Tonight Kip and I went out for our second date night since Emma was born.  We had a nice dinner at Texas Roadhouse and then went to a movie.  We saw Fireproof with Kirk Cameron.  It was really good, and I’m excited that Kip was willing to take me to see a “chick flick”.  I highly recommend seeing the movie, just keep in mind that it was made with amateur actors.  I am so thankful that we also have the most awesome baby-sitter.  Hope everyone else had a Happy Mole Day!!!

Emma has hit a very frustrating and tiring milestone, well, it really isn’t a milestone, it is just a phase I wish we could move past.  We finally started being able to sleep through the night about a month and a half ago.  We quit being the kind of parent that went upstairs at the slightest stir to quiet and comfort so that Emma would learn to self sooth and put herself back to sleep.  It was great after only like four nights of me having to get up and turn the monitor off and sit up in the living room so that Kip could continue to sleep, she quit waking up.  Then suddenly, last night at 2:30 am, Emma woke screaming.  I almost went up stairs, but refrained and she did eventually quiet only to start screaming only fifteen minutes later.  I was concerned because we had only just lowered the level of the mattress in the crib that evening, and I was afraid her pacifier had fallen out under the crib bumper.  When I did get upstairs I was unable to find the paci in the crib, so I replaced it with a new one and she did eventually calm  herself down enough to go back to sleep.  In the morning I found the paci on the floor next to the crib.  I hoped that this was a one time occurrence and things would be back to normal this evening.  Well, as you can see by the time stamp of this post, and the possible incoherence of the rambling that it in fact has not gone back to normal as I had hoped.  (Thank goodness for spellchecker too.)  I’m going to check in the morning to see if Emma is finally cutting her first tooth and that is why sleeping all night and taking good naps during the day has once again become difficult for her.

She has calmed down and gone back to sleep, so I am too.
“Good night stars, good night air.  Good night noises everywhere.”

So today is an interesting day in the wonderful world of motherhood.  Both Emma and I are sick with colds.  So I’m learning very quickly that I have to put how feel on the back burner to take care of her, instead of only feeling icky myself.  What is really interesting, Emma doesn’t even act all that sick.  She is still happy when she sleeps enough, and cries when she is hungry or sleepy.  She just sneezes more, and has a runny nose.  She might feel as bad as I do, but I have no way of knowing that as she has yet to master the art of speech.  She is however really good at making lots of different sounds, to include the “mmmmmmmmmm” sound.  This could mean that she will say “Mama” first instead of “Dada”.  She is ever growing and changing.  We now let her sleep on her tummy, and she is growing like a weed.  At her last check-up she measured in at 13 pounds 11 ounces and 25 inches long.  I’ll try and keep you updated on other mommy moments.

I’d like to start this post out by wishing all you mommies out there a belated Happy Mother’s Day!  I just celebrated my very first Mother’s Day two days ago, and I’d have to say it went really well.  It has been a real blessing having Emma in our lives, and we both love her very much.  She made me a very special Mother’s Day gift (with Kip’s and my help of course).  She made a really good hand print, and had her daddy frame it so we could keep it forever.  And then Kip gave me a new Honda CR-V to replace the Ford that I had been driving since college.  True, we bought it a couple of weeks ago, but it was for Mother’s Day.  Kip also got up early and brought back breakfast from Bojangles’ this morning.

At church on Mother’s Day they always have three really pretty flower bouquets to honor the moms that regularly attend the church.  They draw three names from a bowl, and each lady got to pick her bouquet.  Each year they leave out the names of the moms who were picked the year before.  I think that is a very fair way to make sure the same ladies don’t get flowers each year.  Well, it was exciting because my name got pulled second, and you can see the pretty floral bouquet in the picture below.  So, all in all, I’ve had a really good first Mother’s Day!

PS: You can see just how much Emma has grown in the picture.  She is getting so big, and beautiful!

We’re having a baby GIRL!

