Big Boy Milestones

I don't have any pictures to go with this post. But this past weekend was a big one in the milestone department and I just want to jot it down so I don't forget it. So if you read the two previous post you will know that Cooper just got moved into his BIG boy room. With a twin size bed, etc. I remember thinking months ago that I didn't want to throw too many changes on Cooper at once too close to the baby coming. He isn't the best with change... ha. But who is? So only getting him into his new room just about a month before the baby is due, wasn't really my ideal idea. But our ideas aren't always what is best, right? And so I just had to have a little faith that things will work out. And that 'someone else's' plan is better than mine, which it always is.

So the Big Boy room is the one big thing. The other thing on is getting Cooper potty trained. We gave it a shot months ago when he started to out grow his clothes diapers. But he wasn't really getting it, so we decided to take a break until the summer. The past few months since Joe has been out of school we started it up again. We tried some new things and so far until the past weekend we have had no luck. We really want to send Cooper to preschool at our church but he has to be potty trained by the beginning of August.. no pressure. Ha!

Anyway this past weekend was HUGE in that he went on the potty multiple times. And was telling us when he needed to go some of the time. He had literally never even gone on the potty with me. He had sat on there many times.. but then nothing. It just wasn't clicking. Well this weekend, something clicked. He even told us when he needed to go #2. Now granted we didn't actually make it to the potty, but he realized he needed to go. Pretty awesome! We still have a ways to go to be FULLY potty trained. But I'm hopeful for continued progress and that Cooper will be able show up at preschool the first day.

So back to the BIG boy room. We weren't sure what his reaction would be. He is in a "NO" phase right now. Everything is no, some of the time, most of the time..ha! But when we showed him his room, he loved it!! So we were very thankful for that. And he even faked us out a bit when it was time for his first nap in there. He layed down, gave us kisses and everything seemed great. But.... then he chickened out. But that's ok. I layed down with him for his naps and bedtime the past few days. Just for 5 or 10 minutes until he falls asleep. I know its not the best habit to start. But if that's what it takes to get him adjusted and comfortable, then that is what we will do. Once he is asleep he has done great. Sleeping through the night with no problem. Its a huge change for him. Baby crib his entire life, to huge twin bed all of a sudden. And he is doing great! So we are very proud of him. He is a great little guy and I know he will be a great brother once Gwen arrives.

So we are enjoying soaking up our Cooper time this last few weeks. And now that Cooper is settled in a new room, we will be kicking it to high gear finishing getting ready for Gwen. Jazzing up Cooper's old room just a bit. Getting out the rest of the baby gadgets and toys for her, etc. So lots of fun changes at our house. And more fun changes to come.

Big Boy Room - The Reveal

 

Well finally the BIG Boy room is done and we showed it to Cooper this weekend (4th of July weekend).

He reaction was pretty good. He say "oh wow". We got it on video. 

I hope to add that later once I get it edited.

He went straight to his baseball chair and books in the corner. He was really excited to have some new books. 

 

 

 

Next he climbed up on his new bed.

 

 Then he checked out his closet. And was excited to see his hats in there. 

 Back to the bed to play with the new mascot stuffed animals.

Lastly we had gotten a few new boards games that were in an ottoman at the end of his bed. 

Joe and him played a matching game first. And then hungry hippos.

We thought it went pretty well. He seemed to really like it. There are only a few little things to finish up. We have a decal coming that will go over his bed. It's a big "C" and says Cooper. And I'll probably hang some stuff in his closet. The next step will be sleeping in here in his new big boy bed.

