More of DC

Have I mentioned on here that Tim and I have a special place in our hearts for squirrels? I'm sure that some of you will say "ewww! they're gross" or something but whatevs. :) So it was very exciting in DC that the little guys were so tame and I got some great pics. And of course I called Tim and told him all about it. And if we had iphones then we could've sent pics back and forth but oh well. :) Maybe next year.
So here for your viewing pleasure are some very tame squirrels!


Come and get the cookie!

See, isn't that yummy?

This little guy thought he was really cool.

This one loved my purse and had no fear. He was actually searching for the source of the yumminess, smart guy!

What can you get for $22?

THIS!! ($15)

And THIS ($7!)




I also got a winter coat for $5 and some other random stuff. I went with a friend of mine who put some of my stuff in with hers. At this thrift store you just "buy" a big black trashbag and fill it with stuff, she had room so she added my stuff to hers. I will certainly be checking back there for anything we need. Tim already wants me to look for a bookcase - he was very impressed with my finds. :)

I <3 The Weekly Standard!!

Hey guys,
I've added some new links on my site for some news and political sites I enjoy. I especially love the Weekly Standard. They have a great group of editors who all write very intelligently about current events. And a lot of times two of my favs (Bill Crystol and Fred Barnes) guest on Brit Hume's "Roundtable" at the end of the 7pm show on Fox. You gotta check it out!! I'll post some of my favorite stories on here but I challenge you to check them out for yourselves. It is so important to stay informed and reading these sites will really help with that.

The Irrationality of Anti-Americanism

The Passion of Dick Cheney

Sarah Palin and the Sham of Feminism

Let me know what you think! Love 'em, hate 'em? I wanna hear it!

Home sweet home

I got in really late Monday night and am just now getting settled back into the swing of things. The house is a wreck and I've got a lot to do but right now I'm drinking some (de-caf) coffee and watching foxnews. So I will have to conquer those piles of laundry and stacks of dishes...later. :)
The trip was amazing!! I had such a great with sweet Kristin and we did a lot of really fun stuff. I got there on Thursday afternoon and after she got off we went to her house and dumped our stuff before going to the new 911 Pentagon Memorial. It was very powerful and a terrific monument to the people who died seven years ago. The memorial had been dedicated that day and they still had a military band and choir out there. The music was beautiful and the images were very powerful. They had a bench with a reflecting pool underneath each one for each person who was killed. And each bench faced either the Pentagon or away from it based on whether they were on the plane or in the building when it was struck. A lot of the relatives had visited already so there were flowers and pictures on most of the benches. Please go there whenever you visit DC, and I think it was even more special because we went at night. So try to go after dark. :)

On Friday I went in to work with Kristin and hung out a bit before going on a tour of the East Wing of the White House. A lot of people were on this one as you can get a pass through your Congressional office and that was great but I was disappointed in how casually people dressed. Some were wearing shorts and t-shirts even! I know that most of us were tourists but still! Come on, people, you're visiting the WHITE HOUSE!! Okay, done with that rant. :) I hitched on to a group who had a guard who was leading a tour and I learned some neat facts. He was a pretty interesting guy as well! Quite the character. :)
Friday afternoon was probably the neatest thing that I've ever gotten to do in DC. We were able to go to the South Lawn of the White House and greet the President when he came in on Marine One. That was very exciting and very loud! I've never been that close to a helicopter before! He got off and was only about 20 feet away from us! There weren't very many people there so we were at the very front so I got some good pics. He was very happy to see everyone and took a while waving and smiling. It even seemed like he waved and made eye contact with each person. It was a great experience and very neat how he was so excited for everyone to get to be there and he recognized how important it was for us. He's been getting off that helicopter for almost eight years but he still took the time to smile and wave for everyone. Then when we were walking back we saw the Presidential doggie water bowl so I took a pic. Too funny. :)

That night we went back to Kristin's house and one of her sweet roomies made pancakes, bacon, and eggs for us. YUM! (Sidenote: Kristin's roomies are AWESOME! They're some of the coolest girls ever and they make me wish I had had the opportunity to live in a big house o'girls.)

