sweet home alabama

i love these 2 goobers

well folks, im sitting here with my momma and papa bear in alabama watching colbert, while my sweet munchkins are sleeping in my old room and ryan is in atlanta. ryan is going on business trips for the next 3 weeks, so i figured i would come here and stay with them so i wouldn't get too lonely. they both work full time, so its just like any other day during the day- just me and the boys, but then i get to hang out with them once they get home, and i cherish every moment. i love my parentals. i miss them so much. living in missouri while they are here in alabama breaks my heart. i think the only reason i dont cry all day every day because i block out the fact that they arent 5 minutes away and i can't get a hug unless i drive 8 and 1/2 hours to get it. im excited to be able to be with them and let my little soldiers make some memories with their nana and papa. i love them.

right now my dad is mumbling randomly. he cracks me up. i brought a bag of jelly beans here leftover from christmas. he has eaten them nonstop last night and tonight after he got home from work. he just told me he feels like he threw up in his stomach. it could be that he ate a million different flavors within a very short amount of time. my mom and i ate left overs for dinner, so after 2 hours of being home he asked in a wimper, what we ate. after i told him, he wimpered again saying, thats nice. he was fishing around trying to get one of us to make him something and bring it to him while he lounged on the couch. i told him he had 2 legs : ) he told me in a ghetto accent if i weren't prego, he'd slap me upside my head. of course he was totally joking. and if he did actually slap me, id slap him back. heh. he is such a weirdo and i love it. my sisters and i always say we get our hyperness from our mom and our weirdness from my dad.

*update: hah...45 minutes later he just asked again what we ate for dinner and said he wasn't that hungry...maybe i should get off my butt and make him something... or maybe he will just go and get the box of lucky charms...

well, i guess i just spilled the beans, assuming you haven't already noticed the pregnancy ticker on my blog : ) we are gonna have another little person running around this summer. well.. hopefully it won't be born running around. but what im trying to say is, we are gonna have a baby and i think im due around august 15th. so im roughly 11 weeks. i dont think that that date is very accurate cause my cycles were WAY weird after i had cole. im excited for my first doctors appointment so i can find out for sure, but its not till the middle of february when we get back. it would be awesome to find out i was a couple weeks further along than i thought : )

here is a blog that i stumbled upon somehow during one of my blog marathons. i absolutely love this girl. she is so funny and i feel like we could be best friends if we actually knew each other. she is just too funny and such a down-to-earth person. she totally inspires me to want to run. i actually just told me mom today that she inspired me to want to run a marathon. i must have lost my mind. so... before i die, i will run a marathon. anyway, her blog site is http://www.hungryrunnergirl.com/. u should totally check it out. its so fun, and she posts like at least twice a day, so if u have time to kill like i do when i dont have a hubby to snuggle with, u should check it out. : )

do u guys have any blogs u love???

i think even though 3 weeks is going to feel like forever, it will be fun to be here. my sister jacquie, AKA the JACKAL, and her hubby doug are going to come visit this weekend (they live an hour and a half from my parentals). im excited! and then next week me and the boys are going to load up and go visit them for 2 days : ) it will be fun fun fun till daddy takes the t-bird away!

oh, and did i mention i miss this man. its only been 2 days since i last saw him. 1 week in atlanta and 2 weeks in venezuela equals death of my soul. i am returning to my coping mechanism and blocking out the fact that i dont get to see him every night for the next 3 weeks. i love him.

this picture was in our room on our honeymoon cruise, that was really fun : )

And gone...

Well, well, well... its taken me forreeevvveeerr to finally finish up december events with our familia. But I think we have a pretty good excuse... sickness! It all started with a small cold I got that turned into the ABSOLUTE worst sinus infection I have ever had. That lasted 10 days. On the day I started to feel better, I got a chest cold that turned into laryngitis/bronchitis. All the while, my poor little babies have been suffering too...

Tucker broke his collarbone on new years eve! He was running to leave my in-laws and he tripped on Ryan's foot and landed with his collarbone hitting the leg of the elliptical machine. We thought he might have broken it, but we wanted to wait it out. we thought we would wait a few days since cole broke his collarbone when he was born and they told us broken collarbones have to heal on their own. Soo... after i started to get worried, i took him to urgent care and they gave him a sling. thats all : ) but he was very brave!! he kept his sling on and so its been able to heal very well so far.

