Greens and Beans*

Carrie and I started a "diet" on the 1st of the year. I put diet in quotes, because we're not really limiting the amount of food we're eating or counting calories; we've just started putting only healthy things into our body. And it's working out well for us because it goes that we can put as much raw veggies, cooked veggies, fruit and beans into our body as we want. It doesn't feel like a diet at all, other than we are eating things we never thought we'd be eating. In the initial six weeks, I lost 20 lbs and Carrie lost 15 lbs. It is funny, becasue it's going so well, I don't think we'll go back to our old ways, at least any time soon.


I like to file this one under "I ate that." We have a smoothie for breakfast almost every morning and, honestly with as many salads as we eat, it's the thing I look forward to most in the day. Did I mention your taste buds change a bit on this diet?


We've started composting because we go through so much plant waste. It's nice because we take the garbage out half as frequently as we used to. Owen likes it because there are a bunch of bugs in there.


This is how our refrigerator looks now. Especially on Sundays after we stock up for the week.


Owen has even gotten in on the action. He LOVES helping me make smoothies. He helps in any way he can, all the while professing "I'm a good helper." I seriously like that. Also, he'll just reach up while we're making a salad and grab a romaine lettuce leaf and start munching on it because he "loves salad." I seriously like that too.


We haven't got Owen on this diet 100%, mostly because he just doesn't eat that much, so he probably wouldn't be getting enough of the stuff he needs if was getting it from leafy greens and nothing else. It is nice to hear from Owen's teachers, however, that Owen always has the most healthy lunches in the class and they are proud of how well he eats.

Overall, changing the way we eat has done wonders for our health in a short amount of time. We have more energy, lost weight, and - per Carrie - I don't snore nearly as much anymore. If anyone is interested, we followed this book and highly recommend it:
http://www.drfuhrman.com/shop/ETLBook.aspx

*Name of the vegan restaurant Carrie wants to open. Next to the brewery she also wants to open which is next to her community garden. She dreams big.

Valentine's Day 2012

Happy Valentine's Day to all. Owen had a fun day at school and this is the first time he's gotten the shoe box full of cards. He felt quite loved by all his friends.


A huge mystery box of candy, what's not to love about Valentine's Day?


Carrie and I went to a black tie event the other night and had Dawn watch Owen. It was one of the few nights out we get so we weren't going to waste it. Since this is also one of the very few times we get dressed up, we had Dawn take some pictures.


Carrie was looking more beautiful than ever; Ed even less gooney than usual. A perfect evening.


This picture encapsulates our life right now. (Hint: the little reminder of why we rarely go out is never far away.)

News Worthy

Short story
Owen and I are leaving the house and he sees part of a newspaper on the ground. He picks it up and states he wants to bring it with him so he can read the newspaper in the car. As we're driving Owen exclaims:"Mama! Grandma and Grandpa are in the newspaper!"

Carrie: "Oh really? Which ones?"

Owen: "Grandma and Grandpa Cooper."

Carrie: "What are they doing?"

Owen: "They're huggin'. Why Grandma and Grandpa in the paper?"

Carrie (now very curious about this newspaper): "Can I see it buddy?"

Owen: "Sure! I'm going to bring it to school and show my teacher."



Carrie: "Huh. How about we just leave this paper in the car?"

Just Add Paint

We bought a new couch the other day from Costco and in true Costco style, the couch came in a gigantic box. It seemed a waste to just break it down and recycle it so we invited Miles over to help Owen paint a fort.


Started out in an orderly fashion using a paint brush and not mixing colors.


Moved to the inside to paint "furniture"; realized it's fun to fling paint.


Decided paint brushes were totally unnecessary when you have hands. Shortly after this shot, Owen decided his belly was an even better painting tool.


The artist in all his glory.

Owen Didn't Even Need The Edge

Last night was Monster Jam and Owen had a hugely good time (and so did Dad). We ordered good tickets, but when we got there, we realized how good they were. We were two rows back from front row. All of the trucks parked right in front of us while they were waiting for the other trucks to run the course. To sum it up, it was loud and rad.


This is the scene that greeted us. Incidentally, this is also the scene where I realized we were going to have a fantastic night.