Saturday we had a lazy morning, or at least I did. Kristin went for a run and then mowed their lawn before I even got dressed. She's a hoss. Good thing I rested though because we had a very loooong day! We went to Eastern Market and browsed through a ton of clothes, paintings, jewelry, food, fruit, and pretty much a ton of stuff. We went to a great used book store and I spent a ton of time looking for books on my "Good History Books" list. And success! I found 6 of them! So I should have plenty of reading material to last me a while. And we went to a neighborhood garage sale that ended up being one lone table. However, I found some cute bags and a roomy top, all for $4! After that we hightailed it back to the White House where we found everything roped off. We changed clothes in a coffee shop and were able to do a West Wing tour! So amazing! It was great to get to see the Oval Office, Roosevelt Room, Cabinet Room, and the Rose Garden. Very cool!!! Here is a link to the White House website where the President and others give video tours. It was very exciting to see so much that I've only ever read about or seen in books or movies.

Saturday was a long and tiring day and it felt so good to get back to Kristin's house, take a shower, and make a huge dinner. :)
Sunday we went to Kristin's church and heard a great sermon and I got to meet some of her friends. That afternoon we rested a bit then did a little shopping and ate some pizza that night and watched the movie "Hitch".
Monday I went to work with Kristin again and after some yummy cinnamon rolls made by her co-worker I went to the Holocaust Museum. Again, something every person must do while they're in DC. It was incredible. There were a lot of people there but everyone was extremely quiet and moved silently through the exhibit just trying to take it all in. There weren't a lot of children there but I would think it was suitable for some young people. There were some disturbing videos but they were very strategically placed so you had to consciously choose to watch them and wouldn't just happen upon them. I started out walking very slowly through and reading everything but I realized it would take me all day to get through the museum so I had to scurry through the second half. I got back in time to hang out with Kristin before she walked me to my bus stop. And then I rode a bus for four hours, walked a mile through NYC, and took a very late train (after I missed an earlier one), before finally getting picked up by Tim around 9:30. It was such a fun trip and I'm so glad that I was able to go!!! And if you've been able to read through all of this, here are some pictures as a reward. :)

The spot where the plane hit the Pentagon.

3,000 flags set up at the Pentagon.

On the South Lawn just after the President arrived - it was windy!!

George W. himself!

Kristin and I.

The Press Room where the newsmedia attempts to eat Bush or the WH spokesperson alive.

In front of the White House.

Cooking in Kristin's kitchen!

And the view of the White House from the street.

Mrs. Merkin goes to Washington!

Tomorrow I'm hoping on a bus and heading to Washington, DC! One of my bestest friends, Kristin H. (sister of Bethanie) lives and works in DC and I'm going to visit her! This is Kristin in case you've forgotten.

And I'm going to tour this place!

I'm going to go on tours of both the West and East Wings and I am so thrilled!! Its going to be a great experience! And I hope I don't faint in the foyer. :) What an amazing experience to see the place where so many influential and powerful men have lived and conducted business. As a lover of US History it just sends chills through my veins when I really think about what an amazing place it is. And the whole city is steeped in history of our glorious country! I'm so excited! Plus, I'll get to hang out with one of my favorite people! Kristin is such a unique, special person and she really adds a lot to my life. Plus, we go waaaaaay back so if nothing else we can watch "That Darn Cat" and laugh about old times. That classic movie is our two families "theme movie". All of us can probably quote the whole thing. Reminds me, we gotta make sure the younger ones have that deep appreciation of this Disney classic.
So that is what I'm going to be doing this weekend! I'm going to take bunches of pictures and I'll be sure to tell you all about it when I get back! Until then I have some laundry and cleaning to do, oh joy. :)

Holy cow, I "popped"!

Here's a quick pic I just took with my mac's camera. In all my make-up free glory. ;) Gosh, I look huge!! I keep meaning to take a new one, or get Tim to but I kept forgetting. So here's one from 25 weeks and 2 days! :)
PS Doesn't Maddie look cute? She's asking me what on earth I'm doing and can I please stop and play with her? :)

My Garden!

Wow, my garden is currently a sad little mess. However, the neighborhood cats have enjoyed having a nice sand box to use this summer. Which has contributed to its yuckiness. Its a sad spiral, I didn't do much with it, the cats pooped in it, and so then I avoided it in all its stinkiness. But my garden did not abandon me! Here is some proof of what I've gathered from it.


