Team Cohen: September 2013

Sunday, September 29, 2013

Shalom Bayit

Shalom Bayit is a Hebrew term referring to the concept of domestic harmony. In this situation, shalom can mean hello or peace and bayit means home or house. We say hello to our house and we look forward to peace in the home.

I've received a weird number of requests (demands) for pictures of our new house. And while it is a work in progress (and will continue to be), I decided to give in.

The beautiful part is that we went to hang up our mezuzot (parchment mounted on each doorpost) this morning which motivated me to take the rest of these pictures, and as I sat down at the computer to put this post together, it occurs to me that today is September 29th - EXACTLY one month after we closed and officially owned this house. This has been an extremely crazy, busy, and fast-paced month. Through the holidays, birthdays, and traveling, it amazes me what we have been able to accomplish in such a short period of time. We still have pictures to hang and areas to fill, but we are grateful and proud to call this our home. (We are getting ready to replace almost ALL the windows in the house, so please ignore all windows and hideous/nonexistent window treatments.) Enjoy your pictures!

Home Sweet Home

On the right of the entryway is what we're turning into our
"office." It has space for a couch and bookshelf that's in
Houston with Alyssa now.

To the left of our entryway is our "formal" dining room.

Keep walking forward downstairs, and on the right is our living room.
Bonus Points if you can find all 3 sleeping kittens!

our AMAZING kitchen
(still waiting for our microwave to install above the stove)

our kitchen dining area with great bay windows
(with current hideous blinds)

downstairs guest room waiting for
its furniture when it is returned to
us next June

laundry room downstairs
(We love having a room from having
the laundry closet in NC!)

fenced-in backyard with shed

covered and fanned (but not yet set up) back porch

play area loft upstairs - Ignore the hideous window
treatments, and as you may predict, this room will
grow and be decorated in time.

master bedroom on the right of the play room

front of master bathroom, unseen tub on left

back of master bathroom
(If you'll notice, our 2 sinks don't even require us
to look at each other when we brush our teeth!)

patiently waiting to be filled by baby #2
(ONE day...this is no announcement!)

acting as storage and cat room until a perhaps baby #3...?

Gabi decided she wanted to show off her nursery,
another room that will grow in time.

The other side of her nursery. Her bathroom connects
with baby 2's room with separate vanity areas.

Close up on that cutie!

creating a sacred space in our home
by hammering in our first Mezuzah

Gabi looks on.

While Daddy does the hard work, the girls play.

Saturday, September 28, 2013

8 Months Old

It is quite hard to believe, but Gabriella Daphna is already 8 months old! I have to admit, my prediction from last month was off; she is no more ready to crawl than she was a month ago. (She has started putting her hands down, ALMOST rocking, but we have a ways to go still.) BUT I am not at all upset or jealous of those babies who are on the move! The stage of sitting up independently but not yet crawling is quite a lovely one, especially while we are getting settled into our new home.

In this 8th month, Gabi has certainly gotten a lot more hair than she used to have. She continues to love to stick her tongue out. And very excitingly - we are pretty convinced that she is starting to use sign language! We use sign language with her in most of our conversations, and just this past week, we have seen her start to use the sign for "all done." Genius baby! She also picked up clapping, and this happy and excited baby now has even more ways to be super cute.

Gabi is getting better at solid foods (as long as she has 2 other objects on her tray to distract her hands from swatting at the spoon that is feeding her). She continues to smile and laugh and light up our lives (and strangers' lives) every day. She is growing all the time, and we still love those chunky thighs and cheeks!

Gabi tries apples for her first time in honor of Rosh Hashanah. (sans honey for the infant)

Gabi shows you her multi-fisted talent.

This cutie is big enough to sit up by herself in the grocery cart!

We got to celebrate Gabi's first Simchat Torah
(celebration of the Torah), and Gabi knew
just what to do with her flag!

Gabi shows off her cute cute laughing (...aided by a relentless mother)

Gabi picked up her latest trick this past week, and it's super cute!

Just to show off her continued, growing cuteness: (These pictures get more difficult each month; hopefully, we can last with the sign just a few more months!)

Also this month:

Daddy got glasses! Team Cohen is becoming quite the four-eyed crew.

Who's the cat and who's the kitten? Maggie loves her flat cat!

Thursday, September 12, 2013

Boston Bris

Mazel Tov to Mitchell, Amanda, and Noah Kaye on the birth of a great new addition, Samuel Joel, born FIRST thing on September 3rd (which also happened to be Mitchell and Amanda's 7th Anniversary)! I am so proud to be an aunt again! Gabi and I enthusiastically flew to Boston to be with them for the bris and some special hangout time. We stayed with cousins Elana and Brendon whose hospitality was MUCH appreciated.