Morning

Last night I finally took the time to upload pictures from my camera.  I haven't taken pictures of the kids for over a month! Bad mommy!!  This morning I made Cooper a green smoothie and he climbed up with Dad to drink it. Then he moved onto Dad's orange juice.  Now that I finally have room on my camera for new pictures, I had to take some!  I absolutely love watching Cooper drink from of a straw.  He's been doing it for months now, but I finally got some pictures.  He was being so cute and serious and calm this morning.  Oh, I love his sweet precious face and puffy baby arms and hands. 

I know, picture overload of Cooper.  That's just what I do with a kid this cute. 

My new blog

I started a new blog.  It's not just about the Harrington Family.  It's allll mine:).  Take a peek and maybe even become a follower!  The Harrington Family blog will still exist and be updated as well.

How to follow our blog

CLICK HERE to be alerted every time we update our blog.  This link will explain.  Being a follower of this private blog will not update you, so you will have to click on the link (just this once) to see how you can follow us!  Thanks.  Don't forget about us just because we are private:)!!:)

Julien and Jonah's Room

At last, I finished their room!  When we moved into this apartment, we decided to separate the bunk beds since the room was big enough.  The thing I don't like about bunk beds is it's sooo hard to wash the sheets often from the top bunk and it's hard for them to make their beds too.  I also found some super cute ideas online for displaying artwork and for bookshelves.  So, I got to work to give them a room makeover!  Originally, I called up my dad and asked him if he would be willing to help me build some book shelves for the kid's room.  He was willing.  With Rich's schedule, there was no way we'd ever get around to making these together, and my dad is pretty handy with wood.  I had several options that appealed to me. What first inspired me to make bookshelves that would display their books better were these rain gutter, bookshelves.  But once I found some other options like this I thought I would rather go with wood.  That one was super cute, but with the space I had to work with, they didn't quite work; plus, that one looked a little more difficult to get the books out of...but definitely cute!  I also knew with that one, my dad would be doing most of the work, and in my older age, I don't like waiting around for things.  So finally I found this idea and decided I could do that all by myself!  By the way, if you did take the time to glance at that last site, it said, $20 at the top.  Well, she wasn't talking about per shelf, but total for all the shelves she made.  She had a few more supplies laying around her garage than I had, so it cost me a little more.  But over all, it cost me a little over $5 to build each shelf!  Not bad at all.  These are actually called "picture ledges" and can be sold for $10 per shelf for the small ones, and $20 for the longer ones.  We are pleased with how they turned out.  The whole reasoning behind them was to encourage more reading.  When books are on a typical bookshelf it's easy to forget about certain books and easy for them to make a mess searching for certain ones. There is something about seeing the front of a book that makes it more tempting to pick up.  So they are working out nicely and being used just as we had wished.  The idea I fell in love with for displaying their art work was this.  Found at Ikea.  The online store doesn't carry them and we don't have an ikea here.  I did find some on Ebay if you are interested, but after shipping (for two sets), it was going to cost me $60.  So nope, as cute as they are, I just couldn't justify that one.  I then found this idea from potterybarnkids.com, still expensive, but gave me the idea to make my own.  So for a few bucks, I made these (seen below).  All supplies bought at a craft store.

Jonah's side

Julien's side (yes, we are actually allowed to paint in this place.  But since it's just a rental, we only painted this one wall in the whole house).

I love children's books!

Instead of getting side tables, I just made some smaller shelves.  The lamps are great for bedtime reading!  What I really wanted was wall mounted swing arm lamps, but hello, they are SO expensive!  These lap desks (on the floor) were Christmas presents and have also come in handy!

Ta dah!! I am proud that I tackled all of that on my own, and super relieved I'm done with that room and don't have to think about it anymore!  I think I'm tired of projects for now!

Happy 5th Birthday Jonah!

It finally came!  Jonah's 5th birthday!  He still can't believe it himself. Everyday he says, "I just can't believe I turned 5!"  Turning 5 has been a good thing for Jonah.  He is the most stubborn out of all of our kids and turning 5 has motivated him to try some new things lately. It's been nice.

To celebrate his birthday, we went to the Children's Museum.  He had never been there before so he was super excited.  Julien had gone there for a field trip for school, and told Jonah ALL about it!  While Rich and I were trying to get ourselves, everyone, and everything ready that morning, Julien and Jonah were going nuts-o in the living;  they could not contain their excitement.

Before we left we gave Jonah his birthday presents!