A few days after he broke his collarbone, both of the boys started getting sick. long story short, at one point or another they both have had eye infections, minor ear infections, coughs, temperatures, and a TON of snot and congestion. not to mention tucker had 2 days of extreme bloody noses that came one after another. it has been a rough 2 1/2 weeks, but i think we are on our way to getting better. cole seems like he is 99% better so that is exciting. me and tuck just have our congestion and cough and i figure those will be around for a little while longer. luckily, ryan has only had a little cough and some congestion, but he is feeling better.

well, now that you all have our medical history of the last few weeks, here's the recap of the rest of december!

we had one day that it was actually pretty warm out. so we went to a park ryan used to go to as a kid. we went on a walk and it was great to get out of the house and get some fresh air without freezing to death!

as a mother of 2 little boys, i figure there will be lots more of lightning mcqueen, especially since a CARS 2 movie is coming out sometime soon i think! "santa" got the boys matching lightning jammies. and cole got some lightning slippers from his cousin for christmas : )

I love this picture of tuck and his cousin lilly at my in-laws house over the holidays. they both are growing up!!!

tucker hates having his picture taken lately, but with all the excitement of the holidays, he actually let me get some good ones of him!!!

Well, christmas was awesome! We stayed here in missouri to be with ryans family. it was great since all of his siblings were in town at one point or another. its always fun to be with everyone. to begin the family festivities, we had a family service night. on the 23rd, we went to a big wilkin's family christmas party at grandma wilkin's farm, where they did a christmas play and a live nativity scene. We were at my in-laws house quite a bit over the holidays... and that could actually be an understatement. i mean, i think i didn't have to cook dinner for like a week and a half! well, i did help when i could, so i hope i wasn't completely lazy when we were over : ) but i have to admit it was nice to not worry about dinner. christmas eve we had dinner and the kids got some new matching pajamas that grammy and grandpa gave them. christmas day we opened presents with the boys at our house first. and of course, ryan over did himself with the presents, making me feel like a stick in the mud. but i have a feeling that no matter what i do, he will always find a way to out-do me at christmas. i guess thats a good thing? anyway, then we talked with my family on skype, which i always love! i miss them all tons. after i took a shower and got ready, we went over to bob and lois' to have their family's traditional christmas crepes and just hang out.

There was a lot more that happened, im sure, but i can't remember everything right this second. all i know is i was exhausted by the end of it all :) but thats a good thing!

Can we say someone was excited that santa came?!?!?! : ) if u can't tell, he is screaming "woo hoo!!!!"

some fun presents from aunt annie, uncle ashton, and ashton's mom

yay for a new lightning mcqueen!!! santa knows just what to get tucker. his 60th lightning mcqueen ever : ) (that might be a bit of an exaggeration, but it also might not be, i guess we will never know) and santa even brought cole his very own racecar!!! now tucker can't claim all the racecars in the house are his.

here's the new sweater i got tucker, i just couldn't resist it!! i think he looks adorable in it!

my sweet mother-in-law made lightning mcqueen quilts for all the older grandsons. tucker definately loves his!

we had a very fun holiday season here in missouri! we feel very blessed with not only the material things we were blessed with, but also the family we were able to be with and talk with (via skype and phone), the love shared, and the memories made. It was fun for me as a parent to teach our children what the true meaning of christmas is. Well, im tired and im gonna call it a night. I hope everyone had a great christmas/ new years!!!

December has come....

I am just blessed! I have the sweetest little boys I could have ever asked for. I am seriously so grateful for every second I have with them! Not to mention, they crack me up like crazy!!!

My little cowboys : )

cole looks a little suspicious, dont ya think? like maybe, he just went cow tippin'?

Ryan is the BEST! i swear, i am so lucky to have Ryan. He loves me no matter what. And trust me, my hormones are quite wack-o lately, and im definately not perfect, so im amazed at his unconditional love for me. The boys love him to death, and i actually get somewhat jealous/ sad at the attention he gets from them. BUT, i know it is because i am blessed to be with them all day every day, and not ryan. so when ryan is home, they just want to be with him. so i am grateful for the wonderful dad that he is. He is such a good example to me, not to mention he is one jumbo sized stud-muffin! : )

* and note this picture below... HE actually asked for someone to take it... and i am usually the one that has to force him to take a pic with me lol. so i want to remember that moment in time forever!

Our family gingerbread house. We made it at my in-laws. It was so fun to make it from start to finish. My mother in law has a recipe to make your own gingerbread and frosting... so it was a 100% from scratch! i loved watching what tucker was going to do next to decorate. he might have something going for him here... i spied a knack for architecture with those candies ; )

I got to help decorate our house too, and it was a blast! at first i was picky where tucker was putting candy, but then i just thought, what the heck am i doing? let him decorate it! he will LOVE IT, and who cares if its not perfect? im a weirdo for perfectionism on some things. so we both just worked on it together, and its not symmetrical, but i loved EVERY minute of it and i think it turned out pretty sweet if ya ask me ; )

Pink (supposed to be red) bathtime

Bunk beds my mom got for the boys back in october

Cole loves animals! he is always playing with the stuffed animals we have here at home. You can find him at least a couple of times a day walking around with a stuffed puppy with him saying "dah" or dog

Well, lots of fun things went on in december, and there is more to come. so until next time...

TO BE CONTINUED...