Wednesday, August 31, 2011
A Quick Laugh...
I am probably a horrible mother for thinking this is a funny story but I will share anyways. This morning on the way to drop Alex off at my aunt's I heard him fussing just a little. Nothing major, just "talking" a bit. I had his paci on the console by me in case he got really upset and I could reach it back to him at a stop light. He never got that loud before I got to a stop so I didn't try and give it to him. I figured he had just fallen asleep, which it turns out he had. The funny part is that this morning I had tossed a little blanket type thing with a stuffed monkey head on it in the carrier with him because he has really started playing with his hands and I thought he might like to mess with it. Turns out, I totally confused him and apparently he thought the monkey was his paci. When I got him out at my aunt's he had the monkey soaking wet where he had been sucking on it. I felt bad for him but had to laugh! I can only imagine what he looked like back there trying to suck on that monkey...
Monday, August 29, 2011
Soccer is back but so very different...
A little history...
Spring and Fall takes the Coles out to the WYSA soccer fields. My first year watching Reagan play and Matt coaching was the fall of 2008 when she was just a little 5 year old in a lime green t-shirt playing for the Gators. Matt had warned me that at that age it was pretty much the "fly on poop" mentality and all 6 of the kids on the field would just stick right to the ball and keep kicking until it popped loose. This is exactly what happened but it was still all kinds of fun to watch. I am pretty sure the kids enjoyed the parent tunnel that they ran through at the end of the game and snack more than actually playing at this point.
The next fall brought us to U8 and a new team - the Mustangs. The unfortunate part of this was that the mustangs wore red with black lettering and we played a game on just about every Saturday - the same days as UK football. I pretty much never supported the Mustangs by color, just in spirit. :) We were mustangs for 2 sessions, fall '09 and spring '10.
Fall '10 brought yet another change as Reagan decided it was time to move to an all girls team. We were given the Ladybugs. You can guess what colors we were - once again red and black and once again I failed at supporting the team by color but had lots of fun with the girls. At this point I had slowly become Matt's assistant coach. I would help run drills at practice and mainly took care of keeping the team under control on the bench and helping keep up with who needed to sub and making sure all the players got equal playing time. We had lots of players that wanted as much playing time as possible and always felt like they weren't getting as much as the other team mates. With the ladybugs we had 7 players. With 4 on the field at a time, this made it impossible to sub out all at the same time. So every player got extra time. One of my buddies - Anna Beth always wanted to make sure she got her extra time. I finally put together a list on my phone each game so she could see when everyone was getting their extra time and wouldn't worry about missing out. We stayed with the Ladybugs for the Spring of 2011 and had the same team with the exception of Sammie Jo taking the place of Olivia.
The 2011 Fall Session - the Stingers
This brings me to this session. This year we moved up to U10 and with that came more changes than I will probably be able to remember. We have a new team - the Stingers. New colors - Royal blue and white (yay!). New team mates - only Caylee is a previous Ladybug. New assistant coaches - with my hands a little more full, Andy (Matt's brother) and one of the team dads, Brian, has graciously stepped up to help Matt coach. Which is good since we are now playing 6 vs. 6 and one of those is a goalie. The girls have never played with a goalie, which means they have never played the position of goalie. After 4 years of preaching to them not to touch the ball with their hands, I am sure it is hard to get them to reach down and pick it up during a game. They are also faced with the daunting task of figuring out off sides. I have trouble with this concept so I can't imagine how they are figuring it out.
We had our first game this past weekend. We got beat pretty badly but our team is young with a lot of new girls to U10. They have a lot to learn but I think overall they will be okay. I just hope they all have a great time out there. I know I really enjoy watching them play and watching Matt coach. Alex can't say the same since he slept through the entire game Saturday. But mommy was thankful to be able to really watch the game and enjoy it.
Spring and Fall takes the Coles out to the WYSA soccer fields. My first year watching Reagan play and Matt coaching was the fall of 2008 when she was just a little 5 year old in a lime green t-shirt playing for the Gators. Matt had warned me that at that age it was pretty much the "fly on poop" mentality and all 6 of the kids on the field would just stick right to the ball and keep kicking until it popped loose. This is exactly what happened but it was still all kinds of fun to watch. I am pretty sure the kids enjoyed the parent tunnel that they ran through at the end of the game and snack more than actually playing at this point.
