2012

Hello 2012! Im excited for this year, more so, Im excited to see what God is going to do in our lives! So far, we are a week and a half into the year and we have celebrated Wyatt's first birthday. Time is starting to fly! This year I really need to relax and try to live in the moment more. Its hard for me to give up controll of everything and just enjoy life.

Wyatts Party was a blast! He was surrounded by all his family, he loved to play in the cake, he wasnt quite sure of the taste, so he didnt eat much of it. Next weekend we will celebrate Noah's third birthday! I can not believe I have a THREE year old. It just doenst seem possible. He is turning into such a young man! oh man, how i love those kiddos!

Over the past few months Wyatt has started have chronic ear infections. The decision was made yesterday to finally put tubes in his ears. Im not nervous about the proceedure, as Noah has had it done twice; we also have a fantastic ENT. I have never met someone who loves his job more than he does. We are super excited for Wyatt to start feeling better, he just hasnt been his self since all of this began.

Our Christmas was wonderful. The kids recieved way to many gifts, so did i! I do not like surprises very much and Keith pulled one over on me this year. On Christmas eve, I was handed a very sweet, lovey dovey, mushie card, at the end it told me to look in the shadows of the tree...where i found my favorite photo from our wedding day...on the back was a note to see the "little one" who tells Santa if you have been naughy or nice.... I swiftly ran to lil elfie who was sitting on the counter covered in marshmellos. I looked and Keith and was confused, there wasnt a note or any other clues... he said look around... i dug in the marshmellos to fine a diamond band. I was in shock!! Its beautiful! For those of you who dont know, before this, i had not wore a wedding ring in almost a year because of all the weight i had gained with Wyatt. I picked up this ring and put it on my finger, looked at Keith with these big tears in my eyes, and he told me he just wanted everyone to know that I was his! He has such a wonderful heart and I cant imagine life without him.

This year is going to be great!

Fall Photos!!

Thanks to Amanda Westhart at Westhart Photography we have beautiful family photos! Hope you enjoy!!!

God - My Husband - Noah Riley - Wyatt James - My Mom(MiMi) and Step-dad (Pappy) - My Dad (Papa Jack) - My Sister (Aunt Jesse) - My Granny (GiGi) - All of my In-Laws - For the right to worship God freely – my church family – amazing pastors – friends – my camera – memories – my health – Umbrellas – Rain – darn cute things that kids say – giggles – belly laughs – bonfires – sweaters – scarves – boots – Dates with my husband – hello kisses – long goodbye kisses – nose snorts – long lost friends – hearing “I love you much mommy” – holding hands – reading – treasure hunting – baking – smiles – Christmas décor – tears – bathtime – singing the abc song – hearing the abc song sung – knowing surprises – jumping on the bed – hide and go seek – boo – hearing “buh bi” – answered prayers – sweet notes – Jesus – painting – babies – green – owls – unanswered prayers – peacocks – my motherinlaw babysitting – bedtime – the little blue man – sleep – my past – coffee – love -

Uh Oh

On Wednesday night Noah decided to chew through his paci, he woke up screaming "MY PACI BROKE!!!" This did not sit well with us at 3am. Who am I kidding, it didn't sit well with Keith. He is the one that always gets up with the kids in the middle of the night. Yes i do have an awesome man! We decided that last night would be our first time in 3 years without the paci. He went to sleep without a fight. I really thought we were in the clear, but when the middle of the night waking happened, he woke up screaming and we ignored it for awhile, but finally went in there to find a cold little boy without pajamas on! He didn't want to put them back on and went back to sleep. He was very restless all night, but we didn't have too much of a melt down. Hopefully this will be like sleep-training, and after the 3rd night he will be "cured"! Here's a picture of the "broken" paci. Looks like a little beaver got a hold of it. I'm really excited that we are going to a bonfire tonight with friend and leaving the kids behind! So excited for adult conversations! Don't get me wrong I love chatting about WHY the fire trucks are red, and WHY God let it rain all day, and WHY it is foggy outside, and WHY we have to flush the potty... Have a wonderful weekend people out there. Pray that Noah forgets the paci ever existed!

....Mommy of Two...