Kip and I went to the doctor’s office on Tuesday and we learned that our baby is a girl.  It was exciting until they got started and we found out that Emma (that will be her name by the way) had decided to be camera shy.  It took about thirty minutes to get a decent shot of her face in the “4D” view.  I actually thought that the 2D view looked better than the 4D view.  (You can judge for yourself, but we think it looks weird.  In fact, Kip thinks the fourth dimension they are referring to must be creepiness.  Sorry, he made me put that in here.)  The technician kept shaking and poking my belly to try to get her to roll over, but somehow it gave her the hiccups.  It was actually really cute to see her with the hiccups because her whole body would spasm, but I still can’t feel it.  It is amazing just how much I love her already, just from seeing her on the monitor.  We think she is going to have my nose, chin, and (sadly) my feet.  You can see for yourself in the picture of her feet.  I had fun today getting out all of the baby girl’s clothes that we already have (from numerous yard sales over the last few months) and washing them so they will be ready for Emma’s auspicious arrival next March.

Other exciting news on the baby front
I actually felt the baby move Friday night.  She decided to finally let me know she was down there.  It feels a lot like somebody is thumping you, but from the inside out.  She is especially active in the last hour or so before I go to bed in the evenings.  She also will roll around if I wake up in the middle of the night.

And in case you haven’t noticed, the pictures link to larger versions of the sonograms.

My what a big month April was.  Kip and I had our second anniversary, as he posted about, there was Easter, I decided exactly when I would be quiting my job, and I have sprained my foot pretty seriously by falling down the stairs at church on Easter Sunday.  That is correct ladies and gentlemen, I said fell down an entire flight of stairs, and as it was on Easter Sunday, I was dressed appropriately in my new Easter outfit.  I was told that my skirt did not go over my head though, so I managed to remain modest on my quick trip down to the basement of the church.  So, I spent my Easter Sunday in the emergency room of Northeast Medical Center in Concord, NC.  I fell down the stairs because the heel of my shoe caught on the step and I lost my balance.  I am very heart broken because the very tip of the heel, or the grip of the heel, broke off when I fell down, and those were the shoes that I wore on my wedding day.  They are irreplaceable.  After spending the day in the emergency room, having a pregnancy test (it was negative for those of you keeping track or at all interested), having four x-rays taken, and waiting for quite awhile, we learned that they couldn’t see that anything was broken, so they think it is simply a sprain.  However, the doctor told us that if it still hurt after a few days I should to to the orthopedist to have them do a more thorough exam of my foot.  Well, it is now several weeks later and I still have a sore foot, and it pops almost daily.  On the shoe front, Kip took me to the mall and I bought the cutest flat ballet slippers that were eyelet material to match my Easter skirt perfectly (the same one that I fell down the stairs in).  Of course they were flats as I have pretty much decided to give up high heels for the time being until my foot heals and I will be able to walk in them again.  I shared all of that to share that within the month of buying these brand new shoes, that I absolutely adored, I ruined them too.  I wanted to wear them to Scott’s (and for those of you living under a rock, that is my brother-in-law) graduation ceremony at High Point University.  I didn’t expect it to be such a miserable day, or that we would be sitting on folding chairs on the lawn.  Needless to say, wet grass and perfectly white cloth shoes do not mix in a positive fashion.  The shoes are now grass stained, and no longer white.  I did enjoy Scott’s graduation, and the fun of listening to the arguing African-American family that sat directly in front of us for the better part of the ceremony, and listening to Bill Cosby give the graduation address without having planned a speech (we think).  All in all, it was an ok day.  I go to the doctor on Monday to see how my foot is doing, and exactly what is wrong with it.  I’ll keep you posted on the foot and shoe fronts as the week progresses.

I recently was asked to come into work on a Saturday at my place of employ.  I have no problem with coming in to work on a Saturday if my work requires that I come in to finish something that has not fully been completed during normal business hours.  However, this day was a mandatory work day for the entire company, and the area in which I work had nothing pressing to accomplish that day.  Instead, the upstairs lab came in to work solely to clean the lab from top to bottom.  True, it needed this scrub down terribly, but still not badly enough to make us come in on a Saturday.  And that isn’t even the worst of the situation.  We were required to come into work at 5:30 am!!!  On a normal day I don’t go into work until 7:30 am, but on mandatory Saturday workdays, we have to go in two hours earlier, to clean.  We were also in no way compensated for coming into work that day.  Normally I would expect to receive time off back in place for this extra time we were putting in, but no that didn’t happen.  Also, if I decided not to come in on Saturday, they would take a day of vacation from me, even though I already put forty full hours that week.