It has been so nice to be able to go out and harvest tomatoes whenever I needed them. And we've had a lot! I've been cooking all sorts of yummy tomato related recipes and I may be biased but I think they taste awesome! Plus, its nice to think that I know exactly where they came from and didn't have bug juice sprayed on 'em.
My other huge garden-related success has been with the herbs I've grown. All summer I've had a bountiful supply of basil, oregano, and parsley! So now I'm totally spoiled and can go out at any time and pluck some fresh herbs for whatever I'm cooking. Its certainly caused and extra bit of yumminess in my cooking, again, is it only because I'm biased? Hmmm, I don't have any pictures of those but I have them in a cute little striped tin that I busted some holes in and filled with dirt. And its worked great! I wonder if I could try to plant some fresh stuff in there and try to grow it inside. We have a lot of windows and therefore a lot of sunlight in our sun room. Any tips? have any of y'all had any experience with doing this?
And tonight I'm going to go make us some homemade spaghetti. I actually made it a couple of weeks ago but I made a ton and stuck it in the freezer. I love doing that and will hopefully be able to get a deep freeze soon, our freezer is so full now! And so I'd better go do that, hope you're having a great day! (new belly pics coming soon!!)

Whatcha reading?

A few weeks ago I finally went to our little town library and got a card. Growing up my family went on weekly trips to the local library where we would routinely check out 20+ books. This frazzled my poor mother (think of the potential library fines!) so she always made us write down the titles and the name of the person who checked them out. Usually the culprits were my younger sister, Stephanie, and I. Between us we probably checked out at least half of the family's weekly book list. We mowed through the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew books as well as other random ones. (I'll give a list of my favorite children's books later.)
Anyway, she and I both have retained our love of reading although she's been much more of a prolific reader in high school and now college. In fact, she's even majoring in English! So I talked to said sister on one of my trips and she recommended the author Harlan Coben. Since then I've read a couple of his books and was highly entertained. They are a bit "PG-13" but are a very easy read. Much like watching a movie, not a lot of intellectual stimulation but they will give your imagination a run for its money! I enjoyed the Myron Bolitar novel better but when I looked at Coben's website I discovered that the other one I read "Tell No One" is now a movie. Maybe I'll make Tim watch it when it comes out on video.
So those are the novels I picked up. But in order to actually develop my mind I have also been reading some non-fiction. There is quite a variety among these titles. First off is one titled "Real Change" by Newt Gingrich. This was as interesting and yet depressing read. It discussed a number of topics ranging from health care to social security reform. I leaned a great deal from this book and it helped me figure out more of what I believe on different issues and reasons why. I might go into this book more later, in fact. Another non-fiction book I've read is probably not too interesting to many of you, but the title is "Husband Coached Childbirth" its a book about natural childbirth and is extremely interesting. I would highly recommend it to anyone who is expecting.
So those are the ones I've gotten through in the past couple of weeks and now I'm working on a couple more. A most interesting one is a history of George Washington titled "His Excellency" by Dr. Joseph Ellis. This is another one which I'll probably go into more detail later. And last but not least is one that I've heard a great deal about, "Blue Like Jazz". My mom got it for me for my birthday and I'll probably get through it pretty quickly. I've heard that a lot people have greatly enjoyed this one so I'm excited to finish it.
So what about y'all? Love to read? Hate it? I'm usually a fast reader, especially with fiction, but a little slower with non-fiction stuff. Are you a quick or slow reader? And what do you prefer? Fiction or non? I'd love to hear any suggestions anyone might have.

>>>>NEWSFLASH<<<<

Tim has declared me "officially pregnant". Last night was the first time of our married life where he got cold and I was hot! I had to move to sleep in front of the window fan while he shivered next to me. This morning he said, "well, I guess you're really pregnant." Gee thanks for noticing, sweetie!

On a side note, August weather up here in Yankeeland is AWESOME! It actually gets chilly at night! And our window fans feel like ac units, in fact, I don't even turn them on anymore!! Time to pack away the fans already? Wow! Crazy! (sorry to all my TX peeps who are still sweltering).

23 weeks!

Its so encouraging to see the number of weeks remaining growing smaller. I'm a fan of the count-down and I like thinking, only 16 1/2 weeks to go! And it won't be long until I'm under 100 days! Everything is going well, no weird symptoms, just the eye troubles. Yesterday while I was on my walk one of my glasses lenses popped out so I put my contacts in when I got back. BIG mistake!! By 6pm they were very red and hurt something awful. And when I woke up this morning they were both bright red, sore, with little crusties around the lids. Pretty picture, huh? And they hurt so bad that I had to stay in my bedroom with the lights off and windows darkened until after lunch. Tim says that being pregnant is turning me into a vampire (isn't he sweet?). Oh well, its all for a good cause, right? All I can hope is that it clears up after she's born and doesn't continue on.

