A Quick Weekend Getaway

Brandon and I have lived less than 5 minutes away from this exclusive 5 star resort for nearly 6 years and have never been inside it's grand gates.  It's not that we didn't want to go to Barnsley, but let's face it - when we want to go on a getaway or vacation, we usually want to get away and we just never considered laying down the money to vacation in our back yard. (We had both visited Barnsley before it's incredible renovation on elementary school field trips.  Back then, it was just the gardens and the ruins.)  You can read up on the history, romance and tragedies of Barnsley Gardens here.

The service at this resort is incredible.  When we walked into the registration lobby, the clerk said "Hello Jessica.  Let's get you to your cottage."  I almost looked down to my shirt to see if I had accidentally worn my bank name tag in!  After signing in, the sweetest little man escorted us to our cottage.  The little cottages are so cute, luxurious and cozy.  Here is our cottage for the night:

The cottage had a separate living room with a sofa, chair & ottoman and a small table and four chairs.  The living room also had nice plasma television and a small bar area with a sink, coffee pot, mini fridge etc...  The bedroom was just as nice with a huge king-sized bed and a cedar armoire that smelled so good I could have slept in there.  My favorite part of the cottage however had to be the bath room.  The toilet was in a totally separate room altogether (like not even in the bathroom), but the actual bathroom had solid white mosaic tile floors, a grand claw foot bathtub and a separate standing shower flanked with more of the pristine white mosaics.  The bathroom floor wasn't the only flooring worth mentioning though - the entire cottage was covered in the shiniest, cleanest pine hardwood floors that I've ever seen (and with just the right amount of "creak" I might add).

After getting settled in, Brandon and I quickly headed outdoors.  We walked just a few hundred feet away to the entrance of the gardens, and then on through the the mansion ruins.  The weather was perfect for our walk - not too hot and we could vaguely hear rumbles of thunder off in the distance.  It was kind of the ideal mood for walking through the gardens and ruins of Barnsley (which legend has it is haunted by Julia Barnsley's ghost).

From the looks of the gardens, we had just missed all the tulip blooms.  A few still had their blooms, but the azaleas were blooming and were soooo beautiful.  I planted a couple of azalea bushes last spring, but alas.... they didn't survive :(

The ruins are so hauntingly beautiful.  You can't help but imagine what life inside this mansion in the late 1800's must have been like - with more than 4,000 acres of beautiful gardens surrounding you. 

Now I'm sure this chandelier has been added through the renovations, as this is a well-sought after venue for weddings and other romantic rendezvous, but this mansion was the first dwelling in this area with indoor plumbing.

If my backyard were this beautiful, I may never step inside the house...

After checking out the mansion ruins, we walked through the gardens to find what Brandon remembered as the family's cemetery.  I didn't remember that stop on our elementary school tour, but it has been proven that Brandon has a much better memory of such events than I do. 

We did find the cemetery, complete with the Barnsley family plots (only one of which was marked).  We also saw some lesser decorated, but still marked grave sights scattered among the woods near the family's cemetery.  Brandon remembered those as the family's slave's grave sights.  I didn't get any pics of the cemetery.  Too morbid for my taste, but still neat to see.

We saw this big guy on our walk back to the cottage from the gardens.  The thunder was getting a little closer and we had dinner reservations to attend to.  He was getting his picture made by several other people enjoying the gardens, but for some reason when I tried to take his picture, he jerked his head up and started hissing and almost growling at me!  I did what any other girl in my shoes would do - I threw my husband at him and took off running!

We also walked back through the mansion through the rear entrance and heard this beautiful dance music running through the mansion.  We didn't think much of it, again because of the types of events in the ruins it isn't unthinkable that they have it rigged with various romantic lights and sounds, but then we turned the corner and OOPS!  We walked right into this room where a lovely young man was asking the question of a lifetime - complete with rose petals, music, dancing and champagne on ice.  We tried as quickly and as quietly as possible to get out of there, and then only on our way out did we notice the rose petals leading through the gardens and into the ruins.  So much for this guy's romantic plans :/ 

We had dinner reservations at the Woodlands Grill on the resort that evening.  There are actually two restaurants on the resort grounds, but the Rice House (the more upscale dining) is closed January through April each year.  We were more than excited though to try the Woodlands Grill.  From our friends who are members at Barnsley, they all recommend the Grill over the Rice House anyway.  