One of the things Jonah got was the movie "Oceans."  They watched it in the car on the way to the Museum.  They love it!  I still need to watch it, but the parts I have seen are so pretty!

We weren't trying to hide Jonah, he just didn't feel like taking pictures that day and insisted on standing behind the stroller.  He just wanted to get in there!

This is when we first walked into the museum.  Cooper was just taking it all in.

Mini market.  The kids loved this.  It's so cute and fun!

To die for CUTE!  (The boys and dad were in a science lab at this time, learning about density, and unfortunately I couldn't get in there to get pictures of that).

Seriously.

I know, picture overload!  Then, we went out to Chili's for dinner because Jonah has been dying to see what it looked like in there, lol. 

Happy 5th Birthday Sweet Jonah!  We love you!!!

Cooper and Sleep

A years worth of sleeping pictures and not one of me and Cooper sleeping together!  But every night he was in my arms or his crib right next to my bed.  I so wish I could make this collage even bigger because some of these pictures are hilarious.  I may end up posting them individually on Facebook.

We moved!  If you read one of my recent posts, I mentioned that we would be moving and that Cooper was finally going to get his own room!  This was bitter sweet for me.  Mainly sweet.  Sad too, because my baby boy and I are attached at the hip.  I got very comfortable being able to peek on him while he slept and also had a love/dislike relationship with him sleeping in my bed for 1/2 the night.  I LOVE cuddling with him, but staying in the same position for hours on end is not comfortable!  I would strain in one position to keep him safe if he were sleeping with me.  Mmm, but the smell of his hair and breath and his sweet little sounds were priceless.  But this co sleeping thing needed to end.  It was very draining and I wanted us both to get better sleep at night and also at nap time for him.  To recap on that post, I mentioned that my other boys slept through the night much sooner.  Cooper had not slept through the night for the 13 months of his life and we were very convinced that it was because he was in our room.  It was also all too easy to just pull him in bed with me when he woke up throughout the night because I was sooo tired and he knew we were there; and crying it out was something I was trying to avoid and I don't think that would work when we were in the room anyway.  SO we moved.  Cooper baby has his own cute room now!  I love it!  I thought the transition was going to be a little rough, but it wasn't!  We were right, he needed his own room.  He needed to be in his own space that was smaller and mom and dad were not there!  Since we moved (a month ago) he has slept through the night almost every single night!  We have had a few nights that he was up with gas or teething, but for the most part he is sleeping SO much better!  Also, another improvement is that I can put him in bed while he is awake and say, "goodnight Cooper, I love you," and I shut the door and he puts himself to sleep.  I tried this so much at the other place and he would scream his head off.  Every once in a while he will refuse and I rock him for a bit and out comes a big burp.  He is so stubborn with his burps and he won't lay down until they are out. I don't mind rocking him every once in a while.  In fact, I cherish every second of it. He is growing up too fast and I can't get enough of him.  But for his sake I have to let him put himself to bed the majority of the time.  It's so much easier too, since I have 2 other kids to tend to.  He loves his room!  Around nap/bedtime when he starts to get sleepy, I say, "lets go nigh-night," and he waddles down the hall to his room, turns on his sound machine, gets his binki and kiki (blanket) and I put him in bed.  He seems so content and I just love that!  So in celebration to Cooper sleeping better, I made a collage of the first year of his life of all the sleeping pictures I had of him.  Actually, there were more, but I tried to limit myself to one per day for the collage, except for a few of those days that were hard to choose from.  Going through all of those pictures made me choke up.  I also found myself talking to my computer in the voice I talk to Cooper in.  He is in bed right now and man I miss him!  I have a hard time going through old pictures and videos sometimes because it reminds me how fast this amazing thing called motherhood is going by.  Anyway, I'm so proud of my little boy!!

The Witte Museum

My dad got some VIP tickets to the Witte Museum.  The current exhibit there is "Amazon Voyage: Vicious Fishes and Other Riches.  Doing something different is always fun and we knew the kids would love it!  Unfortunately, we couldn't use flash photography inside so I didn't get much of that, but outside was fun too.

Since we were VIP we got to enter in a different way (oooh!!) and that lead us into a room with free snacks and drinks.  My kids probably would have been cool with just that.  They thought they were in heaven.  As they were eating, they were already saying "this is the coolest museum ever!"  And Cooper who very rarely has crackers started laughing every time I handed him one!  It was too cute!

