Happy 2 Months Cooper

We have had a lot of activity in this house over the last two months. Mom was here for 5 weeks with three trips from dad in the middle. Then GG and Papa came to visit. Now Auntie Erin has been here this week topped by Fran making a trip this evening. Mia has enjoyed all of the visitors and so have Sam and I. It's been a great help and allowed the two of us to get out on many "date nights."

Mia really enjoyed GG and Papa's visit. GG painted her finger nails and toe nails. They sang all sorts of songs together. And of course her favorite thing was making cookies.

Cooper is growing like a weed. We had his 2 month appointment today and he is 11 pounds 2 ounces and 22.25 inches tall. He is starting to sleep better at night which is great for both of us. He is officially smiling and "coo-ing" and he is working on his tummy time. I can't believe it but we are about to start using his 3-6 month clothing!

We have had quite the cold Charlotte winter thus far. Normally we have a few January and February days where you can break out the flip flops but not this year. In fact, it seems every time someone from Boston visits we have snow. The picture below is our snow from last Friday night. Enough to make a snow man!
This week Auntie Erin has been with us. Most of the week has looked like the below:
Auntie Erin has also done a number of art projects with Mia keeping her entertained as she hasn't felt so well this week.


Cooper and I have officially become mall walkers while Mia is at school....and sometimes Mia gets to come along. We try not to run down the older folks with our stroller. :-) Cooper likes to window shop as I get some well needed exercise in.

Hope everyone is well...till next time!

Welcome Cooper!

Sam, Mia, and I had the most wonderful Christmas present ever. Our little boy, Cooper Samuel, arrived 3 weeks early and in time to spend Christmas at home. We felt he would come early but didn't think he could come at 37 weeks. It was a wonderful surprise. Mommy had a quick and easy labor. If we decide to have a 3rd, let's hope we make it to the hospital in time! Cooper arrived weighing 6 pounds even and was 18 inches long.

Because Cooper was born just after midnight, we were given the option to come home technically a day early. We decided to take this option to get home to Mia as soon as we could. Mia was very happy to meet her little brother. She had waited so long for him to come out that I think she thought he never would appear.
This is pretty much what Cooper's first week looked like.....he's so handsome when he sleeps.

We had a wonderful Christmas complete with grandma and grandpa who arrived on Christmas Eve. Maybe next year, we will get a picture of the four of us all looking at the camera!
Mia and Cooper had matching pj's for Christmas morning courtesy of Auntie Lisa. Mia just loves to hold, hug, and kiss her little brother.
In other news, we have been blessed with Sam being able to take vacation during the holidays then start his paternity leave. During the last 3 weeks, we have been doing lots of things will Mia including her getting her first haircut....riding the bus with daddy, watching planes at the airport, and riding the Linx (subway) into uptown to have lunch with daddy.

Happy New Year to everyone!

Happy Holidays!

We have been busy this month. We are trying to finish last minute preparations for Cooper's arrival and making sure we have time to do all of the holiday related activities we can with Mia. Mia has been reading books about Santa since this summer. This was not our choice but her's. Now that the Christmas tree is up and we have been to "meet" Santa himself Mia is taking it more seriously. She will wake up in the morning or from naps and tell you about how "Santa brought toys for Mia and then went home." She appears to dream about getting cars and a slide. Good thing both of these happen to be on Santa's list. I do however wonder how long our little girl will believe in Santa. The one thing that is very unique about her is how observant she is for her age. You can already see the wheels turning in her head when she see's the different Santa's at the malls or the ymca. It's like she notices they look different and wonders what is going on. Next year should be interesting as I am sure she will verbalize more of what she is thinking.


This weekend we took a trip into "Uptown" as they call it here....really just downtown Charlotte to see the singing Christmas bears. Mia enjoyed dancing to the music and singing along to Jingle Bells which they have been learning at school. Below is a shot of Mia watching the bears last year and this year. It's amazing the different that one year can make!

Although, she enjoyed seeing the bears the highlight of her morning was riding up and down the escalators with daddy. Almost better than going to the airport. And just a side note, I have no idea why my text is underlined right now and I don't have the patience to figure it out. :-)
In terms of Cooper, we are just waiting now. Things are looking good and they expect me to make it until at least 37 weeks again (which is next week). We are hoping for his sake that he either comes a good 5 days before Christmas or waits until after Christmas so his birthday won't get lost in the mix by others. We will keep everyone updated. But until then have a great week and enjoy the holiday season!

Uncle Meelad "MeeMee" Comes to Visit

We had a great weekend here in the Hanna household. Not only was the weather beautiful but Uncle Meelad and his girlfriend Brooke came to visit us from UT. On Friday night, we had "faux" Thanksgiving complete with pies which was super yummy.
Saturday, we went to the park to play in the morning. Mia taught uncle "MeeMee" how to drive.

And in the afternoon, Uncle "MeeMee" taught Mia how to bowl.
Mia had a great time and actually got some pins down. She loved the ball return...
Fell in love with the computer...
But towards the end realized that if she laid on the floor she could feel the vibrations of the balls....which might have been her favorite activity until....
She found the driving game. She instructed daddy to "sit here" and away they went. Our little NASCAR driver.

Thank you to Meelad and Brooke for a great weekend and congratulations to Brooke for winning her first Monopoly game against the Hanna boys which deserves a trophy.

Below is me at 32.5 weeks. Counting down the time to Cooper's arrival! Have a great week!

Happy Halloween!

Mia started her Halloween with some good old pumpkin carving. She tried to eat the eye cut outs kind of like an apple. According to her, they were "yummy."



Then in the afternoon, Mia and Cooper got dressed up to go to a local church Halloween festival. Mia loved that baby "Pooper" was a baby pumpkin.