We have a camera that can catch a hummingbird's wing mid-flap with perfect clarity, but it didn't stand a chance with Owen's mid-flap excitement about the show unfolding in front of him.


We were lucky to have Grave Digger at our event. He's pretty much the monster truck top-dog. I guess they have other shows around the country and some of the other popular guys were spread out, but Grave Digger was nice to have because he always puts on a great show.


During the racing (as opposed to the freestyle) portion of the show, we were privy to a serious Lightning McQueen style photo finish ending.


They had it on the Jumbo-tron and said it was a tie and just gave it to one of the trucks. They said (and I would like to fact check this before I go on record as saying) that this was the closest race finish in monster truck history, but the announcers were also shilling cotton candy and Matchbox toys, so I'd take that with a grain of salt. Fun nonetheless.


There were spills.


Huge air.


And huger air.


These trucks articulate like crazy.


To a point. Also, look at how hot the differentials get. You can see them glowing.


Owen even got a kick out of watching them set up for the freestyle course during intermission. It was a really fun night for all (in descending order of Owen, Ed, Carrie).

Time's Flyin' So We Must Be Havin' Fun

We set up this blog when we were getting ready to welcome Owen into the world so that all of the people who care about us near and far would be able to keep tabs on what was happening with the Wilhelmes in Arizona. We looked at the calendar and discovered that we've been at this thing for four years. That's a pretty decent chunk of time.

It's easy to get wrapped up in the here-and-now, but from time to time we will sit down and browse the blog. I am eternally grateful that we have it. For something that was set up to be inclusive of others, it sure turned out to mean a heck of a lot to us. So, in a sense, we owe a sincere thanks to all of you who follow along with us or we would have much less of an impetus to keep at it. In that spirit, happy blogiversary everyone!


4 years ago - baby cooking. Seems like a long time ago now.

Photo Fun

Baby Grae (Niah's brother) had his first birthday party last weekend. Wren (their mom) is a great party planner and had a photographer, props, and a make-shift photo booth where you could take fun photos.

Our mustachio family. Is that Owen's look of parental embarrassment?

Photographic proof that you can herd cats. (All the kids in photo are in, or have been through, Dawn's daycare.)

Shoes Make the Outfit

Owen has mastered the whole pants/shirt dichotomy. Old news for this young man. He's discovered a whole new realm of flair where there are seemingly no rules: shoes. The shoes make the man and he's dabbling in the look and feel that fit him to a tee.


He's got the fish-out-of-water urban-cowboy-hoodie look. Not bad, and it got a good laugh from quite a number of patrons at the restaurant he wore it to.


And we have the street-smart, dice-shootin', slipper wearin', loose canon. The daycare kids liked this one.

Fireside Friends

Ever since Owen was exposed to s'mores this summer on Blake Island, he's had a pension for campfires. This has only been exacerbated by our own newly purchased fire pit where we roast marshmallows as a family. Since it's not feasible to have campfires as often as Owen would like (read: every night), we got him his own campfire for Christmas, complete with sticks, hot-dogs, and marshmallows. It doesn't put out any heat, but it glows and blows a fan through the fabric flames. It's actually pretty cool and Owen thinks so too.


Owen has gathered all his friends around his campfire and is graciously cooking for them all. Notice Monkey's hot-dog.

The Moments In Between

Well, there it went. 2011 has come and gone. What a year. New jobs, schools, challenges and adventures. It was a rough one, but we saw that coming when we rang in 2011. We are very optimistic about 2012.

Our blogging, unfortunately, slacked a bit this year. There were a few moments we were going to post about and never did. So to wrap up 2011, here are some moments from the year that, for various reasons, never made it up. Enjoy.


Visiting the La Jolla emergency room for an earache and spending 5 hours in a hospital waiting room rather than hanging out on a beach.


Ed and Owen running the bases at M's spring training with Jason and Jackson.


Celebrating Owen's 3rd birthday.


Looking for, and finding, Easter eggs...again and again and again....


Learning how to drive a boat.


Running in mud and drinking beers at Warrior Dash.


Talking to a parrot at the Santa Monica Pier.