Before entering the Amazon exhibit.  Dinosaur bones!!!  Can it get any better for these two?!  Actually, Jonah did look up at me and whisper, "they are dead, right Mom?"

My camera=no good without a flash.  But can you sort-kinda tell they were having a blast?!  (Not a real snake folks).

Boy Heaven!

 The H-E-Buddy Skycycle

 This is how it works (quoted from website):

The counterweight on the bottom of the cycle lowers the center of gravity making the cycle stable. The weight below the cycle is heavier than you are and pulls the cycle firmly on to the rail.

You can't tell in this picture but this is pretty high up and is over a river. 

One of the greatest things about living in San Antonio is that there is so much to do!  The kids had a blast at the museum.  I guess we kind of raced through the exhibit a little too fast because after we left, Julien said, "I didn't learn anything."  Maybe next time we will spend a little more time reading the displays and exploring.  They were just so eager to see what was next!  A big thanks to my dad who not only got us the tickets and spent the day with us, but also spent too much time trying to help us jump start our van, only to find that it wasn't fully in park and didn't need to be jumped!  Good times.  My ghetto van is still giving me trouble, but at least that day we discovered the real problem and now when I'm sitting in the parking lot and it won't start, I just give it a good shove into park and we're off!  Gotta love it!  Thanks Dad!!!

Uncle Robbie

 We were blessed to have Rich's brother Rob come for a visit!  The kids call him uncle Robbie.  Rob had a friend who was buying a truck off of Craigslist and the truck was here in San Antonio.  Since his friend was injured while deployed, he could not drive alone yet.  They live in Georgia, so it was a long drive.  Anyway, his friend and him jumped on a plane and bought the truck and stayed at our house for a night.  It was a short visit but we were so glad he was able to come!!  I love his brother Rob.  He is such a great guy.  We don't get to see him very often since we've always lived so far away but it's always good to see him.  He is a Ranger in the Army.  Okay, he's like big time, and has a better title than that, but I can't remember.  All I know is this guy an amazing soldier and deserves all the respect in the world!  His best friend Kevin, that came with him, is also big time too.  Forgive me for sounding so ignorant with their correct titles, I don't mean any disrespect!  (I'll have to get back to you on that).  These guys are the real deal and the sacrifice they make is one that leaves me ever so grateful.
   So we had fun.  The kids loved them and the day went by quickly.  But at night, once the kids were asleep and Rich was finally home from work, all of us stayed up late talking.  They told us stories of being in Iraq and Afghanistan.  I noticed at one point my jaw was on the ground and I must have looked like a very ignorant and naive American.  The things they were saying about the hate these people have for Americans is so disgusting, it's hard to wrap your mind around it.  I just sat there listening, feeling like I no longer had any problems.  Life there (in Iraq and Afghanistan) is just so incredibly night and day different!  Of course I knew that, but after hearing stories, it made me really contemplate my reality vs theirs.  What an amazing life we live, here in America!  I just find it so fascinating how everyone living on this earth has different realities and perspectives.  It's easy to get so wrapped up in our own reality that we forget how others live.  It also made me appreciate everything I have, especially the people I love, and was a great reminder of the freedoms we enjoy as Americans.  His friend, Kevin, had a grenade blown up under his feet.  He was in a coma for weeks and had to relearn how to walk and talk.  He still has some issues with his brain and has seizures from time to time.  I felt so humbled to have these brave soldiers in my home.  Kevin just kept thanking us for letting us stay at our house and for Rich to have taken the time to check the truck out before they came out.  I'm sitting there, as he is thanking us, feeling like a jerk that they were sleeping on my living room floor; these people that put their LIFE on the line so I can live a life of freedom!  So in debt to these heroes!!    I have so much respect and appreciation for them and their families.  Why is it so easy to take this life for granted?!  Rob is now deployed for 6 months again.  I'm so glad we got to see him before he went out.
   Now, here are some pictures from the visit.  I must write that Rich is definitely Rob's little brother.  What I mean is he looks up to him soooo much and loves to be in his presence.  The way he talks about Rob today (at 33 years old), leaves my imagination to visualize a little Richie trying to be so much like his big brother Rob.  It's really that cute how he still adores him.  And since my husband doesn't read my blog anyway, maybe I can throw in a little funny story about the two of them.  :)  When rob was here he went in the bathroom and changed into his p.j.s.  He came out wearing a t-shirt and some really short running shorts.  It surprised me a bit and made me chuckle inside, but Rob wore them with pure confidence.  And on a side note, his friend Kevin changed into some flannel p.j. bottoms with reindeer on them...super tough guys with silly p.j.s!!!  Anyway, Rich made some poking-fun-comments about Rob's short shorts that night.  I told Rich he should go get his short (and I'm talking SHORT) running shorts that he has had for years that he used in a triathlon (? or something) when we first started dating.  I begged Rob to please take the shorts home because they've always been something I don't care to see Rich in and they are just taking up space because he only used them once!  The next day, Rob left and I found the shorts on our chair.  I mentioned to Rich that Rob must not have wanted them and Rich said, "Yeah, these things are just really short." (They weren't too much shorter than Rob's).  ANYWAY (to the point), a few days later, Rich gets home from work, showers, and comes out wearing THE short shorts.  He's dead serious and is feeling super cool in them because his big brother sports these things at bed time too.  LOL.   Let's just say they get worn to bed quite often now.  So you tell me, is he Rob's little brother or what!?! 