Onto happier subjects...we found a birthing class! After some research and discussion we decided to enroll in a Bradley Birthing Class. They really emphasize the role of the husband in the process and teach you all about birth. I'm excited about it! You can find out more information at http://www.bradleybirth.com/. The instructor is a nurse and has been teaching the class for 17 years. We're starting at the end of September and it meets every week for 10 weeks. Each class is going to focus on a different topic such as, nutrition, relaxation, nursing, preparing for the baby, and post-natal care. She's also going to go over different "interventions" (i.e. epidural) and c-sections and when they're necessary. All in all, I think we'll both learn a lot and I'm really looking forward to them!

This Saturday is my birthday!! I love having my birthday on a weekend and even better its on a holiday weekend! Tim has a present for me and he wants to take me to our favorite restaurant on Friday night! Hurray for huge plates of pasta!!

Hope everyone is doing well!

GOTCHA!!

Today was a day that one of my favorite families will never forget. It was their "Gotcha Day" where they were able to pick up their sweet little boy, Abe, from Ethiopia. This is their blog and here is a direct link to an amazing slide-show of this special day!
CONGRATS ALEXANDER FAMILY!!!

Bethanie has a blog?!

Hey guys!! Wanted to tell you to check out "Buff's Blog" I linked to her new blog. She is Tim's cousin (one of the H kids from my previous story) and we grew up together. Bethanie and my older sister, Rebecca, are very close in age and were always best friends. I was the annoying younger sister who tagged along and wasn't always welcomed. (She called me "Forgetful Jones" for some reason - he was a Sesame Street character - and I called her "Barfany"). But interestingly enough, now were are very close and I count her as one of my bestest friends. She was the only person we knew in Dallas when we first moved there as a newly married couple and she came over so many times to hang out and make dinner with me. And we created some interesting memories. Like the time she and her friend Mary rode to the ranch with us for Thanksgiving. Four people, one small car, a ton of luggage, a litter box, and two cats. And one of those cats had a tendency for car-sickness. Ahh, that was a good trip!
She was also in our wedding as one of our bridesmaids and played a beautiful piano piece and sang a trio with her sister, Kristin, and my sis, Rebecca. Well, I'd better scoot now but maybe she can write about some of her memories. She always did have the best memory of our group!
Also, she, as all the H's are, is extremely interesting so I know you will enjoy whatever she has to write. So go check her out and leave her a comment.
And here are a few pics of my beautiful cuz-in-law. :)

