June Beach Trip

We took a family beach trip to the Alabama Gulf Coast a few weeks ago.  Here are a few pictures from our trip!

Cooper loved playing in the sand this year!

 Trying on Mama's sunglasses - ha!

In a hurry to get to the sand!

Our little beach bum!  He couldn't get enough of it!

He and his Daddy were trying to build a sandcastle.  That didn't go so great.  Seems like we are all a little weak in our "sandcastle building skills."  :)

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The water was absolutely beautiful!  Reminded me of the Caribbean.  I don't ever remember it being so pretty!

Summer is Officially Here (or at least it is for the Richards Family)! :)

Cooper's first sno-cone of the summer!  We had to chase the Ice Cream Truck down for this one! ;)

 

Birmingham Botanical Gardens Photos

We had some family photographs taken on Saturday, April 28, 2012.  The weather was gorgeous and it couldn't have been a better day for pictures!  We met up with a new photographer named Sherry Griffin at the Botanical Gardens and we are so pleased with the photographs!  I just love how she makes the color "pop"!  I was worried about getting and good pictures of Cooper since he was more interested in playing than having his photo taken, but Sherry got some really great photos!  You can find other samples of her work on her website www.sherrygriffinphotography.com.

Our little cutie!  Oh, how I love this child! :)

 I love this picture of him and his cute little grin!

 Sherry would tell him to give me "sugar" and this is what we got!  Ha!  He's all boy! :)

 Ditto for Daddy!

 Just the 2 of us!

 Family pic!

 I'm a sucker for black and white photos!

 Love this pic!

 Our little monkey!

 Sweet boy!

 Love this family photo of us!

 This was the last picture that was taken.  You can tell by the expression on his face that he was ready to go!

A Few of My Favorite Things

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and New Year's! I am so behind in blogging! We had so much going on in the Fall and then, right before Christmas, we all caught a horrible cold that we passed around for a month. We are finally getting over that so things have gotten back to normal! I'm going to try to get Christmas photos on here soon, but until then, here are a few things that I am totally loving right now and thought I'd share!

First, I would just like to share that I have the most sensitive skin in the world....seriously, it's ridiculous! I have to be SO careful with new laundry detergents, makeup, etc. because most everything irritates my skin. Over the Christmas season I discovered this...

...and I am IN LOVE! This is the most wonderful facial moisturizer! It has SPF 15, so you have a little protection from the sun, and is so soothing! It has really transformed my skin and I couldn't be more happy! Usually, after wearing makeup all day, my skin would be really irritated at night. Now, I use this at night after I take my makeup off and I wake up with the softest, smoothest skin! I also put in on under my makeup in the morning and I don't have the irritation at the end of the day that I did before I discovered this!

Second, I don't know how many of you are fans of the TV show "Friends" but it has always been one of my favorites. Last year, I happened to catch a new show on ABC and it is one of the most hilarious shows that I have ever watched! It's like a modern day version of "Friends" but I actually think that it's funnier! It's titled "Happy Endings" and if you haven't seen it yet, you should!

Third, I'm one of those people who struggle with deciding what to cook for my family each night. I feel like I cook the same thing over and over had really gotten to the point that I grown really bored with cooking, which I have always loved doing. Then I discovered E-Mealz (http://www.e-mealz.com/). I had heard of it before but never really thought about trying it until there was a Groupon for 50% off for a 1-year subscription so I thought I would give it a try. Well, I absolutely love it! Along with easy (and tasty!) recipes for each night of the week, it also gives you a complete shopping list. Anyone with an active 2-year old like myself will appreciate that!

Lastly, I have been a faithful reader of http://www.thepioneerwoman.com/ for a few years. I mean, come on, you can't NOT love Ree! Now she has her own cooking show on Food Network. If you have ever read her blog then you will love her show! A new season starts this Saturday!

I just thought I would share some things that I'm loving at the moment! :)

Pumpkin Patch Express - Part 2

Cooper and his Daddy in front of the HUGE pumpkin!

Decisions, decisions! Which one should I choose?

Having fun in the corn maze!

Pumpkin Patch Express - Part 1

Cooper is currently in love with anything to do with trains so we thought it would be a good idea to take him to ride the "Pumpkin Patch Express." It was a huge hit! We got to ride a train to a field that was setup as a pumpkin patch. They also had tons of kids activities there also! And they were all for kids Cooper's age so he had a blast!

Here's a picture of our "ride" - ha!

We rode in an interior car on the way there. Here's a picture of Coop waiting for the ride to begin.

Family picture taken by the train conductor.

Coop met a buddy on the train! He and this cute little guy talked and played the whole way to the Pumpkin Patch.

More pictures to come in Part 2!

The Joys of Raising Boys

Cooper has been attending a Mother's Day Out program since July and he LOVES it! I have never gotten a bad behavior report from his teachers. That is...I haven't ever gotten one until today. When my mom went to pick him up from MDO both of his teachers brought him out and asked my mom if we were letting him watch wrestling at home. Wrestling?!?! Neither myself or my husband have EVER watched wrestling. College football, yes, but not wrestling! Turns out Cooper has been going up to his classmates, grabbing them around the waist and body slamming them to the floor. He's also trying it on his teachers, who are two of the sweetest ladies you will ever meet. I was mortified! My little angel did that?!?!?! I started thinking about where he could have learned this. The only TV shows he watches are Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, The Wonder Pets, Sesame Street, Bob the Builder and Thomas...and I've never seen Mickey and Donald performing wrestling moves on each other. But, I do kind of zone out when it's on, so I guess that could be a possibility, right? Nah...probably not. Could he be picking it up from college football? We do tend to cheer (loudly) when our team makes a tackle. Also, my husband will throw Cooper on our bed (which he LOVES)...could that be it? Or could it just be from being a rough-and-tumble little boy? I really don't know, probably the latter of the three. Maybe he is wanting to be the "Hulk Hogan" of his generation, I don't know. I just know that the wrestling is going to have to stop! We can't have him terrorizing everyone with the threat of being thrown to the ground. Besides, I have much bigger aspirations for him. Cooper, let's stick to careers like becoming the scientist that cures cancer or President of the United States, ok? ;)

