Samuel: 7 months

Happy 7 months to this best little buddy!  He is working on the bottom two teeth (come on teeth, just pop through already!), continuing to sleep like a champ, and loves to eat!  He is starting to make lots of fun consonant sounds, our favorite of which is "dadadadada."  He notices little details on toys like tags and rings, and everything goes in his mouth. He wants to move so bad, but only ends up scooting backward when he tries to crawl. He is happy all the time and is such a joyful blessing in our home!

Is this summer?

Today was an odd and wonderful combination of productivity, rest and fun.  Most if our days around home are only one of the above (if not just "survive").

A friend from church told me about For Garden's Sake, a garden center about 10 minutes away that has loads of plants (yay for me!) and goats, chickens, alpacas and a koi pond (yay for kids!). We went this morning, as we've been building up plans for our gardens this year.  It was gorgeous weather and we had a blast.  James woke up from his nap later and asked to go back.  We'll definitely return (once they get more warm weather herb and veggie plants in)!

Sam napped once we got home, so James and I worked outside.  Don't be fooled by his winter hat... He insisted on wearing it when I asked him where my gardening hat was (which we never found).

James got some bloody knees and a busted lip when he tripped over his too-big-Crocs, and we both got a little sunburn.  First of the season (whoops)!  James also enjoyed a strawberry-pineapple-yogurt Popsicle out of the freezer from last summer. He ate all of it - must still be good!

Sam took a long early evening nap, so James and I played and cleaned and colored with markers.  We're having our community group over for a St. Party's dinner tonight, and everything is all ready for that even. So productive!

It's just been a really sweet day with these two little boys. And because the weather's been so beautiful, I think we're all in great spirits. Is this what summer feels like with kids? I hope so!

The big 2-9 and a stool sample

My birthday was this past weekend, and it's been a nice, long, drawn out celebration (that isn't finished yet!).  I worked Wednesday, and my mom stayed that night again to watch the boys so that Stuart and I could go out to a residency dinner.  Free food and drinks!  I actually got there quite late after my shift ran long (busy day!), but I was able to enjoy a little bit of adult downtime with Stuart.  We stopped by the Cheesecake Factory on the way home and picked up dessert (and some for my mama, because she had a bad, poopy day with the boys at home... I could share details, but it's just gross!  Though, it is a part of my birthday story... Read on).

Thursday morning, my mama hung around for a while, so I got to run some errands by myself.  She offered for me to go get a haircut and be pampered, but I went to Lowe's and bought plants instead (priorities!).  Thursday evening, Stuart came home a little early and we went out to Only Burger for a birthday eve dinner, and to celebrate Stuart submitting his fellowship application (a big life milestone for us!).

On Friday morning, my birthday proper, I took the little boys and myself to Foster's Market for brunch after Samuel's first nap (side note:  I also collected a stool sample to take to our pediatrician for James during that nap... Never imagined I would be doing that activity on my birthday...).  Everyone was mostly well-behaved at Foster's and it was quite enjoyable!  Then, I got this text from Stuart:

So we had chicken and biscuits for my birthday lunch.  Around 4:30pm, Stuart had to go back to the hospital because he was on call and unable to switch his shift.  Then, I got a phone call from the pediatrician that James' stool sample was negative for what I was most afraid of (C.diff) - so hallelujah for that.  Still waiting on some other results to figure out what is going on with my dear boy's digestive tract... Then, I made cupcakes for myself:



And some girlfriends came over Friday night after the boys went to bed.  We enjoyed drinks and desserts and good conversation!

Saturday I got to do a lot of gardening (got all those plants in the dirt!) and we ordered pizza in that night.

Sunday evening we went out for a fancy dinner with my parents.  The boys wore their Easter outfits and were quite dapper:









We went to Harvest 18, a new-ish restaurant in Durham (their 1 year anniversary is actually the 22nd of this month), but the owner has two other restaurants in Raleigh, one of which my sister worked at for several years.  The manager recognized my dad, and then comped us some dessert at the end of dinner.  All her years of fine dining food service finally paying off ;)







Happy birthday to me!  Stuart and I are going to Hanging Rock this weekend while the little boys stay with Mema and P/paw.  Yay for a mountain get away!

Snow Day 2015: Take 3

We had our biggest snow of the year last week - 6 whole inches!  This actually is more than we usually get, and it was so soft and packed really great!  Melting snowmen still line the streets of our neighborhood.

Then, over the weekend we had a little ice and freezing rain.  The roads were a little slick Sunday morning, but it was all melted by Sunday afternoon as it got a bit warmer.

All of these photos were taken a few days after the "big" snow because (see below) I had to work on the actual snow day.  A lot had melted by the time I was able to enjoy playing in it, but the hospital did provide some great views of a snowy Chapel Hill!

The following photos are from Thursday morning, in the middle of all the snow falling.  The trees were beautiful!  Though, also apparently quite heavy, because several fell and caused power outages throughout our area (thankfully not our home).

We considered driving to UNC before it started snowing on Wednesday night, but sleeping at the hospital is not fun.  So, we decided to risk it and just go early on Thursday.  I had to be there at 6:45am, so we left by 5:30am to make sure we had plenty of time (turns out that Stuart actually didn't have to go in at all because all of his clinics were closed, but he didn't want me to drive alone, so he just went in and helped since everyone was short-staffed due to the weather anyway!).  We took it slow and had no real trouble... and we were there around 6am!

The hospital is at the top of a long hill, and this little Honda was stuck in the snow at the bottom.  Stuart hopped out and gave them a push...

Success!  However, they struggled all the way up the hill... and we eventually passed them.  Hope they made it!

Arrived safely in the parking deck.

Some L&D nurses made these little snowbabies.

We love snow days here (even when we have to work, though my preference is to be at home!).  But now that we've had 2 weeks of them, I'm ready for all the snow to finally melt and just move on!  Come on, spring!  (And, Happy March!)