They seated us right in front of a gorgeous window overlooking the driving range and practice putting green.  It was such a beautiful evening and we sat right next to Bobby Cox, the newly retired manager of the Atlanta Braves.  It's not unusual to see him here in Adairsville, as he has an "off-season" home here, but I was pleasantly surprised to see that most other patrons of the restaurant left him alone to have dinner with his family. 

We ordered the chili cheese nachos as an appetizer.  They were soooo good. 

I haven't been able to eat much chicken with this pregnancy (which is strange and new to me), so I of course opted for my protein of choice lately - steak :)  Oh.My.Goodness.  This was a bone-in ribeye (at least three inches thick) with asparagus, red potatoes, and mushrooms covered in a red wine sauce.  Believe it or not, I actually ate most of it.  We enjoyed our conversation and surprisingly, we didn't talk about the boys at all.  We talked about work, Bean 3 (Brandon has finally conceded to my choice for this baby girl's name.  I think he was just being stubborn all along, but he'll never admit it ;)) and we had lots of laughs over screwing up that guy's moment of a lifetime.  Brandon said the guy needed an interruption because he had inevitably set the bar wayyyy too high with that type of proposal and needed a good reality check.  He said the guy will have to live up to those standards for the rest of his married life....  (insert eye roll here)

After dinner, we walked back to our cottage through the streets of equally adorable cottages and then through the Beer Garden.  The Beer Garden is an outdoor (and much lower key) dinner option at Barnsley.  They have picnic tables set up under strings of paper lanterns and garden lights with an order-at-the-counter style burger, hot dog and beer stand.  They had two huge televisions showing the March Madness basketball events.  I could imagine that Brandon and I would have made a stop here for a few after dinner beverages had Bean 3 not been present ;)

We passed lots of couples playing the various lawn games - croquet, frisbee, horse shoes, etc.. and several more either making their way to the Grill or off to the gardens.  A few people were horseback riding, or renting bikes.  Not very suitable for me and Bean 3, so we just retired to our cottage for the night.

Fully intending to sleep past our boys' usual wake up time of 6:50 -7:00AM, we woke up promptly at 7:30AM.  Special thanks to the sweet little bird that sang us awake so early right outside our window :)

Because we were awake anyway, we walked back down to the Grill for breakfast.  While they do serve menu items for breakfast, they were also having a breakfast buffet that we had heard rave reviews about, so we opted for that.  I filled my plate with bacon, fruit, a cream cheese crepe and warm pancakes topped with fresh fruit preserves and syrup.  They sure do know how to make a pregnant girl happy at Barnsley!

After breakfast and a cup of coffee, we walked down towards the spa and pool area of the resort.  I've heard wonderful things about the spa at Barnsley, but we had so much in the way of yard work to do on Sunday, that we didn't have much time for that.  I did want to make a special trip down there, however because I had been told by a little birdie that Barnsley had planted a tree in my late cousin's honor right in front of the spa.  Sure enough!  Here is the cute little tree - I just had to take a picture.

We had a wonderful night at Barnsley Gardens.  I would definitely recommend it to anyone - even if you do live right next door.  They also have special accommodations for the even the smallest members of your family.  In addition to the pool and (obviously) lots of roaming room, they have little bicycle/tricycle rentals, a playground and even children's menu items at the Grill.  I don't see us taking our little bits there anytime soon though - Barnsley would have a few more "ruins" after my boys made their rounds!

Will's First Tee Ball Practice

We've been super busy lately thanks to life - work, school (for Will), Bean 3 preparations, and baseball.  Yep, you heard that right!  Will is playing baseball this year.  He's been drafted to the 4/5 YR Gamecocks for this Spring and Summer's baseball season.  We are all excited - Will is excited to run the bases (his favorite part), I'm excited to watch all those precious kiddos screw up the game so badly, and Brooks is plum tickled to get an excuse to go to the park 2-3 nights a week.