Oh, the joys of raising a boy - it's the BEST job and I wouldn't trade it for the world! :)

Toys & Shopping

Here's a few pictures of Cooper in Target a few days ago. Whatever store we are in we have to look at toys! We took him to Toys R Us for the first time this past weekend and he was in HEAVEN! He spent 20 minutes playing on their Thomas the Tank Engine table. Here he is pushing what he calls a "tractor" through the toy aisles. LOL!


Nothing goes together better than a pink shopping cart and Star Wars Lightsabers! Ha!

He loves those Lightsabers but he isn't letting go of his tractor/shopping cart! :) I love this funny, silly little boy! He is always doing something to crack us up!

Cooper - 22 Months Old

I haven't written a monthly update on Cooper in a while so I thought I would do one just so I have a record of what he's been doing.


Cooper - Here's what you've been up to:

-Favorite TV Shows: Thomas the Tank Engine, Bob the Builder, Chuggington & Jack's Big Music Show. He still will occasionally watch Wonder Pets and he also like Little Einsteins.
-Favorite Foods: Bananas, Apples, Corn Dogs, Corn on the Cob, Pizza, Chicken Fingers, Yogurt, Grits, Oatmeal, Pancakes, Mac & Cheese, Veggie Sticks, Applesauce.
-You know all of your animals & animal sounds.
-You recognize a lot of letters and know what sounds they make.
-Your vocabulary is VERY extensive! It seems like everyday you are saying new things!
-You LOVE puzzles and can do them all on your own.
-You love playing with Matchbox cars and will "drive" them around the house for hours!
-You love to color with crayons! Next, we are going to try painting!
-You still go to MDO 3 days a week and you still LOVE it! The Tumblebus comes to MDO one day a week and you really look forward to playing on it!
-We spend a majority of the evening outside. You love playing with your puppies and playing in the sandbox.
-You love popsicles but usually end up feeding part of it to the dogs!
-You love going to the park to play! You are so independent! You climb up the slides and slide down all by yourself.
-You love people and never meet a stranger! You have the happiest, most outgoing personality and love being around people.
-You are such a joy! I can't imagine our lives without you in it! You make us SO happy and we love you SOOOO much!

Climbing & Football

Maybe it's just a little boy thing but Cooper loves to climb. He pushes a chair up to our kitchen counter to climb onto it, he climbs onto the back of the couch, he climbs up on our bed (which is impressive because our bed is kind of high), etc., and it makes my heart skip a beat when I turn around and he is eye level with me. Ha! Here's an example....

This was just his first try. He can actually get onto the top of it to sit now. Any question on why we call him "Monkey"? Ha! He's such a funny kid and keeps us on our toes!

On a different note...on 24 days left until college football begins! These arrived last week - Roll Tide! I can not wait to go to the games! Fall is my absolutely favorite time of the year! Besides football, the leaves are changing, the local pumpkin patch opens, etc. Also, it starts getting cooler, which is nice since the temperature here has been high 90s - with a few over 100 degree days - for a while now and the humidity is awful! So, the cooler weather will be appreciated! Also, I'm already into planning mode for Cooper's 2nd birthday in November (which is always fun for me!). I can not believe that he is about to be 2 years old!

Cooper's New Favorite!

Cooper loves yogurt. Past favorites have been Danonino and YoBaby but we found a new favorite the other day...Trix yogurt! He LOVED it and made such a mess that we had to take some pictures to share.

Note the hand covered in yogurt. The spoon wasn't getting it into his mouth quite fast enough so he dunked his entire hand in the cup!



YAY for deliciousness! Note the blue goatee. Ha!

He just can't get enough! :)

After he was finished it took a while to clean this up! It was EVERYWHERE! All over him, the table, the floor, his chair....it was ridiculous! But the yogurt covered cuteness and his enjoyment was worth the 30 minute clean up! ;)

Fun at the Zoo!

We recently became members of our local zoo because Cooper loves it and this way we can go as often as we like! Here's some pictures from our last trip there.

Here's Cooper posing as a giraffe....

...having fun on the carousel...

...chasing a rooster or, as he calls it, a "cock-a-doo-doo" :)...

...posing for a picture on the antique tractor (he still loves tractors!).

First Day of Mother's Day Out

A couple of weeks ago Cooper was finally at the age where he could start Mother's Day Out. This is something that we had been planning on enrolling him in for a while because we thought that it would be good for him to be able to socialize with other children. For a few weeks before his first day I was really trying to build it up to him (we call it "school") and we would talk about how much fun he was going to have, all the new friends he would make, etc. I never thought that he was paying as much attention to what I was saying as he was! On the morning that the summer MDO session began I woke him up a hour before we had to leave so we would have time to get him ready and have time for him to eat breakfast. Little did I know that we would only need 10 minutes for all that! He was super excited, ate his breakfast at lightning speed and was standing at the door saying "bye-bye" ready to go to "school." He absolutely loves MDO! All of the teachers are so sweet and he looks forward to the days he goes. Here are a few pictures of his first day...

Family Beach Pictures - 2011

Here are a few of our family beach pictures that we took in Gulf Shores on Memorial Day weekend (thanks to Mona for being our "photographer"!)...