opening the pantry door. He loves to go in there and get his goldfish or "cookies" and take them into the dining room so I won't find him and take them away. Little does he know that I'm on to his secret, he thinks he's sneaky. :) He'll always go behind the table and dig into the box of food.

"Hey Cole....I can see you bud going for those cookies"

Another close-up

Yesterday he even got the oatmeal out and took that into the dining room. He wasn't as impressed with the oatmeal because it was sealed shut still and couldn't get into it. What a bummer! I guess we'll save that for breakfast on Saturday morning.

Because Cole has gotten so good at opening doors, this is the reason we got these......

We aren't too excited about having these on our doors because they are THE biggest pain in the rear, but we definitely need to have one on the front door. We finally just got used to having those annoying clip things on our cabinets and now we add this to the baby-proofing...oh joy!!

This week we have been dog sitting for Max. Max is Grandma Tracy's dog and he's hanging out with us for awhile. He's so easy to have around and Benson and Roxy have grown up with him since they were all puppies, so they all get along great! Max is such a cuddler...ahhh!!

Here's just a cute picture from this morning...he likes to have his feet out of his PJ's and just have the arms in, kinda like a cape. Typical boy, I know. Except this morning he was trying to get his arms out, got stuck and fell head first into the tile floor, giving himself a nice little bruise on his cheek. Oops!

This video is so funny because Cole is starting to do some animal sounds. Mostly just saying "mooo". Today when I went to pick him up from Andy and Teresa's, they said he had been saying "Te-sa" all day. Needless to say, that obviously warms Teresa's heart. Cole absolutely loves her! Every morning, Cole walks up to their house and he walks straight to Teresa, wants her to pick him up then will just cuddle with her. She loves it because most of the kids are just so busy to stop and cuddle. :) Cole sure is a cuddle bug and he for sure DOES NOT get that from me. However, I do like to cuddle with Cole....haha, sorry Nick! At least you have Max :)
There is one little boy named Bradley at Andy and Teresa's and he is so funny because every morning, his mom drives up to the house, Bradly (who is probably 2.5) gets out of the car and yells at his mom, "Mom, stay in the car...bye!" It is hilarious...I can totally see Cole doing that soon.

What a Random weekend!

We had such a random weekend. I feel like we didn't do a whole lot, but when you have a 15.5 month old, I guess there are always fun stories! :)

Saturday Nick had a softball tournament.....this picture is the result of that tournament. Ouch!

Saturday afternoon, Emily came over to watch Cole while I went to Stacey's baby shower. Baby showers are always fun because I love seeing the stuff that people get. AND, it gives me ideas for the next baby. :) ha! And NO, baby #2 is not on it's way. :)

Emily and Cole played and I'm sure Cole had a great time. Emily thought it was funny when Cole would bring his tennis shoes to her so she could put them on him so they could go outside. This kid LOVES being outside!

Because how much he loves being outside, we decided to get him some sidewalk chalk. I know, he's probably more interested in eating the chalk, but we still had fun with it!

Now, we went to Target with every intention on buying the new 3D sidewalk chalk (probably because I was more excited than anyone to play with it), but when we realized it was dang expensive, we decided that until he was older to appreciate the greatness of it, we would just stick to regular chalk for now. Plus, I think he had more of it on his skin and clothes than on the patio.

Nice outfit Cole!!! :) Seriously, who dresses you?

I love my little man...what a sweet smile!

While we were outside playing, Benson decided to roll around in the mulch and his hair is the kind that is like a magnet, everything just sticks to him. I tried pulling out as much as I could, but then Nick decided to just take the vacuum to him.

Cole loves playing with his green car. Even though it is an "outside" toy, we still let him bring it inside because he loves to climb on it.

Hey Cole, that's not where your feet go when you drive. Someday you'll learn.

Sheesh....who put this kid's diaper on? Have I not told everyone that I should be Mother of the Year??

I promise that we do not let Cole get like this for every meal! I feel like I always post pictures of him completely filthy and trust me, this is maybe only a once-a-week thing. Cole LOVES pasta, I think he ate a whole piece of lasagna by himself tonight.

Also, I took this picture to send to my friend Jenn in St. Louis. She sent me the sweetest Mother's Day Card and it had a baby with spaghetti sauce all over the face and it looked just like Cole, so I wanted to send her this picture for comparison.

Hope everyone had a great weekend!!!

Climbing...it's like a Flipbook

Since Cole has learned how to climb up on furniture, he thinks he is hot stuff and gets so excited about his new abilities. Whenever he wants to get off the couch, he goes the LONG and more time consuming way. Probably because it is just way more fun and challenging. The next few pictures are almost like a flipbook of him getting off the couch.

Alright, he got on the couch, now time to get off the couch.....

"Just get this leg over"

"Now the other leg, wow, I feel like a frog"

"Alright! I did it! Now to get off the stool...hmm"

"Ok, just get on your bottom, I can do this"

"Just a slide on down and...I'm the champion!!"

"I Rock!!"

Nick took this picture this morning to send to his Aunt Judy and Uncle Dan. They got Cole this outfit and we thought it was so funny...he looks like such a big boy in it.
Oh, and thanks Nick for combing Cole's hair for the picture. Usually when Cole gets up in the morning he tends to look like a rooster with his hair sticking straight up in the back. :)

This picture cracks me up because he has my old cell phone up to his ear and he's saying "hi, hi, hi". Then he'll just jabber away.....he must get that from his dad :)