Easter Weekend Fun!

So Cole and I were off Good Friday so we headed down to AL. I had an appointment to get my hair done and Cole was going to hang out with Julia and Jessi. Fun, fun, fun! He LOVEs his girls. When we were getting ready to go he said " I have to tell my cousins bye". I said who are your cousins? He said Julia and Jessi :)

Cole with his AL girls....Jessi, Jodi and Julia

Saturday we had 2 egg hunts scheduled. One was at the Shriners temple and the other one was at Madison's off campus site. We went to it last year and had a good time. I would still say that it won out. It was a beautiful day and such a fun time. Cole got entirely too much candy, but had a blast!

This was the closest Cole was coming to the Easter Bunny and we all had to be in it!

Coaching out his route!

And he is off!

Sunday was equally as beautiful. I do not remember it being such a perfect Easter weekend in years. It seems as though the last few years have been rainy and cloudy, but not this year. After church we went to Uncle Lincoln and Aunt Pam's house for lunch. When were in church Cole said he was hungry. I said remember we are going to Uncle Lincoln and Aunt Pam's for lunch. Cole said "and Seth and Zane?!". I said yep! and Seth and Zane. Cole said "Sounds like a great day to me!"

He seriously comes up with some of the cutest things! Another favorite is him telling me..."mommy you look beautiful!" LOVE IT!!! I hope he is always sweet.

My handsome little guy

Coggin men/boys

My guys! :)

We have a 3 year old!

We have had a busy few weeks. We are still staying with Tisha and that transition is going a little easier. It was more adjustments than I had planned on. We are so thankful that we are able to stay with her, but it is always an adjustment for everyone. Fingers crossed our house will be on the market THIS weekend! Don't even ask why it isn't yet! :) hahaha....
Casey has been looking at different plans recently too! Well, I guess I should say he is always looking at different plans and models, but he has actually gone back and forth on what we are going to build now. I am good for almost whatever! I am SO excited about having a new house I do not think I can quite fathom what it will be like. It is SO exciting! Casey does this all day everyday and has more input and suggestions than I do. So who know what we will be building, but I know it will be great and I will love it! Now hears to building it soon!!!
So our 3 year old....Yes you heard me correctly....3 years old! How did that happen?? We had a super hero birthday party and it was SO much fun! I gave everyone a job and it came together beautifully! We had it at church again. Our church just has a really great set up, plus they do not charge us. We also have some friends from church who use to rent those bouncy houses. They do not do it anymore but still have them so they give us a deal. Perfect for a birthday party!!

The crew who helped me make it all possible!

Cake pops made by Aunt Karen!!

Super Hero appearance!!

Make a wish!

Gotham City made by KK

Rough start, but finally settling in...

So we are officially city people and I think I am never going to want to move back!! I love the location and for my job it is absolutely the best place to live. I can probably make it to every MNPS school in 20 mins or less and that is still leaving at 7:45am. It is SO amazing going the opposite of traffic. Can you tell how much I love it? I LOVE IT! I love that you don't have to worry about freezing pipes, there is a garbage shoot (we always forgot garbage pick-up day), there is also a recycle station right by the trash. I love that Cole gets to experience being with his Aunt Tisha too! They are close and I love seeing them together.Things just seem to be a little bit easier and that is always nice. :)

