Valentine's Day

Twelve years ago today Pete and I started dating. Here we are at Lassiter's Senior Formal in 1998. We had gone out a couple of times before this and Pete asked me to be his girlfriend later that evening. We were at my friend Katrina's house in the first picture. She also married the guy she took to the dance. Happy togetherness anniversary honey! Happy Valentine's Day!

Snow Fun

Here are some of my favorite pictures from our snowy weekend. They say it will snow again tonight. I can not remember this much snow since the "blizzard of 93" when I was in seventh grade. I mean, we are talking 15 years ago!

Here is Cohen patting a tree. Grandpa has taught him well.

My attempt at a picture of the boys together. Cohen was not cooperating.

More Snow!

Pete did a great job with his first ever post, don't you think?!? The boys really had a great time and the snow was just beautiful. I tried so hard to get photos of Cohen; most of the time he ignored me and kept walking away, fast! It is so hard keeping up with him! The whole time I just kept thinking of those Family Circus comics from the Sunday paper, when they illustrated the path that the baby took all over the yard with the dashed lines. I should've just shot video the whole time so you could hear me screaming, "Cohen, Cohen!" just to try to get him to turn and look at me. He avoided looking at me the entire time.

Cohen took off right out of our yard once we got outside. You'd think we were holding him against his will!

There were several times when I was taking a picture of Kent and would look and see Cohen was nowhere in sight. I would ask, "Where's Cohen?" and Kent would say, "Oh he just rolled down that hill" or "he's going into the neighbor's backyard!" My nerves could take no more, so we moved to the backyard, which is fenced.

This morning I took Cohen straight to the backyard. Everything was SO PRETTY!

Here is Cohen ignoring me as he walked past me. He doesn't even look up! I am screaming his name the whole time! He must think he can get away with it with the hat covering his ears! This is one of the few photos of him moving that I was able to get in focus. He's a quick one.

The pretty view from our side yard as Cohen finds his way out of the backyard.

Snow in Georgia?

Finally it has snowed in GA! I have seen a few occasions of snow flurries and unfortunately black ice, but this is the first time we had the opportunity to play in snow that sticks.

On this special occasion Laura was able to get off work an hour early and I rescheduled all my appointments to be with my family and to play in the snow.

Cohen just has no fear! From the sand to the ocean and now the snow. As soon as we put him down he was off and running through the snow towards our steep hill. I started to chase him, but the fear of slipping on ice took over and I stopped to watch. I knew Cohen would recover that night, but God only knows how long it would take for me to recover from a fall. Well, Cohen took a tumble down the hill; he tuck himself in and rolled all the way into the neighbors yard. All I could see was his little head pop up and down over the hill as he took off running again. It was really hard to contain this kid in the vast openness of our cul-de-sac, so we decided to move into the fenced in back yard. We have a pretty large back yard and Cohen loved the freedom of having no one chasing after him. He went off to be one with the land and every now and then he would return to Mommy. His love for the outdoors is so evident.

Kent and I decided to celebrate this moment with a larger than life snow man! This task seem pretty easy until Kent could not roll the bottom of the snowman anymore. So I took over. I rolled and rolled until it wouldn't roll anymore more. Kent and I tried one more roll and it simply would not move, so we decided that spot was a perfect home. The difficulty of moving that first ball did not cross my mind when making the second ball. I guess I didn't think about having to lift it! The second ball was extremely, extremely heavy. I huffed and puffed and using all my might I lifted that 60lb ball ice. Note to self: it does not matter how fluffy the snow is, it is still water weight. I decided that the head would be a decent size and once we put the head on, he was not tall enough. So we constructed a top hat to make him really big! Kent and I took our time on some of his details. Kent took one of his Valentine candy hearts, which was purple, and we placed it inside his chest so he could live. He had a carrot nose, grapes for his teeth and pine cone eyes. We even put leaves on the side of his hat and gave him a bottom lip and eye brows. It was a great moment to spend with Kent. Unfortunately, we lost our snowman the next day. We found him face down in the snow, but there was no sign of foul play. The coroner said his tiny little purple heart with the quote "Hug Me" on it could not pump enough blood through his large obese body. Sadly, it was a massive heart attack. I should have seen the signs with a 60lb mid section.

Laura had a blast hitting me with snow balls and of course the kids started hitting me. I was about to throw one at her and she looked at me and said "it's going to hurt." I turned away only to give her my back as she nailed me with another one. Thanks for the two days of fun, wished snow could be here often. I know others disliked it, but the kids enjoyed it so much. The only thing I can tell you as I close this post is to make sure you have some kids involved in your life. They are such a blessing!

When Kent Grows Up

On the way home today Kent told me that he was almost a man.

I said, "Wow, you are growing up, huh?" Kent said, "When I grow up I'm going to be your daddy." I said, "no..." and then he responded, "when I grow up I'll be Cohen's daddy." I tried to explain, "when you grow up you will be someone's daddy, but not mine or Cohen's." This didn't satisfy Kent. He asked, "whose daddy will I be?" I told him, "when you grow up you will have a wife and you will have children and you will be their daddy." I thought Kent was beginning to understand because he said, "ohhhh!" I could hear the light bulb was going off! And then he said, "Cohen will be my wife!!!!" I busted out laughing and said, "no, no, Cohen will always be your brother! Your wife will be a girl." This was getting deep! I was waiting for Kent to start asking me which girl he knew was going to be his wife, but he said responded with a disappointed "oh man!" I asked what was wrong and he said, "I just really wanted Cohen to be my wife!"

I am STILL laughing!

Kent's Birth Story...According to Kent

Kent told me this story on the way to school the other day:

"Mommy, when I was a baby, I was inside your tummy and it was really dark! And I could see your chest" (weird I know, I think he meant stomach-he sometimes gets these mixed up!)

"Your tummy got really big and you and daddy went to the hospital and your tummy broke open and I was born! And then I said watch mommy, and then I grew up!"

Looking back, he wasn't too far off...he turns five next week.