Being a family.

Vanilla Cake

Today is my father's birthday and being the loyal blog follower that he is, I wanted to send birthday wishes via the blog. It's always hard when I can't be there to celebrate my family's birthdays, sometimes more so than holidays. Maybe it's because birthday celebrations are more personal than holiday celebrations. Large groups come together for holidays but only a select group come together, year after year, to celebrate the day you were born. Whatever the reason, I wish we were there to celebrate.



Happy Birthday dad. Vanilla cake with chocolate frosting is my favorite too.

Merry Christmas 2011

Living away from family is felt most around the holidays, but having a small family of our own helps. As does having a loving family who is willing to exchange holiday wishes (and presents) from afar. Speaking to everyone on Christmas was great and here are some photos of our big day. We hope everyone had a lovely holiday season and is ready to have a fabulous 2012.


Not a creature was stirring, not even a slot-car.


This Christmas was by far the longest Owen ever had to delay gratification. I'm hoping it helped build a little character. Not that we need him to be more of a character or anything.


Ever the considerate soul, Owen made and decorated cookies for Santa and left the perfectly logical number of five carrots for Santa's eight reindeer. Notice the Brato cameo - his farewell appearance for the year.

All told, we had a wonderfully relaxed Christmas weekend and we hope everybody got what they wanted this year.

A Very Brato Christmas

For about 25 days we've had a visitor in our house. Brato (Owen named him) is an elf who gets into mischief but who has a job to do also. His job is to see if Owen has been a good boy or naughty. He then flies up to the North Pole every night and reports to Santa. This is why we can't touch Brato, because, like butterflies, if you touch him, he can't fly (unless, of course, that's a line my parents told me about butterflies, in which case... ha ha [being a science teacher, I should probably figure that out]).

The whole endeavor seemed a little Orwellian at first, but being on the other side of all that monitoring sure gives insight into why monitoring on that level is so appealing. Any time Owen does something wrong he says, "Brato tell Santa about that?" As loving parents, we have tried to very much limit how hard we use this leverage over him, but it's tough because it's so effective.

Moving beyond the morality of the whole situation, we have had fun with Brato in the evenings. He appears in a different spot every morning for Owen to discover. Staging him in 25 different ways has proven a slightly challenging, yet eminently rewarding midnight task. Owen has really enjoyed our guest and since tonight he will be returning home to the North Pole, we thought we'd share some of our favorite 2011 Brato moments.







Bonus: Holiday Owenisms

Why does Santa eat so many cookies? He needs to be careful. He's going to get a tummy ache!

Daddy. I need help. I can't wait till Christmas time.

On Christmas night, Santa will come and I'm going to sleep with one eye open so I can see him.

I'm dirty with Christmas! (Said after playing with artificial snow.)

Momma! We ate all the cookies! We need to make more cookies for Santa.

Surprise Visit

Santa Claus (aka my dad) stopped by my parents house last Saturday night to say hello to Bella and Owen since they have been such good kids this year.


Owen asked for a race car track from Santa. He was a little confused and upset when Santa didn't immediately produce a race car track. It took a bit of explaining that Santa brings it on Christmas and doesn't pull it out of his red, toy sack when you meet him.


Bella very sweetly asked for a guitar. Then she got the heck away.


Santa and his family. Quite a jolly bunch.

At the party, Santa handed out candy canes to the adults though he missed me. I mentioned to Owen that Santa forgot to give me a candy cane and Owen said, "Santa didn't give you a candy cane because you are mean to people." I, quite shocked asked, "who am I mean to?" Owen says, "You're mean to Owen. You put Owen in the time out chair. Santa doesn't like it when you put Owen in the time out chair so you don't get any presents this year."

Clever little punk.

One Little Monkey Jumping on the Bed

He looks like a little angel when he sleeps...


... and then he wakes up.

Notice the bruising on the middle of his head in the 2nd photo? He ran full speed into a pole at school. Owen told us his friend Blake was chasing him and when pole jumped out in front on him. Owen had a pretty good bump and was sent home from school to rest.

And so it begins...being the parents of a boy. I feel like I should have the doctor's number on speed dial.