Casey, Cole and Bella on our lot/land

The rough start was that we could not find anyone for Bella. It was getting SO stressful. Everyone that we asked, after putting any thought into it said no. We understood everyones reasonong, but still as the owners  and desperately needing somehwere for our dog, it was so stressful. Casey was living at our nearly empty house and Cole and I were on West End. Csey would get his brother Ben to stay at the house a few times so that he could stay with us. Casey and I both used the term "we feel divorced". Casey was having to ask when he could see Cole, we had dinner dates and dates at Target a few times. Cole was really confused. Another thing that was hard was I was having to drop off and pick up. I was driving anywhere between an hour and fifteen minutes to hour and a half every morning! It was getting to all of us! Then out of the blue someone we didnt even think of, Unlce Lincoln and Aunt Pam said that they would take her. We didnt think of them at first becasue they didnt have a back yard, just had a major add on to there house and don't have any dogs anymore, so I didn't think of them as wanting to be dog people. They have her and it has gone great! We got Bella a wireless pet containment system, so she loves being outside and is enjoying being a Brentwood dog. She has been there since Feb 11th. We are so lucky and blessed that they were able and willing to take her.
Cole has done well. He is definitely happy to have daddy here with us all the time now! He would say things like, "I love having daddy here", "mommy is daddy coming here tonight? I love when my daddy stays here". Casey takes Cole to school about 99% of the time. So not only was the morning route now very long, but it was also wrestling a dramatic, confused and very upset 2 year old. He would sobb and say "My daddy takes me to schoooollll!!!! It was pitiful.


Our little Super ManThe past few day though he has mentioned our house, our old house. He will say "mommy I want to go home" We talk abut it and remind him that someone else is going to live in our house and that daddy is building us a new one. It was interesting that I got an email from "What to expect". I started getting them when I was pregannat and they still send them talking about issues your toddler may have. The one they sent discussed moving. It put things in a little more perspective for our little guy. I know once we start building and he can see the house being built and the progress it will hopefully make a little more sense to him.
Life is good!!

No traffic in the morning and bumper-to-bumper on the other side.

 We went to see the Lego movie! Uncle Ben and Uncle Craig came too! Thumbs up!

Being silly at Loveless Cafe for Tisha's birthday.

Moving Day!

We will actually have a couple of moving days I guess in the next 6 months (fingers crossed). Yesterday we became city folks! :) We will be living with Tisha, Casey's sister, while we sale and build our new house. Its very exciting! We decided since we were going to have to live some where while Casey was building the house that we would go ahead and go now. Hoping that having a staged house and not having to worry about keeping it clean and viewing ready at all times would be easier. So we did it! The only problem was Bella... I had been asking around for a few months and in the back of my mind I thought I had Brad (possibly Craig as a last resort, but he has 2 dogs already) in the back of my mind. Brad didn't seemed thrilled, but he has been our babysitter for the last 9 years when we would go out of town. Any ways, now we are on the search for a foster family for Bella. I know something will work out in time, but for now Cole and I are at Tisha's and Casey is at our house with Bella. Hopefully he can get some things done while he is there too! :) I am excited about our adventure. I feel lucky and blessed to have a wonderful sister-in-law to take us on. I am hoping we can motivate each other to eat well and exercise too!
I took one picture last night of our current view. I will have to add some more!

the view from our bedroom window

Our Birthday!!

Dinner at Logan's

Another Birthday in the books! It was a nice relaxing day with my two boys, then an early dinner with the family at Logan's, then off to met some friends to go to Jellystone Lights at Opryland. Apparently they have done the lights at for 4 or 5 years now, but this was the first year that I had heard of it. Since Brad and Karen were gone for the holidays and we saw that it was running until January 4th we decided to go. We also decided because it is $25 a car or bus or truck. Brad drives the church bus once a month, so he asked the guy if we could use it and he said yes! So we asked the Wray's, Greer's and Matlock's to go with us! We had a party bus! :) We had a fun time! We went to the mall afterwards for sweet cece's and to ride the carousel. Party's aren't what they use to be, but we had a good time!

Bus driver Brad

The crew

Cole saying my flash is to bright

Oh no! Brad let Cole help drive once we got in the park

Karen made cupcakes! Ella was giving her approval

Cole with the birthday boy

My birthday ice cream date

Carousel fun

The group minus Casey (he took the pic)

ICE!

