2012 End of Year Fun

Cooper loves his new firetruck pjs from Grammie!

 This is New Year's Eve.  Coop giggling, and I turned around to find him like this with our dog, Brody.  I asked what he was doing, and he said, "I'm snuggling with Brody!"  He was all giggles.  Our dog is so patient with him.

This is also New Year's Eve.  Coop played outside that day for hours on end, enjoying the new sand in his sand table, which he decided to use as a sand BOX.  The boy loves to get dirty.  Ever seen a kid play in the sand wearing mittens?  I hadn't, but even though it was a bit chilly, Coop wanted to play outside.

 New Years Eve was quiet for us.  We went out to dinner at a local steakhouse.  Cooper was in a mood, and throwing a whiny tantrum when we arrived and were seated.  I finally sternly told him this was our New Year's Eve celebration dinner, and he was NOT going to ruin it by being whiny and throwing a fit.  He decided to be good, and we had a rather nice night out, something we don't often do any more.  We came home, Coop went to bed because he was ridiculously tired, and Nate and I watched a movie.  We missed the ball drop on tv, but shared a midnight kiss, and called it a night.

The next day we had a fun family day.  It was really cold and rainy, so we headed to the mall where Cooper could play on a free indoor playground.  I did a little shopping and purchased a cute sun hat for Baby Cheese for this summer, and some socks for Coop.  That was my "big" shopping day--ha!  We came home, and Nate watched a bunch of football.  Coop was playing pretend.  He came to the tv room and insisted that Nate "get on his boat" so they could go fishing.  This was Coop's boat he "built" himself, and Nate's was the exercise step.  The pool noodle was the fishing pole.  I wanted to let Nate enjoy his one day of football, so I took Coop to his room, where we used the "boat" and "fishing pole" to fish for all kids of "fish" in his room (Duplos (large Legos), blocks, etc.).  We were both wearing "fishing hats."  Mine was my old straw gardening hat, and his was his yellow fireman hat, turned backward.  Then I got an idea to stick his new flashlight in the end of the noodle, and tell him it was a "glow fish."  He turned off the light, and we fished for glow fish for a bit.  It was a lot of fun playing pretend with the Coopster.

 This Sunday Cooper will graduate from the baby nursery at church (18 months to 3 yrs), and start attending the childrens' Primary (3 yrs to 12 yrs) for the last 2 hours of church each week.  The 3 year olds are called "Sunbeams."  They have one hour of class time, and one hour of music/group time.  Cooper is so excited to be a Sunbeam, and be a big boy in Primary.

Those children in the nursery who have turned 3 during the year are graduating with him, and his teacher, Sister Lorraine Bryant, requested to be their teacher again this year.  I couldn't be happier.  Lorraine is my visiting teaching companion, and she is just amazing.  She has raised quite a large family, and is just superb with children.  Serving in the Primary presidency, I get to work with the children and teachers each week for two hours.  This past week I was taking pictures of the classes and kids for a thing we're doing, and I thought I'd include them here.

Cooper's Sunbeam class:

Weston, Rachel, Sister Bryant, Finn, Cooper, and Corrine

  Cooper James

I can't believe my baby is going to Primary in a few days.  Crazy how time flies.  He's getting so big.

Christmas Day

Sadly, my camera battery, known lately for not holding a charge for long, decided to die overnight, and I had no good camera for Christmas day.

It was a memorable Christmas, this being the first time Cooper understood Santa.  He woke up about 6 am, despite getting to bed late, and apparently went for a sneak peek to the living room, because I awoke to him saying in an almost crying voice, "Mom!!  Santa DIDN'T come!  He didn't bring me any presents!"  He was so upset.  However, I knew that Santa had dropped the presents and stockings on the floor, and that in the dark room they were probably out of view from the door, with the coffee table blocking the way.  I was glad Santa had picked that spot, so we didn't miss the surprise on Cooper's face.  I assured him that Santa did come, but that it was a little too early to open presents, and he needed to come back to bed.  I offered to have him lay with us in our bed, and he did, for about 5 seconds, and then he told me he was too excited and we needed to go see.  I relented, and at 6:20 am we woke up Poppy and MeMaw and ventured to see what Santa had brought.