The next fall brought us to U8 and a new team - the Mustangs. The unfortunate part of this was that the mustangs wore red with black lettering and we played a game on just about every Saturday - the same days as UK football. I pretty much never supported the Mustangs by color, just in spirit. :) We were mustangs for 2 sessions, fall '09 and spring '10.
 |
| Spring 2010 Mustangs |
Fall '10 brought yet another change as Reagan decided it was time to move to an all girls team. We were given the Ladybugs. You can guess what colors we were - once again red and black and once again I failed at supporting the team by color but had lots of fun with the girls. At this point I had slowly become Matt's assistant coach. I would help run drills at practice and mainly took care of keeping the team under control on the bench and helping keep up with who needed to sub and making sure all the players got equal playing time. We had lots of players that wanted as much playing time as possible and always felt like they weren't getting as much as the other team mates. With the ladybugs we had 7 players. With 4 on the field at a time, this made it impossible to sub out all at the same time. So every player got extra time. One of my buddies - Anna Beth always wanted to make sure she got her extra time. I finally put together a list on my phone each game so she could see when everyone was getting their extra time and wouldn't worry about missing out. We stayed with the Ladybugs for the Spring of 2011 and had the same team with the exception of Sammie Jo taking the place of Olivia.
 |
| Fall 2010 Ladybugs |
This brings me to this session. This year we moved up to U10 and with that came more changes than I will probably be able to remember. We have a new team - the Stingers. New colors - Royal blue and white (yay!). New team mates - only Caylee is a previous Ladybug. New assistant coaches - with my hands a little more full, Andy (Matt's brother) and one of the team dads, Brian, has graciously stepped up to help Matt coach. Which is good since we are now playing 6 vs. 6 and one of those is a goalie. The girls have never played with a goalie, which means they have never played the position of goalie. After 4 years of preaching to them not to touch the ball with their hands, I am sure it is hard to get them to reach down and pick it up during a game. They are also faced with the daunting task of figuring out off sides. I have trouble with this concept so I can't imagine how they are figuring it out.
We had our first game this past weekend. We got beat pretty badly but our team is young with a lot of new girls to U10. They have a lot to learn but I think overall they will be okay. I just hope they all have a great time out there. I know I really enjoy watching them play and watching Matt coach. Alex can't say the same since he slept through the entire game Saturday. But mommy was thankful to be able to really watch the game and enjoy it.
Baby Robot...
Just a quick little post and picture of some fun we had yesterday. I am pretty sure mommy and daddy had more fun than Alex. Props to daddy for finding the costume on eBay and providing us the laughs and the great picture!
The new toy
Two weeks ago today we became the owners of our latest toy - a Jeep Wrangler. We had been shopping around for one for a while now and got pretty lucky with this one. I can easily describe it as the good, the bad and the ugly...
The Good...
There are several "good" aspects to this Jeep. It is a 2003 with a little over 35,000 miles on it. None of those miles are off-roading, hard miles, just everyday road miles. The owner is a good friend of my family and took it to the Jeep dealership for everything, oil changes, any maintenance and had them fix the smallest squeak. So mechanically it is pretty much perfect. Oh, and the price...let's just say Matt didn't believe me when I first told him the price and we didn't haggle him at all on it since it was pretty much a steal.
The Bad...
When we go to look at it we notice the dirt, stickers, trash, etc. right off the bat. I have never seen a vehicle as dirty as this. That's when Jim informs us, "I drove it off the lot in 2003 brand new and it has never been washed since." 8 years old and never washed!! I don't know if I should be amazed or disgusted. Which leads us to the ugly...
The Ugly...
A 2003 Jeep Wrangler that has never been washed!
Not so Ugly Anymore...
After a lot of hard work by Matt we are starting to really get a beauty. Matt also ordered some new rims which came in last week and just need some new tires to go with them. Considering how extremely busy we have been the past 2 weeks I am totally amazed and proud of how much work my husband has done and how great the Jeep looks. I think the Coles are going to have a lot of fun with this new toy.
The Good...
There are several "good" aspects to this Jeep. It is a 2003 with a little over 35,000 miles on it. None of those miles are off-roading, hard miles, just everyday road miles. The owner is a good friend of my family and took it to the Jeep dealership for everything, oil changes, any maintenance and had them fix the smallest squeak. So mechanically it is pretty much perfect. Oh, and the price...let's just say Matt didn't believe me when I first told him the price and we didn't haggle him at all on it since it was pretty much a steal.
The Bad...
When we go to look at it we notice the dirt, stickers, trash, etc. right off the bat. I have never seen a vehicle as dirty as this. That's when Jim informs us, "I drove it off the lot in 2003 brand new and it has never been washed since." 8 years old and never washed!! I don't know if I should be amazed or disgusted. Which leads us to the ugly...
The Ugly...
A 2003 Jeep Wrangler that has never been washed!
Not so Ugly Anymore...
After a lot of hard work by Matt we are starting to really get a beauty. Matt also ordered some new rims which came in last week and just need some new tires to go with them. Considering how extremely busy we have been the past 2 weeks I am totally amazed and proud of how much work my husband has done and how great the Jeep looks. I think the Coles are going to have a lot of fun with this new toy.
All my worldly possessions...
