One Year Ago Today

One year ago today we woke up earlier than Trey and Dillon have ever raised their heads and headed to the Nashville airport. We spent the day in airports and airplanes. We headed towards China to meet and bring Coee home. What a trip. What a year it has been!

Coee is a very very active little girl, always in to things. But that is another whole post all by itself. She talks A LOT and is putting words together to form sentences very well. She has never met a stranger, except for Santa Claus. I don't think she will be sitting on his lap this year.



She is a girly girl. She loves purses and new outfits. When I put a new outfit on her, she heads to my bathroom saying "irra!" (Mirror) "irra!" She loves to look at herself and her new outfit in the mirror.


She was a flower girl at my cousins wedding last week. She went down the aisle in a wagon, being pulled by the "senior" flower girl and the ring bearer. She did very well. She danced ALL night. She had a great time at the reception. Cake and dancing. (She seriously loves cake...dances when she hears the word cake.) Her rendition of the Happy Birthday song goes like this: "Happy Birthday woo hoo. Happy Birthday woo hoo. Cake!"


Coee got a jump on the season and decorated cookies the day after Thanksgiving with her Meme, brothers and cousins. She really liked the icing. The cookie was simply a dipping tool.


This girl is true to her heritage. She seriously gets on a natural high when she eats Chinese food. We took her out to eat last night. This is her finishing up her THIRD bowl of egg drop soup. She was giddy; lauging, saying "hewo" to everyone in the restaurant, screaming. Hyper.

It has been an amazing year. Terrell and Dillon have brought up the blog over the past week and "relived" our trip. I've heard many laughs and giggles coming from the computer from both of them.

Me and my brother

Coee loves to play outside with her brothers. A few Saturdays ago, Trey was playing in our pile of rocks which are left over from building the house. Coee was there with him and he thought she needed some boots to play in the rocks. We hunted down the boots that we have bought for her for this winter. They are boys boots with light up footballs, baseballs and soccer balls. They proceeded to play in the rocks for quite some time. Too cute.

Oh my - Am I behind

Hello! We are still here. Boy, do we have a lot to catch up on!! Trey and Dillon have been practicing and playing football 3-4 days/week since late July, so that has taken up a lot of our time. Coee did great at the hour and a half practices- much better than I expected. We took toys and food and drinks and more food, and I only had to chase her across the field during one of the very last practices. She loved it and it was actually nice to have that down and outdoors time built in to our week. I do better with structure so I am now having to readjust to having some free time during the week. It's not easy, on anyone.

Coee is great. She is saying just about anything you ask her to and is even putting two and three words, as well as families, together. We say the word "Caitlin" and she proceeds to list off Neil, "Nonya", "Paigse", Morgan and Leo (the dog). She knows they all belong together! Her last baby tooth pushed through over the weekend. She is loud and talks non-stop, sometimes saying the same word over and over and over again (for example; mommy!) She loves to go. She does not love the church nursery. She is quite independent. When we got home one night, she was hungry. I was putting things away in the refrigerator so the door was open. Before I knew it, she had the "loney" (balogna is one of her favorites-yuck) and cheese out and was putting it on her little table. She fixed her own snack!

Coee's First Fourth of July

Coee experienced her first Fourth of July, which is always marked by a golf cart parade through Terrell's parents lake neighborhood. This year was bigger than normal, probably around 150-200 people. After the parade, we all gather at the pavilion and have yummy homemade ice cream and desserts as well as games. Unfortunately, this is the first year that we have walked away without any bragging rights (unless you count Jill's "most egged" award after the egg toss contest).

Kendra, Paige, Coee, Jill, Carson and Cameron.

Our "float" entry. Don't overlook Terrell's COOL hat!

Trey and Dillon are silly-stringing the retiree spectators.

The "Grand Poo-bah" making his victory lap.