The festival had a wonderful set up for the preschool crowd including an obstacle course courtesy of My Gym. Mia went straight for flat ladder and climbed it like a champ.
Their tent set up was pretty cool too.
In the tent Mia caught up with her good friend Kathryn who was a kitty cat (you can't see her tail and as you can tell no one wanted to wear their hats because it was too hot.)
Mia amazed mommy and daddy by walking the plank all by herself. Maybe we have a gymnast on our hands?
Our Halloween unfortunately ended with playing with candy in the living room as it has been a total wash out of a Halloween night here. Mia agrees with daddy that KitKats are really "yummy" and is still talking about them in her crib as I type. :-)

Happy Halloween. Hope you had a great one!

September 2009

September is already over....where did it go!? As always, September is the busiest month of the year in the Hanna household. I will do my best to remember the highlights.



Mia had her first official day of preschool. She was a little unsure about the preschool thing in the beginning but now loves to go and chatters all the way home about all the things she did and the songs she sang. She is learning everyone's name, doing art every day, having music class, playing on the playground, and having a great time. Today I arrived to find them all participating in a homemade obstacle course which included squishy stairs, a tunnel, and a tent. They were all having a ball.







We celebrated Daddy's 33rd birthday. Mia now thinks that whenever you sing happy birthday that daddy is the one having the birthday. ;-) And yes this cake looks similar to Sam's birthday cake from last year but all he wants is pound cake!

Grandma and grandpa came to visit. Mia was soooo excited! She had lots of fun playing with grandma and grandpa, we went to the Greek festival where she enjoyed spinach pies for the first time, and Sam and I got a break from chasing her around the house (her favorite activity).

I hit up the September consignment sales and found some great fall/winter clothes and some Christmas presents for Mia. I might have gotten some things that Sam really likes too.....

Auntie Erin came to visit for mommy's 3oth birthday (thank you Jewish holidays).

Auntie Erin brought Mia her first dance outfit complete with new ballet shoes.

Auntie Erin taught Mia how to make cupcakes for mommy's birthday. Mia stirred and put the cupcake papers in the tin. She did a great job!

Overall, we had a great month. We are gearing up for Cooper's arrival. We have his room almost put together, crib, bedding, and all. Mia is learning at least a word a day and is using verbs wonderfully (running/run, walking/walk, broke, etc). It's really wonderful to watch her grow up.

Other pictures:

Me at 25 weeks (although now I am almost 27 weeks and have popped out a little more):

Mia's artwork from school:

Have a great week!

Reflections on 18 Months

Sam and I have just completed our first 24 hours alone since having Mia thanks to Lisa and David who have offered to take Mia over night so Sam and I could celebrate our 6th anniversary before we become a family of 4. We had a great time and really enjoyed some time by ourselves but realized how empty the house is without Mia in it. We complain about never being able to sleep past 7am (note I was making coffee at 7:20 this morning child free) and the constant responsibility when you don’t have family in the state to help out but we wouldn’t change a thing. We can only imagine what it is like to be empty nesters after 20 years of having children in the house and suddenly they are all in college. The quiet is a little strange.

I admit to being behind on blogging. We have had a lot going on here in August and as with every year our busyness will extend into September. This September is our 6th wedding anniversary, Sam turns 33, and I turn 30 and we have several house guests coming through to help celebrate. Mia is starting “preschool” this week on Wednesdays and Fridays 9:30-1pm. I admit to looking forward to the time to actually get some things done around here without interruption but I am also looking forward to her becoming more independent of mom and dad and realizing that she can have great fun and learning experiences away from home with other adults. As I picked her up from her orientation last week (1 hour to meet her teachers and classmates), she looked at me all teary and sucking her thumb then turned to a bulletin board with apples on it, pointed and said “look at this!.” Our little girl is growing up and talking up a storm with mini sentences these days.

To catch you up on the month of August, we found out that we are having a baby boy who is thankfully very healthy. It took us a few days to adjust to the fact that we would not be dealing with dresses and hair bows any longer but we are very excited to welcome baby boy Cooper to our family. We have already started working on his room and Mia is currently deciding if she wants to move in who knew she would love his décor so much! We had a quick visit from both Melissa and Fran which was wonderful.

Mid-August we took what has become our annual trip to Ocean Creek in Myrtle Beach, SC. Auntie Erin came along and we had a wonderful time. The weather was perfect and Mia LOVED the beach and the ocean. When it comes to water she has no fear. She went right into the waves, followed hermit crabs, and just plain loved getting her and anyone else in her path sandy.

Mia took her first carousel ride. She loved it for the first 5 revolutions then didn't understand where daddy was going everytime we passed him and got a little upset.

Reunited with Daddy after the carousel.

We also took a trip to the aquarium which she LOVED.

But by the time we left I am not sure if the fish were her favorite or the moving side walk that took you through a tunnel tank. Mia thought this was the most interesting invention ever. She would get on and look down, turn backwards and look down, get off and watch daddy float away run down the side to catch up with him and jump back on. It was really cute to watch.

In her own private pool which daddy dug for her:

We also had a visit from Marion, Mike, and Sammie David who were on vacation at Lake Lure. Mia loved having Sammie around to play with her and slept really hard that night!

Cooper at 21 weeks!

For those who haven’t seen Mia in a while, she is a full blown 18 month old now. She is a mini-adult running around with serious opinions and words to match those opinions. It’s really fun but at the same time we know for real that we are leaving her babyhood behind and looking at a little toddler.

Mia on the morning of her preschool orientation.

We have over 200 new pictures to download. Hopefully Sam will get those up online by the end of the weekend. Last weekend we had the upstairs painted and we are putting together Mia's big girl room, Cooper's new bedroom, and moving the guest room so we have been a little busy!

Have a good holiday weekend!