There were about three other problems I had with coming to work this particular Saturday.  Shall I tell you about them??   I think I will even if you don’t like it.  The first being that I acquired a small chemical burn from the chemical cleaner that we were using to clean the lab.  I accidentally sprayed some of the cleaner on my forearm and about thirty minutes later, I had four or five nickel sized whelps on my arm.  They are now just a few red spots on my arm, but it has been over a week since it happened.  The second thing I had a problem with was that one of the other people I work with somehow managed to do practically no cleaning at all in a full eight hours.  He spent most of the day sitting at his desk chatting with everyone else in the lab while they cleaned around him.  When our bosses came back up to the lab, he continues to simply talk to them instead of clean while the rest of us cleaned our little tooshies off.  Well, needless to say, we cleaned and cleaned and he got the credit for it.  He has made procrastination a true art form.

I know this wasn’t exactly a fun or exciting post, but hey, at least I finally got around to making one!!!  Have a great day!!

What is the deal?  Tonight, Kip and I were stopping by BJ’s to pick up milk on our way home from church, and they were closed.  It was 8:30 in the pm, and they are usually open until at least 9 pm if not later.  That wasn’t the part that annoyed me though.  I don’t have a problem with businesses closing early, I have a problem with businesses closing early and not announcing to their customers in some form of LARGE sign saying that they are closed at this time and for this reason.  But no, BJ’s did not do this courtesy for their customers.  Instead they had an employee stand at the closed and locked automatic doors and yell at you that the store was closed.  Which brings me to the real reason for this rant.  I do not, and I will repeat, DO NOT appreciate being yelled at by a sales person, whose sole job is to satify the customer, for something that I was not previously informed of, like the closing time of a store prior to its normal time of closing.  And more to the point, it was the way that she informed me of their closing.  I walked up to the automatic doors and when they didn’t open, I began to search for a reason as to why they didn’t open, like the aforementioned sign.  The employee proceeded to stare at me, and then shouted “WE’RE CLOSED” very angrily and slowly I might add, as if I were currently trying to pry the automatic doors open with my bare hands while wearing my church clothes like some crazed lunatic.  As I walked away it occurred to me that tomorrow is a holiday and that could be the reason for the early closing.  But as I got back in the car with Kip, we realized that tomorrow is a holiday, but not one of the major ones like Christmas Eve or New Year’s Eve or President’s Day Eve.  All of those holidays might merit leaving early to attend a party of function of some kind.  But who really goes to a Martin Luther King Jr. Eve party???  I mean, it can’t really be a holiday as I have to work tomorrow and so does Kip.

Today at work, I did absolutely nothing productive.  Now some of you might think, “Yeah, right.  It just feels like you did nothing productive.”  But, truly, I did absolutely nothing at work today.  Everything I touched turned into waste that I threw out at the end of the day.  So to pass the time of this interminably long day, I came up with an idea for the post that I am now making.  (And yes, I do realize that a similar question was posed on “The Office” in Season 2.)

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island for the rest of your life, and were allowed to take five movies with you, what would those movies be?  Ground rules being that any mode of movie is allowed be it VHS, DVD, reel-to-reel, etc, and compilations or multi-disc movies count as a single movie.

My personal TOP 5 (“High Fidelity” geeks are enjoying this) are as follows:

5:  Sahara
Matthew McConaughey...need I really say more?  However, I will humor you.  This movie is excellent in my opinion.  The relationship between McConaughey and Zahn (Al in the movie) is hilarious, and neither of them is bad to look at for two hours over and over again.

4:  Anne of Green Gables Box Set
Ok so there really isn’t a box set, but it is a movie divided into three parts (the last one being absolutely fictitious and not from the books), and I want all of them.  It’s my list, so I make the rules.  It is a wonderful story, and has sentimental value between Kip and myself.

