I was skeptical...

Now I'm so impressed!

Stephen and I wanted to give the boys a swing set for Christmas. When we started investigating, we were a little shocked at how expensive the things are. Stephen decided that he was going to build the swing set. I was hesitant (to say the least) but it has all finally come together and the kids LOVE it!

Stephen still has to put a roof on the fort. He used an existing platform that was here when we moved in the house (it was just sort of a little tiny tree house type thing). He put on new sides, build stairs, and added the slide.

I don't know if you can see it over there on the left of the above picture, but we put the sand/water table out with the "play ground" (as Henderson calls it) which is a great place for it.

He even put a little boat wheel up in the fort which Henderson has loved.

The view from up in the fort looking down the slide at the swings. We have also purchased the "big boy" swings which we change out when older kids (or adults) want to swing.

I love how Stephen marked the area off with landscape timbers and filled in with mulch! It looks great! He had to bring in loads of fill dirt in order to build the ground up. There was definitely some back breaking work involved. On that note, I also want to thank those who came over and gave a helping hand at one point or another!

Friends Forever!

We were so lucky last week to have the Street family in town visiting! We are dying for them to hurry on up and move to Valdosta. We keep praying that things will work out for them to be here when Thomas is finished with his residency. Henderson and Emmett really had a great time together. Henderson keeps asking me every day "Mommy, Where is Emmett?"

It is so much fun to have such wonderful friends with boys right at the same ages. Looking forward to many fun times ahead!

David and James
Henderson and Emmett

Buddies forever!

Potty Update

Yay for Henderson! He has done EXCELLENT with the potty training. He hasn't had a single accident (since the first day when he had 2 small ones). He has also done so well at school. We travelled to West Point this past weekend and he did really well in the car too. He did make us stop about 5 times on the way home (2 false alarms). Stephen and I wondered how it would be when we travelled and we both agree that we will take stopping a bunch over changing those toddler diapers ANY day!

WoooooHOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Henderson is now potty trained! He has done so well and I hate to jinx it by posting it on my blog, but I am just so proud of him that I want to tell everyone. We had not planned on potty training this weekend. In fact, I never posted about it but we had an epic fail of a potty training session a few months back. David was still pretty little. It was kind of a bad time to try, as there was no way I could give him the attention that the whole potty thing takes. Anyway, It ended with Henderson back in diapers and Stephen and I exhausted and feeling like we failed. He CLEARLY was not ready at that time. I vowed I wouldn't try again for MANY months. Well, on Friday, he told me he wanted to wear his Woody (from Toy Story) undies that he got for Christmas. I went with it just to see what would happen. He started telling me he needed to potty and was going in the potty from the get go. He had 2 tiny accidents on Friday, but has remained dry ever since. Praying this continues and that he does great at school on Tuesday!

9 Month Check-up

David went to the doctor today for his 9 month check-up. Oh my time is flying by. I have really tried to savor every minute with my sweet baby. He has really taken off over the last month. He babbles constantly (lots of mama and dada!), he waves bye-bye, and crawls all over the place. He is weighing in at a whopping 22 lbs 11 oz (75th percentile). Everything went great at the appointment and he is a healthy, very happy little boy. He was flirting with all of the nurses (I'm going to have to keep my eye on this one:-) I have included a little crawling video for your viewing enjoyment. This is his slower speed, but he has really kicked it into high gear now.

Something I want to remember

David got this "Glow worm" from my mom and dad for Christmas, but don't you dare call it a "Glow worm" in front of Henderson... His name is Baby Jesus!

You see, I'll have to explain a little... On Henderson's first Christmas my sister gave him the Little People Nativity. This is one of my favorite things. It has been so fun to get it out each year and let Henderson play with all of the people. This year it was an awesome way to talk about Baby Jesus and what Christmas is all about. I explained (as much as I could to a two year old) about each of the people. We would sing Away in a Manger (the tune the manger plays when you push the angel). Anyway, take a look at the Little People's Baby Jesus...
To a two year old, they look pretty similar... close enough for them both to be "Baby Jesus"

He was thrilled when he saw Medley had a "Pink Baby Jesus!"

We have gotten the biggest kick out of this because when you try and tell him that the Glow worm is not Baby Jesus, he gets so mad. Hehehe! Just one of those little things I didn't want to forget.

I Admit Defeat

I honestly can't keep up. I'll admit that lately when I get a free minute, I usually don't want to sit down and update this blog. Admit it - your annoyed that every time you click on this link, there is no new update. I get it. I find myself looking at other peoples' blogs and thinking - come on give me something new! Anyway, I'm not even going to try and make any sort of new years resolution about updating more frequently because I don't see it happening. David has started crawling which adds a lot of new things in the mix. Not only does David have a knack for finding something tiny and super dangerous (as in choking hazard) on the ground among a thousand baby friendly toys, but he also can now get to anything that belongs to Henderson. Whoa boy, this is really hard. Before I know it, David has managed to get over to (and of all things TOUCH) something of Henderson's. Anyway, I realize it will only get worse.

On another note, we had a terrific holiday. We went to West Point for Christmas. I took off work the following week and stayed the week after Christmas too. Stephen went back to Valdosta to work and came back to West Point the Friday before New Year's. Stephen and I headed to Atlanta on New Year's Eve to attend my friend Rob's wedding. Mom and Dad rung in their New Year's by keeping the boys for us. We returned to Valdosta this past Monday. I went back to work on Tuesday and Henderson started back to school on Wednesday. Because of all of this, our Christmas tree finally made its way out of our house yesterday.

I have posted a few of my favs from the holiday. Of course my dad took all of these...

Henderson had the best time with his sweet cousins. He loved riding the Jeep! His cousin and buddy Frank even let him drive his "blue Jeep". Henderson is on the left riding Frank's Jeep and Frank is on the right driving the Gator that Nannie and Granddaddy have had since Jack was little. The cutest thing is when they would jump on together. They were very good at taking turns too!

My sweet David Doodle Bug! Nice drool! He has gotten four teeth on top within the past few weeks.

David is enjoying his chair that Nannie and Granddaddy gave him.


Can you tell Henderson was excited to get Woody from Santa? As soon as we could get the toy out of the box, he gave Woody this big hug!
This was taken on Christmas eve at Jack and Mary Beth's house.
There were of course TONS more adorable pictures taken during the time we were there. I'll not kid myself and think that I will ever get them posted, but hopefully I will surprise myself and get a few more up.