Rudolph

I wish I had the video running for this one...
Colvin (singing): Rudolph the red nose reindeer had a very shiny nose, and if you ever saw it, you would even say it glows. All of the other reindeer, used to laugh and call him names.
(Stops singing) I wish I could be in that song.
Me: Why?
Colvin: Because then I could be friends with that reindeer and help him.

Oh melt.
Seriously this girl has the sweetest heart.

Sharis

Sent from my iPhone

Letter to Santa

Written by Ryan Cooley (completely independently)

Map for Santa

Illustrated by Ryan Cooley (age 5)

Top two

Lilly has four teeth now. Time is going by too fast.

Pure exhaustion

We had such a fun reunion with the Colvins in MO! Kids are tuckered out.

Rag-a-muffins

An hour from the ozarks and things are going well!

Lilly's first tooth

Lilly's first tooth popped through on Ryan's birthday. Right bottom front. No sign of any others yet. It always makes me sad to loose that gummy smile.

Also, she is really getting around now. She has been army crawling for a few weeks and is up rocking on all fours-sure to be crawling soon! Watch out Lego dudes, you look yummy.

Sent from my iPhone

Half birthday

Happy 6 months Lilly girl! You are so very loved.

Monkey bars!

We went to the splash pad today...it was HOT! But this is definitely the highlight of our day. Yay ry!! He was so proud of himself he just kept doing it and tries out 3 other sets at this park!

Happy 4th

Making treats for the 4th

Jet vs. All

Ryan has matured away from lining his cars up and is full-on into battle scenes. Here the jet is taking on many of his other toys. Flying solo.

Face off

Lilly figures she can take this guy after she made it through the ones she saw yesterday at the zoo.

5 hours at the zoo today!

We headed out to the MN zoo to check out the Dino exhibit. Ryan was not disappointed! Went through 3 times and then hit up the dolphin show after. An exhausting but fun day. Poor Lilly was wiped.

Ryan does butterfly stroke

Colvin swimming

Ryan swimming

What form!

Hot mess

Diva baseball at its best.

Big eyes or small head?

You be the judge. One thing is for sure...she has ry ry's eyebrows.

Farm trip

Headed north for strawberry picking!

Nature packs

Westwood hills nature center has packs that you can borrow for a week and they are filled with information on different subjects. Our most recent pack was "mammals". Ryan is very interested in bats and raccoons right now so this was perfect for him. We had fun with the pack and found new creative ways to use it that weren't suggested by the folks at the nature center. CPS please don't judge.

We might get a total of one pint all season

Raspberries

The kids are in love w our little garden and check it every day for potential harvest. We are in the midst of raspberry season now.

Nothing but love

Very badly.

Note to self...

Any opportunity you may think you have during the day to get something done is only going to end badly...

Twins Game

The older kids are going to the Twins vs. Cubs game today. Lilly dug
out Colvin's old Cubs garb and threw it on. There is a bit of tension
in the house.

-Dan

This baby could not be any happier!

Lilly loves playing soccer!  Sorry it's a little hard to hear.  Hope you can catch some of her laughter. :)

Funny

Lilly tries to put Dan's carrot in her mouth and then laughs because we are all laughing at her.  Such a happy baby.

Lilly has the same sense of humor as her brother apparently

Laughing

Sorry this is so jumpy.  She was in the swing and I had to get my face close for her to react so it was hard to hold the phone still.  Hope you can enjoy the sweet sound of baby laughter nonetheless.

Lilly's new trick

Laminating

What do you think these guys are doing? According to Ryan, they are
laminating. What does that mean Ryan? It means they are looking for
bombs.

Huh. I didn't know that.

-Dan

Should we be concerned?

Colvin taught herself a German song

She loves this song that she learned from an animal app on the iPad.

Love

Not sure if Lilly could be loved more by Colvin. She tells me all the time how much she loves her and gives her kisses. She tells me she wants to keep her. :)

My antisocial kids

Colvin's Birthday

Happy 3rd Birthday to Colvin (a little late). For her party, some of
the guests wore tutu's - including Uncle T.

Coopie

Colvin and her buddy whom she affectionately named Coopie.

Sweet Lilly

Lilly is such a good baby. We had some issues for the first 2 months
but ever since we started the sleep training (and she learned how to
find a finger or thumb), she has been a dream. She puts herself to
sleep when you put her down - that is when she is allowed to nap
somewhere between the busy schedules of the older kids. The older
kids adore her and she can stay happy for a long while if the kids are
around making noise. We are so blessed.

-Dan

Sprinkler day

It got up to 90 today so we pulled out the sprinkler for the fist time this season.

Sweetest pea

I could just eat those cheeks

Running Woman

This is how we found Lilly tonight before we went to sleep (please
ignore the fact that she is fully dressed and still has her shoes on;
we thought she would wake up one more time when we put her down at
5:30 but she never did). She has been rolling onto her back lately
but then she can't get back onto her stomach again. She isn't quite
strong enough yet.