3:  Legally Blonde
We all know that deep down inside, we all wish we were blonde.  The movie is so funny, and cute, and corny, and great that it has to be on everyone’s’ list.

2:  Pride and Prejudice  (The A&E version only, any other version is a sheer abomination.)
This movie is by far one of my favorites.  I love the book, and this is the most accurate adaptation I have ever seen.  The acting is phenomenal, the clothes are classic and accurate, and the actors themselves really fit the parts (can you say Colin Firth is Mr. Darcy).  The music is excellent as well.

And at the top of my list...

1:  Kip and Stephanie’s Honeymoon Video from Hawaii
If I’m going to be stranded on an island for the rest of my life without my husband there in person, I at least want to be able to see the two of us together while we were both very happy, in a beautiful location.  I would miss him too terribly to not have some part of him there with me.  I’m sure all of you are thinking that is the dumbest, corniest pick yet, but I don’t care.  I love Kip!!

Now it is your turn.  Post your lists if you dare allow the rest of the world (or at least our readers) know exactly what kind of person you really are.

I know, I know, it has been way too long since I last posted anything on the site.  I’m sorry to all those who are just waiting to hear what is happening in my life lately.  Well, here’s the scoop...

Kip and I are officially an uncle and aunt respectfully!!  My older sister, Emily, gave birth to a bright-eyed baby girl on August 2nd!! Riley Paige was welcomed into the world by a very loving and happy family to meet her.  Though I haven’t seen her yet in person, and I can’t wait to do so at Thanksgiving, there are pictures of her online for those of you curious to see what she looks like.  She definitely looks like Emily as far as her hair goes (Emily was born with a full head of dark black hair, who’d have thought that she would be a total blonde).  Riley does have Dustin’s very distinct forehead though.  I think she is just so precious and I love her to pieces already!!!

I’m now officially the Nursery Coordinator at church.  I find it ironic that the only married lady without children in the church should be in charge of the ministry that takes care of all the babies in the church.  My duties (go ahead, laugh, I know you want to) include: organizing the schedule of who works in the nursery when, making sure there are enough snacks and diapers and whatnot in supply, and creating a working list of nursery policies to be followed while working in the nursery.  That last one I actually took on myself simply because to my knowledge there wasn’t one, and we weren’t exactly following the recommended policies to the full extent to which they covered.  The first job was the schedule, which I know you are thinking sounds really easy.  Well, it isn’t as easy as one might think.  You have to take into account who teaches Sunday school, who is scheduled to play the piano and organ during the church services, who teaches AWANA on Wednesdays, who has a preferred time slot that they like to work, who doesn’t want to serve a whole lot, and who loves to serve and wishes they were always in there.  I have to also make sure that people are getting into the services regularly to hear some good preaching.  It was kind of complicated to begin with, but I got the hang of it.  So I think as far as that goes I’m doing ok.  I do know that I have the full support of my husband, the pastor is behind the changes I’ve made (though he doesn’t want me to offend people with creating too many changes suddenly as people are often resistant to change), and the police officer and his family that attend our church.

Another big development at church is this years Christmas play.  I have been asked to direct the acting portion of the performance.  I am very excited about this, but also extremely nervous, as I have never actually directed before.  Those of you who know me already know that I am extremely dramatic, so it isn’t that much of a stretch to see me teaching other people how to be dramatic.  But still, it is a little different when you are acting in the performance as well.  That’s right, ladies and gentlemen.  I’m also acting in the play.  The lady I had cast as Mom, decided that she had too much to do this fall, which I respect as she is a school teacher with tests and papers to grade.  So the task fell to me to portray Mom in this year’s performance of “A Peanut Butter Christmas”.  We will be performing on December 17th, in the evening service, if you are interested in coming and watching.

I guess that gets everybody caught up on my life.  If you didn’t want to know all the cool things happening, well, then why did you read my post??  If you did want to know all the cool things happening, now you know, and knowing is half the battle!! :)