Easter Weekend

We gad a great weekend. Saturday I had a band festival in Silverton and Sharon and Cooper came with. I played in the late morning so we had the afternoon to play! We brought our bikes and found a great park in the downtown area. Cooper wanted to play at the park for awhile, then we all biked for about 10 minutes, then we played at the park more. It was so nice outside and great to play with Mama.

Sunday we did the egg hunt and Easter basket at our house in the morning. Sharon had a coffee date and then did more bathroom work. I was happy the library was open and I picked up two plants from a local garden store that I requested last season. We had Easter dinner with the usual clan at Grandma Lindsay's. There was another egg hunt with more gifts for Cooper. Dinner was awesome: hamburgers and German spicy brats!

End of the Easter Egg Hunt

All the Easter eggs are found and Cooper is enjoying his treasures.

Easter

Cooper's Easter Egg Hunt. It began with many stops and starts for potty breaks. This is the longest video finding his eggs.

More Black Butte Pictures

More pictures from our trip last week.

Cooper and Mama in the pool.







Cooper and Erin on a big rock.

Back to Preschool

Cooper had three weeks off from the Preschool Adventure class for spring break and resumed yesterday. We changed the day to Wednesdays so he and Emory could attend together. They had a great time in class, Miss Brooke said they held hands the entire time (2 hours)! Libby and I took the boys on the bus to get there in the morning and after class we took a bus/train adventure to Target and Learning Palace (the boys' favorite two places to go on the Max). They were pretty tired just from preschool so the afternoon adventure totally wiped them out. Cooper was asleep by 7:30 p.m. last night.

Balance beam on the way to toy store.



Backpack boys

Outdoor Day

We are getting lots of Vitamin D today with the yellow orb in the sky. Soaking it up because rain is once again in the forecast. I did yardwork yesterday in the backyard and today tackled the front. I also surprised Sharon and took the cover off the trailer to get ready for our upcoming camping trip in May.
Cooper found some worms, played in the water, and waved to all the neighbors driving by.

Sledding

We had a great week at Black Butte Ranch with our friends Erin and Maria and their two boys, Teo and Ciaran. Cooper and Teo played really well together. They enjoyed playing trains and race cars together every morning. They played Zingo and some matching games and also enjoyed taking out the pieces to some of the adult board games. They rode their Skuut bikes on the bike trails a few times, played at the park and went to the pool. We hot tubbed every morning, relaxed, visited the closest town Sisters, and played games at night when the kids were asleep.
It snowed the second day we were there so we hit the golf course to go sledding. Cooper and Teo loved it. There was also a snowball fight and some running in snow.

Great company and a great trip.

Pretend Play

Today was a great day and filled with pretend play. Cooper's friend Emory came over this morning for a few hours and while I was cooking breakfast they were playing train in a cardboard box. Cooper got out all his hats from his dress-up basket and was wearing his train conductor hat and sitting on the windowsill. Emory was patiently waiting for his turn with the conductor hat so I took out some more and Cooper decided to be a cowboy with a tool belt. He then started working on the train, which Emory did not like. Cooper set to work, called the train a construction zone. Told Emory that he better cover his eyes so the dust doesn't get in them. It was really cute and sweet. I took a couple of videos and a bunch of pictures.

This afternoon I watched Ciaran and Teo while Erin went to a hair appointment and Teo and Cooper had some great pretend play outside. They were chasing each other around on their Skuut bikes for a long time and then decided to play house. They each had a house across the driveway and visited each other. Then Cooper would say he was going to the store and pretend to call Teo to ask if he needed anything. They each took turns going to the store and calling each other with their shopping list. They played outside for about an hour, it was so nice and warm. It finally feels like spring may be in sight!

Outdoors and Saturday

I met Erin and the boys for a hike at Lacamas Lake in Camas, WA Friday afternoon. It was a great idea and did the kids a world of good. They had fun walking in the forest, Cooper rode his bike most of the way. They also spent a good chunk of the time throwing rocks in the lake. There was a playground to romp around at after our long hike. Riley enjoyed being outside and frolicking through the forest too.

This morning I had some alone time while Sharon and Cooper did some Mama stuff. I enjoyed Ikea solo and ran some other errands before heading to a chiropractor appointment to adjust my bum. The adjustment was great, one of my hips was stuck from working out last week. It still hurts but at least I know why and what to do about it. I also checked out Fubon Asian Market.

This afternoon, Cooper and I met our friends at the Better Living Show at the Expo Center. We took the Max train there and spent about an hour sampling foods, checking out cars, doing a little craft and milling about. I think I am turning into a person who doesn't like crowds. Cooper was great and stayed near me the whole time, whew. I walked in and freaked thinking he would take off. He pushed his stroller for a little bit but kept running into people. And it was hard to get the free snacks with Cooper in the stroller because of the crowds of people flocking to food.