My Tim

Tim and I celebrated our forth anniversary last week and I had wanted to write something about him and us but just hadn't done it yet. So now I need to or else I never will, right? And I'm about to get a second cup of coffee (shhh!) so I know I'll be filled with energy. :) And this might get rather long so I'll try to sprinkle in some pictures. And feel free to grab some coffee for yourself!
He is so precious to me and I think we have one of the sweetest love stories I've ever heard (I might be biased but I'm sure other's would think it is pretty interesting!) So I'm going to tell that today!
Background info: My parents have been life-long friends with Georgianna and Eric H. They met my dad before he met my mom and have had a very special relationship. They were the ones who led him to the Lord and Georgianna prayed for a long time that my dad would marry a Christian girl. Well, he found my mom in New Plymouth, NZ and she was not a Christian. However, God is good and Georgianna was able to come to NZ for the wedding and just days before led her to the Lord too!! And such was the beginning of their life-long friendship.
Fast-forward a couple of decades and the H's have seven kids and my family has seven kids. We all grew up super close to each other and spent a lot of time visiting back and forth. One year I went down to the H's and we took a picture in their van, all the H's and me. Mimi (Georgianna's mom) saw the photo and asked me for a copy, which I sent her and which she placed on her fridge. Very important part of the story!! :)
Georgianna has two sisters and one brother and the sister right under her is Carol Sue M. Well, Carol has four kids and her oldest boy happens to be Tim! Since we had grown up so close to the H's we also knew the M's really well, and I was good friends with his mom and sisters. I had seen a couple of pictures of Tim and always heard great things about him but strangely enough we never met! In all those years of rendezvous with the H's and M's Tim and I were never in the same place at the same time! And honestly I don't think that Tim knew I existed...until the fall of 2002. He was at Mimi's house and happened to see the photo on her fridge. Hmmm, he said, "who is that girl with all of my cousins?" Oh thats Stacy S. everyone said! "Who is she?" Tim replied. And everyone gasped because they were shocked that he did not know that precious and wonderful family! ;) You know how mom's and aunts are and they claim to this day that they "set us up" after Tim's question. He very nonchalantly asked his mom to invite our family to the Ranch for Thanksgiving but we were unable to go. (which was a blessing because I was at the end of a dead-end relationship and it wouldn't have been the best timing.)
However, the opportunity soon came for us to meet and it happened in typical H and S fashion. I was asked to drive from Houston to the Hill Country (where the Ranch is) for the day and pick up a few Henderson kids. A "kid swap" as we called it. This was a few days after Christmas (Jan. 7th to be exact) and my mind started thinking. We had gotten a Christmas letter from Carol Sue and family with several pictures in it and I saw Tim and thought, "hmm he's really cute!" And then over Christmas I learned that he had broken up with his long-time girlfriend the previous summer (remember the picture, Kristin?). So on the morning of the 7th I thought he might be at home on break from school so I shamelessly curled my hair and put on make-up. Heehee, the wily ways of a woman! ;) Oh and I was 19 at the time!
My sister and I arrived at the ranch and as we were walking up to the house I realized that Tim was not there. Oh well! I learned that he was at work in San Antonio and was hoping to get off in time to come hang out. In the meanwhile we all went on a horse ride through the ranch and I rode double with Carol Sue (Tim's sweet mom). And the whole time she told me about the ranch and talked a lot about her oldest son. :) Then when we arrive back at the house after our ride she announced "Tim is here!". And there he was! He came walking up to us and we shook hands and I was still on the horse (soo romantic!). We then all went inside and ate some lunch and played some cards. Tim never left my side and strategically asked questions about me (like how old I was!). And I thought, "hmmm, this is interesting, I'm going to test him". And I announced that I wanted to go outside and go for a walk and just went out without asking him to go with me. Yup, he followed. :) And the group was taking a while to get going so I grabbed the nearest H kid (Kathleen!) and the three of us set out on a walk. More questions, one of which got us on the subject of baseball. Now, everyone who knows me at all knows that I love baseball and have been in love with the Atlanta Braves (and Chipper Jones!) since I was eleven. Kathleen knew this so when Tim announced that he too liked the Braves she just snorted. Soo hilarious! She was the best little chaperone! And then we were talking about something else and Tim gave this killer line, "since we're talking about computers, can I have your email address?" Priceless!! I said yes and thought to myself, I'll give it to him if he asks me again. :)
We made our way back to the house talking and talking and silent Kathleen just taking it all in (thanks again, Kathleen! You're the best!). And we actually took a group photo but I don't think I have it scanned in.
Anyway, he did ask me again and so I gave it to him and after a long and very interesting day we started back to Houston. The next morning I went back to work and my sweet friend Lizzles (Elizabeth D) knew something was up. Might be the way I didn't really walk into the room but floated in and told her about this cowboy I met the day before. I wasn't sure if he would email me but when I checked that morning there it was! Our very first (of many!) emails!
I don't have a picture of the two of us when we first met scanned in and I'm feeling kind of lazy. So here's one from March of '03 when we were able to spend a lot of time together over spring break.

At the ranch sitting on the fence while my patient brother conducted a little photo shoot for us. (Thanks Nathan!)
And that was the beginning of my relationship with my wonderful Tim! I'll probably post more later but now I'm all hyped up and need to get to work! But let me post just a few more cute photos of us (if I may say so myself!).

Another one from that spring break. Gosh! We look young!

Post-wedding family camping trip.

This was also taken after we got married but I still like it.

Sooo happy to be marrying him! And he cried the whole time.

Best kiss EVER.

Ok, this has inspired me to post more pictures of our wedding. It was so perfect and we made so many memories!! Seth was the best, best man ever! Every time we looked at each other up there we both started cracking up. It was great! Ok, more about that and the crazy wedding assistant lady later!!
Love y'all!!