This post isn't too word heavy, but I did want to share a few pics of Will's first practice.  Sooooo cute!

Before practice - he looks a little nervous, huh?

"Show me your glove Will!"

uhhhhh - head's up son!

Looking a little more alert with the coach

Yea - Brandon got roped into assistant coaching. hehehe

So sweet.  Will said his favorite parts of baseball are wearing the helmet and running the bases :)

Sleep? What Do You Mean?

Can I be honest with you for a second?  When people ask me if I'm nervous about adding a 3rd baby to our family, I kind of feel like saying what's one more?  Oh yea - we'll be outnumbered children to parents.  We need a bigger vehicle and the boys will share a room. We'll need to switch from "man-to-man to zone defense", but really - what's one more?  I mean, let's be honest - our house is freakin' crazy RIGHT NOW.  I may not even notice another crying, hungry, coughing, tantrum-throwing human.  My case-in-point - last night:

I had ushered the boys (husband included) off to my in-laws house for the evening, because I had to wait on a home appraiser.  The house was spotless yesterday and in the 15 minutes my boys were in the house while we were waiting on the appraiser, a yogurt raisin was squashed into the carpet and I caught my 3 year-old trying to sneak a water gun into the house.  As I bent down to scrape a nasty looking stepped-on raisin out of the carpet, I looked at my husband with a look of total desperation and asked "What exactly are your parents doing right now?"  So they were shipped off and returned only after 8 PM with one of the two children asleep.  We put both kids to bed and settled in to watch American Idol. 

Brandon and I went to bed around 11 (which is really really late for me) and at about 11:30, after nearly three hours of sleeping peacefully in his bed, Will starts crying out in his sleep. WHY?!!  Why do they do this!?  Are my kids the only ones with telepathic mom-has-laid-down radar??!!  I send Brandon in to check (if mom goes in, mom gets suckered into sleeping in his bed for the rest of the night).  Brandon comes back and says that Will is having a bad dream - he's mumbling incoherent things and tossing around. 

12:00 (Yes, MIDNIGHT):  Will screams out again.  Having not gone to sleep yet, while my husband is snoring peacefully, I go in.  Will is still mumbling around.  I try to wake him up.  I ask him if he's okay and he nods.  I go back to bed.

We do this same routine every 20 to 30 minutes.  Will cries out and we go in.  He tells us he's fine.

At 2:30AM I am exhausted and I am determined to wake this kid up.  I go first to the kitchen and get a glass of water.  I go into his room and almost consider dumping gently splashing him with this glass of water but I came to rather quickly.  I force him to sit up and drink water.  I ask him again what's wrong and he says "I was just stirsty (thirsty) mom" and he turns over to go back to sleep. 

2:35AM:  I lay down and close my tired little eyes.  4 hours until the alarm goes off.

2:37AM:  Brooks (who's been sleeping peacefully the whole time his brother is screaming like a stabbing victim) starts coughing.  LOUDLY. 

20 minutes later, the child is still coughing in his room.  I know he's still asleep because he would have come into our room already if he were awake.  I punch tap Brandon and ask him to go in.  He checks on Brooks, puts a pillow under his head and gives him some water. 

At 4AM, after us holding him, rocking him, giving him water, Brooks finally stops coughing and we put him back to bed.  2.5 hours until the alarm goes off.

Just as my head hits the pillow (and I only wish I were exaggerating) Will screams "MOMMMMMYYYY!" I run in and it's the same thing - he's asleep but tossing, turning and mumbling incoherent words.  I pull the covers back, make him sit up and he drinks more water.  He goes back to sleep.

At 5:15AM Will screams out one last time and I stomp in, turn on the lights and consider jumping on his bed to wake him up.  Thankfully, he sits up without me asking and says "Mom.  These pajamas are hurting me.  That's why I can't sleep."  Huh?  Your pajamas?  The same ones you've slept in a hundred times?  Yes, he says, his pajamas are hurting him.  I yank his drawers open, pull out a t-shirt and change his clothes.  He asks very sweetly if he can sleep in my bed and considering that my alarm is getting ready to go off anyway, I tell him yes and carry him to our bed. 