An apple with Dillon

Coee loves apples. You can literally just hand her a whole apple, and she will eat it until it is almost gone. I found her and Dillon having an apple snack on the couch on this day. She thinks that she is one of them. She an Trey have even started fighting "like brother and sister." It usually starts because he is trying to protect her ( a bit of a mother hen) and she doesn't like it. She even grabbed him by the nose with her sharp little finger nails once and gave him a bloody nose.

Trey and Dillon continue to love her with more passion and compassion than we ever expected. Dillon even recently told a friends mom "Life is not worth living without Coee."

Fun Day at Meme's

We went to Meme's house for a fun day last week. She invited all of her grandkids and told the "big boys" they could bring friends. We ended up with five nine year olds; Ethan, Baily, Dillon, Trey and Landon. We spent a large part of the day watching them riding the tube. We also put up a huge water slide, had corn dogs, snow cones and funnel cakes. It was a really fun day. (As we say over and over; poor kids. They don't get to do anything fun. :))

Tubing

They liked the rough waves.

Tristan and Coee having lunch.

Great Grandma's Girl

Coee's middle name is Catherine, after my maternal Grandmother ("Grandma"). There have been many many times that I have wished that Coee could have met Grandma, and Grandma could have met Coee. I know what she would have done. She would have sat and watched her with her hands over her mouth. She would have held her and rocked her, and loved her. She would have made those noises she made playing with Trey, Dillon and Ethan. She would have LAUGHED at her, because she is really funny.

Tonight, we went to a 50's Classic Diner event at church. The choir sang music from the 50's through the 80's. The Blues Brothers were there, as was Elvis. We had cheeseburgers and hot dogs and COKES in the old fashioned GLASS bottles. Coee decided she wanted the last of Dillon's so we let her turn it up for a "swig" - as Grandma termed it. Grandma always had glass bottled cokes in her refrigerator. There is no telling how many cokes she drank in her life time! When Coee turned that bottle up tonight, I so wished that Grandma could have been here to see her namesake do what she did so many times in her life. It brought a tear to my eye, and does again as I type.

We miss you Grandma!

Life's a Beach

We just returned from a little less than a week in Orlando, FL. We traveled there for a family reunion and had a great time. Coee met a lot of cousins that she hadn't met and Trey and Dillon were very happy to get to spend time with all of them. We were able to spend two days at a beach condo (Thanks Todd and Meghan!) so Coee has now swam in the ocean as well. She loved it and surprisingly didn't mind the sand. Here a few pictures from our trip:

Too cute in Mommy's hat.

Trey and "Little Cousin Ethan"

Checking the sand out for the first time.

Who are these boys and why are they growing up so fast?! I've resorted to methodically patting Dillon on the head several times a day in effort to curb the growth! :))

Cameron, Dillon, Morgan and Trey
"Morgan's Posse"

Day at The Zoo: More Pictures

Monkey see. Monkey do.

Meme & Tristan

Three Amigos.

The Hippos put on the best show of the day.
The four of them were very active and fun to watch!

Going to the Zoo Zoo Zoo

We took advantage of the great spring weather and the kids being out of school for election day to head to St. Louis for an overnight in a hotel and then spend the day at the zoo. Meme, Ethan and Tristan joined us. We had a great day!!

Coee loved swimming in the hotel pool, although it was pretty cold. Then, there were lots of things for her to love at the zoo!!:

She loved being with her brothers and cousins.

She loved the monkeys. (all four pictured)

She especially loved the carousel. She just got this heavenly smile on her face and it stayed during the whole ride.

She loved petting the goats.

I believe her favorite was the splash park!!

First Camping Trip

Coee had her first camping experience this past weekend. We had planned on going up to the lake to celebrate my Dad's birthday with everyone and then come home, but we decided around noon to spend the night. We rushed around in a frenzy and packed everything for it and headed to the lake. It was great weather for her first camping outing and we had a great time!!

Coee's first morning of camping included Granddaddy Mike delivering breakfast-in-bed/tent: powdered donuts and bananas. What's not to like?!

