Davis turned F-R-E-E...

Can you believe it, we have a 3 year old or as Davis would call it F-R-E-E!! Davis' birthday was on Monday but we celebrated it last Saturday! It really is amazing how fast your kids grow up. I can't believe Davis was born 3 years ago....it is just crazy to me how time flies! Last year when Davis was turning 2 and at his birthday party we announced to the family that we were having another boy! We were so excited that Davis was going to have a little brother and a buddy. Davis is the sweetest, big brother. He really is and he is always trying to take care of Cole if he cries by telling him it is okay or putting Cole's pacifier in his mouth. He sits on the floor and plays with his toys right by Cole so he can watch and he even tries including Cole in his imaginary play by giving Cole a car or truck or plane or whatever he is playing with and he tells Cole what to do even though Cole just stares at him with the toy in his hand. If we are loading up the car to go somewhere he always ask "Cole coming?". I have yet to figure this one out because Cole always goes with us, but I guess he just wants to make sure!

Anyway for his party this year we just had some cousins come over to eat cake and ice cream with us. We decided not to do a huge Extravagant party this year that is why it is soooo nice having three Bettes families up here now. Davis is obsessed with the movie Cars, you know Lightning McQueen so we had a Cars party for him, in honor of his little obsession! His cousins Kinley and Logan bought him some cars from the movie and Tucker and Haley bought him a bike! We didn't even really have to get him anything because his cousins spoiled him enough....but we got him some random toys too! His Grandma and Grandpa sent him some money and when he opened the card "Ohhh...monies". Mimi asked Davis on the phone what he wanted and he replied with "presents and cupcakes". He is crazy.... It was a great party for Davis and he loves all his new toys and has learned how to pedal and ride his new bike already! We are looking forward to this next year and what challenges a F-R-E-E year old will bring!

Hitting the gym....

Going to the gym consistently can be difficult. You have to find ways to make it either fun or find ways to do different things. If you go and you do the same thing every day and there’s no real purpose behind other than simply staying in somewhat decent shape, you get burned out and bored!! This has happened to me more times than I care to mention! I refuse to buy bigger pants so when my current size begins to be uncomfortable, I usually start to do something. Whether it’s do something around the house or sign up for the gym. Last August or September some friends from work started playing racquetball. Right around this time I was needing to do something about the shrinking pants so I decide to sign up for the gym once again. I end up playing racquetball 3 or 4 times a week and doing a few minutes of lifting weights before everyone else gets there. I loved it! Not only am I getting some pretty good exercise I’m also improving in a game that gets quite competitive! And I love competition!! I continue to follow this routine for close to 6 months. Right around the time February comes around my racquetball friends are not able to make it out as often and I’m starting to find myself with not much to do. So I decide to spend the majority of my time away from the courts. Go back to lifting weights for longer amounts of time and trying to do a few different cardio things (rowing, elliptical, and even a little time on the treadmill). Doesn’t last long before I decide to be done with the cardio stuff and I can sense that I’m not going to make it much longer lifting weights. I was just getting burned out!!! No competition, no purpose other than to improve the body which is a worth thing but can get boring! During all of this I have been working on Jess to sign up but so far no luck. She’s making me feel if she’s going to do anything it will be in the house. One Saturday we’re spending time in Alpharetta at one of the parks when I ask if she would like to go do a tour of the gym, just to see what it looks like. By the end of the tour I had succeeded in getting her to sign up. That was close to 3 months ago and we’re still going strong! It was like a huge boost for me in getting my motivation and excitement back. I’m back to looking forward to 11am and I’m not spending my time sitting around not wanting to do anything else. It’s literally like a date every afternoon! We even go on Saturdays! I love it. I love the time I get to spend with Jess and I love that I’m not feeling as lazy! I’d encourage anyone to do the same thing! Find a way to exercise to together. The benefit of the gym is they have the kids club so for $10 a month they watch your kids. Not sure how else you could do something like this without someone watching your kids. I think this is the way that you can make this sort of thing a lifestyle. I’ve been watching one of our families at church do the same thing for quite some time and I was always hoping that could be us. Now it is and I couldn’t be happier about it!!

Anyway, there ya go!! First post from the Bettes’ in months!!!!

I am not a Potty School Dropout.....

I thought that Davis was going to be a potty school dropout and I was really stressed about it. I hadn't even started potty training and I thought it was going to be a nightmare because of all the not so fun things I have heard about sitting your kid on a toilet, especially boys. I knew all along my main goal was to at least have him potty trained by 3, you know I didn't want to have him hanging out with the wrong crowd of kids, you know those size 6 diaper kids are trouble....just playin' :)

So, I knew that Davis' third birthday was creeping up on us in a few months and I kept this mental note that I needed to start trying to potty train Davis. One day when I noticed that his diaper stash was getting a little low, I decided to just do it. The first day was not so good at all and I went to bed that night thinking 'yep this potty thing stinks', but the second and the third day he only had one accident and after that he has never had any accidents and he wakes up in the morning dry too.....WAHOO!!!! Not bad at all.....I guess when you are ready you are ready and he was just ready!!! So, lucky us no horror stories!! Congratulations Davis you have officially graduated from potty school and have now entered the world of toilets, we are so PROUD of you!!

Mary, Mary quite contrary how does your garden grow??

I had a strange idea this year and wanted to plant a garden, don't ask me why, I just thought it would be super cool to say "yeah, I am a Gardner". Doesn't it make you sound like the coolest person ever.....

