Happy New Year!

Well, we hope you all have a great 2009! It'll be a big year for us since "the clumpster" will be arriving in the next 3 months- eek! A few pics of the holiday festivities below...which Riley LOVED, of course- I mean, c'mon, who DOESN'T Love getting presents! I just wish the post-holiday time was not "what it was" as Riley ended up with some crazy high fever virus for 2 days this past weekend and then had a 24 hour reprieve before his nagging cough (he and I have had it for a couple of weeks) turned into full-blown bronchitis in a matter of a few hours! So, he was sick as a dog (still is, but he's running a regimine of 5 different medicines as of yesterday so he's getting better, thankfully) for the last few days of 2008- looking on the bright side, it sure beats last year with our trip to the ER in the middle of the night on January 1st! Anyway, back to the well wishin'- Hope ya'll have an awesome New Year, filled with good health, good fortune, and all that warm and fuzzy stuff I'm so well known for bestowing, eh??

Happy Holidays

Jim just whisked Riley off to work for the day- Merrill always asks employees to bring in their kidlings on Xmas Eve for a day of breakfast, Santa, and other holiday-esque activities. I woke up with Riley this morning (Jim had a late night at the Court- yeah!) and he was an absolute angel for a good 1:15 hrs, until Jim got up and Riley apparently found his "evil" switch and turned it on to hyperspeed- hopefully, the car ride to Hopewell will return the sweet little guy we all know and love. My Riley-free activities will be baking 2 pies, 1 streusel cake, baked sweet taters, a batch of nut cup cookies, cleaning the bathrooms, laundry, and wrapping up some pressies. Ugh. Anyway, hope the holidays are awesome for all of you- can't wait to see MOST of you who read this thing during my break from teachin'! Wooo!

A few pics of Riley trimming the tree..he's been really amazing at NOT touching the tree, which has surprised both Jim and I.






A funny video of a frequent "post-bath" but "pre-jammie" game- we usually instigate the "hi-ya" game to redirect Riley from some irritating behavior just as trying to pinch us/kicking, etc...sometimes, he can be a real pain in the tuckus after his bath at night, but this little game seems to turn on the "sweet, giggly" Riley and all is right in his little world once again.


P.s.- Our "Frosty" watching count has got to be nearing 50 times in the last 2 weeks. I think I might have switched Riley over to at least incorporating "The Grinch" into his Frosty repertoire, but only time will tell...that, or Wall-E, which Riley got from "Santa" in Nutley last weekend.

Angry....

I've been wondering where my Christmas cards were...ya know the ones I ordered on November 30th??? Well, lo and behold, stupid head up their butts VistaPrint (a printing site I held in such high regard until this morning) had an issue with processing my order but never contacted me, so our order just was sitting in limbo (I kept checking online but the status of "processing" led me to believe that they were just busy with the holiday season, as every one is, of course)...not to be printed and sent before (or ever?)the holidays. Anyway, so ya'll will be receiving Happy New Year cards from the Cook Crew this year...

Here's the "shot" you would have received, had VistaPrint not provided me with such shitty customer service:


This pic was cute too, but the clarity was not great for a Xmas card..


Anyway, tomorrow is my last day of teachin' until the 5th! Woooo hoooo! Hopefully, I will update more frequently in my "downtime"!

T-day Recap

Since Christmas is quickly approaching, I figured I'd better get on the ball and post some T-day weekend shots (including some pics from Jim's bday!)

Daddy gets his annual "Daddy Juice" presents..Happy 37th Lovey!

The Birthday Grinch that stole Daddy's Jameson

How does one entertain a 2 year old at a restaurant? lobster bibs, maraschino cheeries, new foods like calamari (mind you, this is the child that nixed every single Thanksgiving meal option the day before in lieu of a cheese sandwich and some raisins), and grammy's jewelry!




Random Cranny moments that involved someone other than Jim and I entertaining the boy...Ahhhhhhh!


First taste of the seductive world of Entenmann's Crumb Coffee Cake:


Not too much else exciting to report..just crazy busy with wrapping up teachin' for my ginormous winter break (Dec 23rd to Jan 5th!)and trying to get prepped for the holidays without going schizo, ha ha ha. Riley and I have been sick, but nothing too crazy, but enough to throw a few kinks into the works. We're off to Cranny today to celebrate Poppy's birthday tonight and then Jim and I get to venture into the City tomorrow for brunch with my bro, Sean, Leah, and Chris so we're really looking forward to it. Riley will be spending the day in Cranford racing cars, playing knock hockey, and scouting for deer in the woods with Poppy and Grammy.

