East Coast Cousin Time

(Anyone catch the title pun? Yes, we're a bit jet-lagged right now)

Lucy, Mom and I just got back from a fabulous trip to Princeton, NJ to visit family. My brother-in-law Davey is getting his doctorate at Princeton and my sister Kate just had her second son, William.

With a newborn, 1 year old and 2 year old in the mix, we intentionally had zero expectations for doing anything while we were there, which made the week really relaxing and enjoyable. We spent most of our days hanging out watching the kiddos play, taking small trips into the town and campus, and eating lots of wonderful food.

I also took about a thousand pictures.

For me, one of the best parts of the trip was watching Lucy bond with her cousin David. Here's some of the fun they had together.

Naturally, a good portion of their time together they spent playing in the dirt, which resulted in some very dirty faces:

Then there was bedtime story-reading with Davey:

And pool time when the weather hit 85 degrees.

Princeton campus has the cutest children's library, complete with a tree-house that was just the perfect size for them:

They loved exploring the campus together

And when Lucy got tired David pushed her in the stroller

Of course, one of the biggest reasons we flew to Princeton was to see the newest little cousin. And while he couldn't take part in the older cousin's adventures, Lucy did enjoy meeting "baby Wi" and handing his mom his pacifier.

Will spent a good portion of the visit doing this:

And occasionally we even got a smile out of him! I love those newborn grins!

Walking in a winter wonderland

What with the warmer Eugene climate, this year Joel, Lucy and I are just going to have to pretend we're living somewhere nice and snowy for those few weeks of the year that everyone wants snow in December.

And even though there are still some brilliantly fall-colored trees around Eugene, it's December and it's time for a Christmas post! So here's some decorations we've got around the Cohen casa.

We're still undecided on whether we'll do a tree this year since we won't be in Eugene on Christmas, but in the meantime I've put our fun white twiggy tree out with ornaments on it to festive up the place.

And here's our hearth (complete with Joel's nice fire). I strung the ornaments from yarn and I think it looks nice and cheery!

And lastly, this is how we spend our days when the weather is not nice enough to go outside. We lounge around in our pajamas at all hours of the day, snuggle up in a nice, festive blanket, and read books. Sounds about perfect!

Easter Pictures

We had an incredibly relaxing and fun time in Moscow for Easter this year, I'm so glad Joel was able to get the time off to visit home!

We went to the Ryan's house for Easter:

Here are my parents all spiffied up for church:

Dad decided he should teach Lucy how to use an I-Phone:

We also spent time with the Williams' and Points':

Les and Lu having a narcissistic moment. Only joking. I think they were comparing eye colors?:

We went mini-golfing (sorry for the horrible light, forgot to change the settings on my camera!)

And Brian taught Lucy Adele a thing or two about the game (I'm not sure how much she picked up, though):

Lucy 1 and Lucy 2 became fast friends on the trip:

We also played several games of Ticket to Ride with my parents and watched some Bones episodes with them. And we went over to the Church's for a fun evening of games and fellowship, although I forgot to bring my camera that time! I'm impressed at how much we were able to fit into four days. It was so nice to be back in Moscow for a bit, and to get to share Easter with our family!

Phoenix

Like I mentioned in the last post (two posts in one day! I'm just flying) we went to Phoenix after Christmas and stayed through the New Year. We had a great time seeing family and introducing many of them to Lucy. It was unseasonably cold in Phoenix, but still much warmer than Moscow which made me very happy. And the last few days we were there did get pretty warm. I was able to soak up some much-needed sun (and visit Ikea!).

Unfortunately, traveling with a baby makes things a lot more hectic. And so the extent of my picture-taking during our entire trip is this:






Cute pictures though, eh? This was on one of the glorious afternoons when the sun came out and we were able to sit outside. We miss our Phoenix family!

Christmas Decor

I finally got around to finishing the Advent calendar that I started last year (hey, better late than never!). I'm really happy with how it turned out, and I managed to finish it on December 4th, so I was only a few days past the beginning of Advent season. And really it worked out quite well since we got to eat four days worth of candy in one go. :)



This year we put Dove chocolates (dark for me, milk for Joel) in each day. Next year Lucy will be old enough to appreciate getting her own treat.



The only thing I would have done differently is that I used felt glue to fix the letters to the white background, and they're having trouble holding the weight of the candies. I'm going to have to go back and hand-stitch the letters back on. Other than that it turned out great!

And here's a terrible shot of our Christmas tree. It really is very pretty, we promise!



And a cute decoration for our bookshelf:



Our santa figurines:

Getting the Christmas Tree

We went with my parents to a tree farm a little ways out of town for our tree this year. It was a very, very cold day. So of course we needed to get Lucy all bundled up to face the cold trek through the snow to find that perfect tree. She has three snowsuits, and naturally I first pulled out the only one that is 0-3 months. This is what she looked like.



I have to admit, Joel and I laughed long and hard after putting her in this suit. I'm not sure she appreciated the humor, but she still managed to look very cute.



So that suit was nixed, and we pulled out the second suit, which actually said 3-6 months but looked smaller. I think this one was from grandma sunny and grandpa howard. This one fit much better.



Off we went to the tree farm, and here Lucy is settling down for a nap in dad's arms before we began the walk out through the trees.



Even though it was frigid, the sun was shining and it was a beautiful day. We found our trees and the guys sawed them down. Behold Joel using his strong muscles:



After conquering the tree:



Joel and I next to our felled tree:



Mom holding Lucy while she slept:



Lucy Sleeping:



A landscape shot:



Here's Joel and dad loading the trees into the truck. They were both over 10 feet, although we cut them down to about 8.



Lucy was exhausted from all her hard work. She napped in the car on the way home...



and continued her nap in her snowsuit in her crib once we got home.



She somehow managed to sleep through us dragging the trees into the house and putting them in their stands. But they look great! I'll have to post pictures of our decorated tree later.

7 weeks

Happy 7 weeks Lucy! A few nights ago she slept for 6 1/2 hours, a record for her! This photo is actually from church on Sunday so it's a little old, but she looked so cute in her church outfit I had to share it!



And happy 4th day of Advent to everyone! We are going to get our Christmas tree tomorrow, I'm very excited to decorate it! And hopefully I'll also have our advent calendar finished tomorrow as well, I'm ready to get these Christmas decorations up!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hope everyone had a wonderful thanksgiving! Even though both Joel and I caught serious head colds the day before Thanksgiving, we still had a wonderful time over at our friend's the Ryan's house. We ate lots of food, Lucy was the life of the party, we laughed and played games, it was a blast!

Here's another shot of the amazing snowfall we had on Thanksgiving day.


And here is Lucy all dressed up to go to the party.


Lucy bouncing on the table with mama and Becca.



She really was having a fun time, as witnessed by this photo:


Lucy with her mom:



Lucy with mom and Rachel (notice a theme here?):



Lucy, mom and dad:



Lucy and Nana:



We are so blessed and thankful to have such wonderful family and friends!