First Week of August

This week literally flew by, as they all do.
It was a good week, but it went by way too fast in my opinion.

Here is what we were up to:


First off, the kiddos took lot's of naps to recover from our busy weekend.

I love this picture, as it captures Madilyn's ratty old blanket just perfectly. This ratty old blanket is "snuggle"...or what's left of it. And "he" makes everything better. So we think we will keep him around.

naptime is crucial in our lives, especially after a few late nights over the weekend.....this is what our little lady looks like beforehand.

She is just too cute with her snuggle and sucking her thumb. (and yes, we realize we might have major dental bills someday) but I decided a long time ago (like when she first started sucking her thumb at 3 months old) that it is worth it...she is so content when it comes to bedtime.

She is so grown up in so many ways, but when I look at her like this, I still see my tiny little cooperative, sweet, baby that she once was.

All of the crazyness of her *almost* 3-year-old self melts away...at least for a couple of moments ;)

The last few weeks have been a challenge with this child...potty training (which she just doesn't want to do so much) paired with her complaining and whining about pretty much everything gets pretty tiring----so I will take those few moments of her sweetness :)

and this is what our little man looks like when he gets up from a rest. So completely adorable...eyes squinty and a little confused...I call this the "mole face" and everyone in our house has one. I think it is the cutest.

This is a desperate face.

But, that adorable face doesn't last long...hunger has set in and it isn't pretty....must eat/drink NOW

Oh yeah, just what I needed :) All better now.

we do A LOT of this around here. Cowen loves to throw most of his food "overboard" these days...which I will revisit a little later in this post. Luckily for me, my little lady just loves to sweep. If only she loved to sweep only the floor, but that is just not the case. She happens to love sweeping her brother, me, the counter tops...EVERYTHING..pretty gross, but I don't want to discourage her too much from helping out.

This week was the first week in a long time that we weren't staying up until all hours working on our little home projects. I have to say that I missed it a little bit. I must be crazy.

Loving this view from Paul and I's bedroom. Our backyard is so quaint and we are pretty proud of all the work we have done out there. Okay, I must admit that it was mostly Paul, but I did help out with what I could :)

Here is the board and batten in the family room. I can't even express how much I love it.

Now to the weekend that pooped the kids out:

We kicked off our weekend by spending Saturday morning at our local farmer's market. Such a perfect way to spend a Saturday morning. It was scorching hot, but we still had a good time.

We were enjoying all the food, crafts, etc booths when Madilyn spotted something that completely caught her attention:

SNOW CONES!!!

This is what Madilyn's face looks like when she spotted a snow cone place. She gets this honestly. Paul and I adore snow cones.

Pure bliss!
Madilyn thought that this snow cone place was really cool because you put your own syrup on. You can see a glimpse of it behind Madilyn. She had a hard time choosing which flavor, but settled on tiger's blood. I just have to say nasty. Paul and I might be the only ones on earth that hate that flavor, but it's true. Thumbs down to tiger's blood. Madilyn on the other hand, LOVED it.

I promise that I am not torturing Cowen, contrary to what you might think from this picture :)
We were trying to catch a family photo, but Cowen (who is usually a total ham for pictures) just wasn't in to it this time. He wanted to break free and crawl all over the grass and destroy an abandoned snow cone or two. Who could blame him?

After she wrestled her snow cone back, she posed for this picture. Isn't the sky just gorgeous? It was a beautiful day (in the shade)...loving the blue skies, that is for sure.

And then came Sunday.

We began our Sunday as we do most Sundays...with an awesome brunch. This time we went to one of our favorite places that we don't get to go to very often now that we are living up north. The Porcupine. It is so yummy. I love the location at the mouth of Big Cottonwood Canyon...one of my favorite places in the world.

But even better than the food, was sharing it with these silly faces.

With our bodies fueled, we went on a short and relaxing hike. It would have been a lot better had it not been 100 degrees outside. We felt like we were in an oven with the heat blaring right on top of us. Why do we have to live in a place with extreme winters and extreme summers? I think I am more of the mild weather almost all the time kind of a gal...maybe someday? We shall see.

the shady parts of our hike were amazing.

We looked for caterpillars and lady bugs. We didn't see any, but we did spot a few butterflies. Sure love looking for bugs with my little lady.

