The Pram

Something about me has always loved an old fashioned baby pram. Navy blue with big silver wheels. I just love them....

Several months ago, DW and I were driving through Archer, when I saw a pram sitting beside the road for sale. I was helping host a baby shower the next weekend and almost jumped out of the truck to see how much the seller was asking for it. I could just see a big blue bow tied on it and gifts stacked up in it....

Devin kept driving, despite my efforts to grab the steering wheel and make him stop. I told him how badly I wanted one of those old prams and how I had even "researched" them on Ebay. I pleaded that we should stop in and just see how much the man was asking for it, because the ones on Ebay were like selling for $400.00 and up. I told him if the man was asking less than $100.00 we should buy it, because it would totally be an "investment".... well, Mr. Finance Degree didn't much agree with my ideas of how we should "invest" (he doesn't really agree with my plan to stimulate the economy either...)... he sighed that big sigh he does when I am trying to talk him into something and then tells me that he's willing to put money on the pram being in my next yardsale if I do buy it..... I promised him that wouldn't happen. After much persuasion, he said we could stop on our way back through and see how much they man wanted for it...

When we got out of the truck, I immediately saw the tag... it was well under $100.00 and I even talked him down a little more!!!

I've already used it at 2 baby showers and I think it's just precious... I wish the blue was a little less faded, but I guess it just adds to making it look antique...


Last week I got the idea to put Annabelle in it and take some pictures... I thought she'd be sweet dressed in a bishop dress and bonnet... we were going for real old fashioned looking...

I think the pictures turned out so funny... they just look kind of silly... I wish I had taken her pictures in it when she was smaller....the sun was in her eyes and she was scaring me to death "bouncing" in the stroller.... I thought it was going to throw her out of it!

They didn't turn out liked I had hoped, but they're still cute though...hello, anything with her in it is cute! Of course, I am not partial or anything...

So what do yall, think? Is my pram trash or treasure?!?!? I know if my dad reads this, he will definitely think it's junk...along with any other man that sees it, I'm sure! Ha...

~annie~

Peaches & Pals

Is it Monday morning already? Hard to believe another weekend has come and gone....School started today marking the end of Summer vacation for many. (Thankfully we've got a few more years before we will be on the county's time line for summer!)
We soaked up some sun and splashed in the pool both days of the weekend this week...
Saturday morning DW worked in the yard and I helped Carrie paint...Annabelle spent the morning and early afternoon with Grammy & Pop...

Saturday afternoon, when all the work was done, we had some company....

Adam, Carrie & Allie Claire came over for some swim time and we grilled out with them...

Belle splashing

I saw this frog outside the pool. Is he pitiful? DW said it's the chlorine that made him swell up so bad. I've self diagnosed myself as having consumed too much chlorine as well, since my clothes are all getting too tight.....

The girls had fun playing and are so cute crawling around together...Allie entertained us at the dinner table, doing her new tricks... (she 'sniffs' at her Daddy)... too cute!

My mom and dad brought back some peaches when they went up to Beau's last weekend, so I used the ones they gave me to make some homemade peach ice cream... it was a hit with the little girls for sure... Neither of them were happy that their Mommas only let them have a couple tiny bites... It's rough being little...

It's funny that growing up I never liked homemade ice cream very much. The only kind we ever made was PEACH (with the RARE exception that we made 'chocolate frosty'). I don't know if I just got burnt out on it or if it was the time that we used some peaches Granny had canned that were on the shelf in the canning room for probably a decade, and tasted like kerosene that made me not really like peach ice cream anymore. For years I wouldn't eat it. Thankfully, about 10 years ago, I decided to give it another try and have loved it ever since. Good thing, because guess what flavor DW grew up on, too?!?!? PEACH... let me tell you, we are forever having some homemade ice cream around here... mostly peach... sometimes strawberry, but always YUMMY!

Take one of these last few weekends of Summer and spend some time churning some ice cream. It's so worth it. Of course you have to serve it in plastic cups with plastic spoons. (We were out at our house on Saturday and had to use bowls... it just wasn't the same, I'll tell ya)...

~amw~

Show us your life- Baby Showers

How fun that this week over at Kelly's Korner's Show us Your Life, the theme is baby showers!