 Santa brought Cooper a remote control truck, a nerf gun, and a Matchbox car track for the bathtub--all the things he'd asked for.  In addition, his stocking was packed to the brim.  His two most favorite toys from his stocking were the harmonica, and the flashlight.  He LOVES having his own flashlight to play with, and also loves harmonicas.  Santa must know the boy pretty well.

Nate and I gave him some board games (Candyland and Chutes/Ladders), DVDs (Alvin & the Chipmunks [a video he loves] and Beethoven [the dog movie from the 90s], along with a few other things.  MeMaw and Poppy gave Cooper a John Deere tractor that makes sounds, so now he has a big one for outdoors AND indoors.

Later we went to Abby's house for a late Christmas brunch--so yummy!  It was a great Christmas morning.  Cooper asked to watch Tangled, and he and Nate watched it while the rest of us visited.  They were the only two; it was pretty funny seeing my two boys watch a "girl/princess" Disney movie.

Nate and his Dad left to go hunting, and Michele went home to rest, so Cooper and I stayed and visited with Abby, Haleigh, and Stella.  It was a nice, relaxing Christmas day.  Cooper had fun with his cousins, especially Haleigh, who (with my permission after he begged me to let her) painted Cooper's fingernails neon green/yellow/pink.  He wore the fingernail polish for several days before allowing me to remove it.

All in all, we had a wonderful Christmas, surrounded by family.

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve day we did some of the usual.  MeMaw made sugar cookies for the kids to frost.  I think Coop had more fun eating the frosting than putting it on any cookies.

 Michele and I did a lot of cooking that day, but then it was all done for Christmas, and we didn't have to do much cooking at all on Christmas day.  I think we found a new secret to enjoying Christmas a little more!

 That evening we joined Nate's extended Smith family for dinner and gifts at his Aunt Faye's house, as they do every year on Christmas Eve.  With so many little ones, the gift opening was mayhem, shrieks of joy, and giggles. 

 Coop faked a smile for a picture after running through the house, and scraping his face on the corner of some furniture.

 I knew this would likely be the only Christmas picture of the three of us, so despite protests from my husband and child, we snapped a shot.

 We went home and watched Joy to the World with MeMaw and Poppy, helping remind us all the true meaning of Christmas.  Cooper enjoyed watching a movie about Jesus being born, and recounting the story of the first Christmas.  Then we set out some cookies and milk for Santa, and a carrot for the reindeer, and Cooper was off to bed in his new Christmas pjs, excited for Santa to come the next day.

Poppy's House! MeMaw/Aquarium and Poppy/Beach

We didn't tell Cooper we'd be going to MeMaw and Poppy's house for Christmas until the day we were leaving.  We left the Friday before Christmas in late afternoon.  All I heard ALL DAY LONG was, "when are we going to Poppy's house?  I want to go NOW.  I want to see Poppy and ride on his golf cart."  In the car, we weren't more than 10 minutes into our 5-7 hour drive when he said, "Can we be at Poppy's house YET?!  Get me OUT of this carseat!!  I want to see Poppy!"  It was a loooooooong drive, to say the least.

Cooper and his Poppy

 While visiting his Dad's, Nate and I took Cooper to a local park one day to play.  The weather was nice, and Coop had a great time playing with us.  He rode his first merry-go-round, a new addition to this park, and something you don't often see any more at playgrounds.  He thought it was great!

 Nate and I had a race with Coop on these little bouncy toys, and the rocket Nate chose was so small for him, and looked so funny, I just couldn't resist.  Nate will have my hide when he finds I've posted this on here, but it's just too good not to share.

 Cooper got to play with some of his step-cousins one day while MeMaw babysat them.  Little Regan is such a cutie, and had fun playing with Cooper's boots.

