Special Memories in Mexico

Enjoy this slideshow of some of our favorite memories of our vacation in Mexico. 

See the next blog below for more details of this wonderful vacation.

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Vacation & Wedding in MX

Layton and I have been planning our vacation to Mexico since this past April.  Jennifer, my best friend, and Kyle picked Puerta Vallerta Mexico as their destination wedding spot.  As the months grew closer, we began to get more and more excited about our trip.  We decided it would be our 5 year Anniversary gift to ourselves. 

The Coopers kept the kids while we were away for our 8 day vacation.  Abby was able to stay at Uncle Fred and Auntie Andrea's house for 2 nights too, which she found to be great fun!  Abby went to Build a Bear and had a great time making her "Hello Kitty" themed bear.  Lots of time with Mama, Papa, Tee, Chase and Kyndall....it was tons of fun for them. Abby wanted to try on her new dress and pose with her new baby doll from Mexico, such a little diva.

Our travels started out a little rocky.  One week before the vacation we found out that our tickets (paid and bought for in April) were no longer good, Mexicana airlines went bankrupt and left no notice to us.  So we looked and with a little stress found tickets for our trip.  With just one week out we decided to take the cheaper tickets and stay at the resort a few days longer (same money, more vacation time). 5:05am departure time from O'hare airport (PV at 1:45pm) was the plan, "mechanical problems" was the reason for a flight cancellation.  We were put on a flight at 9:30am (PV at 6pm) with stand-by seats at 7:20am flight.  Things were looking up, we got on stand-by and were on our way to Phoenix for a short layover.  Phoenix flight on and off all on time.  As we are hoovering over PV again and again, the flight attendant announces that the plane is going to have to fly to Mazatlan, MX to land while the PV airport fixes a sink hole in their one and only run way.  While in Mazatlan we took in the duty free stores, hot dog and beer stand and witnessed 2 Federal Police planes land and deplane 4 buses of criminals, scary stuff! 2 hours later we were back in PV (5:45pm).

Our stay at the Dreams Resort and Spa was wonderful.  Words cannot explain the beauty, excellent service and great food/drinks it had to offer. We had an ocean view room with balcony for our 8 night 9 day stay.  The resort had 5 restaurants, and 4 bars.  It had nightly entertainment from movies on the beach, fire show, Mexican Festival, Casino night and much much more.  Due to the season, sea turtles were hatched daily on the beach each morning and at 6pm, the resort had an organized turtle release for all to participate in.  It was really neat to learn about this process and be able to hold one of the little ones before his adventure out in the ocean.  We meet lots of people during our days at the beach and pool.  Layton played beach volleyball most days and I was able to enjoy relaxation by the pool every single day.

 

Jennifer and Kyle also had a delay of flight on their way to the resort, but made it to the resort on Saturday afternoon.  They were followed by lots of family and friends.  It is hard to describe the friendship that Jennifer and I have without saying 'endless and heartfelt'.  I could see in her eyes the excitement of her big wedding plans all taking into action.  Many, many months of planning and phone calls were made to make her dream come true.  Their wedding day was beautiful, as all days in paradise are.  The girls spent the morning at the spa getting our hair done and the guys were able to hang out all morning.  Pictures were beautiful with the beach and blue sky and ocean behind on each view.  Jennifer was a truly beautiful bride.  She glowed the entire day with excitement and joy.  The ceremony at the pavilion was toasty with the sunshine but filled with smiles and tears with the wonderful occasion.  Sealed with a kiss, Kyle and Jennifer were pronounced husband and wife.  The reception was great fun.  Dancing, music, great food, friends and family, the night was perfect.

The remaining days at the resort were filled with sunshine, friends/family and drinks.  We enjoyed each and every single minute of our vacation in Mexico.  We are thankful that our travels were safe and that this trip was able to bring Layton and I even closer together in our marriage.  We vowed to ourselves we would do this again within the next 2-5 years. 

Congratulations Jennifer and Kyle, we wish you two the happiest and most blessing filled life together!  We love you.

Grandparents Visit from SD

We were so excited when we found out that Grammie and Grandpa Bob where coming to visit us for a long weekend.  To much surprise both Maggie and Grandma Great came along also.  It was Maxwell's dedication service at the church (previous blog) so it was great to have them here to help celebrate.  We enjoyed a relaxing weekend with most of it spent in the house allowing everyone to enjoy both Abby and Max.  We were fortunate to have Lewis University allow them to the stay in the "Guest House" on campus for free.  This was so nice, as it allowed them to have their own space and be very close to us at the end of each day.  We enjoyed our visit with the family and were sad to see them go on Monday.  We look forward to the holiday season as we plan to make a trip to South Dakota to visit them!

Maxwell's Dedication to the Lord

On Sunday, November 7th Maxwell was dedicated to the Lord.  Our journey with the Lord has been wonderful, with both Layton and myself being baptised Easter 2009.  Since this day it is magnificent how much the Lord has blessed us and how wonderful it feels to be a part of His path.  We believe in the way of the Lord and know that He would not give us any challenge we couldn't handle.  Our home is a home of His word and we are not ashamed to promote His word to all.  We are all disciples of His plan and we are blessed to have the opportunity to bring another life into His word.  We believe Maxwell will be a disciple of the Lord and we as his parents will guide and teach him these ways.