I recently (this past Sunday) helped host a shower for Stephanie! Steph is married to William, one of DW's cousins, but she's also one of my dearest friends. They are expecting a boy, due 9/9/09. (Pretty cool due date, huh?) The baby is being named after his Daddy, but some of us will call him, "Willie." (Which I think is precious). Anyway, my Sister-in-law, Lauren and I, along with an aunt and cousins hosted a drop in shower on Sunday afternoon.

Lauren, Me & Stephanie

William and his Dad really enjoy duck hunting and so Stephanie decided to make that the theme of Willie's nursery. We decided to carry the theme into the shower, and what perfect place to host a duck hunting themed shower than the family lodge?!?!? There's plenty of manly things including lots of stuffed game on the wall! While it wasn't the typical "baby" shower, I think it turned out really cute and was SO William & Stephanie....

It was a great afternoon and I was so glad to play in part in hosting a shower for Steph.
She's such a good friend and just the person who's always doing for others and is beyond unselfish....so doing anything for her is a treat! She and William are so excited about baby Willie.

Here's the food.... we decided to "girly" up the food spread by serving it in our Arthur Court pieces. But kept it boyish, too, with the burlap and cattails. We also covered letters to make his initials with reindeer moss. Steph's going to hang these in Willie's nursery, too....

Steph loves polka dots, so the cakes had brown and dark green (camo colors) polka dots on them.

On the melon at the top of the fruit cascade, I carved the Ducks Unlimited duck head...

Here's Steph opening gifts....

Since the shower was a drop-in, we set up a couple tables to display the gifts as Stephanie opened them. We made tags on the Cricut and taped them on the gifts and wrote who the gift was from as we displayed them.... Here's one of the tables... (the pic of the other table and of the little clothes hanging up didn't turn out...)

The last girl shower I helped host was for my BFF, Carrie, when she was expecting Allie Claire. The shower was last September. (Hard to believe that Allie is almost a year old & that Belle will be right behind her!). It seems most couples our age help host a couples' shower for the parents-to-be. It's a fun way to let the new dad's get involved and be a part of the whole thing! Devin and I love Adam & Carrie dearly and we were excited to have a dinner to celebrate with them. Allie Claire was due in the Fall, which happens to be Carrie's favorite time of year! I knew since Allie was a girl, we had to have some PINK involved in the shower, but since there were also men coming to the shower, we wanted a male friendly atmosphere, too. Ha... We decided instead of having the dinner at our house, to have it at the lodge...We thought having it there would keep the men feeling "manly"--- ha! When I went to order invitations, I found the sweetest ones with a big brown branch and tiny pink birds on it. Then decided to just carry that into the decorating for the shower.

We had pork tenderloin for dinner and instead of a cake, we had a couple homemade desserts... chocolate delight and banana pudding...

Adam & Carrie opening gifts....

I don't have any pictures from any of my showers with Cooper. I hate that I don't. I just wasn't a good picture taker before he was born. All of the showers were just perfect and I appreciated them so much.... One that was really a good idea was the one that I had at my work (I was working at Millennium at the time). Because I was already having several showers, the girls I worked with, decided to have a diaper shower at work instead of a traditional shower...It was great because they had everyone bring diapers...between the diapers we got from that shower and the ones given to us at our other showers, we didn't buy diapers for almost Cooper's first year! I thought the diaper shower idea was a great one!

With Annabelle, we also had several showers. (People are just sweet where we're from!) :) I do have a few pics from her showers, but didn't take as many as I wished I'd had... I'll share a couple of each....

Our couples' shower was at Adam & Lauren's house. Our friends, Cullen & Megan & Cecil & Charon also helped host it. The girls outdid themselves with all the yummy food. We had 2 different fondues with lots of dippers and then also a couple homemade cakes. YUM. The decorations were so sweet... lots of fresh flowers, candles & tulle...

It was sweet for Devin to get to come to a shower. I let him open the gifts and I read the cards...

Here's a couple from a dinner that the girls I graduated college from hosted for me....We had italian food and it was a fun time to get together with my "RRS" girls...

This was a shower that the same aunt & cousins who helped with Steph's shower this weekend hosted for me...Steph & a couple other cousins also helped with it...Everything was PINK! :) It was very girly!!!

The cute favors...

And here's pics from my last shower... Is this spread not BEAUTIFUL?!?! It was equally delicious...

