Remember Addie's imaginary friends? She had a handful--her closest buds were Lehleh and Wap. Then came Yehyeh, Eggy, and Goldilocks. They were often in an imaginary car behind us on the way to the grocery store. They came with her to bed to nap. She talked about them at least 5 times a day. Once we were at Target and Addie was in the cart and she suddenly laughed and I asked her what was so funny and she said "oh, Wap just ran by." And if Addie said something that surprised me I would ask her "Where did you learn that?" and she would usually say "Oh Lehleh taught me." She became their mom, their friend, they just filled in whatever role she needed for the day.
So one day Addie and Cole were doing a project in the kitchen. (Yogurt fingerpainting--hey you gotta get creative with a baby who puts everything in his mouth--we don't want purple poop afterall).
I asked Addie later if she had fun fingerpainting and she said "Yep. Lehleh wanted to fingerpaint too but she's too pretend." At the time I thought--hm, quite a complex thought for a little one. For the record, she had admitted before that her friends were pretend, she never really thought she "saw" them. But perhaps her comment was a bit too real for her because that night she said "I don't want to be a mommy anymore. My friends went away." And from that moment on, we went from 5 to a gazillion references to Wap and the gang a day to ZERO. None, no slip-ups, nada. Where did you learn that Addie? Oh, I watched it on TV.
Dare I say, I kind of miss Lehleh? Or maybe I'm just a little nostalgic because Addie is growing up! We went out to a restaurant for dinner last night and she ordered for herself! Who is this young lady?
Steve and I had a little bet going. He said that Cole would be walking before his first birthday, I said he wouldn't. Addie walked a week or two shy of her first birthday and I remember her doing a lot more cruising and pushing a car across the room earlier than Cole did at the same age. Guess what? We were both right. Cole technically took his first unassisted steps before his first birthday. I should know the date, but I don't--it's somewhere on a video on my phone and someday I may go back and find it, but today...you'll just have to believe me :) So...again comparing the kids. Addie wasn't a fast crawler--if you remember, she did a funny one leg in front one leg behind crawl. Cole on the other hand is pretty durn fast. So I think that while he was excited to take some steps, he realized that crawling is just way more efficient. So since he took his first steps almost a month ago now, he still hasn't taken to walking all that much, but here and there, he'll just bust out and go at it.
Guess what happened this weekend? Little Cole bear turned 1!!!!
We decided to not have as big of a 1st birthday party as Addie had (there were just under 30 people) mostly because I tend to be a stressball about these things lately and what fun is that? So with the guilt of having a small, family-only shindig instead, I decided that he needed a super cool "theme" for his party--so we decided on a "Moo Baa La La La" theme. For those who are confused and don't know what that means, a cool author named Sandra Boynton has written a ton of great kids books and songs and Cole's favorite Boynton book is Moo Baa La La La. He giggles through the whole book every time--it's adorable. Sooo....theme established, we set out to make it an adorable party!
First off, party favors! Since there were only 3 kids in attendance, the favors could be big. I made t-shirts for the kiddos. Cole was Moo, Julie was Baa, and Addie was La La La Next--what party is complete without party hats?? So I printed out some of the animals from the book and pasted them on these shiny blue party hats. Rock ON. The cake--I had it in my head that the cake would look like the cover of the book. I'll be honest that Addie's butterfly cake looked better in my head than it did in reality. But Steve vouched for his copying skills and we armed ourselves with pre-colored fondant and away we went. I made the cake and frosting (and colored it "teal", yeah baby). I also rolled out some of the fondant. Then Steve got some pretty official tools (is that an exacto knife? Why yes it is...) and.... VOILA!! I am SO SO proud of Steve's artistic skills and practically had tears in my eyes when I saw the final product. Pretty kick ass, huh? So with some color-coordinated balloons (or "baboo" as Coley calls them)... and some Aunt-Alli-rockin' streamer action....the party can begin!
