Pool Day

Cole and I were lucky enough to join some friends at the pool on Thursday. Cole loves the water! Because it's been so hot, there wasn't even a chill to the water temperature for him to get used to. I could have had it a little cooler than it was but I won't complain. I usually hate getting into the pool and adjusting to the cooler temperature. We stayed about an hour and had a great time! Cole was exhausted afterwards and fell asleep like a rock.

Here he is with his cool baby sunglasses (UV 400%). Even with 50SPF sunscreen with titanium dioxide (complete sunblock) my little man still got a bit of a tan on his arms. I wonder what would have happened if I hadn't used such a strong block?!

Elvis is Alive!

Saturday was customer appreciation day at my mother's store. They had giveaways and goodies but the coolest part was they had Elvis perform! He was really great. I could have listened to him a lot longer. I am not even a huge Elvis fan! The singer is actually a family friend who does this for a living. So fun!


Cole seemed to enjoy listening and watching him too. Then again, Cole was also extremely distracted by the plant beside him.

Then he saw Grandpa's water bottle and that's all he wanted. He's so funny in that Cole loves to try to do whatever he sees you do. He sees me drink from a straw and he wants to try. He'll put it in his mouth but that's about it. So the same goes for us drinking from any cup or water bottle. I should start drinking from his sippy cup then maybe he'd show more interest!


This is a picture this morning before church. I wet his hair down so it would actually lay flat and then hairsprayed it. I know you can't really see his hair in the pic but he looked so cute chewing on his church shoes!


Today was special because Cannon was blessed today in church. It was beautiful. It's fun to have family come to church with us that normally attend other buildings closer to their home. Cole sat with Uncle Robert and Aunt Beverly most of Sacrament Meeting. He was so patient as Jade and T passed him back and forth and back and forth!

And finally, a special Happy Father's Day to Dads and Granddads out there!

Sunny Days and Tasty Crackers

Cole and I have been going for walks almost everyday. We've done this really since he's been born. Well, now it's hot, really HOT. It's actually unusually hot even for Austin in June. We were going in the evenings to avoid the heat but I finally realized that at 6 or 7pm, it's still just too hot and too sunny. Cole's little face gets SO red from the heat, but he doesn't complain. Sometimes, when I get him out of the stroller he is a big ball of sweat. So we've switched to morning walks and it seems to have helped a little. The sun doesn't get steaming until about noon so we go sometime before that. These pics were taken about 20 minutes after we got back. His cheeks are still so red and his lips and chin are wet still from him trying to drink water from his sippy cup (he doesn't quite have the hang of it). But he was extremely happy and didn't seem to mind the heat at all. Such a great kid!

I promised a video of Cole eating his crackers. He really loves them. I like that they don't make a crumbly mess and they are relatively clean. His hands get a little sticky, but that's to be expected. They are basically really refined rice cakes.

Cole has started to pull himself up and thinks he's so cool after doing it. He'll look at you with this big grin. It makes me laugh because he tries to do it all with his legs instead of using any upper body strength so he's wobbly. He still prefers to use mom's hands as his stability bar but I'm working on getting him to realize he can hold on to other things as well.

He's also become quite clingy to me (yes, even more so) lately. He doesn't even want me to put him in the high chair to feed him. He will refuse to bend his legs. There are times when I can convince him, but I'm a softy and just resort to holding him to feed him the cereal and baby food. I'll admit, even though at first it was a little frustrating, it's become quite endearing to see him clawing at my shirt and squeezing my neck begging me not to put him down. Thus far, it's only during mealtimes or when he's tired so he still plays on the floor and such by himself. Thank goodness for that!

Popsicles

Rick loves those cheap little popsicles in the plastic that you push up to eat. Well, Cole has watched him eat them and decided he HAD to have some. Rick thought it would be too cold for him to eat, but Cole seemed to enjoy it!

He's also started eating baby crackers. He LOVES those. I think he just mostly enjoys the fact that he can hold something and actually eat it too. He's eating more baby food and his favorites seem to be butternut squash and sweet potatoes. I think he eats those even when he isn't hungry.