Look who made her first baby shower debut... that's Allie Claire, Belle's BFF...

Baby showers are so sweet and fun. I love, love, love helping host them and celebrating a new little life! But, I can say as much as I have loved hosting them, I have loved having them hosted for me even more! Is there ANYTHING better to celebrate than having a baby on the way?!?!? Now, somebody get pregnant, I want to host another shower! :)

Next Friday at Kelly's Korner is wedding showers...

Have a great weekend---

~annie~

Birthday, after Birthday, after Birthday

All these birthdays can only mean one thing.... CAKE....which only leads to one thing.... my clothes getting tight(er)! After last week, I need to run about 150 miles and spend 3 weeks at the gym. Why is it so much easier to gain weight than to loose it?!?!?!?

The 12th was DW's 30th birthday!!! To celebrate, his Dad took us all to dinner on the 11th at Yamoto.

Me, DW, & Belle

Annabelle tried to figure it all out. It was so cute. Of course when our guy went to start the fire on our grill (I guess that's what you call that thing?), I got Belle and stood up a good ways back. My first couple experiences at a Japanese Restaurant involved singed eyelashes (well, maybe that's a little dramatic, but they felt like they were on fire for sure) and being hit in the face with a flying shrimp...since I'd hate to go all "crazy-momma" on the cook who might accidentally toss a shrimp my girl's way, I decided it was safest for me to just stand. She loved watching him cook and he was way less of a "trickster" than they usually are...I guess since we had a baby with us, which of course I appreciated. He was great.... and the food was great, too....

Can you see that smile behind her paci?

After dinner, we went back to our house for cake. I had asked Devin earlier that week, what kind of cake he wanted....he thought and thought, and I named off every cake I remember him saying he'd had when he was a kid, and every other cake I could think of... he decided a cookie cake sounded good. He said they used to get the ones from the mall on their birthdays. Oh my gosh, our mall used to have the BEST cookies and cookie cakes...now, not so much, but when we were kids and it was "The Great American Cookie Company" --- ohhhh, man, they were good. Anyway, I decided I'd try to make one. His only request was that it have pecans in it. It turned out pretty dang good, if I must say so myself... and it's MY blog, so I MUST! :)

After we'd decided what kind of cake he'd have, I thought about what to put on it. Several years ago, his mom was cleaning out some old things and she gave me the heads for the superhero cakes that she had made for Devin and his brothers when they were kids. I drug them out, and couldn't decide between Batman or Superman. ***Sidestory, coming.....A few years ago, after much persuasion (and of course the seller was that Cooper was dressing up as Robin) DW had dressed up as Batman for Halloween (which is hilarious because storebought costumes are made to fit men who are about as tall as me (which there aren't very many), definitely not my 6'4"husband... when I brought the costume home and he tried it on, he came out of the room with a "ticked-off-at-me" look, and said, "well, I'll do it, but I look like Bat-Dork..." (I was Batgirl, (Catwoman was way too much for me...something about my thighs in a black pleather bodysuit just didn't sound appealing...and when you add a baby on my hip to the picture, well, it was just not a good idea...BatGirl is more my style, so I was her... plus my BFF had the costume leftover from years prior, so that was a pro, too! Ha...) so we were the whole Batman crew)... anyway, I thought about doing Batman on the cake, in honor of his stint as Batman, but "Happy 30th Birthday, Bat-dork" didn't sound very nice, even though he'd totally get it and think it was funny...
So I decided on Superman. He totally IS my Super-man... He's my do-it-all honey and the best husband and daddy I know...


In the middle of our dining room table, I had put out some of his old things...(My M-I-L and I went digging in the attic storage....after loosing 4 lbs in just sweat, we came out with 2 boxes of stuff....mostly old toys from his toddler to teen years.....everything from his "Tow-Gator" tow truck to his gameboy.

(I laughed so hard about that gameboy. It's so funny to see how things have changed...now the Nintendo DS' have color screens and graphics that don't even compare to the old-school Gameboy)...

Don't the toys just scream "1980's"!!!