Cole rocking his Moo shirt with Poppy. All the kiddos sporting their shirts. Cole showing Alli how cool Elmo "Eh" is. Cole chooses his hat... ...Douggo chooses his "stupid horse" hat :) Gaga and Uncle Dan Addie and Yaya Alli, Julie, and Douggo Nom nom nom--delicious lunch if I do say so myself. Then it's cake time! Cole had a big lunch so he wasn't all that interested in the cake at first. Addie was using her high-pitched big sister voice "Coley, it's CAKE you EAT it" Steve finally took it into his own hands and fed him a piece. And the rest was history! Addie had cake AND a matching cupcake. Presents! Lucky Cole had some help from his big sis. Cole loves Addie's green Anywhere Chair, so he got a blue one for himself. Yep, he loved it, too! I LOVE this picture of Doug with the baby cousins!
In conclusion...Cole turned 1. He's still our baby. The party was awesome. We have an amazing amazing family. Life is good!
You know what 11 months old means, right? It means we are now less than a month away from Cole's first birthday. 1 year old coming up. No longer a baby! Well ...he will be our baby for much much longer than he probably wants. By the way...here was Addie at 11 months...she's still our baby too!
We're still not sure when Cole is going to begin to officially walk on his own. He can cruise, though he doesn't like to do it all that much. For the last few weeks he has been able to come to standing in the middle of the room without any support. Until today the only video proof I had of that was Cole completely naked. And as much as I don't think we have a huge readership on this blog, I know it's not totally private so I didn't want Cole with all his manly-hood out in the world for all to see, but I finally got him (appropriately covered) standing today!
Does it get any cuter than this? Cole and Addie LOVE to hug each other. This is the stuff that melts my heart and makes all the challenges of having kids absolutely worth it.
Cole has more words now! The other day he was tired and as I was carrying him upstairs for nap he was rubbing his eyes and saying "nah nah" over and over until I realized he was saying "night night!" So cute! On Saturday I was out of the house and Steve was unsuccessful in getting him down for a nap while I was gone. The minute I walked through the door, he crawled towards the door and pulled up on the baby gate separating us screaming NAH NAH at the top of his lungs. I think he was tired :) He also says "Hello"--or rather "eeyuuuuhhh" but it's totally hello. What do you think?
We're just having so much fun around here. Cole does new things every single day!
Besides impersonating Homer Simpson perpetual 5 o' clock shadow...
He has words: Dada (guess who loves that?), more, and "uh-oh" This last one is his FAVORite. And boy, he knows how to use it. He's in his high chair and deliberately drops food over the side--uh oh. He's in his crib not wanting to nap and throws his paci out of the crib and all you hear is a succession of soft uh-ohs over the monitor :)
He climbs EVERYthing nowadays...stairs, dishwashers...
He hugs stuffed animals to his cheek with a big smile each time, I know, it's adorable, but I have yet to catch it on the camera.
He blows kisses and makes kissy noises when you ask for a kiss. He puts his hand or a toy up to his ear to pretend it's a phone when Addie's pretending to talk on a phone. He cleans his tray when I give him a paper towel. He tries to brush our hair with a hairbrush. He loves hats. He loves when we wear them--cracks him up. And he loves wearing them himself (except, of course, when it is meant for the actual purpose of keeping his head and ears warm in the cold weather).
He is SO into "cooking" in the play kitchen--he seriously can spend 20 minutes opening and closing cabinets and placing the food inside various doors.
And on to the big sister! Addie has started another round of ballet! She is with the same teacher and is the oldest and most experienced in the class, so of course, she is quite the star. Here she is patiently waiting for the class to start.
Addie has grown almost an entire inch since her birthday!! It was only 2.5 months ago! So that means she thinks she's 13, not 3... Addie's actually never herself these days...she's either baby Addie still in my belly (my pajama shirts are quite stretched out with this game), Cinderella (and then whomever is playing with her gets to be rest of the cast--"now you're the stepmother, now you're the fairy godmother, now you're the prince..."), "Katie" (we don't even know where she got that name), or--in this case--Fancy Nancy. I love this picture--just wish it didn't have my arm (in stretched out pj shirt noted above) We've had a bit of snow lately. This was just a little bit of snow in this picture but it was the perfect stickiness for Addie's first snowman! Or as she called it, snow girl. All of her dolls and stuffed animals and imaginary friends are girls, so why wouldn't her snowman (er...girl) be one as well? We got some more snow later that night and sadly lost our power :( Addie insisted we make snow ice cream (Cole LOVED it) and it was roughly 54 degrees F in the house when we ate it...brrr! Thankfully we were able to escape to Gaga's house for the night.
