Running Away

This may be one of those posts I have to delete once Coop is internet-savvy enough to find the blog.  But a few weekends ago, he was convinced that he wanted to run away.  Unfortunately for him, it was 20 degrees outside that evening (with a wind chill of 9), so that didn't seem like a wise plan.

Nonetheless, here was his running away outfit:

In his "hobo bags," he had packed the following treasures:

 Costa Rican money (so he'll be set once he makes it that far south), cheese slices and a wooden cage to catch mice (to sell to pet stores for money), and a bunch of things to keep him entertained and to entertain others.

The note he left me Sunday morning:

Thankfully, he settled for walking by himself to Alan's house (about a mile away) once the weather warmed up to 50 degrees.

Vehicles

Coop and I made this tank to serve as his valentines collection box at school.  It was all his vision, but I think we did an admirable job painting camouflage!

With a birthday gift certificate to The Toy Store in Lawrence, Coop picked out these three new cars for his collection:

And here he is posing with a line-up of all of the cars that he owns that he has disassembled (with the screwdriver he's holding).  One is missing from the picture -- it didn't make it back together!

And in completely random news, a friend of mine posted this line of babies on Facebook.  (Coop is second from the right, with the pacifier.)  When I was pregnant, I took a water aerobics class with a bunch of ladies who were all due about the same time.  When our babies were all born, we got together for a "play date" and took this photo:

I would love to line them all up now!!

Creativity

Cooper made this diorama to go along with his report of the Atlantic Ocean:

Our friend Eleanor came over one evening and thoroughly enjoyed painting:

Coop and I saw a One Man Star Wars Trilogy play at Starlight.  It was spectacular!  (And Coop has been busy trying to recreate it ever since!)

And always another magic trick in the works:

NINE!!

Storm Trooper cookie cake for the birthday festivities:

We had his "friend" party at Epic, an arcade / laser tag place in Lawrence:

Air hockey with Madeline:

Kids v. grown-ups laser tag:

Coop requested fruit crisp for the family party back at the house:

New Star Wars bedding (and stuffed snake from his friend Molly!):

And modeling the new outfit from Aunt Ellen, Grandma Marlene, and Kent:

Games

One of the Baker professors conducts war games (it sounded a lot like Risk when Coop described it to me, but I have no idea!) for kiddos.  Coop and Alan had a grand time!

New magic tricks from Aunt Jill:

New legos, magic tricks, and a storm trooper bobble head courtesy of Aunt Kelly's Barnes and Noble gift certificate for xmas:

Coop had the all-time luckiest game of Battleship ever.  Only one (ONE!) random shot that missed (the others were figuring out which way to go after a hit).  He totally smoked me.