Poor kid, but of course we laughed

Behold, the antithesis of Skater Baby's Santa photo-op...

Riley wanted to see "Ho Ho" and was fine, all the way up until he actually sat on his lap. He was also fine, shortly after and hung on to the little stuffed elf Santa gave for the remainder of our mall excursion so I don't think he's scarred for life. We laughed, of course, and although we had our choice of 3 photos, we went for the most grief-stricken one (the photo tech, asked us 3 times if we were sure THAT was the pic we wanted). In all honestly, all of the pics were pretty bad, not a smile in the bunch, just a bunch of lip curlin' scaredy cat-ness, and since I'm hoping to avoid the mall until the post-holiday season, we figured it was now or never. Poor baby, eh, maybe it'll score him a few sensitivity points for a future girlfriend or two. In addition, Jim said they'll go nicely with the dozen or so pics he has of him getting freaked out by Santa back in his "heyday"...I'm allowed to say that now, as the "old man" turned 37 this past holiday weekend. Pics of The Thanksgiving Weekend to follow at some point soon...Stay tuned!

Quiet Weekend..

Quiet weekend this past one, which was nice as the weekends coming up will be chock full of craziness with the holidays quickly approaching. Is anyone else freaking out that Christmas is only 4 weeks away? *Sheesh! We did hit up the new outlets in Tinton Falls (I think they're actually in Neptune) on Saturday and Riley was rather angelic- we scored two pairs of Vans (ghost print and santa skull print)for a sweet 20 bones plus a fairly dorky hat and mitten set from Gymboree that was desperately needed with the weather taking a header into deep winter. So, the weekend was nice, aside from a few hours in the late afternoon yesterday when Riley decided he would invoke the spirit of Manon (Uncle Woobs will be the only one to get this reference, for sure)and act like an absolute animal, not unlike Fairuza Balk's character in one of my all time favorite guilty pleasure movies of all time, The Craft. In the end, we forgave him, as when we he doesn't get down for a nap before 1pm, it's usually a hard sell anyway, so it was our fault for shopping and hitting up Delicious Orchards for holiday dinner fixins' anyway. Today, it was a late morning with Mommy (Walgreens, Pathmark, and the carwash!)as Jim has a bit of a cold and we wanted to give him time to relax. Riley ended up crashing out for a nice long nap so I finished a bunch of school crap and my Christmas list!

Oh, and Clumpy (Hiiiii Heather!)is doing a-ok, going back for another ultrasound this week just to check on something they couldn't see in the last one 2 weeks ago(not a penis, so get your head out of the gutter, but some vessel in the umbilical cord) and I'm fully in maternity clothes now, so the belly is getting large and in charge. I'm helping "the belly" along as tonight will be my 3rd night of dessert, aw yeah!

A few pics...

Riley's new favorite after-bath activity is rifling through the scarf/hat/glove winter bin (which also houses some old purses for some reason)





Riley made Jim take a picture of his belly after he took one of mine a few nights ago (we're not trying to be artsy, our camera just double exposed the image I guess)





Oh, and Happy Thanksgiving!

Hawt Wheelz

Ok, I'm not sure this will top the Placentalicious post I previously made, but this one (I think) is too good not to share.

On yesterday's daily day care activity report, in addition to the normal, we read such and such book, sang songs, there was a comment (the teachers always include a written comment). Normally these comments aren't worth sharing with the interwebs, but, and I quote "Riley just loved playing with the new purple princess car outside"

I searched and i can only assume that this is his new ride to pick up chicks at school. I guess his latent North Jersey guido gene has surfaced. I should have known it was coming since he does have a love of Pizza and spaghetti...

Placentalicious

Yesterday the current Cook crew went to clumpy's photoshoot. (aka 20 week sonogram). Most of our friends always seem to get the the cutesy pictures of the baby waving to the camera, smiling, or even pretending they are Skeltor (of He-Man fame). I guess watching all of those episodes of Bizzare Foods and No Reservations have started to make an impression, since we get a shot of the baby kissing the placenta.