I had asked 30 different people from different times in DW's 30 years to give me one word that they'd use to describe him. It was fun to tell him all 30 of the words and sweet to hear what everyone said. I had scanned old pictures for days and picked the perfect songs to include on a slideshow of old pics and then I had planned on doing a whole "this is your life" kind of thing with the words from the people in the slideshow, as well... Well, things never turn out like planned and since I am semi-computer illiterate, not to mention that I try to do 500 things at the last minute, it just didn't happen. I ended up putting together a little something and I think it turned out okay.

Singing "Happy Birthday"... I love this picture...because there's only 2 girls he looks like that at, and I was holding the camera, so you know he's not looking at ME! :)

I hope DW felt very celebrated and loved. I am certainly glad and thankful that he's mine.

Wednesday was the last bible study meeting for the summer bible study group that we've been having....it was also the day after Danielle's birthday, so of course we had to have cupcakes and sing to her!

Also celebrating a birthday last week, was our little miss, who turned 8 months old on the 9th.
EIGHT months. Wow. Two-thirds of a year have passed. I can't believe that....

The biggest milestones lately have been, of course, the crawling... Miss Priss is into EVERYTHING. She explores all over the house and enjoys getting her hands on anything she can! She has turned into Momma's little helper, and follows close behind and "helps" me all over the house....
in the laundry room... in the kitchen....

and especially when I'm cooking dinner!

We now have 4 teeth and are working on 2 more.

She has started making this new face this last week. It's the cutest thing EVER and I am so glad I got it on camera... She sucks her top lip in like she's thinking about something... I think she's just feeling those new top teeth, but it's the cutest little face!!!

She loves the Gerber snacks (fruit puffs & yogurt puffs) and does such a good job feeding herself those. She loves to be a 'big girl' and thinks if we are eating, she should be, too. It's so fun to watch her and we love our time spent around our kitchen table. She has quite the personality and loves for people to talk to her. If there are people around who aren't looking at her, she does anything to get their attention. When they do finally look at and talk to her, she smiles and buries her face in my arm and acts all shy. She's such a girl! She is so silly and just loves to laugh. It's absolute cuteness. Even though, it makes us sad to see her growing and changing so quickly, it is so much fun to see all the new things she's doing.

She is such a joy and oh-so very loved.

With that, I think I'm almost caught up with what's been going on around here...Up next is the baby shower we hosted for Stephanie on Sunday....

~amw~

On the go....

We've been SO busy the past couple weeks. So much has been going on... I've been taking lots of pictures, but haven't had time to stop and 'document' all of it! Ha...
There's lots to share from the past couple weeks, but the biggest thing going on in our house right now is that little missy is no longer immobile.

She has been pushing up on all fours for a few weeks now, so we knew it was coming soon... but I was holding it off as long as we could. I kept her strapped in her bouncy seat or on my hip most of the day everyday just soaking up her last little bit of "stillness"....and trying my hardest to delay this latest milestone as long as I could!

I knew after spending a few days with her BFF, Allie Claire (who's 2 months her senior and who is an experienced crawler), baby sister was going to want to be a 'big girl', too... She started on the Friday night that we got home from the beach. Just a few little crawls and then some big leaps forward. By Sunday night, she was up to 3 or 4 crawls... Now, 10 days later, she's a full blown crawler... and I am pretty sure I am going to have to get some sort of heart medication... she wants to go straight for our fireplace---needless to say, she's been hearing the words, "no-no" a whole lot this week! We moved our coffee table out of our living room, so she'd have a wide open space to crawl and play, and also in hopes of preventing yours truly from having a heart attack when she gets too close to it....

Here's a little video I took this morning, so yall could see it... Do yall hate hearing yourself talk as much as I do? I also feel the need to clarify that I don't really usually sound like this (I don't think), unless I am talking to persons under the age of 2)...


Happy Monday!
~annie~

August 9th

It's been an extremely busy week...one that's been pretty emotional and draining at times.

Sunday was Cooper's birthday.

August 9, 2005
Four years ago on that day, I became a mom.
I struggled on whether or not to share about it on here...
Cooper will forever be a part of us. There is not a day that goes by that Devin and I don't talk about him and miss him. It would hurt us more to NOT talk about him or to not see pictures of him and to not remember him...I've often said that the no one could do more for us than to remember him. To acknowledge that even though he is not with us, he is still a part of us. It's such an awkward thing for other people, though. I get that. I can imagine...no one knows what to say or do....and I would never want to make it more uncomfortable for others. But, I feel like I share all the things that Belle is doing on here, and I just wouldn't feel right not acknowledging Cooper's birthday. I know that for some parents, it might be easier to not talk about it...I get that, too. But for us, it is.

