Baby's First Christmas

Cooper's 10 month birthday is today, and I just realized I never made a post about his first Christmas.  I could just go on and on about our busy few days, but I will make it a little more enjoyable and just recap Christmas through pictures! :)

Opening presents the weekend before Christmas at the Carters

Cooper's 1st bite of Pops' sugar cookies

Great Grandma

Huddled around the computer watching the Elf Yourself video

SANTA CAME!

Sharing their love for food

Our family on Christmas morning!

The Lyons family came to visit Christmas morning.  Cooper had fun sharing his toys with Jake!

Daddy and Cooper at JuJu and Pops on Christmas morning

Cooper was a pro at opening presents!

A NEW CAR at Nana and Papaws!

LOVE this face!

We were so glad to have a short visit with the Harpers the day after Christmas.  This is the best picture I could get of the boys!

Bad Momma! :(

Anyone that knows me knows that Brad and I treat Bailey like a real, human kid.  Well, something happened a few weeks ago that makes me so sad and makes me a bad dog mom.  We forgot Bailey's 5th birthday!  Yep...me...who always orders Bailey a special doggie cake or special doggie cookies for her birthday...

Her birthday was on a Friday (December 16th).  I woke up that Sunday, and the first thing that popped in my mind when I opened my eyes was that we missed her birthday.  I never thought the day would come, but it happened, and it will never happen again!   :)

9 months or 3/4 of a year

You read that right!  Cooper was 9 months old the Saturday before last!  I'm not sure where the time has gone, but I want time to stop right at this point!  Cooper is at such a fun age.  Yes, he's all over the place and into everything, but it's so much fun to see him having fun and exploring new things. 

A little bit about Cooper at 9 months:

• Went to the doctor on December 2nd for a follow-up appointment for his ear infection, and the doctor went ahead and did his 9 month well check-up since he was only a week away from being 9 months.  He weighed 20 lbs., 5 oz. and was 29 in. long. 
• Wears 12 month clothes and size 4 diapers.
• Taking less and less formula and eating more and more baby food and people food.  If you're eating something you better be prepared to share with the little guy. 
• Started crawling on November 25th (the day after Thanksgiving) and continues to get faster and faster everyday.  He has the cutest little crawl on the hardwood floors.  Now that he's mobile, he moves all over the house.  The 3 of us were playing on the living room floor one night and Cooper just decided he was done playing with us, and he took off crawling into his room by himself and started pulling all of his books off the shelf.  He also likes to crawl in the kitchen and shake the cereal boxes.
• Pulls up on everything (couch, toys, bed, dresser, bookshelf, bathtub, people....)
• Has started throwing a few little "fits" when you tell him no.  He'll kick his legs and put his chin down to this chest and scream or start babbling like he's talking back.  Isn't it a little early for this? :)
• Favorite toys are still books...he can just sit and flip the pages of his books for the longest time.
• Has 1 little tooth on his bottom left, and I think there may be more to follow pretty soon.

• Loves going around the house and looking at the pictures on the wall.  He'll crawl up to them, look up, and just start laughing and talking to them.
• Babbles and talks more and more each day.  He still says "bye bye" sometimes (when he wants to) and he'll say "ball."  He says "da da" all the time, but I still don't think he puts it together with it being Brad.

We had Cooper's 9 month pictures taken on December 4th (a little early) so we could also get some Christmas pictures made too.  They turned out great considering he never sat still and wanted to crawl around and grab everything!

Even the 9 month pictures I took turned out cute!  Cooper woke up from his nap, and he was in the best mood...can't you tell?



What a difference 7 months makes!

Go away germs!