Big Boy Room- In Progress

So we have been talking about a BIG Boy room for Cooper, it seems like FOREVER. We never really did much with the spare bedroom in our new house because we planned that eventually fairly soon Cooper would be moving over there. So the last few months that has really been the focus. I kinda thought we would have him moved over there a little sooner. But we were waiting to sell the bed in the spare bedroom before we could really get things going. And the next thing was finding the right furniture. Of course Joe and I are super picky and though we didn't know exactly what we wanted, we knew it had to be something cool and different and that didn't cost a fortune. We shopped around and had no luck finding a set that we really liked. There wasn't much selection in the furniture stores around here. Even though I swore after Cooper's nursery furniture I wasn't going to buy a set that had to be assembled. I just wanted it delivered and set up, done deal. Well, not so much!! Of course we found this cute set (pictured below) online. We really liked it and it had good reviews. And it was in our price range. So guess what that means. That we would be putting together each piece. Awesome... ha! 

FYI.... the picture below is NOT, I repeat NOT Cooper's actual room. My parents were  confused. So I figured I better update this post. Just wanted to show what the furniture will look like once its assembled.

So I ordered the three pieces that we wanted: the platform bed with headboard, the nightstand and the dresser. I was shocked at how quickly we actually received them. THREE days after I ordered them from Amazon. Ha, that is freaky fast : )  At that point, which I think was last month, we weren't in a big rush, so I knew I could just take my time getting the stuff assembled. I started small with the nightstand (see above). I think I worked on it for a few weeks. Just doing a few steps each night after Cooper went to bed or when I felt like it. It wasn't hard by any means. Just had lots of pieces and quite a few steps. I just didn't have a large chunk of time to do it all at once.

But it came out really cute and we were pleased and excited to get the others pieces out of the boxes and put together.

The next big step was picking out paint colors and getting the painting started. We bought Cooper a little bedding set a few months ago. We already had our hearts set on a sporty theme (or Joe did.. ha!). Sure hope he ends up liking sports.. ha! We picked out some colors to go with the bedding and for some crazy reason we wanted to do a stripe. We had a stripe in our living room at the old house, so we already kinda had some practice. I can't take any credit. Joe did all of the painting. And he did an awesome job on the stripe (see below).

Finding the time to work on the room without Cooper seeing what we are doing has been a challenge. We decided we wanted it to be a surprise. Even though we tell him about him having a big boy bed and a new room. We haven't let him see anything. Except the massive boxes of furniture sitting around. We have kept the door closed. And wanted to have a 'big reveal' all at once, once the room is totally done. Its hard to have a big chunk of time to work on things. Since the weekend is when I like to spend a lot of quality time with Cooper, his naps are when we try to do projects. Actually he has been sleeping a ton the past few weeks. We call it a 'marathon' something, because we have put him down for his nap.. and he never wakes up. He sleeps all night. It has to be a growth spurt. But its come in handy a few weekends allowing us extra time to work on his room. See above picture. We tried to wake him from his nap, brought him downstairs and he passed back out. So we layed out a blanket and let him sleep. That night he slept for another 3 hours, while we were hammering and building things. Kinda funny. But I guess the poor guy just needs his sleep.

 

Joe finished painting. We bought a mattress. I started building the dresser. 

We wanted to have a couple of surprises in the room for Cooper, something he could be excited about. One is a little baseball shaped chair that we ordered online. 

We knew the chair was smallish, but its actually is a little smaller than we imagined. But we are hoping that he likes it. Once we are finished, I'm planning that little corner to be a reading nook for him. Fyi.. the dresser was still in progress in the above picture. I was slowly working on finishing the drawers. We got pretty good at assembling drawers.. ha!

We bought a new blind and were able to use one our of red roman shades from Joe's boys den at our old house. It ending up matching perfect.

This weekend we really got a lot done. Cooper had another marathon nap. So we built the bed. And assembled more drawers. I think we are done with putting drawers together. 11 drawers total.. yikes! No more please. 

And here is the bed with the headboard attached.

Joe assembling the lamp.

Ta da!!!!! Well the mattress is on, most of the bedding. I was still washing up the comforter (so its not pictured). So I'll have to take a new photo. 

Soon those pictures on the floor will be hanging above the dresser. So we are really, really close. This week we plan to add the finishing touches. Finish organizing his closet. Move some of his toys into there. Get his clothes put away. Add hang more art on the wall. We are planning to move him in this weekend. Should be fun!!