I am so thankful that I had last week at the beach. A whole week to prepare for it. There is NOTHING that we do that we don't wish Coopie was right there in the middle of it. My mom and I were down by the water one afternoon and we just cried thinking about him and wishing he was with us. It is always the "What would he be doing" and "what would he be like now"s that hurt the most. He would be so sweet with his baby sister, I just know it.

As Sunday got closer, I started to really dread it and wanted to just block it out. Just thinking about it made me want to crawl in bed and stay for a few weeks to get myself back 'together.' When we talked about what we were going to do for his birthday this year, I couldn't decide. Last year, a few of us met at the cemetery on the morning of his birthday and released balloons. Honestly, just doing that last year, was about all I could muster up the will to do.

Cooper was such an amazing little person. I know that all parents think that about their children, but he really was just exceptional. So smart and silly and sweet and adorable. PURE JOY... Every day that we spent with him was that way---I am so thankful that we realized that from the beginning and that it did not take us loosing him to see it. I am so thankful that we don't have any regrets and that I know he knew how loved and special he is. After his accident, I remember telling myself that he would always be part of us, and that we'd always celebrate his birthdays and make sure that if he had brothers or sisters, that they knew about him, too. But, it is so hard to think about his birthday and not be sad. It's so hard to 'celebrate' on that day. We haven't gotten there just yet. I am not sure if we ever will. No doubt, August 9, is one of the best days of our lives...the day we became parents. But not having the precious boy who made us parents, here to celebrate, makes it a very sad one. This year we decided to do like last year, and meet at the cemetery to release balloons again. We met Cooper's Grammy & Pop, and Pappy & Granny there...I don't really know what we'd do without those four...we talked about our sweet boy and how much we all missed him, and at 8:51 (which is his actual birth time) we sent our balloons heaven-ward... is that a word?!?!?

We also decided to do a little more this year and have Cooper's favorite (cheese grits) for lunch. My parents had gown down to Cedar Key the day before to buy some fresh grouper, and so they cooked that with all the 'fixings'...I made a small orange (Coopie's favorite color) cake. We did exactly what I hoped we would. We remembered our son.

1st Birthday:

2nd Birthday:

There's so much heartache in the world. People suffering losses of every kind...I don't know why some babies are born sick. Or why some perfectly healthy kids, like Cooper, die tragically in accidents. I don't know why people get cancer. Or why some couples who desperately want babies can't get pregnant, and so many people can and have abortions. I don't know why some marriages end and others make it.

But, here's what I do know about loss and heartache...
- I know that the God I serve is a loving and compassionate God, full of mercy. (Lamentations 3:32-33).
- I know that He never promised a life free of sorrow and pain. But He did promise us peace and comfort, even during those difficult times. (John 16:33)
- I know that He is near the brokenhearted. (Psalm 34:18).
- I know that every good and perfect gift is from ABOVE. (James 1:17)
- I know that He has a plan for me (Jeremiah 29:11), and that He knows every day I will have on this earth before I was ever born (Psalm 139:13-17).
- I know that I don't understand it, but I also know that I don't have to. (Isaiah 55:8-9).
- and most importantly, I know that He LIVES.
"I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God." -Job 19:25-26
Because of that, even in the most horrible circumstances imaginable, in the deepest sorrow and grief, I know that there is HOPE. (1 Thess. 4:13).

I know these things, not just because The Word of God says so, but because I have experienced them. If I have learned anything FIRSTHAND it's the above.
I do not understand why my life has turned out they way it has and quite frankly, I don't think it's fair....But life isn't fair. We live in a fallen world... a world cursed by man's first sin, and nothing will be right and perfect until we get to Heaven. Thank you, Lord, for that. For the gift of salvation and the promise of eternal life. I pray that every person who reads this "knows that they know that they know" (that's the baptist coming out in me) that they have an eternal home in Heaven. There is nothing more important than having that settled and secure. And there's not a better feeling than being certain of it.

We made it through another one of his birthdays without Cooper. It's hard to believe that we've had 2 without him, and we only had 2 with him.
There will never be a day we don't miss him....and wait anxiously until we are reunited....

~amw~