Oh, before anyone asks, no we did not find out what we are having :)

Daylight Savings Blows

I'm all for the NOT having to drive to work at 6:15am in the pitch dark, but man, this whole Daylight Savings thing has wrecked Riley's sleeping schedule. He's been getting up at 4:30-5am every morning! Ugh!
Not too much going on here- I have off for a few days for the Teacher's Convention so that's a nice break from teachin'- plus Jim also took off from work as well. Yesterday, we met up with Greg and Sean at the Convention for the day in Atlantic City. Jim gambled with Greg while Sean and I attended the conference before breaking out for lunch at Buddakan (sooo delicous, although pricey)and some gambling! The AC gods were not on Uncle Woob's side but Jim and I scored a bit of coin (or at least didn't LOSE) so that was a nice change of pace from the last couple of times we have hit the casinos. Today, I'm getting some school work done in the morning and then it's off to IKEA to check out the toddler furniture as we will need to boot Riley out of the crib (and his room!) in the not so distant future. Clumpy Cook is almost half baked (Clumpy is 19 weeks old)!

Anyway, the pics below are WAY overdue (as are Riley's Birthday Thank You cards that I hope to get out this weekend)...Enjoy!

Dylan's 4th Bday Party at "Bounce U"








Olivia and Blake's Birthday Party! Happy #1 Blake! Happy #4 Olivia!




And one pic of Riley thinking he is absolutely hilarious (as his parents often think they are as well...unfortunately, the majority of people usually disagree, ha ha)

I'll Take Anatomy for $200, Alex

*disclaimer* for those uncomfortable about hearing about anatomy of a family member or friend, turn back now. you have been warned.

Let's see how I can phase this post appropriately for mixed company...

So this morning, like many mornings, as Alison gets ready for work, my "job" is to keep Riley occupied (on those, seemingly more frequent, days when he wakes up before we are both ready for work). For what ever reason, Riley wanted to see Mommeee, so we walked to our room, when Alison was getting dressed.

Well, still drying off from the shower, is more like it. ( I think you all can start to see where this one is going...)

For those of you that have/had a 2 year old you should be familiar with the constant "What's that? What's This? Questions. So as i was saying, Alison was getting dressed, and Riley walks over to her and asks the inevitable "what's that?" with his hand pointed in the general direction of Alison's ever expanding belly. "The Baby" was the response. Again comes the "what's that?' Only this time, Riley's aim was a tad lower. "That's a vagina, Mommy's peepee" (love the mix of technical and kidling terms).

"GIIna" Riley echoed.

Next, he pointed to his goods, and said, "where's my giina?". No, Riley, you have a penis. we (well Alison) corrected him. "peenis" Riley said as he proceeded to unzip his PJs to get verification of what his bits and pieces looked like in comparison.

There you have it. Anatomy 101 for toddlers.

Happy Daylight Savings!

Apparently, Riley is not into this whole "extra" hour of sleeping idea so the Cook family is up watching Elmo on the tube and playing with his new train set...I snuck away to post some Halloween Pics! Riley is definitely "my" kid as he asks to go to bed (nappy) at night and gets up early raring to go. Halloween was great- he LOVED wearing his costume and loved trick or treating around the neighborhood. We only had to deal with one creepy old lady who hailed us down from the end of the street to stop at her house for trick or treating, kept asking us to stop over soon to hang out and asked if Riley was girl...I swear I was waiting her turn swirl around, turn into a witch, and ask Riley if he wanted a bite of delicious shiny, red apple. The best part about Halloween was that we were able to get his "pumpkin" pail away and he has completely forgot about the candy that was in it- which is weird b/c this kid remembers EVERYTHING. Unfortunately, that means Jim and I have been scarfing down sweet, delicious, mini candy bars! If I was poetic kind a gal, I would write an "Ode to Reese's". Anyway, we're off to breakfast soon so here's some pics of Halloween at The Little Gym and Halloween Night!

Riley is in "3 eyed blue monster" suit...he thought he was cookie monster, so we just went with it.

This is his "wigging out" face ala' The Iron Giant

Some action shots from The Little Gym


Yo Gabba Pumpkins...and a "pirate" as Riley calls all skulls pirates! I spent a good half hour, sitting on the floor with my legs going numb cutting out the Brobee and then Riley takes one minute to look at the finished product and rips the face completely off. So, it was "Dr. Toothpick" to the rescue.


Trick or Treating


Is this a proper dinner? Nope, but it IS on Halloween...He kept making me want to gag b/c he would take bites of turkey and/or broccoli and cheese rice with a lollipop chaser.