The past week or so

Crawling around in the big open gym

Ready for a walk with Daddy, Parker, and Parker's Daddy.

Sometimes, Cooper does the strangest tricks. And just for a day or two, so we have to take pictures fast. This was a recent one:

Holding his leg up off the ground for a while. I'm not sure precisely why, but it was cute!

Bubbles! (with Parker)

It's a girl!

Foster care agencies try to provide respite care for foster families who need a break from foster care or are going on an extended vacation. We're providing just such respite care this week for a foster family who is traveling (*cough*KU game*cough), and so we're taking care of PrincessC.

She's just over two months old, and has a sweet gummy smile:

Cooper doesn't know what to do with all of the pink stuff:

Sir Cooper Hillary

Climbing Plastic Box Peak:

Mt. St. Sofa:

Mt. McBleachers:

Stair Everest:

A true climber hates to be carried back down the mountain.

Stopping at base camp to rest before summitting:

What we're laughing at tonight

Recently, Cooper has started playing a dangerous game. He'll sit on the floor, get a funny gleam in his eye, and throw himself backward, hoping we'll catch him. When he's not on the rug, I catch him when I can get to him in time. But lately, if he's sitting on the rug, I'll let him fall backward and bonk his head, hopefully as a not-so-subtle suggestion that he should stop doing that.

He seems to have caught on a bit. His game has now morphed into this melodramatic flinging of himself onto his side. Then roll over, sit up, and repeat.

The video is 40 seconds long, so it may take a bit to load. But Alan and I have watched it about 10 times in the last couple of hours. And we laugh every time. (As usual, there's no sound, which is good because you'd mostly hear me laughing.)

Belly Button

Or, as Cooper says, bo-bu.

Playing with Mama

Peek-a-boo!

Hmm... not sure about him.

Snuggling

Our final family photo with Baby J before I took him to meet Great Aunt.

BabyJ's brother, ToddlerJ.

When I met Great Aunt, she said that she had been praying for a playmate for ToddlerJ and that now he had a friend for life. I thought that was sweet.

How big is Cooper?

Sooooo big!

Enjoying the spring weather (and a small snack of grass and dirt):

Trying spinach:

One bite went in. The rest hit the floor.

Peek-a-boo, redux

This time, no props needed.

One-handed, even!

Update on Baby J

It looks like our family of four will be back down to three by Monday. BabyJ is off to live with a relative (his great-aunt) until his case wraps up. If he isn't reunited with his birth parents eventually, then I think this relative will adopt him. So I'm busy trying to finish his photo album from the weeks he spent with us. Mercy, I take a lot of pictures!

This was Cooper's latest toy: A light switch box that I bought and put together for him. He figured out how to flip switches, but neither Alan nor I wanted to hold up him by the light switches for longer than 30 seconds. So we built him his very own light switches.


BabyJ in the swing, which he loved:

Cooper in our new take-your-kid-walking backpack, which he hated:

It went better once we finally got moving outside. But I'm sure it's pretty freaky for him to be hanging out six feet off the ground, all of a sudden.

BabyJ's "Just Like Me" African-American doll, dressed for St. Patrick's Day already!

You will NOT believe this!

We have a friend named Donna. Everytime Donna sees Cooper, she says, "Don't you think he looks more and more like Alan?" And I have to reply "No, Donna. He doesn't look a thing like Alan. I question his paternity, frankly."

And then the next time she comes over, she'll say "Oh, this picture looks just like Alan, don't you see it?" And again I say "No, Donna. No one but you thinks he looks like Alan. Not even Alan's family is making a claim to him."

Oh my stars, I may be wrong.

We celebrated Alan's birthday (*cough*41*cough*) this weekend with his family, and Alan's mom gave us some pictures from Alan's childhood, including his 1st birthday pictures. And -- wait for it -- he looks just like Cooper. Not the ears, which were a little pointy, even back then. But the round face and little cheeks. Just like my baby.

My favorite part of Alan's childhood photos is that it's always Alan + two little girls dressed alike (his twin sisters). Alan in his Easter suit + two little girls in matching Easter dresses. Alan in his Christmas outfit + two little girls in matching red dresses. It's sweet.

Here are close-ups, just so you can make a better comparison:

Seriously. Isn't that my Coopie's little round face and squishy cheeks??

Of bathtime and stair-climbing

In my last post, I asked what you thought Coop was doing in the video. Very few of you actually guessed. Party poopers. But I'll tell you anyway. I was singing "The Wheels on the Bus," and Coop was acting out the verse about how the wipers on the bus go swish, swish, swish. It's his favorite verse.


So it seems that BabyJ enjoys bathtime, particularly the hair-washing part:

For point of reference, this is the bowl we use for single-serving microwave popcorn.

Finally, we replaced the popcorn bowl with the old baby bathtub.

And in Cooper news, Alan thought it would be fun to help Cooper climb the stairs. He did pretty good, and made it to the top.

But then decided he wanted to climb everything:

This is going to bite us in the butt, I'm afriad. Kind of like the time Alan thought it would be cute to lure Mikey (the cat) up a ladder with a string, and then we came home one day to find Mikey perched at the top of the ladder and unable to get down. Will we never learn?

The Leap Day Weekend Edition

Cooper really likes this string of plastic beads (we call it his snake).

He holds onto it while crawling:

While playing the piano:

While napping:

And while eating:

And finally, a trivia question for the day.

What's Cooper doing in this video?

A hint: if the camera had sound, you could hear me singing,

and you'd know immediately what he was doing.