On a regular day, Cole still takes three naps. Most moms look at me like I'm crazy, but it's true. It really all depends on when he wakes up from the second nap if he'll have a third. The third is only 30-45 minutes but it puts him in bright spirits again and has no impact on his bedtime either. Although I have been trying to push bedtime back to 7:30 or 8:00pm instead of 6:30 or 7:00pm. We're down to one wake up at night sometime between 3:30 and 5:00am. He's a little over 18 pounds now and is definitely trying to make all the sounds he can. He has this new "clicking" with his tongue he's started the past two days. He gets happy when he does it so I'm sure he thinks he's so cool. I'll try to get that on video as well as his little hand trick. I thought he was finally signing back to me but he isn't. He's just playing with his fingers. He lifts his forefinger up and wraps the other fingers around his thumb. Pulls out the thumb and then rubs the thumb down the fingers. Odd to explain and even odder to see a baby doing it.

A Few Weeks Highlights

One of my favorite things to do is watch Cole play. He seems to study each toy and carefully decide which one to play with and makes his way to playing with each of them. I really want to know what is going on in that little mind of his! We definitely have a thinker on our hands.

He really enjoys his "cellphone" but one of his favorites is not a toy at all but the remote (not any, but the one he last saw you use). He also really, REALLY enjoys brushing his teeth. Dad's toothbrush is his first pick (An electric one with a really small head.)

Cole and I went swimming a couple of weeks ago. He loved the pool as soon as he got accustomed to the water temperature. Here's a pic of after. Sorry, there wasn't anyone else with us to get a during picture.

I recently purchased these vintage overalls for my little man thinking they would last until he was a year. Sadly, they barely fit now. :-(

Jade, Cole and Jeremiah at the store on one of our errands. Cole wasn't too thrilled about being in the umbrella stroller. He definitely prefers to see who is strolling him around.

"T" thought he was SO COOL!

Jade wanted to hold Cole so badly, so while in Macy's we went up to the furniture section so she could play mom. It was so cute!

I've decided the only word I can think of for what Cole looks like now is cherubic. Just look at those big eyes and puffy rosy cheeks!

Absorbed...

Sorry about the lapse in posting. You can blame it all on Rick really. He left last weekend to attend a wedding in Utah and returned with a book in hand for me to read. I had already warned him multiple times that I had to be READY to read. I already know that I just drop everything and become totally irresponsible and do nothing until the book is finished. I hesitated to start it knowing that is probably what would happen again but Tuesday I started it and...Tuesday I finished it and then Wednesday sort of re-read it again (the parts I liked) and Thursday got another book and Friday...and another today... Rick mockingly asked me last night, "Are you feeding my son? Are you changing his diapers?" Of course I am! I actually have been having a ball with Cole. We even spent time with my niece and nephew this week. Then he asked, "Are YOU eating?" Um, yes and no. I don't really get hungry when I'm reading. But I am also an extremely fast reader. I also have been skipping naps, not working out and I've been staying up late. So by today I'm feeling pretty beat but the reading will be over this week and that's usually how it goes. I'm like a bulemic reader. I binge read and then don't read for months or even years to make up for the total waste of a week or two of life. Silly, I know. But that is the reason for not posting for a week or so.

However, like I said, I didn't slack on the "mom" part of life. Promise. Cole actually developed a new habit in the process...he now rolls ALL OVER the floor and it keeps him completely happy. He loves this new sort of freedom. When I put him on the floor he keeps his knees tucked in so that he's on all fours until he decides he can't really go anywhere like that...yet. He'll kind of rock there for a minute sometimes. So the crawling may come soon, or may not. He also LOVES to stand up holding onto the ottoman. He thinks he's SO BIG.

Today I put him in his excersaucer again and usually when he pushes the buttons that make animal noises I'll say them too. Well, today he thought me making the doggie bark was SO funny. We laughed and laughed together and then I thought "OH! I'd better get this on video." Having laughed a lot about it already the video is sort of weak but you get the picture.

I picked up Jade and Jeremiah from school on Wednesday and we ran errands. They are SO CUTE with Cole. Jade is so motherly which actually shocks me. She is ultra attentive to him and tries to soothe him when he's upset. Jeremiah just keeps asking why he is whining. They both got a kick out of watching him roll over and I thought their eyes were going to pop out when they heard him "talk" as they said (You know, the momma, dadda, baba thing.) Jeremiah kept saying, "Oh, I wish he would say "googoo gaga". It took quite a bit of explaining to get him to see that Cole probably would NEVER say that and most babies don't. He was so disappointed. We played with Jade and Jeremiah on Friday too. They couldn't be prouder of their cousin. When I picked them up from the Gym Child Care center they were shouting to everyone, "HEY! This is my cousin!! His name is Cole!!" It was so cute. As we ran more errands, they each took turns sitting next to him in the back seat. It was so much fun to watch them kiss him and tell Cole they love him.

I'll post some pics soon.