October Happenings

Cooper started Tiger Cubs this year.  I think he looks so cute in his uniform!

 

 happy girl

 
My good friend Bekah is having a baby (actually already had him!) and myself and another one of her friends hosted a shower for her.

Bekah is in the middle along with me and Kristen, the other hostess.

Claire has so many cute fall outfits and I'm trying to make sure I get photos of her in them!

 One day we made pumpkin muffins.  Jackson especially LOVES to cook with me.  He asks me all the time if he can help me make dinner. 

 I just loved this picture of Elizabeth! :)

 Our family friends were in town that we hadn't seen for YEARS.  It was so fun getting all our kids together!

Jackson and Claire love to play together, aren't they cute together??  This is what they do while Cooper is doing homework. 

And here's poor Cooper, slaving away at his homework.  He gets distracted by his brother and sister so we set up this super cool table in our bedroom for him to have some privacy.  He's such a hard worker, and I still can't believe he's in 1st grade!!

Halloween Activities

We've had a few different activities that the kids were able to wear their costumes to.

 

We went over to my parents' house to pick up costumes and we went out to take a few photos.

 

The Super Heroes!! 

 

Elizabeth and Ben met us there so we took a few with them.

Three iron men!

 

We then went to a Halloween party at a friend's house.  We took a few photos ahead of time and took a great one of our family but Ryan wouldn't let me.  Ryan's costume included superman underwear worn over his jeans. :)

 I barely took any photos at the party but did get one of my crazy boys pulling each other down the slide.

 A beautiful sky!  We left the party and rushed over to my sister's house for her annual costume party.  We were racing a big storm on the way over and luckily made it before it hit!

 
I didn't take many photos but we had tons of fun as always!  Laura had lots of fun activities for both kids and adults.

 My parents attended the party and spent a lot of time watching Claire for us so we could play the games.  It was so nice of them!  Aren't Elizabeth and Claire cute as super heroes?  We're looking forward to next years party!

 

September Happenings

So I'm just cramming a lot of photos together so I can catch up so there will probably be a few random posts here!

 

Elizabeth and Ben came over to spend the night and had fun dressing up.

 

 Cooper played soccer this fall and did really well.  He made at least 5 goals this season!

Our neighbor has this adorable lemonade stand-isn't it so cute!?!

My friend Leanne made Claire this adorable dress and also her doll a dress.  Isn't it so cute how they match?

Cooper's top front tooth was loose and he loved walking around pushing it out in these gross way. :)

The kids were ready a little bit early one morning on the way to take Cooper to school so I tried to get a few photos.

Claire has a few cute KState outfits.  She's all ready to cheer on the wildcats!

Then of course I had to include my two cute boys!

First Days of School!

So I'm very behind and I'm going to try to catch up!! 

RIGHT after we had Claire's birthday and baptism, Cooper had his first day of first grade!

I tried to do a VERY simple special dinner the night before where Cooper got to pick out what he wanted to eat (chicken pockets). 

Look at sweet Cooper on his first day of zoo school when he was 3 1/2!  Crazy to see how little he was!

 

 

Iron Man is the new cool thing this year.

Can you tell he was getting bored of posing for pictures?

When we were getting ready to school, both Claire and Jackson wanted to wear their back packs as well!  We couldn't find Claire's so she used Cooper's old one.

 Cooper with some of our neighborhood friends on the way to school.

 This is his "mom, please stop taking pictures" face! :)  All ready for first grade!

 (this has nothing to do with first days of school, I just thought it was cute :))

 I had a little party after school for the kids (it was pretty simple- green apples to look like Mike and a rice krispy cake to look like Sully).

 Then we had Jackson's meet the teacher!

 Here he is with his preschool teacher!

 Jackson started school about a week or two after Cooper.  This was his very first day of school, ever!  I was so nervous for him because last year when I brought him to MOPS childcare he sometimes would cry and I had to go and get him.  But he had no problems at all, he LOVES school!

 Claire wanted to sneak into the picture. :)

 Here he is sitting at his table.  He was so ready for school.

So now two days a week it's just Claire and I for a few hours.  We are able to get a few errands done and I bring Claire to gymnastics on one of those days.  It's fun having one-on-one time with Claire but she misses her big brothers while they are gone! 

6 months with Claire

 This week marked a very special milestone for our family, it was our 6 month anniversary of adopting Claire!!!

The time has flown by- sometimes it feels like we were just in China (or at least just a few months ago, definitely not 6!), but other times it feels like Claire has been in our family forever!  Just the way it should be.

 She is such a silly goose-she has so much personality!  She has come so far from when we first met her.  She was so timid and scared to try new things.  Now she loves to do pretty much everything and is getting much better with meeting new people!  Hardly any timidity left (is that a word??)  Sometimes is unsure around new people (which is a great thing, that means she is attaching well to us) but is usually so friendly with everyone.

 She loves to play with her brothers and can totally keep up with them, and loves to color, play with her Mickey and Minnie toys, her baby dolls and her toy kitchen.  She is starting to enjoy reading more.  When she first came home she wouldn't sit for even a second and look at a book.   Now she'll sit and read a few at a time!  Her favorite thing to do is watch Mickey Mouse.  Which is so funny because she didn't have any interest in TV at all when she first came home!

 She is learning so many new things-she understands pretty much anything you say and can follow directions well.  She says quite a few words but her articulation is pretty poor due to her cleft lip-she just didn't get to use those upper lip muscles for almost 2 years of her life!  So now she's in speech and we're working on her articulation.  She tries so hard and is making progress! 

 She loves her family, loves to give hugs and kisses, and loves to do anything her brothers are doing.  We are so blessed to have her in our lives! We love you Claire Bear!!!