Stupid painters

Hello my peeps. A request has been made for a new post and as there's not a whole lot going on I'll vent about my favorite subject. In April our landlord told us that he had hired a group of painters to strip and re-paint our house. These guys had painted Vincent's favorite bar in town and the "owner" was the bartender. Keep this in mind!
So waa-hoo! We were thrilled and happy to have the house painted. Very exciting! They started at the end of April or the beginning of May and got right to work...blasting this poor 50+ year old house with sand. Not exactly what Vincent wanted but oh well. Yeah, it worked, blasted the paint off and created deep groves in sections of the wood. Vincent started biting his fingernails nervously and told them he was not happy with the results. Oh it'll be okay, I guess they thought because they proceeded to just start painting. Uhhh, no go. They then had words with Vincent and started puttying up the groves which obviously showed through the paint. During all this we endure sand being blown into every crevice of the house and unfortunately left some windows open a few days. And at the end of May we had our first visitor, sweet Elizabeth Dillon. Ok, I thought, at least they'll surely be finished by the time Susan and Kristin come (in June). All the while the painters continue to show up maybe two days a week for a few hours a day. And they usually came on the days I had off work (which explains my very wimpy tan). June comes and goes and still they're painting, then puttying and scraping off the putty. July comes and goes. Vincent still very upset, gives them till the end of the month to finish. Does it happen? Nope. They still continue to come maybe two days a week and work from about 9-2. And then FINALLY last week a whole mess of them come on Monday and in one day completely paint the house. Waa-hoo!! Talk to Vincent and find out that he paid them to paint THREE coats of paint on the whole house. Hmmm...interesting as they only came that one day! The guy insists that they did two coats on the house in that one day (from 8-3). Vincent is sick of dealing with the whole mess so he just pays the guy and gets rid of them. And he still paid for the supplies for three coats and did not get that. Poor Vincent! But thank goodness they're finally through!!! And now that the temp has dropped to the low 80's as a high I might be able to get a tiny bit of a tan. :)
Moral of the story: never hire your friends! especially part-time bartenders.


The front door of the house.

Tim arriving home from work.

Sniper coming to greet Tim.

Side of the house.

My pitiful little garden.

Little watermelon finally growing!

These next two are "before" pics. Yikes, that snow scares me. That was the first day of MARCH this year. :*(

20 Week sonogram

Here she is! I know these pics are hard to see but I wanted to show one anyway. :) I can't figure out how to flip it but oh well. Everything looks good! The tech was able to see her kidneys and everything this time and he said she weighs 13 oz. Awwww! :) Just a few more weeks until she reaches "viability". I think its either 24 or 26 weeks when they get developed enough to survive outside the womb if something were to happen. Hopefully that won't be necessary and she'll keep baking until December.
Yesterday was our 4th anniversary so after the sonogram we went to the mall and bought her a little outfit. Tim actually helped pick it out! I think its soo cute so I wanted to post a picture of it.

20 weeks!

Half-way!! At least I hope so! A lot of first-timers go over their due date, but I'm going to just pretend for my own sake that she'll arrive on or before December 20th. :)
It feels like its been so much longer than 20 weeks! I guess we've only known about 16 weeks but it seems like it should be more. Oh well, hopefully this will be the downward end and things will pick up and go faster.
I've enjoyed being pregnant so far. I haven't had to endure the morning sickness that most women face but I've had other symptoms. Mostly fatigue. Its very annoying to always be tired unless I've had a lot of rest and getting tired very easily is well, tiresome! Also, I've developed some kind of eye allergy that is extremely annoying. I've always had very poor vision and have worn contacts or glasses since I was eleven. Well, it seems my eyes are revolting against my contacts! And its been very gradual. At first they would just get slightly red and irritated if I wore them too long but now pretty much if I wear them at all they get bright cherry red and hurt like the dickens! I've heard of women developing allergies while they're pregnant and maybe my eyes just don't like my contacts anymore! Its frustrating though, I wouldn't mind wearing my glasses but they're not nearly as convenient as contacts. And my eyes get very dry so my vision is hazy and that's extremely annoying! Well, anyway, sorry to be whiny about this but its very difficult to have your vision compromised. It was difficult even to clean for Tim's family because I couldn't tell if I was getting the floor clean or not! So if you think of it, please pray for my poor sick eyes and hopefully they will return to normal soon!
Oh and if you tell me I look like a mom when I wear glasses you are no longer my friend. Just kidding! ...sort of... :)

Love it!