At 6:30 our alarm goes off and I want to cry, scream and cuss because my eyelids hurt so badly, only I can't because my child who has kept me up all night is sleeping soundly tucked under his daddy's arm.  I can't help but laugh to myself as I stumble to the bathroom for a serious splash of cold water on my face. 

My husband says "Gosh - what are we going to do when there's a newborn added to that mix?"
I reply "Are you kidding?  What's feeding a newborn when you're awake anyway thanks to these two tag-team brothers?  We won't notice."
He says "Yeah.  You're right.  I can't wait to get to work and attack that pot of coffee."
Huh.  At least you get to drink coffee.  I can only have one cup and that will wear off before lunch. 

So that my friends, is why I'm not stressing over the third child.  Going from one to two rocked my world.  It was tough.  I dealt with so many emotions - stress, guilt, etc... But I am not one bit worried about what we'll do when little bit is up all night feeding or whether she'll have colic, because guess what - we'll be up anyway and more than likely, someone (and it may be me) will already be crying!

18 Weeks & Counting

Brandon and I went in to check on Bean 3 this week.  She's still a girl :)  And everything looks great with the baby.  Two arms, two legs, two little feet and two little hands, 3 vessel umbilical cord, 4 chambers of the heart, kidneys, stomach, noggin... she's just as healthy as can be so far! 

The ultrasound tech had a hard time getting Bean 3 to cooperate with having her picture taken.  She wiggled all over the place and before the tech could snap the pic, Bean had moved away.  The tech said "Well she's a wiggler!"  I laughed and told her I hope so - she'll need to be a mover and a shaker to survive our crazy household!  Similar to her brothers, Bean 3 was snuggled up nicely with her ankles crossed and her hands curled up under her chin.  She weighs in around 9 ounces so far - I wish I could say that's all the weight I've gained, but unfortunately it's not :/

(She opened her mouth soooo wide here - it looked like she was laughing!)

After the ultrasound we went on to see the doctor, where the he informed me that I do seem to have a little bit of a low-lying placenta.  He said that all that means for me right now is that I get another ultrasound in six weeks.  He said that as the pregnancy progresses and the uterus moves further up into the abdomen, most of these cases correct themselves.  If the placenta is still low at the next ultrasound, I will continue to have ultrasounds throughout the pregnancy to check on the position of the placenta.  If it doesn't correct itself, a vaginal delivery will be out of the question as the opening to the cervix will be blocked by the placenta.  If it does correct itself, we're good to go :)  I'm not too concerned, we'll do whatever it takes to get Bean 3 here as safely as possible. 

Brandon is still having a hard time processing the fact that we're having a girl.  He thinks all the ultrasounds are wrong and I'll give birth to a boy in August.  I've finally processed the fact that we're having 3 babies in 4 years and that this one is a little girl.  Now I'm starting to stress about moving the boys into one room and getting started on her room, which is going to be a little different this time since I'm making the bedding myself :/ (With the help of an experienced sewer!) 

The To-Do List looks a little something like this:

• Buy two twin mattress & box spring sets
• Buy multiple sets of twin sheets and covers
• Paint the twin beds & move the boys into one room
• Finish buying the fabric for Bean 3's bed
• Decide on curtains for her room
• Paint her room (and her furniture)
• Buy a bigger vehicle
• Buy an infant car seat
• Invest in a new baby monitor (our old one just bit the dust)
• Get the essentials - clothes, pjs, diapers, bottles, receiving blankets, burp cloths, etc...

Yeesh - I'm tired just thinking about it!

A Construction Birthday Party

As we discussed last week, our sweet little Brooks turned the big TWO a few days ago.  We celebrated this past weekend by inviting all of his little buddies over for a Construction themed birthday bash.  Because the little guy is too young to care what kind of birthday party he has, it's still "mommy's pick" and I tried to choose something that he would love (he's all about "diggers" and "tractors") but that wasn't too overdone.  (Those "mommy's picks" become fewer and farther between as the wee ones get older - Will is insisting on a Buzz Lightyear party for his upcoming bash, complete with a "jumping bean" - a bouncy house). 