Apparently Alex was hearing too much on the news about Irene on Saturday and heard them advising people to take their most prized possessions with them upon evacuation. So when we made a quick run to Lexington, he decided to take all his prized possesions with him as well...
Friday, August 26, 2011
Smiles and sleep...
One of my purposes for thsi blog is to keep a "journal" of the many milestones that Alex is going through so I can go back and look at them. There is no way I will be able to remember all the details during this fast, hectic and crazy time in our life.
The past 2 weeks have brought us a lot of fun with a happy, smiling boy. He is really starting to react to you and smile back at you. We have even gotten him to coo and talk to us on several occasions. This is so much fun, I could sit and talk to him for hours.
He has also gotten very reactive to his surroundings and is enjoying his play mat a lot more these days. Just this morning I saw his first temper tantrum when I picked him up off the mat to go to Mimi's house. He was not ready to quit playing and made that very clear for about 10 minutes. Here is a quick video of him playing last Friday. You can't see his face of hear him very well but he was smiling and just talking away...
The past 2 weeks have brought us a lot of fun with a happy, smiling boy. He is really starting to react to you and smile back at you. We have even gotten him to coo and talk to us on several occasions. This is so much fun, I could sit and talk to him for hours.
He has also gotten very reactive to his surroundings and is enjoying his play mat a lot more these days. Just this morning I saw his first temper tantrum when I picked him up off the mat to go to Mimi's house. He was not ready to quit playing and made that very clear for about 10 minutes. Here is a quick video of him playing last Friday. You can't see his face of hear him very well but he was smiling and just talking away...
Glorious sleep...
Just in time for mommy to head back to work Alex has gotten into a nice sleeping pattern. Hopefully this won't jinx us but he goes to bed around 9:30 or 10 and will sleep until about 3. Matt and I will take turns getting up for this feeding unless Alex is unusually talkative and decides he wants to see us both. Once we get him fed and changed he typically goes right back to sleep. He will then wake back up around 6 and wants a bottle and snuggle time on the couch. He will sleep in his crib with no problem all night until this wake up but then will not go back in there. However if either of us will lay with him on the couch, he will go right back to sleep which makes it nice for us to get ready for work. I am hoping this continues because I have enjoyed those nice long chunks of sleep!
Thursday, August 25, 2011
Mommy's 1st Week Back to Work...
Well today is Thursday so that means I am 1 day away from surviving my first week back to work. Coming back to work was bittersweet. Would I rather stay home with the kids? Absolutely. Do I have that option. Not a chance. So with that in mind I knew I had to put on my big girl panties and get back to the grind. I was very lucky to be in a position at work that let me stay home for 8 weeks even though I had just over 4 weeks of sick and vacation time. I was able to do this thanks to the wonders of modern technology - a laptop, internet connection and cell phone. I worked from home over 20 hours most weeks. I appreciate this to no end but as Alex got older and more alert, it was becoming harder and harder to get work done during the day so that left me working in the evenings and on the weekend when I would have much rather been spending time with Matt and Reagan. So I now look at the positive that I may be away from the little man during the day but at night I get to be free to enjoy the whole family.
My first day back started out with Alex crying all the way from Versailles to Frankfort. Not the most fun way to start a Monday. However my day got much better when the beautiful bouquet of flowers was delivered from my amazing husband.
Oh and I should mention that I got lucky and came back to work on the 22nd, then had o be off for the day on the 23rd for Alex's 2 month checkup. Watching your baby scream in pain from shots was not fun at all but I enjoyed spending the day with him besides that.
Last week I only worked a few hours so I could enjoy my last week off before I went back full time so I think that helped me prepare for going back as well.
In case you are wondering, Alex is being spoiled every day by my Aunt Kathy. She has graciously offered to keep him for us to help with our crazy work schedules. So far they both seem to be loving it. And I can't complain about the glass of tea she sends me to work with every morning or the breakfast she cooked for me yesterday. :) I may be the one that ends up getting spoiled!
My first day back started out with Alex crying all the way from Versailles to Frankfort. Not the most fun way to start a Monday. However my day got much better when the beautiful bouquet of flowers was delivered from my amazing husband.
Oh and I should mention that I got lucky and came back to work on the 22nd, then had o be off for the day on the 23rd for Alex's 2 month checkup. Watching your baby scream in pain from shots was not fun at all but I enjoyed spending the day with him besides that.
 |
| This was right after his shots at the doctor's office. |
Last week I only worked a few hours so I could enjoy my last week off before I went back full time so I think that helped me prepare for going back as well.
In case you are wondering, Alex is being spoiled every day by my Aunt Kathy. She has graciously offered to keep him for us to help with our crazy work schedules. So far they both seem to be loving it. And I can't complain about the glass of tea she sends me to work with every morning or the breakfast she cooked for me yesterday. :) I may be the one that ends up getting spoiled!
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