Painting…nails

I can’t believe my daughter is 3 1/2 years old and I just now painted her toes for the very first time. She loved having her nails done and did very well at sitting still and letting them dry. She’s already asking for the next color to be pink!

Sink Bath

One majorly messy diaper = a sink bath + a very happy 9 month old and 3 1/2 year old!

Cohen 9 Month Update

I better get this update written because before you know it Cohen will be 10 months. Hard to believe the 1 year mark is right around the corner. Cohen continues to be a delight to be around. His smile just instantly brightens your day.

He’s still been pretty content to just roll around every where but has now added a plank-like position to his moves. We thought crawling might follow pretty shortly after but again he’s doing things in his own sweet slow time. Which as long as he is making some progress we’re fine with keeping him our “little” guy for a little longer.

There’s no slowing him down on the weight gain or the love of food he has going on. He’s gotten really well at eating finger foods. One of his favorite’s: turkey cheese dogs. But he’ll eat just about anything you give him which probably accounts for his size :) He clocked in at 21 lbs 11 1/4 oz (69%) and 26 3/4 inches (7%) at his 9 month appointment. With those stats you can certainly see why he is our chunky monkey. Sevea comparison 18 lbs 9 1/2 lbs and 26 inches. Sevea didn’t reach 20 lbs till well over a year old. But we love every single chubby roll Cohen has going on.

Cohen loves bath time and his sister. He is always making noise either babbling or his new favorite thing is to groan. Similar sound to maybe a constipated child but he’s got no problem there. It is quite funny actually. He’s a pretty easy baby and for that we are grateful. I am also extra grateful for the death grip hugs and slobbery open mouth bite kisses I get. It is rare for him to give these to anyone else so each time I get one I feel 100% thankful for this expression of love he is giving me.

We look forward to another month of fun with our chubby guy!

Another addition of sneaking vegetables

Most kids love fruit. Most kids love smoothies. But a lot of kids are picky about vegetables. Why not sneak vegetables into a smoothie. Green smoothies are all the rage on the blogs that I read. You essentially make a smoothie as you normally would and add spinach. Troy and I have made them before and enjoyed them. You really don’t taste the spinach but they do end up green in color. Sevea wasn’t a fan of smoothies until recently. So she has yet to try the spinach kind but I recently read about someone putting celery in a smoothie. What do you know we had celery, strawberries, frozen banana, and yogurt all just waiting to be used. The result:

Yummy!!! Each of the daycare girls emptied their cups. Since I knew there was celery in it I could tell a little but it didn’t deter me from drinking mine. Troy didn’t know what was in it but said there was a flavor he couldn’t pin point. However he drank it too. Final vote…try it! You’ll be surprised and those kiddos will get a serving of fruit and vegetable at snack time.

Face Grab

Cohen’s latest fun thing

What I am just sucking my thumb?

Oh wait I think attacking mom’s face would be a fun thing to do. But this fun thing is reserved for mom only. I get excited and just think attacking her face would be fun.

Dad don’t worry all is good. Mom loves me attacking her like this :)

P.S. Did you notice my little bruise on my forehead? The photo shoot casualty

Cohen 8 month photos

Enjoy some of the photos we got taken of Cohen at 8 months. We actually had two separate sessions but both times resulted in not much luck on trying to capture the real happy side of Cohen. But we still ended up with some good shots and some memories along the way.

At the beginning of the first session Cohen just couldn’t seem to open his eyes. It wasn’t really bright out and actually kind of overcast but he just kept squinting. So we decided to move spots at the park and tried the chair. The picture we got is cute even without a smile but resulted in him deciding the pavement was a better location. Thankfully later we realized his big belly broke most of his fall but even though you don’t see it on the next pictures he ended up with a little bump and bruise on his forehead…..end any thought about getting good photos.

We bribed him with food. No smiles. Sitting with dad. No smiles. Cuddles with mom. Thumb sucking but no smiles.

Instead just a crabby baby was left. We gave up early and left with a mom who felt TERRIBLE and a baby who did what he knows best…sleep!
Our photographer felt horrible about him falling as well and offered to come shoot some pictures again. We were thankful for the offer and excited to possibly get some smiling pictures with his eyes open. The second session wasn’t as successful as we would have hoped since Cohen decided  to take a long middle of the day nap making it hard to squeeze in another nap before pictures and still sticking to his bedtime. The result was a baby who again just wanted to be held or suck his thumb. But we did capture a few good ones.

Even though it took us two sessions in the end I think we truly captured all that is Cohen. And we love every bit of him!
Each session wasn’t totally ruined either since the big sister took over hamming it up for the camera.

Maybe Sevea can teach Cohen how to work the photo shoot like her by the 1 year mark!!

Treat time

I love baking. I would bake all the time if the stuff I liked to bake didn’t have so many calories. I suppose that is the reason I love to bake…the result is so yummy!! The other weekend I was craving a baked good but wasn’t really in the mood to take all the time to bake something. So instead of just buying something from the store I decided to go the next best route…rice krispie style. I quickly went to the store for the goods and within the next hour we had homemade treats. Even better was I got to spend time in the kitchen with my favorite little helper.

Together we made two (don’t worry we brought almost half of each pan over to Carissa’s…I think she likes me baking as well!!) yummy and simple treats. First up was Nutter Butter Rice Krispie Treats found here.
Sevea crushed the nutter butter cookies while of course taste testing them to make sure they were good enough. She poured in the rice krispies and then mixed them together. I melted the marshmallows and butter.

After I poured the marshmallow mixture in she helped me pat them down in the pan. Of course some stick to your fingers and no better way to get them off than to eat them. We both enjoyed our baking time together. After the first pan we repeated pretty much the same steps for Raspberry Peach Marshmallow Squares found here. Both recipes turned out great but we all pretty much agreed that the Nutter Butter ones were our favorite and one we’ll surely make again. One tip I’ve learned from eating rice krispie type treats…warm in the microwave for like 10 seconds and they become soft again if they happen to hardened.

Looking at this picture makes me want to make them again soon. Enjoy!