2014

It's always hard for me to remember what we've done in the past year. Maybe it's because we move around a lot or maybe it's because I always think in school years from August-September instead of calendar years. But I'm going to try and be better about keeping track of our family adventures for my children's sake. So here goes my sad attempt.

In 2014 we spent the entire year in the same house! It's sort of a miracle, we spent two Christmases here! We love our yellow house.

We visited Utah in January for "Christmas." Josh got to come with us this time so that was extra special! Definitely a lovely change to have help for the plane ride!

We went to Seattle for fun one day in February and took Cooper to the aquarium.

We found out we were pregnant right after Mother's Day.

We all went for the first time to the Point Defiance Zoo in Tacoma in May. It is a gorgeous zoo. Cooper wasn't too enthused by the animals though.

We went to Utah for the Gowans family reunion in June.

We went to Portland with our cousins in August.

We celebrated our 5th anniversary in August. Our last two anniversaries away from family have been pretty low-key. I guess that's what happens when grandparents aren't around to take your child for the weekend! I don't even remember what we did, poor Josh! But I am super grateful to have spent five years with my sweet Joshua.

We celebrated Cooper's 2nd birthday in August with a fun party with his friends.

We found out we were having a girl in September. The ultrasound tech just casually said, "you're having a girl" in the middle of a sentence about something else. At first I wasn't sure what she was talking about and Josh and I just sat there. It was a very anticlimactic announcement. Plus Cooper was super restless and trying to go stiff as a board while Josh was trying to hold him. Haha. But then once the news sunk in we were really excited, and really surprised! We both thought for sure we were having a boy.

Cooper had a very successful Halloween as Thomas the Train. We only took him to about six houses, because it's kind of embarrassing collecting candy for a 2 year old when it's obvious his pregnant mother is going to wind up eating it, but he loved getting candy from people and putting it in his bucket!! He wound up being a lot more excited about it then we thought he would be. It's so fun to experience holidays with little kids.

We went to Utah in November where Cooper got his first hair cut and discovered a love for jungle jims.

We had Thanksgiving at a casino in Ocean Shores which had all you can eat king crab legs. Josh and I gave Cooper the iPhone and a granola bar and then ignored him while we ate crab for two hours. It was awesome.

This picture made us late for our reservation. Something Josh will never forget!

And we had a wonderful Christmas in our yellow house.

It was a quiet year. I was busy gestating and Josh was busy working on his MPA (only one more semester to go!!!!) Cooper and I spent our days at book babies and music makers and at the park. And we spent our weekends at the children's museum, wandering Olympia, at the beach, and hiking around.

Happy New Years! We loved our 2014 and the sweet, little not-quite-toddler we got to spend it with! 

But I do hate it when people only share the highlights so let me also share our worst moment of 2014. It is not hard to decide! In November on our trip to Utah Cooper came down with an AWFUL stomach flu. It was a really bad one. It had been going for about a week when we were due to fly home and he hadn't thrown up in 4 days so we decided to take the risk and fly home, we made it through the plane ride and airport with no vomit (thank goodness) but as soon as Josh picked us up and we got all strapped into the car to drive our 2 hour drive home from the airport, Cooper barfed alllllll over the backseat, me, himself, his car seat, some of our luggage, I mean it was everywhere. And it was barfed up milk which is the worst. AH! Aside from the disgusting mess it was to ride home covered in milk vomit, I was just so sad for my sweet sick buddy. And I didn't know why he had started throwing up again and I was convinced he was going to be sick for forever and I was emotionally drained from a whole week already of stomach flu on vacation and didn't think I could handle another one. I think I cried all night! I HATE seeing my poor kid sick, it absolutely breaks my heart. So that was our worst moment of 2014. I'm very happy that Cooper is healthy most of the time!