I know, I know, here’s my more recent update! As of this year I am a mother of two! WOW does that sound super crazy! I am now known as “Noah’s Mommy” or “Wyatt’s Mommy”. I never thought that I would be so proud to have that as my title, but I am. The anxiety levels I had going from a child to children was ridiculously high. I didn’t know how I could or would do it. I remember being in the hospital after my c-section with Wyatt and holding him and how at peace I felt. My mother in law later brought Noah to visit and meet his new brother and the peace I felt flew out the window. I remember, the kid that was once my baby boy, walking through the door and my emotions were uncontrollable. His hands were so big, his legs were so long and his feet didn’t fit in the palms of my hands anymore. Where had time gone? All that time I saw Noah as a little baby (he was 2). He walked through that door and might as well been 18 years old with a beard and a girl friend. He was all grown up in my eyes. I just felt my heart break. I almost felt as if I had replaced him with a new baby. Noah wanted nothing to do with baby brother Wyatt as he calls him. He just wanted the parent that wasn’t tending to baby brother Wyatt. Once Wyatt started to crawl this all began to change. Wyatt was now able to take treasured toys, blankets, pull Noah’s hair, try to climb on Noah, and chase him around the house. SomeONE did not like that. Wyatt wants to be just like Noah. If Noah sometimes will play and talk to Wyatt and when he does, you hear the sweetest giggles out of both of them. It makes my heart smile to see Noah playing peek-a-boo with Wyatt.
I must say that Wyatt is a wonderful baby, he suffers from what I call second baby syndrome. He is the most laid back, happy. easy going baby I have ever been around. He loves to sleep at night and sleep all night long like a rock. What parent doesn’t like that? Especially when their almost 3 year old cant seem to make it through the night with out the monsters in his room attacking him or the “thunder” from the rain storm in his dreams waking him up. Oh the imagination that kids have.
I never in my wildest dreams thought that I would be here. I am married to a wonderful man of God. He is the best father to our children, one of which is his twin. He sacrifices daily for us, and for that I will be forever grateful. I am so in love. I am the mother to two little boys; one who has the craziest imagination and the other one who has the craziest hair of any almost one year old I have ever seen! Hehe This might not have been how I had imagined my life, but once again, God has proven me wrong and had something way sweeter in store for me than I had for myself.

Just a few pictures of our Fall Fun!

what a crazy ride

I wrote this exactly at year ago 11/17/2010 I wasn’t able to blog at work and saved it, for some reason they open back up the website, so here is my original entry. I will write another update soon…

Wow, what a crazy ride its been…. I know its been a long time since I have updated our blog, but life has seemed to be stuck on fast forward. I have lots to say!!!!

Noah is such a joy! He is such a wonderful little boy, and I thank God everyday for blessing us with this perfect little one. Even though there are days that he is so rambunctious that I don’t know what Im going to do with him, he smiles and give me a hug and a kiss and it makes it all better! He had tubes put in his ears back in January of last year. I was scared to death to let the doctors do the procedure but if there is any one out there, that might be on the fence about this procedure….DO IT! I can not believe the difference it made. Within 2 hours, he was a completely different child. He has not been sick at all except for a running nose here and there when he would have a new tooth come in. In March or April 2010, Noah’s daycare unexpectedly closed with a 2 day warning. I didn’t know what we were going to do, I panicked and cried…but through all the tough times God has a plan. We moved Noah to Calvary Baptist Daycare which is in downtown Greer. He didn’t have a hard time adjusting, 2 kids in his class moved there too. The old daycare closing was truly a blessing. Calvary has truly embraced Noah, and this has been the best thing for him. I believe with all my heart that the other daycare was the reason he was staying sick…he hasn’t had anything major in the past 9 months…no hand/foot/mouth or RSV. Makes for a happy mommy. There are days I go to pick him up he doesn’t want to leave, he cries to stay…kind of makes me sad, but its better he cry to stay then cry when I drop him off.

