17 Months

It is hard to believe Cooper is 17 months old today. I am also way behind on blog posting and decided I better write one today. We had crazy weather this week, with snow on Monday followed by a high of 74 on Thursday. There was not that much snow to play in and it melted quickly, so there are no snow pictures. We did show Cooper the remaining snow out the window when he woke up and he said a typical  "oooh." I am thankful for some warmer weather where we can go outside and play. Cooper loves going outside and will point and say "out" to ask to go play. He loves to play with plastic cups, coasters, and bowls that he can stack. Cooper is wearing dada's shoes in this picture taken near Valentine's day. Cooper is talking more and repeating much of what we say. He is very good at saying "thank you" when we hand him things. Other favorite words are: dog, shoe, sock, ball, and Elmo.  He is getting really good at climbing into chairs now as well. Cooper can make several animal noises now, but his cat "meow" is the funniest.
We are all doing well now after passing on colds to each other for a few weeks and we are excited for spring and warmer weather! The Smiths are from Georgia and do not like the cold very much!

Almost 15 months

Since Cooper was 14 months around Thanksgiving, I did not get a blog update for that month. So I will just combine November and December updates this time. We had a great Thanksgiving with my family and are excited to see both families for Cooper's 2nd Christmas. I think Cooper's favorite thing about Thanksgiving were his Grandaddy's dogs. He loved them and kept going to the window where he could see them.This Christmas is going to be different from last year with a walker on our hands.We put up our tree and had to put all the nicer ornaments on the top of the tree since Cooper likes to play with them. He also likes to eat our baby Jesus from our nativity set. Cooper is saying new words everyday. This is a lot of fun. Yesterday he said "sock" and today said something like "tree." He will also tell us he loves us every once in a while, which is super sweet. You all can pray for safe travels as we make our way through GA to see everyone with an active 14 month old. We are thankful we are getting a DVD player and some new DVDs for Christmas...so this should help! His favorite thing to watch is Elmo and anything with animals, especially dogs. Hope everyone has a Merry Christmas. Once I pic a photo for cards, I will try to post it!

October-13 months

Happy Halloween from Cooper. Our little puppy dog had a great time even though it was cold, rainy, and we just stayed in and handed out candy.  Cooper has been getting over a cold and is finally feeling better. So we did not want to take him out in the cold weather. Then he passed on his cold to dada. Kyle is now feeling bad today. I can't wait until we all get well.

This month we have made a trip to the NC State fair, which Cooper loved seeing all the animals there. I think the turkey was his favorite.  Kyle enjoyed all the food and ate a giant turkey leg and some fried oreos.  We have enjoyed getting outside and playing on some of the warmer afternoons. Cooper is definitely into everything and is now running around. We are excited to have Kyle's family come and visit us soon and then to go see my side of the family for Thanksgiving in a few weeks!

Thank you card for all the Birthday goodies!

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One Year Old

As I am writing this, I now have a one year old. It is so hard to believe how fast a year goes by and how much a child grows his first year.  We had Cooper's first birthday party this Saturday. It was a great success and we were glad most of our family were able to come celebrate with us. Cooper is now walking. He probably started 2 weeks ago. He is now officially into everything and is so excited to explore. He now has enjoyed spending more time outside now that he can walk around more. He also is eating regular food. This is nice that we can all have meals together. I also started giving him whole milk in a straw sippy cup, which he loves. He really put on a show for our guests this weekend by showing them all his tricks. He would do them all in order for them: Clap his hands, point his finger for I am 1, raise his hands in "yeah" position, blow kisses and wave. They of course loved this and Cooper loved all the attention.
It was a great birthday and then 3 days later, was my birthday. I also had a great day where I got to go our to lunch and Kyle kept Cooper for me to go the store (I know, who thought I would be so excited about going to the store by myself). We are having a friend watch Cooper this weekend so we can go the the Cheesecake Factory to really celebrate...yum.

11 months

Sorry this post is a little late. We lost power with Irene, so I am just now getting to updating the blog. Cooper is now 11 months old and is now doing all sorts of things. He has taken steps. He just takes one at a time and then realizes he is walking and usually sits down. Cooper likes to play "peek-a-boo" and what we call "ring around the ottoman" with Kyle. A game where Kyle chases Cooper around the ottoman. Cooper loves this and laughs and walks very fast while holding onto the ottoman. He also loves to play with water bottles and remote controls. He likes to take things apart like his gate by unscrewing the bolt and  undoing his car seat buckle. He definitely has a mechanical mind. We bought him a tool bench for his birthday.
He also loves to roll balls, clank them together, walk behind his dino toy, and drum on anything with his hands.

In other news, Cooper is eating all kinds of things and likes just about everything. He loves mandarin oranges, black beans, apple sauce, chicken, and tried cucumber recently and also liked it.  He has a bad habit of rubbing his dirty hands in his hair when he thinks he is finished. This leads to bath time immediately.

Cooper is talking more and has said "dog" and has repeated things we say in babbles. Today we thought he said "I love you" back to Kyle!

We are gearing up for the first birthday party and are excited about seeing family traveling for the big day! Cooper is keeping us busy, but he is a lot of fun. We are thankful we did not get that much rain or damage from Irene. We just had the inconvenience of loosing power for 36 hours. I had to throw away much of the food from the refrigerator and restocked at the grocery store today. I am thankful this is all we had to deal with and are praying for others who have much more damage.

10 months

I can't believe it has been a month since I last posted, and ohh what a difference a month makes! Cooper is now crawling and into everything! We have baby proofed as much as we can and then I bought gates this week, which should arrive today. I will be putting those up ASAP. Cooper is saying more these days. He has learned "no," he shakes his head when he says it and sometimes stops doing the thing he is not supposed to be doing. He also said "bag," since he loves anything crinkly. He is also giving high 5s on a regular basis and waving and saying "bye."

As for the rest of us, we enjoyed a Church Staff Retreat at the beach this month, which was a blast and a good time of fun with some of our favorite people. We had a good 4th of July and enjoyed hanging out with neighbors for a cookout. This weekend we have our church planting friends from Vermont visiting and we are excited to see the Conyers and thier kids. Then our church takes a trip up to see them!