Thank you for all those that were at Maxwell's service both in person and in spirit.  We appreciate your support, love and guidance as we adventure life with the Lord.

Friday Fun

 Fridays are always a fun day at the Cooper house.  Ms. Melanie comes to spend the day with Max and his buddy Gabe.  Gabe is also one of Abby's little friends, as all last year Ms. Melanie kept both Gabe and Abby during the school year and summer.  We have lots of fun with Gabe and enjoy that he is now friends with both Abby and Max.  As you can see in the pictures Gabe helps Ms. Melanie very much with Max, keeping each Friday full of fun for everyone in the Cooper house.

Fall Party

The fall season brings the season for dress up and pretend.  Abby had a wonderful time at her school during her Fall party.  All the kids in her class got dressed up and had a parade for all the kid's family and friends to see.  Superman, mermaids, lions and toy stories Woody where all a hit for the kids.  Our little Abby decided she wanted to be a ballerina for the day.  Ballerina slippers, tights, tutu, leotard and a bun in her hair, she was a cute little ballerina.  Abby and Max's friend Gabe also attends TLE and was a pumpkin for the afternoon, we do have to say, a very cute round pumpkin :)  Abby's friend K'Trina also came to TLE to visit and was able to paint a pumpkin with Abby in the activity room.

Abby was excited to see her daddy, mommy, little brother and auntie Andrea all show up at her school for the fun afternoon.  She was full of smiles until her classroom got ready to do the train walk through the hallways for the parade.  For some reason, Abby became a little hesitant and tears began to roll.  Luckily she has very wonderful teachers and they got her distracted enough to go through the parade on Ms. Lynn's hip. I had our video camera and captured a few of the moments for her on video.  Our zebra man Max loved watching all the kids and the activities so much he put himself right to sleep on daddy's shoulder.  Little kids love to pretend and this was a great opportunity for them to be something fun for the afternoon. 

This digital scrapbooking design created with Smilebox

Max & his family

Max just loves to be around people.  He is completely a chill baby for sure.  As you can see in all the pictures he makes his way through many loved ones arms throughout each week.  He is 4 months old now and is holding his head up so well.  He sits on your hip when you carry him and holds himself up pretty much all by himself.  He giggles a lot when you do funny things in front of him.  He loves watching his big sister and she loves to entertain and 'watch' him.  He is super ticklish and gives you a big belly laugh when he is tickled.  We love our Maxwell and all his funny moments that come along each week. 

M & M

Max has mommy all wrapped around his finger (just like Abby)!  We always have a lot of fun together, sharing tons of giggles, converstations and of course the night time routine (3-5am feeding).  I truley can say I have found that Max is a true little boy with tons of burps, foot kicking and excited elevated talking to his little mobil friends.  He is sure growing so fast, and hard to believe he is 4.5 months old already.  Love to the Max from his mommy!

Kids Museum & Dentist

Abby, Max and I decided to take an afternoon trip to the Dupage Children's Museum in Naperville last Thursday.  Mommy and Max picked up Abby from school early to be able to meet Ms. Shannon at the museum for the afternoon.  Ms Shannon is very special to Abby and our family as she was Abby's first baby sitter when I started back to work after maternity leave with Abby.  This past May Ms Shannon graduated from Lewis with her Master's degree and got married her US Soldier Dustin in June.  Abby was Ms. Shannon's flower girl and still to this day when she hears or goes to a wedding Abby says "I am going to be in the wedding?"  Oh Abby, too funny.  We had a fun afternoon at the museum.  There is tons to do for kids that is both education and interactive.  You can see in the pictures there is a water play area, puzzles, bubbles, air tunnels and so much more.  Max spent the afternoon in the baby bjorn that I wore.  He loved ever second of the day, as he went for over 3 hours without crying or needing to eat because he was super stimulated.  He ended up eating his bottle and passing out in the baby bjorn for a little nap while we watched Abby play for part of the afternoon. 

There was a surprise in store for us also....the Dentist was also at the museum that day.  So Abby  received her first Dentist appointment.  I was very proud of  Abby as she didn't cry and let the dentist look and count her teeth with no tears.  In fact, after we left (with a new toothbrush in hand), she was excited to tell her daddy all about her trip to both the museum and the dentist.  What a great day we had!

Birthday parties, Birthday parties

It seems like we are always celebrating birthdays with our loved ones. We are always greatful for another birthday celebration for our family and friends.

We celebrated Karlen Kitching's (Layton's cousin's little man) 4th birthday. They had his party at "Pump it Up" in Orland Park. This was a fun time for all the kids. Lots of HUGE air bouncers, slides and obstacle course. Abby loved the slides and even took both daddy and mommy on the big slide (mommy had a little anxiety at the top, it was so HIGH!) At the end they had pizza and cake to end the party. We had a great time!

We are blessed with very special parents. Mom Cooper birthday was October 13th. We celebrated her birthday this past week with a family outing at Pappadeaux Cajun Seafood restaurant. It is a very yummy place to eat and we were excited when mom picked this spot. Mom had a wonderful celebration and received several special gifts. You can see in the pictures she had a wonderful celebration with us all. Thank you Lord for a wonderful mother and bless her with a wonderful year (and many more to come)!