Speaking of Gaga's house...we got to spend some time there with Uncle Robby and Aunt Kati who were "in town" from Sydney Australia recently. Well, they came stateside to meet their new granddaughter, Bella and we were lucky enough to get them to visit us on the East Coast.
Cole was explaining something very meaningful to his great uncle. I snuck in a kiss ;) Cole snuck in an uncle snuggle and Addie (ahem...Snow White) snuck in a few stories from aunt Kati :) So I'll admit-- it's been a looooong winter--we don't get out as much as I want to and we are going a bit stir-crazy, especially when the electricity was out for 48 hours, but we're all still filled with love and happiness in the household....there's still February to plod through, but for now...we're all friends :)
Can anyone else believe that Cole is 10 months old already?? Double digits! When did that happen? That means in less than 2 months he will be ONE. A birthday. I'm not sure I'm ready for that!
So what is he doing these days? Well one thing he's famous for around this house is being a cuddle-bug. He will be crawling around the living room playing and then head over to your lap, crawl up, put his head on your shoulder for a quick hug, then crawl away. All together now "awwwww".... And he will put his head down on the floor, the couch, your lap, Addie's back, your legs, whatever, and the thing is he KNOWS he's cute because he'll look up sideways with his big eyes and giggle as he does it. One day last week Addie saw Cole do this and said "Oh Coley, you and your snuggles" which has become the catch phrase of the house lately. And this mommy eats it alll up.
He's pulling up and cruising. He has one chore--to turn off the light switch before we leave his room. He's obsessed with phones and remote controls and cries hysterically if he happens to get one and you take it away from him before he drools all over it. He LOVES talking on the phone--if you call and I put you on speaker phone he'll giggle and laugh. He sometimes contributes to songs. If you sing "Wheels on the bus" when you say "all through the town" he'll say "dahhhh" or something that sounds like "down" at the town part. And when singing Jingle Bells, I swear he contributes "heh heh heh" after "Laughing all the way." He's even started doing some sign language. We've seen him do "All done," "milk," and "water"--not consistently, but definitely when it gets him what he wants :)
And now for some pics:
I call this Cole's Abercrombie&Fitch pose--you know, when those Abercrombie models have extremely long strands of drool coming out of their otherwise adorable mouths. But come on, what a pose!
"Coley, did you take one of Addie's cookies?" Heh heh heh Cole gets into EVERYthing--he's so so curious and nothing is un-turned, no door unopened, no drawer remains filled and organized. Stevo's proud to say that Cole gets this from him... And dang that boy can eat. I know I'm going to keep posting about this because his appetite amazes me! There are few things that he will turn his nose up at and he seriously out-eats Addie on a daily basis. On the day I took this picture he ate approximately: 3 cubes/ounces of carrot puree, 1/2 cup of peas, 3/4 cup quinoa and 1/4 cup chicken--and that was when I stopped counting. Nomnomnom And no blog post is complete without an Addie update as well! Addie has become quite the helper in the kitchen ever since she got her new chef's hat and apron.
And despite this melancholy snowman (complete with frown and unintentional but ironically placed tear drop) Addie made in school, she had the first week all year when she didn't cry at all! Woohoo! It only took 5 months :) And they continue to fight like siblings over the sharing (or lack therof) of toys, but truly they couldn't love each other more. To say that we are in love with these kiddos is quite an understatement. Enamored is a better word.
UPDATE THE NEXT DAY: Cole decided to make his official first word (besides mama/dada and accidental repeating of things we've said in songs--like this is a word he said on his own and with correct meaning)...... wait for it....... MORE. Oh the irony---see photos of him eating above. My Hoover baby :)