So I started the process several weeks ago by perusing Pinterest, Etsy, and other various mommy blogs for ideas for a creative construction party.  Once I had a vague idea of the colors, time and place for the party, I contacted one of my Etsy faves ianandlola for the invite design.  I first used this Etsy shop for Will's Thomas the Train themed birthday bash last year.  She designed the cutest little train ticket style invites last year and I knew she could drum up something equally as cute and unique this time.  I gave her the wording and she went to work.  I thought the finished product was really cute - I especially loved how the crane was holding the number 2 :)

After the invite, I started thinking about menu items.  The party was mid-afternoon, so no huge meal was necessary, but I still like to have little munchies out for the guests.  I tried to stick with the construction theme, so we had "brownie boulders" (I kept waiting on someone to crack a joke about the brownies being hard as "rocks", but no one was brave enough I guess), a "build-your-own sandwich station", "dirt-cups", a "stack-your-own lumber" tray (french fries), and "nuts & bolts" (Chex Mix).  I tried to get pictures, but I apparently suck at photography - better stick to party planning ;)  Brandon's aunt made the cake - a simple chocolate-iced yellow sheet cake with little "diggers" on top.  I bought the construction toys at Target in a set for $5.

I tried to stick with construction themed colors throughout the decorating - yellow, orange, black and grey.  I bought the yellow and black caution tape at Home Depot for $7 and used that instead of streamers.  My husband was in charge of taping the caution tape up, and I must say that he was pretty proud of himself for his creativity.  The orange cones were borrowed from my neighbor who works for a paving company. 

After the kiddos came thru my husband's beautifully decorated front entrance, I had a "decorate-your-own hard hat" station set up.  The kids really seemed to enjoy this and I felt like it got them in the right spirit right from the start.  I ordered the hard hats from Oriental Trading for super cheap and picked up a few packs of stickers along the way.  The sign read "Safety First!  Decorate your own hard hat!"  The kids wrote their names on address labels and pinned them to the front of their hats and then proceeded to use tons of stickers to make them their own. 

The kids played and played and played their little hearts out.  My mom's house is great for parties for the little ones.  The kitchen is large enough for everyone to gather around, the den has enough seating for all, the kids LOVE to use the long and wide hallway for "racing" their scooters, big wheels and tricycles, and between my kids and my neice and nephew, all of the breakable stuff has already been broken.  In fact, other than the squeals of laughter coming from down the hall, it was almost easy to forget where they were. When the party goers started to dwindle down, they were sent home with their very own canvas tool belt (Home Dept $.77/belt) holding a sucker, yogurt covered raisins, and these cute little handmade glycerin soaps from BrownBagBathBars.  They were yellow or orange and shaped like little dump trucks.  I chose the banana and creamsicle scents and the tag read "For the Clean Up Crew".  SOOOO CUTE! All the parents raved over these "goody bags" and these were probably the cheapest favors I've ever done.

All things considered, Mr. Brooksie had a wonderful 2nd birthday party.  He was given an abundance of gifts and sugar and for a two year-old, that's all that matters.  I think I saw him drinking out of at least three or four different juice boxes and eating off as many as three people's plates (and also the floor at one point, but hey - if you can't get away with that on your birthday, when can you??)  Thanks to everyone who made it out after Friday night's horrendous tornadic weather to celebrate my baby's 2nd birthday.  I don't think there was one person there who hasn't been to all my boys' birthday parties and to me, you all feel like family.  Mr. Brooks is one lucky boy to have each of you in his life.  Cheers!

Our buddy, HC

Sweet Cousins

Safety first!

Aunt Kristian and Nick Nick

His first bike

This was before we even had cake and you can see all the chocolate on his face!

Diggers...

Yummm

And "digging" into his cake

Big brother Will enjoyed the cake as well I do believe

Still playing...

With his Pappi

Who wants cake? Brooks - "MEEEEEE!"