 

Doing what we are good at...Moving

Hi, we're the Harringtons and we are the most unstable family you've ever met.  We move several times a year.  I know, I know, here we go again.  Ever since everything went down in 2008 things have been crazy and we have moved too many times.  It's getting so bad that I hardly have room on my boxes to label what's inside.  They look like this: fragile-living room decor, kid's room books, tpc move-master bedroom, '09 move guest bathroom., dishes-kitchen...etc. etc, Living room pictures.  I try to cross out the old labels but I'm sure the wrong boxes will end up in the wrong rooms as we unload because people probably won't be able to tell what label is current.  Oh well!  I'm just glad that most of our boxes have lasted this long.  On a positive note, we stayed in this apartment for 18 months!  Incredible!  It's been good here but we out grew this place over a year ago when Cooper was born.  We finished out our lease and always planned on getting a 3 bedroom place once our 18 months was up.  We made it!  BARELY!  It's been insane! The place is nice and we could be fine here other than the fact that Cooper has been in our room this whole time.  He is almost 13 months old and does not sleep through the night!  I did not experience this with the other kids.  They were sleeping through the night much earlier and they also had their own rooms.  I just believe that this is the reason Cooper is still waking up.  We have a sound machine so I don't always think it's noise that wakes him (although Rich has been known to snore loud enough to wake him or randomly sneeze or cough in the middle of the night and scare me half to death and wake Cooper).  I really think the main reason is that Cooper knows we are there, right next to him, so of course we will pick him  up.  I need my sleep to be most effective around here and having a baby in my room ain't helping.  Not to mention his things being all over our room and closet as well.  Rich and I are both people who like organization when it comes to our things.  A home for everything is how we like it.  But having a small place makes that tough.  Cooper also naps in the kid's room on most days (in the porta-crib) because it is quieter during the day in there and darker.  So that has made their room more cluttered with the crib being in there.  And if you are wondering why I don't put the big crib in there permanently, it's for this reason, Jonah would kill him.  Trust me, he would.  His crib wouldn't fit in there anyway.  So for the sake of momma getting her sleep and all of us not going crazy with a small cluttered place, we will not be renewing our lease here.  I found a 3 bedroom apartment in my same ward that was cheaper than the 3 bedroom apartment here at this complex.  So we are moving about 5 minutes down the road.  Like I said it is in the same ward (that means we will go to the same church building with the same people because it's in the same boundaries-if that makes sense).  Unfortunately it's not in the same school boundaries though....but more on that in another post.  I know I sound bitter in this post because of our lack of stability but I'm actually excited about this move.  I'm excited that Cooper will have his own space and I'm excited because our new place has a ton of windows!!!  Even 2 windows in my kitchen!  I don't know what it is about windows in my kitchen that makes me feel happy and feels less like an apartment!  I might even attempt to grow some wheat grass or have real plants.  The living/dinning room has a lot of windows too.  The place we are in now is so dark.  I open up all the blinds and it's still not very bright.  I'm really looking forward to this move.  You have no idea!!!!!!  I'll keep you posted on Cooper's sleep progress for those who care.  I am not expecting it to be an easy transition.  He and I have some tough habits to break.  NO more co sleeping!  I'm sure it is going to mean a lot of sleepless nights for me for a while.  But I know it will be so worth it to retrain him to not depend on mommy to fall asleep or back to sleep.

9 more days!