After the fun-filled hour at the Expo Center, Cooper and I met Sharon and Dory at Fire Station 19, by our house for their 100th Anniversary Celebration. It was great, we toured the station, talked to lots of firefighters and Cooper played on the original Station 19 fire truck that they now use in parades. He had a blast pretending to be a firefighter, putting out fires and having Mama and I sit next to him in the truck. I am glad we made it there because he loves that fire station.

Tomorrow I am going to take Cooper to A Rat's Tale at Play after Play. I read a review of this theater in PDX Kids Calendar review .  The theater has two parts, a story performance for young audiences. Then the kids are invited to play with the performers. I am excited to check it out.  


In bathroom news, the plumbing to the sewer is hooked up. It was a big weekend in plumbing, I need to take pictures tomorrow.

Weekly Wrap-Up

This week was busy and lonely. Sharon was gone from Monday-Thursday for work. Cooper did not appreciate Mama being out of town. We incorporated some evening outings to help with the long days. We celebrated a friend's birthday on Tuesday evening, Wednesday we went to the gym and then invited ourselves to Uncle Susan and Kerry's house for dinner. They were very accommodating, made me salad and a gardenburger. Cooper played with their kitten, Edith for a good hour. He made a fort out of the couch cushions and he and the kitty hid in it.
I watched Larkin M,T and Th this week. On Thursday the kids had a busy day. We went to the gym in the morning, then played in a Vancouver Library and finally, preschool. Cooper's teacher invited me to leave Larkin for preschool as she was having fun in the gym with the other kids. When I picked them up at 4, Larkin was exhausted, she almost fell asleep in her arms at the end of class. Cooper was excited that Larkin stayed for preschool, they had a great time. Here they are in shamrock hats for St. Patrick's Day.

One final thing happened this week, we accepted a position in the Tillamook Cooperative Preschool for the two day class this fall!!! I am very excited, I visited the school this week because we didn't attend the open house. I love the school, it's two miles from our house and it is a mixed age classroom. Kids are 2.75-5 years in all classes. It is a play-based preschool, as most the co-ops we looked at are. I am glad the process is over.
Happy Weekend!

Outdoor Time

I can feel spring in the air. Cooper is wanting to go outside more and more, yeah! We spent a good chunk outside this afternoon playing in the sandbox, tag, basketball, fetch with Riley, digging for worms, minor weeding in the garden, and playing with water. I let Cooper play outside by himself (with Riley) for short spurts of time and he does really well.

Weekend

This weekend was rainy, rainy, rainy. Sharon and Dory had a productive time cutting some of the ceiling and planning the plumbing. There is a lot of work and processing that goes into an addition, especially with an old house. There were some techical issues they had to sort out and a trip to Home Depot was in there too.
Janet came over Saturday morning to play with Cooper while I went to yoga and Sharon did some cleaning upstairs. The rest of the day involved a lot of indoor playing with Cooper. We did get outside during a sun break, we took Riley out and ran up and down the hill a few times. Then we ended with a stroll around our horseshoe street.
Susan and Kerry brought over taco fixings and we made tacos for dinner with tattoos for dessert. Cooper loved putting tattoos on everyone and then decided he wanted a couple too, "I want a shark like Mama." He heard Sharon jokingly ask if it would hurt and he said, "Mama is it going to hurt?" Here are some pictures of Cooper and Mama with the tats and one with Dory.

Sunday we enjoyed a leisure morning at home. We met Grandma Lindsay for lunch at her house. She's been out of town for a month so we spent a few hours catching up and playing with Cooper. After Grandma's we took Cooper to get a haircut at Little Clippers. He loves his hair cutting place, he asks for haircuts all the time. Sharon had hers cut this morning so Cooper wanted to get his cut too. He sat in the motorcycle today and watched a fire truck show.

Sharon leaves for Texas tomorrow at the crack of dawn and is gone for four days. We had a great family day/evening and hope to get some Skype time in while she is gone.

Words and Noises

Cooper is trying out new words lately. He loves to say poo and poopy, especially around his friends Emory and Larkin. He goes in spurts of using it and I go in spurts of ignoring it or telling him to stop saying it. He also is trying out many cuss words. He said "shit" the other day when our friends Susan and Kerry were over. Kerry was playing trains with Cooper and one of the tracks fell to which he said "oh shit." Correct context, Kerry couldn't believe he said it. He says some words that sound questionable and I mainly ignore when he says those. Sometimes I will tell him not to say a word and he will ask me if a different word is ok.  My favorite one right now is "shut down" for "shut up". He will say, "Mommy shut it down." I think this one is hilarious and try hard not to laugh.

He is getting frustrated with his trains a lot lately and I will hear grunts or him saying "oh gosh" or screaming from his bedroom. He is having some strong feelings these days with a lot of emotion. I don't know if it is developmental or something he is trying to process. I have been giving him lots of loves when he has a major fit and it is very calming to him.