I remember being put to work as a kid in the garden that my parents always grew. I remember how I was so terrified of all the bugs and spiders that were in the plants that I had to pick. It was so scary and I would cry and freak out and my parents would force me to go and pick the veggies anyway, come on where is the sympathy mom and dad?? Well.... I decided to put my kids through the same torture so I planted a garden even though it is much smaller then the gardens my parents had, so it won't be the same type of torture, I will have to come up with something else.

I really had no idea how well this garden was going to grow but it is doing GREAT and I haven't killed anything yet, so I am very pleased. While my mom was here we used her expertise and she helped me design my garden and we put Nick to work and he built my raised beds and my mom and I did the rest. If my mom wasn't here I would have been clueless on what to do. Anyway, I went out to water my garden this morning and I saw my first vegetable. Who would have thought that seeing a little green tomato would have made my day today!! Hopefully in another month or so I should start seeing some produce!

Nick and Davis building my beds....

Once everything was planted....4 weeks ago

Amazing after 4 weeks.....this is what I planted this year.

In this bed all of my hill plants watermelon, cucumbers, zucchini and squash

In this bed my row plants butter beans, green beans and carrots. And my already plants strawberries and tomato/cherry tomatoes.

Here is my little green tomato...isn't it cute?

Cole's Newdo..

I think that most of you have seen Cole with his new hair cut. Pretty sad that I had to give my baby a haircut at 4 months old. I really didn't want to cut it but it was crazy long and after we saw some pictures of us in Charleston we finally realized that he needed a haircut!! I really didn't want to take my 4 month old baby some where to get his hair cut so Nick insisted doing it himself, maybe he was afraid of someone cutting him with scissors or maybe I was and am trying to blame it on Nick. Anywho....that is besides the point. I just wanted Nick to trim it up but he had other intentions and cut ALOT off but the funny thing is he still has lots of hair left and people still comment on all of his hair!!

Before the haircut....

Very intense...didn't want to poke wobbly head


All the hair we had to cut

The end results....more handsome then ever!!

Spider Jump

Okay, so I am determined to get caught up on this blog. I will start with Davis' spider jump. As we were watching another little girl on this spider jump I was pretty impressed that she was loving it so much. Then I was shocked that Davis wanted to go on this and I thought for sure once they started lifting him up he was going to freak out but he LOVED every minute of it! I am a mother that doesn't get too nervous but honestly this was hard to watch Davis get flung up in the air 15-25 feet. By the end of it I had a few tears in my eyes, my heart was jumping out of my chest and my feet and hands were sweaty. It wouldn't be bad at all if your kids are older. To me Davis is still too small to be up in the air that high, just doesn't seem right!!

To Davis it was a BLAST and he still talks about "jumping really really high". Even when it was done he freaked out and had a crying melt down because he didn't want to get off! I don't think that we caught any pictures were Davis was at his highest point and most of them are blurry because it was so dark in there. Here you go......

I'm ALIVE!!!

Isn't it such a humbling experience to post a HORRIBLE picture of yourself for everyone to see??

Okay, finally I am here and most importantly ALIVE, I may not look alive all the time but as you can see I am mouthing the word 'STOP', which is exactly how I feel. I wish that I could just stop life for just a minute and sit and relax and take a couple of breathers without interruption, no babies to feed, no 2 year olds to entertain. Life just seems to be busy, busy, busy for me recently...but none the less I have come back to planet earth. I am sorry to everyone that comes and checks in on us, I have neglected my blog and reading everyone elses too!! Like Nick has said I have tons to post and blog about let's hope that I can keep it up. This hopefully will be a good starter.

So, let's play catch up. My mom came for a 2 week visit which was GREAT. It was fantastic having an extra pair of hands around to help. I didn't realize how much she helped with the dishes because once she left this 'magical' pile of dishes kept piling up and piling up....funny how that works!?! I know that Nick already mentioned some of the things we did but I have to do this in an orderly fashion or else it won't get done. So, yes I am going to remention and highlight some of the things we did while she was here and I will try to blog about it in more detail a little later. We went and visited a lot of fun and cool places while she was here, like the Coke Museum, Underground Atl, Discover Mills, Nick's parents (hey...if your not from the south Nick's parents is a happening place) and we took a trip to Charleston, South Carolina.

Some things we did around the house that my mom helped me with was organize my kitchen which is great because I now have room for my food supply which she had some insightful tips about organizing so stay tuned and I will share with you what I learned. She helped us plant a garden, which I am thankful that it is growing perfectly and I haven't killed anything yet...thank goodness for the rain this year!!

Some more highlights with the kids Cole got his first hair cut and now looks more handsome than ever and Davis got to go on this awesome spider jump and was soaring 15-25 feet through the air and loving every minute of it...yes, at that moment in time I realized I am in trouble with him!! And after she left we have been trying to get our life back to normal but then we thought that was waaayyy to boring so we RIPPED out our shower in our master bathroom and I am sure for the next few months we will be working on our new and improved bathroom ...see so much to blog about, where to start?? But, that is all that I have time for today because I have a baby to feed and I need to leave some time to get caught up on every one's blogs. I will try my best to get caught up.....but don't hold your breath

Jessie where are you!!!

Ok, we have like 10,000 things that have happened to us in the past 3 or 4 weeks. I'm not sure how long it's been since Jess has left a post but somebody needs to get her moving! Hair cuts, Charleston, gardens, mother-in-laws, downtown ATL, coke museum, mother's day, etc! So mucch has happened since the last time Jess has posted anything. What can we do to get her to post this stuff!! If she doesn't do it I'm going to have to and I'm just not as good!

So come on Jess!!! Post something already!!!