We have a little unspoken agreement with moving:

*I do all of the packing and unpacking

*He does all the loading and unloading (with some of my help and others)

*I hang the pictures and decorate

*He hangs shelves and moves the furniture that I can't move

*We both do the cleaning of the old place and the new place

And together we make it happen!

And on a side note:

   Cooper is just so cute!  I really don't know why we have toys!  He doesn't play with them much at all.  His new favorite thing to do is carry around bowels, cups, boxes, or bags and put things in them.  He collects things and then stops and takes them out and puts them back in.  It entertains him for a long time now.  The other thing he now does that tempts me to have more babies is,  I say, "Cooper, I love you!" And he instantly makes kissing sounds and gives me the sweetest flirty smile and then more kisses. 

And on ANOTHER SIDE NOTE:
  Have you been ripped off lately?  I have.  I know this post is long enough, but read my story here, it might save you from being ripped off one day.

A couple weeks ago on a particular day, Julien was at school, Jonah at a friend's house, and Cooper was toting around with me looking for apartments.  I was starving and the stressful day called for a Hot and Ready pizza.  So I headed over to Little Caesar's to get a $5.99 (they aren't $5 anymore) pizza and figured the rest of what I didn't eat could be for dinner that night.  I walked in and had Cooper in my arms and the creep that was working there immediately started to try to flatter me.  He went on and on about the way I looked and it was really uncomfortable and annoying but whatever, I just wanted my pizza and smiled and answered his questions.  I'm not telling this to brag.  He was nasty and obnoxious.  I ordered, and handed him my credit card and when I handed it to him he told me the total which was $6.98 or something close to it.  He continued to try to flatter me, now asking me (as he looked at my picture on my credit card) if I was a cheerleader in high school.  He then typed something in his register as he looked at my card and I was getting super annoyed and suspicious.  The cheerleader question was to distract me by the way, as was all of his flattery.  He then asked if I wanted my receipt although he didn't use the word receipt.  He called it something else and I said, "yes please." His countenance then changed and he looked a little let down that I wanted my receipt.  So he hand it to me while looking in my eyes, and said "here you go beautiful."  (Again, trying to distract me. As soon as he turned away to get the pizza I looked at my receipt and , UH HUH, INTERESTING...the total was $22.99.  Nice try loser.  I am standing there watching him slice up my pizza, thinking about how I am going to deal with this.  It was soooo irritating and I felt so violated!  He then hands me the pizza.  Again, calling me beautiful (I'm puking inside).  And then I say, "um, this receipt says, $22.99."  He very quickly (looking ever so guilty) asks me for my credit card.  I didn't want to give it back to him, but did anyway and he looked at it and says, "oh, 2299 are the last 4 digits of your credit card number.  I must have accidentally typed that in instead of the total!  The real total is 6.98, I'm so sorry!  Thank you for looking."  Oh really, is that why he said, "$6.98" as he rang me up the first time, sure.  At this point I'm just trying my best to not tell the guy what I really think of him as he voided the sale and gave me a voided receipt.  It made me sooooo mad!  Not just that it happened to me but the fact that I know he does it to people all of the time because he was so quick to say, "oh let me see your credit card...i put in the last 4 digits."  What a loser!   Some people!  Ironically, it happened to be the tastiest hot and ready pizza I've ever had from Little Caesar's.  They aren't always that great.  But even still, not worth $22.99!!!  It took a few days for the money to be returned to my account and during those days I grew more irritated.  I'm still going to try to bust this guy.  Just not sure how yet.  So moral of the story, check your receipts!

Christmas Morning

Julien was up at 1 am and discovered the presents and ran and woke up Jonah and they both came out.  I told them to go back to bed.  Julien had made Christmas cards for each person in the family and hid them all over the house and then went back to bed. He woke up again at 4 am and finally again at 7:30 and we gave them the okay to be awake.  Cooper had a blast having everyone on the floor and went from present to present touching every thing.  He never did mess with the tree since there was so much going on.  After we opened presents, my dad and Carolyn came over and we had brunch and more gift exchanges.

Let the fun begin!

Opening gifts/ Toy Story 3 was the gift that got the most screams and jumps for joy.  Thank you to my sister for that one!

The mess of presents/the new ping pong set up

My kids make funny faces when they are concentrating.  Connect 4 was one of our family favorites this year!  We've played it many times since Christmas day and the kids are getting really good.  They beat Rich and I sometimes. 

 It took me a while to finally get these 2 Christmas posts up and now we are all over Christmas so I'm stopping here.  Hope you all enjoyed Christmas this year!