On Saturday night, we had a huge gathering around an awesome campfire. My Uncle Will even brought his guitar and sang a long and varied list of requests. Coee LOVES music and LOVED "helping" Great Uncle Will play. He even let her hold a collection of pics!

This is Coee getting her first look at this thing called a tent. "We're sleeping in here?"

"I'm not so sure, but I'm just going to go with you on this...."

Spring Makes Us Happy!

It has been too long since I posted new pictures of Coee, so went outside today specifically to take some pictures. Coee is enjoying her "first" spring, especially loves doing anything Trey and Dillon are doing; walking in the creek, jumping on the trampoline, playing basketball, going down the slide, swinging and just being outside!

She is learning new words as fast as we can think of them to teach her. Some of her repertoire is: Daddy, Mama, D (Dillon), Trey, puppy, Dynamite, Momo, Bop Bop, Meme, eat, drink, truck, dirty, cookie, candy, night night, bappy (paci), hot, duck, aya (said forcefully with a kick, product of watching Trey and Dillon's Tae Kwon Do class), and go. Speaking of go, she thinks she is ready to go. Whenever the grandparents come to visit, she accompanies them to their car when they are leaving and tugs on the door handle, saying go.!

She is growing by leaps and bounds, as she should be with all that she eats. Her Bop Bop says he has never seen any kid eat as much and enjoy it as much as she does. She is passionate about most any fruit as well as the egg drop soup from a local Chinese restaurant. Going to eat there with her is more entertainment for us than anything else. Remember when Dillon was worried about her hitting her head on the bath tub faucet, which she fit underneath when we first came home? Well, she can no longer fit underneath said faucet! Enjoy the pictures!!

What they say about kids and boxes...

It's true. I've always know it's true. I knew that kids love boxes way back during Trey and Dillon's first Christmases and birthdays. They would cull the toy and play with the boxes. I knew it when we moved so many times and they would LOVE playing with and in the moving boxes. I knew it when they slept IN a couple of decorated - complete with windows- moving boxes for an entire summer when they were six. But four nine year olds on spring break...

Who knew they would fit and the infatuation doesn't end by 3rd grade? That's Landon, Dillon, Kyle and Trey. Just so you will know that Trey is not throwing an obscene gesture here, I have included a sub-par picture below to show that he is really saying....

"Peace" with the four of us here in this box! That's a 36" x 20" box.

Chocolate Bunny, Reading spot and an aha!

We have a "sweets" corner of our kitchen. I usually have some type of baked goods there; cookies, cupcakes, muffins, cakes, and recently Hershey kisses. Coee has figured out where the good stuff stays and goes to that part of the counter and reaches. Her chocolate Easter bunny was residing there until she got to bite its' ears off over the weekend!!

Yum!!

She crawled under the buffet to take in some 3rd grade science.

What would you like to know about? The Solar System? Soil? Plants?

And here is our AHA!! She has been fussy, whiny and clingy; had a fever and runny nose; has been slobbering and HAS NOT BEEN SLEEPING SOUNDLY! I found it!! The tooth! The tooth! See? Your left. Coming in at several different places now. Ouch! At least we now can have some idea of what we are dealing with.

In case you are wondering, the method here is to put her upside down on my legs and tickle her under the chin; all the while holding the camera at the ready in my right hand.

Happy Easter!!

Coee has experienced her first Easter. She enjoyed the chocolate bunny immensely, and wasn't such a big fan of the Easter egg dying or dressing up in summer wear in 50 degree weather. On top of all that Meme (Michelle's mom, Cecelia) was in the hospital over the weekend. What a bummer that was!! We went by the hospital after church and before lunch to see Meme on Easter day. She got out of the hospital on Tuesday after discovering that her problems were a result of an ulcer. More and different medications and hopefully she is on the road back to recovery!

Easter, our family of five.

Very cool Easter cake Momo made!! (Coee liked the whipped cream!)

Coee and Aunt Tonya dying Easter eggs. Notice the furrowed brow from Coee = not a fan.

Dying Easter eggs brings out the craziness in kids!