On Saturday while Nate and his Dad went duck hunting, Michele and I took Cooper to the Pine Knoll Shores Aquarium, just down the road from their house.  For some reason, I've NEVER been to this aquarium in 15 years of going to the Outer Banks.  It was A-M-A-Z-I-N-G for such a small aquarium (small compared to Atlanta, Boston, Charleston), but amazing in it's own right, and SO CHEAP.  We'll definitely be visiting again.

Here's our little hermit crab Cooper.  Love it!

 MeMaw and Coop outside with the sun glaring in their eyes.

 Just inside the entrance, there's this beautiful waterfall that reminds me of Donut Falls in Utah.  The camera flash went a little crazy, and Coop wouldn't pause for another shot, so this is all I got of it.

 Yehaw--ride 'em Cooper!

 The big tank was awesome with all the sharks, tarpon, striped bass, a big sea turtle, and so many other fish I'm sure I can't name them all.  Coop liked watching for the sharks.  We also made it in time to watch them feed the fish.

 It was a feeding frenzy!

 At one point Coop wanted to go back to the big tank, and he met another little boy about his age there.  We were the only ones there at the time, and the two of them had a grand time running around full-speed, giggling and carrying on like little boys do.  At one point Coop actually tackled the kid because (he said) they were playing football.  My kid is such a BOY!

Measuring up... 

 Besides the hands-on exhibits where he got to touch horseshoe crabs, sea urchins, almost reach sting rays, and get his clothes and MeMaw all wet, this was his most FAVORITE thing at the aquarium...

Yes, that is the steering wheel to one of those penny smashing machines.  He played on this longer than he had attention for any other exhibit.  That's my Coop!

We had so much fun with MeMaw!!!

 Sunday was beautiful, after being cold and rainy for a few days beforehand, so we went to Fort Macon beach with Poppy.  I'd purchased a kite to fly, but Cooper wasn't interested.  We tried to capture his attention with some fun "helicopter" things I'd found that you fling in the air using a big rubber band.  We'v had these before and either lost/broken them, so I knew they'd be fun at the beach.  Poppy had the most fun with them, I think. ;)

 Cooper was as happy as ever just to play in the sand. 

 He enjoyed jumping on the edge of this sand drift, and collapsing it.

 I asked Nate to take a picture of Cooper and I as proof that I was there too. 

 LOVE this!

After the beach, we visited historic Fort Macon.  I could have spent all day there, but let the guys go at their own pace, which was rather quick.  I took off Coop's boots to swap for shoes before we walked around the fort, and I could barely pull them off because they were PACKED FULL of sand.  I mean FULL.  What a kid.  Thank you for having fun with us at the beach, Poppy!

More Pre-Christmas Happenings

The rest of December went by in a blur.  My pregnancy morning sickness disappeared at 16 weeks, 6 days--ll weeks to the day of when it all began.  Thank goodness for the reprieve, because it was a week before Christmas, and I was able to enjoy the holidays A LOT more now that I could be around and enjoy food.

To celebrate my nausea liberation, Cooper and I made some yummy Christmas sugar cookies.  Nate was thrilled to know these weren't for friends and neighbors, but for us to enjoy.  Coop had a fun time helping me with the cookie cutters.  As we were frosting the cookies later, our neighbor friends came over, and the two girls frosted a few cookies with Cooper before they went outside to play in the beautiful December weather we'd been enjoying (65 degrees--say what?!).

 The children performed some songs at our ward (church) Christmas party.  Although Cooper doesn't officially attend Primary (the childrens' portion of our church services) until January, he'd been learning the songs, and was very eager to sing with them.  ALL DAY LONG the day of the party, he kept telling me that HE was going to sing with the children on the stage, and I had to stay in my seat.  However, come go-time, he wanted me right there, which worked out because I was helping direct some of the children anyway.  This picture was taken between songs.  Not sure why the somber face.  He didn't really sing, except for "Away in a Manger" when he sang, "asleep, asleep."  The rest of the time he bobbed his head to the melody, and swallowed like he was about to sing, but then didn't.  It was too cute, and was his first performance of any kind in church, albeit a little impromptu.