In May of this year we got a surprise when I went to have my yearly check up at my OBGYN. I was waiting in the room for the doctor to come in. The nurse didn’t have me get undressed which I thought was strange. But I continued to wait. Finally Dr. French walked in with a huge smile on his face and asked me if I was trying to get pregnant…WOAH… I about fell off the table. At this time, Noah was about 15 or 16 months, and I didn’t know what to do. What makes the whole thing even funnier is that my due date was scheduled for the day before Noah’s birthday!  We are so excited for this new addition! We were planning on starting to try for a second little one in the fall so it wasn’t that big of a deal when God said I have different plans for you. I think everyday that I cant comprehend loving another child as much as Noah. He is truly my heart walking around outside of my chest. I am currently 31 weeks along, and my doctor has set a date to delivery our new buddle of joy by c-section, because of the complications I had delivering Noah. This scares the crap out of me. I cant imagine not being in control. This is something I need to deal with in every part of my life though. I need to let go a little and know that I can not control every situation with Noah or our new one or at work or with Keith. Oh, new little Cothran’s name will be Wyatt James. Every time I type or say his name I cant help but smile. I just can not wait to hold him. We had a 3D ultrasound done last week like we did with Noah and he looks just like Noah did. I have a feeling that they will be just a like. I pray that they are close like my sister and I were. I just want them to be best friends and always love each other and have that special bond that only bothers that were born close together have. I am excited to see Noah grow into his new roll as a big brother, I think it might take awhile but I think he will slowly start to understand. I know its going to be very hard in the beginning but Noah is definitely the center of our universe and to him that will change in the matter of hours. But he will always have my heart, but now he just has to share. He is a wiggly little booger though. He is active all the time in my belly! As of today I have only gained approx. 33 lbs. Which I guess isn’t to bad. Even though I haven’t made it through Thanksgiving and Christmas yet! Im excited again about the holidays this year. The last couple years, I just couldn’t get into the spirit of all the holidays! But for some reason, I am excited! I can not wait to see Noah experience Christmas! I have been trying to teach him about why we have Christmas and who Jesus is and his story. Oh and I cant forget Santa. Noah thinks Santa lives at Lowes. He he… every time we go to Lowes they have this creepy dancing Santa mannequin that sings. Noah loves it, he stares at it and says “Santa” and when I roll the buggy a way he says “bye bye Santa” too cute!

Sometime at the end of August and beginning of September Granny was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. I have a hard time typing it. It just breaks my heart. The one person in my life that I can say that I look up to and strive to be like, the one person in this world that doesn’t deserve this, the one person that has been through enough in the past few years, the one person that has so much joy to look forward to in the future…. I can’t imagine being in her shoes. Through all this, she has remained strong in her faith and trusts that God know what’s best. I can’t say that I could be that strong….I have had a really hard time dealing with this, asking God every night “why”. I’m not questioning that God knows what he is doing. I struggle to understand how something like that could happen to such a selfless person, to someone who receives joy in seeing others happy. I know there is a plan for us all, but I just don’t want this to be in her plan, and if I could change it all I would. I would make it all go away for her. She was in a rehab place near my work right after her surgery and I would try to visit her every day… I was so sad when they took her home. I knew I wouldn’t get to see her as often because of life…. I regret that in the past month that I haven’t gone to see her at all! She has been receiving chemo treatments for the past 5 weeks. I don’t think this is the type of Chemo that makes you super sick. She’s hanging in there. If you are reading this, please send a little prayer up for her and our family.

We as a family have been through many ups and downs this year. I think looking back that I have grown the most. Keith and I couldn’t love each other more. People tell you that having a baby changes everything, and it does. We cant do the things we used to, or as easily pick up and go. But I wouldn’t have it any other way. I wouldn’t want to experience this life with any one else. He has truly loved me through all these changes and stood by me when I thought that I was so overwhelmed that I couldn’t wipe the tears away to see. I know that every marriage is not perfect, and we have our moments when we drive each other crazy, and I thought I would never say this about anyone, but I need him. I choose every day to wake up with a fresh start no matter what happened the day before or what was said. I need him. I choose to love him forever. My children are the luckiest alive to have him just like me. He is a wonderful father…I can’t wait for Wyatt to meet him and fall in love with him just like Noah and I have. God really got this right. Not that I doubted him, but I don’t think this life could be any sweeter. With God as our Lord and Savior leading us how could we as a family go wrong. I am not going to promise but I am seriously going to try in the months ahead that I will continue to update this thing and stay on track. I loved reading about when I was pregnant with Noah!