He asks to help with all tasks. He is a great helper feeding Riley and helping me cook. He likes to help with laundry and throwing our clothes down the laundry shute. He loves to help Mama, especially with the bathroom construction. Many times we will phrase things that he doesn't want to do as helping Mama or Mommy. He is much more likely to do it if he sees it as a task or a job.

Box Fun

Here are some of Cooper's recent pictures.

We had a major box delivery on Monday when our upstairs sink arrived.  The kids had a blast drawing on the boxes and and playing inside them.  Some of the packaging material came out in one box and the kids loved playing with the little styrofoam balls.

Sun

We took advantage of the sun today and went to the park with Erin, Teo and Ciaran.






They were making a train on the slide and crashing into each other. Cooper and Teo rode their bikes to and from the park. We also brought Riley and Kobe our doggies.

Saturday Happenings

While Sharon and Dory continued to work on the bathroom, Cooper and I put together a greenhouse for our vegetable garden.  The greenhouse was a good exercise in the alphabet.  All the pieces were labeled with a letter from the alphabet so I would ask him to get me a "C" or "A" and he would. He was a great helper. He tired of it and was cold after awhile so he went back inside to play upstairs near Mama and Dory.

The greenhouse is awesome. There is one slight problem with the zipper on one side, I may exchange the cover if I continue to have problems with the zipper. It was labor intensive to put together and took me at least an hour if not two. I planted some starts today and mint that I was rooting. We had a tree planted by Friends of Trees in the front yard and it motivated me to get outside, pick up dog poo, play with Cooper and plant! Yay for Spring.

Bathroom Framing

We started the bathroom framing this weekend with the help of our good friend Dory.  Sharon and Dory worked on it Saturday and took a day of rest on Sunday.  This is the framing, it is hard to get a good picture because of the angle of the bathroom and all the tools that are up there.  This will soon be drywall!

We ordered our sink and faucet online and special ordered the shower floor at Home Depot this weekend too.  We ordered a pedestal sink with towel holders on the side and a cool faucet from Vigo Industries.  Sharon is going to tile the surround of the shower so we bought only the shower floor. 

Pedestal sink

Vigo faucet

Preschool Madness

Wow, this preschool thing is crazy. This past month we have attended 3 open houses and submitted 5 applications for cooperative preschools in Portland. Cooperative preschools are run by parents, they offer lower tuition and as a parent you help in the classroom and participate on the board or other position. In Portland almost all the schools choose applicants by lottery, drawing a name out of a hat. There are generally 15 kids in each class and the amount available depends on alumni or siblings of previously enrolled children.  There is one preschool that has 14 spots available for new students and the others range from 6-10 spots.  We received one letter that has Cooper on a wait list, #12 of boys. This school was my number one pick for many reasons plus the perks of close proximity to our house and the attached coffeehouse. 
Saturday we skipped yoga and used our couple time to go to the last two open houses of the month.  It was nice to go without Cooper because we were able to engage with the parents and teacher without him interrupting or wanting our attention. We asked a lot more questions and get a good feel for each teacher and atmosphere.
This whole process has produced anxiety in me, I am waking up anxious before the open houses, I remain anxious up to the deadline of the applications and then I got anxious when we got the first letter. For me this is simply because I have no control over this process and it is driving my control freak nature crazy. As my mate says, "worry is your ego's way of giving yourself a false sense of control."  Gotta love her, she is my balance and reason. I just want the process to be over and for us to know which school he is going to. All the co-ops that we visited are great and have the same concepts. Any one of them will be perfect for Cooper, I just want some say in it and I guess I will have that once all the letters go out. One teacher explained it well when she said that every year there is a fruit basket upset in the summer. I can see how even as #12 we have a chance at that school as the other lotteries are done and familiesnpick favorites.
For now, Sharon and I have the same favorite school and it changed from the one that is closest to our home. I will be glad when this process is over and we have a two year break before the dreaded Kindergarten round-ups start. That is another process that is going to produce anxiety for a whole host of reasons.

Goodwill Finds

I love going to Goodwill when I find cool stuff.  I haven't been in a while so I took Cooper and Larkin there last Friday after a playdate with Erin.  I had a list: jeans for me, basement shoes, washcloths, and games for Cooper.  The trip was a success, I found one sure pair of jeans for me, I found some flip flops for the basement, I forgot about the washcloths.  Cooper found a cool Tonka dump truck that has a guy on the front with two arms.  One arm for scooping and one for grabbing, he loves it and played with it in the store while I shopped for jeans.  I found two puzzles for $.99, Larkin found a pink wand and I also picked up a VTech laptop computer for $7.99 for Cooper.  The computer is a big hit, it works great, and he likes that he has one like Mommy and Mama.  So far he plays a letter game on it and enjoys turning it on and off.

In the sink