Knock Knock...

Adrienne: Knock, knock

Cooper: Who's there?

Adrienne: Adrienne

Cooper (w/ much excitement): Oh, come into my house Adrienne!

this guy sure does make me laugh!

One year older and wiser too, happy birthday to you!

Ryan turned 31 yesterday... he's getting so old:) He had a pretty mellow birthday, which I think at the rate we've been going was very welcomed. He had church meetings at 6:30am and since I was too lazy to get up that early to fix him something fun for breakfast I bought him a carton of half and half and frosted flakes cereal and told him to enjoy. Usually Ryan is running late to his church meetings and rarely grabs breakfast. Yesterday morning, knowing there was half and half in the fridge, he managed to make some time for some cereal.

We had church from 8-11am, lounged around the house, Ryan took the kids to the park while I iced his cake, took naps, had dinner, had friends over for cake and ice cream and called it a day!

Happy Birthday Ryan and no this is not your birthday week:)

Since Ryan's year has been eat, drink and sleep McCain, I couldn't pass up a little McCain reminder in the decorating of his cake:)

Cooper and his new B.F.F. Emily

I guess I'm a soccer mom...

The kids just recently started soccer. Last Saturday they had a welcoming "meet the coach" day. Adrienne had a blast, but Cooper cried and kept saying, "I want to go home, I want to go home!" There were a ton of kids and the Coach was really loud and it wasn't looking good. Ryan had to stay with him the entire time and when he finally started doing things by himself he'd look back every 5 seconds to make sure Ryan was right there. I was starting to think that we were going to have to pay for Ryan to take the class and buy him a uniform!

Cooper did warm up to Coach Jay and talked about him throughout the week like they had been best friends on the "meet the coach" day. "Coach Jay say, 'Ready, Set, Chicken nuggets!' He so funny!" Coach Jay say this or that.

The day of his practice came and he acted excited, but I was worried he'd pull a "I want to go home" moment. He was a little clingy right before practice started, but as soon as Coach Jay said "lets go" he was out there without any problem. Every once in a while he would look for me and wave with a big grin and say "Hi mom!"

It was really entertaining watching 3 year-olds run around.... organized chaos. Cooper many a time got distracted by the dry dirt on the ground and would stop and try to make big dust clouds.

It was pretty funny when the coach said, "The blue team go over there." and all of the blues and half of the reds (including Cooper) took off running. Also, Coach Jay counted them into little teams and was saying, "You're 1, You're 2, You're 3" and so on and he was immediately corrected with, "I'm not 1, I'm 3" or "I'm not 2 I'm 3!"

Adrienne ended up with a fun class with only 10 kids and 7 of them we know! Good times at soccer!




Lizzie, Emma, Adrienne, Avery, Coriel, Alyssa & Ben Cooper learning to stop the ball

Sorry about the loud soccer mom in the background!

Too many questions...

On the way home from school the other day I kept asking Cooper about how preschool was... "What did you do? Who did you play with?" and so on. Cooper wasn't giving me much response and finally told me "I too busy to talk." We rode in silence for a minute or two and then I asked another question and he frustratedly responded, "you ask me so many questions mom!"

School Pride!

Adrienne's school pride day, GOOOO Tigers!

Kindergarten picture day! We'll let you know how they turned out... she told me she was feeling "shy" when they took the picture and didn't show her teeth. I hope they turned out better than the lips smashed together demonstration she gave me (not pictured)... hmmmm... oh well, at least I got this cute one!

I bigger now?

Tuesday morning was Cooper's first day of preschool. That morning I told him he could wear his new shoes and he asked, "I bigger now?"

I told him he was big enough to go to preschool and he was so "sited" (excited). I was worried that the excitement would turn into hesitation once we got to school, but he did great. He hung up his backpack, "I do it myself" and happily greeted his teacher Miss Pat and assistant teacher "Miss Chelle" (Miss Michelle). He went straight in and sat down at the table and while busily getting out play-doh waved to me and said "bye mom" and then told his teacher, "that's my mom" as I left.

I was so happy that he did so well, but there was part of me that thought, I hope he misses his mommy a little:)

Our big boy heading to his first day of preschool in the Bunny Class...

A little ice cream celebration for a great first day!

Who eats ice cream like this? Cooper of course... and after his bite in the middle he preceded to eat from the bottom up, it was lots of fun:)

Besides preschool, Cooper has been doing something else that big boys do... going in the potty of course! I took this little video of Cooper on the potty a while ago...

Warning: this footage contains the word poopy, but I had to share because it really does make Ryan and I SO HAPPY!

GOP Convention 2008

This is Ryan. As many of you know, the company I work for does work for the McCain campaign, so this past week I had the opportunity to volunteer at the Republican National Convention. What a ride! Here is a list of a few memories and some pictures: How Hurricane Gustav started the convention on a somber, yet "country first" note; some of the best ribs in the world at Market Place BBQ, we ate there three times (look it up if you are ever in Minneapolis); The One Campaign Party with Daughtry (and how Jason (our creative director) ran up to the front, snapped pictures with one hand and video taped with the other, and talked some random lady out of her camera battery when his ran out, completely true); Rage Against the Machine's concert down the street from the hotel and hundreds of the policemen and policewomen in full riot gear, while we go walking in that direction right as the concert is letting out (we didn't know that at the time); not having to worry about parking anywhere; my head not hitting the pillow until at least 2 am every night (morning); sitting behind the family/friends box during Rudy's and Governor Palin's speech; the candy bar and kobe beef mini burgers and fries at the Google/Vanity Fair party; playing some good 'ole inner city ball at the downtown Minneapolis YMCA; running into numerous reporters/celebrities (as good as you can get for the GOP convention) on the floor; feeling greatly energized after having worked on this for nearly 2 years.

Here are some pictures:

a camping we will go...