Okay, I think I like this one now! I bought some polka dot blankets a while back and when I pulled them out again I realized how much I liked them. They're super cute and not too girlie. But with this one I can accent with a little pink and red to make it slightly more feminine but without going overboard. Plus, her room is very dark and has all wood floors, walls, and ceiling (feels kind of like a coffin, actually!). So this set will really brighten it up. Opinions?



Oh and its also at Target and got great reviews. Everyone says how it feels like the expensive stuff but isn't! Plus, since its from Target it won't be too expensive and it will be easy to accessorize. Am I over-analyzing this?? :)

Funny onesies

Thought y'all would enjoy these!

Colors

So I keep going back and forth with the color scheme for Libby's room. I'm not a big pink person but I love the soft yellows and blues of this one.



But then I think maybe I'll want pink. :) My mom and sister sent me some adorable little booties and a pink rubber ducky even! They are soo cute so who knows. :) We'll probably go to Babies R Us in the next few weeks and then I can feel the textures and see things in person. But until then, what do y'all think?

The original Libby

Name?

So we looove the name Liberty Ann "Libby". What do y'all think? And yes, its the same name as another little sweetie we had. Remember her?

GIRL!!!

We are having a little GIRL!!! We're very excited!! We were able to find out last Thursday and I have been floating ever since. Tim's family was all there waiting in the front room and before I came out I changed my shirt from black to pink! I also had a blue one and was going to use that to tell them. No one got it at first and then they realized I had changed my shirt! It was a lot of fun!
I had thought the baby was a boy for some reason and there are already three girls among Tim's two sisters so I thought the odds were with a boy. But she'll have fun with her cousins! We're used to a lot of girls, my parents had three before they had any boys and the first two in Tim's family are girls. It will be fun to have a girl as the first one to help out with the others, sorry sweetie! ;)
I'm now 19 1/2 weeks along, almost half-way! And have been able to feel her kick and roll around. Its so much fun!! But it just reminds me she's in there and I want her out! I'm also starting to show a lot more but I don't think strangers really realize I'm preggers. I was talking to a nice lady at the park the other day and she was completely shocked that I was pregnant, much less 4 months along! I guess people just think I have a round belly! Tim tells people I drink too much beer. :) I don't have a very recent picture but here's one from 17 weeks.

Updates!

I've got a lot to update everyone on so here goes...

1.) We had 7 members of Tim's family here for the past week and we had a fantastic time! We went into the city, two state parks, and out on the lake. It was awesome having them here and showing them around everywhere. Thanks for coming, guys!! I'll post some pictures as soon as I get some from them, I've gotten really lazy with taking pictures.

2.) Today I got a call and found out I do not have a job anymore. The little baby I was watching has taken a turn for the worse and the family thinks it will be best to have someone live with them. An aunt is going to come live there with them and it will help give him some consistency. I'm sure this is all in God's timing but as we all know, that isn't always our timing! Please pray for us and we figure out what our plans are. I was going to quit at the end of October but before then we had lofty plans to pay off my car and save up a little. Things don't always work out the way we want them to but I know God will take care of us and we'll be just fine.

3.) Tim's job is going great! He had an evaluation and they told him how happy and impressed they are with him. They also gave him a very generous "salary adjustment" which makes everyone concerned very happy. Tim is loving the work and the people and feels like he really made the right decision to move up here. Its really a blessing and the Lord has taken very good care of him. It has also allowed us to meet a couple of terrific new friends, Jonathan and Vanessa, who live in the city. They're a blast to hang out with and have come out to the country a few times with us.

4.) We have not found a church yet. :( We haven't been able to visit very many but have not been too impressed by the ones we have visited. The Northeast is certainly not like the Bible Belt!!! Please be praying that we can find one soon!

5.) I'm hoping to have the opportunity to visit Texas this fall at some time. My dear friend Katey has generously offered to throw me a Fort Worth shower and on the same weekend my family is also giving me one in San Antonio. I'm really excited about that and cannot wait to see all of my dear family and friends, I MISS Y'ALL!!!

More to come soon but for now I am going to sign off. I'll write a baby update soon. :)

OK, nevermind!

So I love my mac and the blog utility but I also like my money and don't wish to part with $100 every year! So I'm going to switch back to using blogger. Got any ideas to fancy it up at all?

We've had a very busy past couple of weeks and I will write some updates today because I'm staying at home.