We decided that swimming would be a much better activity in this excessive heat, so we were off to my parents house to take a dip in the pool.

Madilyn loves the pool and the water. So does Cowen. It has been our Sunday ritual this summer.
Swimming lessons are in order for both of our kiddos.

I can't believe that there are only a few more weekends left for summer. :( I want to move. I will say that more and more as winter gets closer. But seriously, to live in a place with no winter? That would be amazing. Anyway,

we stopped by Paul's parents house before heading home. We had a little tailgate party when Gpa Larry got home from work. It was pretty late at that point, but the kids were content, so we all had a little chat and a little drink. It was nice to spend some time with Gpa Larry.

Before we knew it, it was Wednesday and we had Madilyn's 3 year old Dr. appt and Cowen's 1 year old check-up this week.

Luckily, Paul was able to take a little time away from work to come with me. I was pretty confident that I could do it alone (as I have many time before), but this was the first time that they were both getting shots at the same visit. Let's just say that I am so GLAD that he was there.
This little lady is in the 90th percentile for height....total surprise right?
She did so well at the doctor. She knew that she was going to have shots, so she was having some major anxiety, but she really did manage it well.

She was such a brave little girl and was a little disappointed in herself for crying when she received her shots, but to her favor she made it through the first 2 before really crying. She had to have 3 shots. I was so proud of her.

After her shots, she claimed that she just couldn't walk anymore. She claimed that her legs were broken. She kept with this story well into the next day. She really milked it...and here she is the next day relaxing from her traumatic experience.

MIL (mother-in law), does this remind you of someone? The story of Paul getting his Polio shot before your vacation comes to mind... He did pretty much the same thing when he was little and got a shot. I was smiling to myself about it the whole time Madilyn was being so dramatic :) She gets this honestly as well.

Cowen had 4 shots and was completely back to normal in no time. He ripped his bandaids off on the way out to the car. He played and played...apparently, his legs still worked ;) He was crawling all over the place..no recovery time needed.
This little man is in the 75th percentile for height but has dropped to the 50th percentile for weight. This concerned our doc, as Cowen has always been in the 90th-95th percentile in both height and weight since birth. When the medical assistant first weighed him, he was scared and he was reaching for me, so she recorded his weight as 20 lbs 15 ozs. This put him in the 25th percentile. We didn't feel as if that weight was accurate, as he was putting his hands on me, so we weighed him again with the doctor and he was 22 lbs 9 ozs, which made the doctor a little happier, but she was still pretty concerned. Cowen weighed 22 lbs at his 9 month visit. So that is relatively a small amount of weight gain for a baby his age. At least it wasn't a weight loss, as was previously thought.

This has me concerned, so I am trying to feed him more often and offer him food more often as well. He just isn't as interested as he once was. He pretty much just likes to throw all his food on the floor as soon as it hits the tray.
I am also trying to start weaning him, so I am worried about that as well. I am sure that everything is okay. He is just more interested in playing and exploring. He doesn't look like he is missing any meals :) Still, we are a little concerned.

On the brighter side, the doctor was pretty impressed with his cognitive abilities. His language and understanding is advanced and she couldn't believe how he had stranger anxiety already. He also got upset when the doctor was examining Madilyn....empathy isn't supposed to develop this early, but Cowen's most definitely has.

He also knows a lot more words than most 1 year olds. Specifically:

mama
dada
ball
more
bye bye
bubble
up

and most importantly....boob.

and he waves and gives high fives and claps.

Impressive little man :)

I decided that we needed a little bit of fun to forget about the previous days Dr. appt, so we made pudding and food colored it and painted with it.

The kiddos loved painting and eating at the same time. Madilyn even discovered that her legs still worked :)

loving these chubby baby hands painting with pudding.

proud mama with my kiddos. My heart is so full and that is such an amazing feeling.

beautiful mess and dueling spatulas!

we had pudding everywhere. Luckily we could just spray everything (and everyone) off with the hose.

and before we knew it, it was Friday once again. Except, this isn't a "real" Friday for us this week, as Paul has drill.

and this is how we feel about that!
and so.......

We decided that we need a little vacation and we are really,really missing the ocean, so we planned a trip to the Oregon Coast. We will be going next month. Can't wait :)