Well, the whole Waltrip household has been hit with some type of sickness, and now that we're all actually feeling better, hopefully it won't hit our house again for a long time!  It all started with me catching a pretty bad cold (probably from my kids at school).  It lasted about a week, and then some small stomach bug hit me one day.  The first day I started feeling better, Brad and Cooper started to get sick.  Cooper's started out as a bad stuffy nose and a cough, and Brad was just achy and feverish with a sore throat and cough.  We took Cooper to the doctor, and it ended up that he had an ear infection in his left ear.  So that everyone could get well, my parents ended up coming down and picking Cooper up to spend a few days with them.  When he came home, he was still pretty stuffy and still pulling on his ear, so I took him back to the doctor on Wednesday.  It ended up that the left ear was completely clear, but the ear infection had moved to his right ear.  Yay!  So that means we had to start a new antibiotic to clear up this new infection.  Just when I thought we were all on the mend, we ended up peeking at Bailey's ears on Thursday, and we noticed that one of them was VERY red and hot.  I took her to the vet today, and it ended up that she also has an ear infection...probably caused by her food allergies.  So now she's on some ointment and pills to get all better, and we've been put under strict orders that she can't have any people food.  So that means we have to pay extra special attention to Cooper when he's eating puffs since Bailey knows that's when she usually gets an extra special treat. 

On a positive note, the four of us are all starting to feel back to our normal selves, and we cleaned the house pretty well to hopefully kill any lingering germs.  I sure hope those germs stay away for a long, long time!

8 months (2/3 of a year)

A little late (as usual)....

Weight: 20.8 pounds
Length: 28 inches

• Cooper still eats pretty much anything and everything.  He LOVES his puffs!  When we went to Florida, I gave him a couple of small bites off of a roll one night when we went out to eat.  At his Uncle Greg's birthday party a couple of weeks ago he ate a few bites of chicken and dumplings, green beans, and a roll.  He LOVED every second of it, and he kept reaching out for more.  We went to Hendersonville with JuJu and Pops the weekend before last, and of course Pops had to give him a few bites of pizza that we had for lunch.  :)  It's so much fun to watch his reaction everytime he tries something new.
• He still doesn't have any teeth, but I know they're right around the corner.  His gums have been kind of swollen and bumpy feeling.  He won't let me touch them, so I guess they probably hurt.
• Cooper's still not crawling either, and he doesn't seem to even care about it.  He has started pulling up on things and wanting to stand and walk.  He even tries to pull your hands off of him when he's standing (like he wants to do it all by himself).  He hasn't realized that when we let go he falls.  We had to put his crib down a couple of weeks ago because he started sitting and standing in his crib.  Our boy is getting way too big!
• Right now his favorite toys are probably books and paper, but he also loves remotes, cell phones, the computer, and anything else he's not supposed to have.  He's started the thing where if he has something that he really wants and you take it away he'll scream.  The kid already has a little attitude and temper.  He gets that from his daddy! :)
• Cooper's just getting over his second ear infection (the first one came when he was about 4 months) and a pretty nasty little cold.  He's still kind of stuffy and has a bad sounding cough, but hopefully that'll all pass soon. 
• As for what he's wearing...we're moving him up to size 4 diapers.  We're trying to use up the last of the few size 3 we have.  After a couple of blow-outs, I think it's time we move to another size.  He's wearing 9 and 12 month clothes.  I think he's slimmed up a bit in the past month or so.  I think it may be because he's just gotten taller, but I can tell his clothes aren't fitting as tightly anymore.
• A couple of weeks ago he started waving bye bye, and he will even say "bye" and "bye bye".  He won't do it all the time, but it's so cute when he does.  Brad got this video of us saying bye bye in the mirror. 

8 month pictures definitely weren't as much fun as they have been in the past.  This was the first month we haven't been able to go outside.  With it getting dark so early and the cold temperatures, we had to do pictures inside.  Cooper was tired, and he didn't really want anything to do with it.  Here are some of the best shots I got on his 8 month birthday.

Cooper is so excited for his first Thanksgiving tomorrow!  I think we might actually take him to see Santa today to try to beat all the crowds after Thanksgiving.  I can't wait to see his reaction to the big bearded man.  He'll either love him or hate him I'm sure.