 I finally found the pics of Santa driving through our neighborhood on the firetruck, mentioned in one of my last few posts...

 

Cooper is certainly loved and spoiled by our family, even though none of them live close by.  As such, when Christmas rolls around, Cooper receives A LOT of packages in the mail (so many that he got used to looking for them from the mailman, UPS guy and FedEx guy each day), and has A LOT of presents under our tree.  Since we would be going out of town to the coast to Nate's Dad's for Christmas, and there were so many presents for Cooper, we decided to let him open a few gifts each day for a few days before we left on vacation.   Cooper's excitement erupted when we told him he could start opening a few gifts each day.  He exclaimed, "It's Christmas time now?!!"  I had to explain that while we were still counting down to Christmas (per the countdown chain we'd made together), and it wasn't Jesus' birthday yet., we'd start celebrating a few days early.  He was ecstatic.

Here are the gifts for the spoiled kid, not in any order:

A John Deere front loader from Uncle David to play in the DIRT!!!  It took him about 2.5 seconds to throw on his boots and hurry outside to break this new toy in.  He knew exactly where he wanted to play with it.  Since David had ordered this toy at Thanksgiving, and I'd been privy to knowing what it was, I'd suggested to Nate that we let Coop open this one at lunch time so he'd have time to play with it before going to bed.  That was such a good decision.  Coop ended up playing outside in the beautiful sunshine with his new JD tractor for 4 hours, pausing only for bathroom breaks and forced water breaks from Mom.  Needless to say, he was in John Deere, dirt heaven.

 So sad that this picture won't save my red-eye corrections. :(  Aunt Denise gave Cooper this handsome shirt.  But his FAVORITE outfit is his Patriots sweatpants and hoodie, which I have yet to capture on camera because it takes only a few seconds for him to get it all dirty while playing outside.  Maybe I'll just have to take one with mud all over him.  I know he loves the dirt, but I do love when he lets me dress him up a bit, and he looks so handsome. 

 Cooper had been BEGGING all week to open this colorful Christmas box from Grammie and Papa.

 He LOVED everything in it too!  He got right to work playing with the action figures.  He also loved reading the Christmas stories Grammie sent.  We have enough Christmas storybooks now that we can read about one a day leading up to Christmas, which is so fun!

 Nana and Grandpa sent some dapper clothes, perfect for church.

 Nana and Grandpa also sent this fun fire station/ Transformers set.  Cooper played with this for a few hours that night before we could convince him to go to bed.

 A few days earlier, Cooper opened this gift from Aunt Eileen and Uncle Peter--a Little People airport set.  He played and played, and told us those were HIS airplane and helicopter, NOT ours.  I also hosted/ taught preschool that week, and this was a big hit with the preschool kids as well.

 Not pictured are a dry erase board from Samantha and Elizabeth (2nd cousins), which he loves to tote around and draw on, and some Christmas books from them that they used to read as kids.  Winnie the Pooh is not a popular cartoon for Cooper, what with Curious George and Caiou, so he didn't know the characters in the books, and when I said, "Pooh," he giggled and giggled that I said poo, and then said that's a time-out word, unless I'm in the bathroom.  I had to try to explain the difference to him.  Ah, boys and their bathroom humor.

Also not pictured is a remote control dump truck from Uncle Tom and Aunt Delia, which he plays with constantly as well.  Time to clean out the "baby" toys and make room for these big boy things.

Lastly, Cooper gets a new Christmas ornament each year to add to the tree.  This year he got a John Deere tractor to go along with his mild obsession.  Our family ornament was a beach house from our vacation in September to Folley Beach, SC.  Cooper also made us several ornaments at school and such, and I helped him make one with his hand print on it, which we also gave away as gifts to grandparents.

May I also mention that Nate and I received a lot of wonderful, thoughtful gifts from family as well.  We also feel very spoiled, and thankful.  It's fun to receive a bit of Christmas from home, even when we're so far away.  Thank you to all of you who spent time and money sending things our way.  You are all so wonderful, and we love you, and wish we could spend every holiday with ALL of you!