Our lazy day! Worn out little buddy

So Aunt Tisha called us this morning and said that her friend had given her 2 free tickets to ICE and was wondering if we were interested?!?! Which we were! We had no plans for the day. It was basically a lazy day for us. So we were lazy pretty much all day. Cole was obviously worn out from our 3 days of celebrating. He slept until 9:30! We played and watched movies. Cole fell asleep on the couch and then we met Tisha at 4pm at ICE! This year the theme was Frosty the Snowman. It is amazing! Truly amazing to see what these people are able to sculpt out of ICE. It is 40 ice sculptors from China who come and do it. Who knows what it all cost, but with the prices they charge, I am thinking it is A LOT! So glad we had free tickets! It is $27 for an adult, which starts at age 13 and then kids are $17.95 for 4-12 years and then 3 and under are free. Don't get me wrong it is amazing, but the whole thing only last around 20-40 mins depending on how slow you walk and look at everything. Oh well, we had free tickets and it was AWESOME! I highly recommend you to go if you get the opportunity for free! hahahaha....

ICE fun at Opryland

Mexican dinner date after ICE with this silly boy

Christmas 2013 in the books!

Soooo.... It was wonderful! Feeling very blessed. We had 3 days of busy, busy, fun! It started on Christmas Eve when Cole and I went to Aunt Tisha's "building" to make cookies for Santa. We had a fun time. I was so glad Aunt T was there to help guide us. I have never made cookies where you roll them out and use cookie cutters. Aunt T had lots of fun shapes and we brought the sprinkles so we were ready!!

Christmas Cookies!

That night we got ready for Santa and ate our Christmas Fettuccine!  Ha! Yes, Fettuccine. A few years back we watched the movie "The Holiday" and on Christmas Eve they eat Fettuccine and refer to it as "Christmas Fettuccine" and act like that is what everyone eats as a tradition on Christmas Eve (either in London or California). Casey thought it was a great idea and thought it should be a tradition of ours! We set out the cookies and took a few pics before going to bed. The next morning around 8am we heard on the monitor "did Santa come, did he come, did he??" It was so funny and so cute! Cole was so excited, but a little overwhelmed with it all too! We had a great morning playing and just enjoying the moment. That night we went to Papa and KK's house to celebrate some more. It was minus Brad and Karen since they are on there honeymoon. We did face time them on Christmas Eve while they were at the beach!!! Well Uncle Craig hit the jackpot with a Batman bat cave and bad guy figures. Cole was SO excited! and Papa and KK gave him a DVD system for my car. Cole was so funny. There are two monitors that came with it. When I put it in the car he said, "mommy there is one for me and one for Bella!" hahahaha....the things this little boy says crack me up!

My sweet little family

Then on the 26th we went over to Uncle Lincoln and Aunt Pam's. We just hung out all day! Casey had to work but got there around 5pm, but the rest of us where there for lunch until about 9pm. We missed the Herren's, but Jennifer broke her foot so she was propped up and had to go to the doctor. Cole was hilarious opening presents. Of course we didn't have the video going, but it was classic. Uncle Lincoln gave him this box and said this is from me, I think you are going to like it. He opened it up, squealed with excitement and said "its just what I wanted!" and then ran to Aunt Pam, almost tackling her, and squeezing her neck. It was a t-shirt that said University of Arkansas, but it had spider-man, hulk and wolverine on it. When Uncle Lincoln said "Cole that was from me, where is my hug?" Cole replied with "not yet!" but then a few minutes later Uncle Lincoln got a big hug too!!
We had a wonderful Christmas and we are looking forward to 2014!!! Thank you Lord for this beautiful life you have blessed us with!

Rolling the cookie dough out

Aunt Tisha!

Putting cookies for Santa out!

He came!!!

Batman with his bat cave

Cole playing scrabble

Getting Uncle Lincoln

Someone found the icing bowl

Thanking Uncle Lincoln for his cool new shirt

Present from Uncle Craig

with Papa!

Even Super Heros brush there teeth