She has been sucking her thumb and/or finger and it is hard for her to
suck them on her back since they fall out once she starts to fall
asleep. She has woken up in the middle of the night for the past week
because of this but is finally starting to put herself back to sleep
now. Oh how we cherish those full nights of sleep.

Poor man's pjs

Lilly inherited one of colvin's outfits and wore a hole right through the foot. Her little toe poking through is the cutest! Rarely is this done in our family to a 3 month old outfit! Glad we got our money's worth :)

After

Lilly got a hair cut. Dan and I just couldn't stand her rat tail any longer.

Before

The end result #2

Colvin loved playing in the mud (she told us many times). I love that I was able to hose them off outside. Dirt has been stressing me out lately as we get ready for a showing on Monday.

The end result #1

Wearing mud "gloves" and crocs just unrecognizable. Should have got a picture of the back. That was worse.

Story time

Story time is a little more crowded these days. Berenstain Bears is
always a favorite.

C and Ry make a mess while I make lunch

Love

Ryan's organization project

We are having a woman come here Wednesday to help us organize our home. Looks like we should just ask our son to do it! He is very proud.

Lots to say

Easter bunny snack at grandma's

Precarious position

Lilly about to take her first flight

I don't think she's as scared as she looks :)

Off to grandma and pop's

On Easter for a whole week! This is the way to go-airport is empty!!

Lego Land

Who would have thought we would be at the Commerce Center of the
United States (Mall of America) on Good Friday? My grandmother is
rolling over in her grave.

Ryan put his goggles on Lilly

The first of much torture ahead for her I'm sure.

Spring break fun at the moa

Bruises from learning to ride a bike well

Hand-me-downs

I was going through colvin's old clothes to see what to pull out for Lilly now (who is growing like a weed and in 3-6 month clothes!). Colvin wanted to try this hoodie in Lilly. Such a sweet little mommy.

Lilly's spot

She sits in colvin's bean bag while we all do our morning thing.

Lilly wasn't really diggin' this

Colvin's first self portrait

Legs, arms and face. You have to envision the body yourself. Very abstract.

Off with the Training Wheels

This weekend it was gorgeous out so we decided to try and take off Ryan's training wheels.  I was inside watching the end of one of the March Madness games.  Sharis was antsy so she took the kids out to get started.  The tools were out and the training wheels off in about 2 minutes.  So Sharis tried to make a couple runs before I got out there - figuring it would be a while before he actually did it on his own.  Well, next thing I know, I looked out the window and he is riding his bike on his own.  I missed it.  He did it on the first try.

Here are some videos.

The first video is his 2nd attempt ever without training wheels:

The 2nd video is of him crashing into the curb.  You can hear him saying "Ow, Ow, Ow" during his ride because he knows he is going to crash.  At the end of the video you can kind of hear him say "I didn't even get hurt."   He was hurt a couple of times throughout the day and now he is a little weary to do it on his own.

Bulla constripter

Ryan is into snakes right now. We were at the nature center yesterday and he held a gardener snake that some other older kids caught in the woods. This morning he wanted Dan to draw him a picture of a boa constrictor squeezing an alligator. He says, "bulla constriptor" and it cracks me up.

Sent from my iPhone

Happy girl

Sleeping beauty

This rock star of a girl is two months old today and she has slept for 10 hours the past 2 nights! Yay lil!!

She is smiling and laughing now too. She's more aware and LOVES her big brother and sister almost as much as they love her. So sweet to see all three of them together. I love it when she coos at me telling me about her day.

She has taken a bottle the past three nights as Dan and I have been out cheering Benilde on. Hopefully she will continue to take bottles...we never were able to get Colvin interested in them.

Happy baby

Laughing at what? Gas?

Keep this image

There have been quite a few moments during the lives of my children that I haven't been able to document with a photo or video but that I've tried to capture in my mind and keep preserved just as I experienced them. Unfortunately, I always fail to remember exactly every detail of the moment as I had hoped. They come often when my babies are small because I love rocking, smelling, kissing and snuggling them. So I have been trying to hold on to this time with Lilly. Today there was also a two hour period with Ryan and Colvin. I know I seems odd that I wouldn't be able to document an image of a 2 hour period, but I couldn't interrupt for fear it would ruin what they had going. I let them play outside for the first time "alone" today. I watched from the window while they laughed and made up games together int he snow. They took turns pushing each other on the sled down the "hill" in our front yard. They pretended to be snow plows (their heads were the plows). They dug and built forts. They had snowball fights. I love what good buddies they are. I hope I never forget the love that I witnessed and felt today.

Sent from my iPhone

Colvin's first dentist appt

She did great! The kids get to watch PBS at the dentist so it's questionable whether or not they actually know where they are.