Hurricane Matthew 2016

The effects of Hurricane Matthew began on a Saturday morning, and thankfully Stuart was home with us!  At breakfast, he was trying to convince James that today would be the day that they would watch Star Wars together... 

We ended up at the museum instead - a wise choice since the boys don't do well staying inside all day long (it was absolutely pouring the rain, and neither wanted to go play outside in it after breakfast).  Even with all of the flash flood warnings, most of Durham seemed to have the same idea because it was very crowded! (However, I magically got some photos with only my people in them!)

After rest time, we made pizza for the boys to have for dinner.

And then after pizza, they decided it was time to play in the rain (as the evening went on, the rain got harder and the wind a smidge stronger - though we didn't really have any more than 15-20mph or so).

Around bedtime, I got this notification on my phone - ha! "Bad running weather today. Better tomorrow."

Saturday evening, just as Stuart arrived back home from picking up our grown up pizza (no deliveries available with the flood warnings), the power went out.  We were pretty surprised because we have never lost power before, and we have had several thunderstorms with much stronger winds than we experienced from this hurricane.  We are spoiled and used Stuart's AT&T hotspot to watch Netflix by candlelight.

However, the next morning the power was still out - coffee and reading by candlelight.

By lunch on Sunday, we started eating up the perishables as fast as we could (though we stuck some meat and a full gallon of milk in the freezer - did you know that a full freezer can hold it's temp below 32*F for 48 hours when the power is out?!).

The boys in their church get-ups with laundry hang drying in the back (weekend laundry was going full tilt when we lost power).

Sunday evening, still no power - dipped into our perishables for dinner.  All the essential macronutrients included (with a little EVOO added in)!

And here is Stuart wrapping up his Sunday evening, preparing for his 24/7 call week that would begin the next morning at 7am... by candlelight.  He's a good doctor and I love him for that.

(Our power came back on late that Sunday night a few weeks ago, but some counties in NC were still without power last week - schools have even been out waiting for power/water to become available again as far east as Johnston county, the county my mom works in, only 1 hour from us here in Durham!  Many counties are STILL dealing with flooding and are just now beginning to be able to go into homes and businesses closer to the coast and assess the damage.  Pray for these people and their communities.  Many of them only recently recovered financially (if they were able to at all) from bad hurricanes, with similar flooding situations, like Floyd and Fran in the 1990s).

Samuel Smith: 2 years (and some celebrations)

Only 2 months late on this birthday post (sorry babybear, I promise I don't love you any less!)... Have lots of posts in the queue, but due to the information released in the last post (pregnancy, yay!), I have had the lowest amount of energy ever in my entire life these past few months... So, now that I am feeling a bit more normal, we have a lot to catch up on!

These are all just photos of Sam right around his 2nd birthday, and all demonstrate things about him that we love:  his courage (or total lack of fear), his admiration and affection for his brother, his love for food and willingness to eat normal, grown up-type meals sometimes (I LOVE HIM for this), his goofy clumsiness and silliness, his curiosity, and his absolute ability to just be the most darling thing there ever was.

Birthday!  August 24th:

Breakfast surprise at Rise Donuts (a family favorite - this location has a toy corner with a kitchen and things, and the boys love to come here)

A trip to Raleigh to visit Marbles Children's Museum with Mema - lots to explore and play with

Lunch with Aunt Kay Kay

Homemade pizza for birthday boy dinner

The next day, we hit up the grocery to prepare for Sam's epic birthday party!

On party day, I woke up before the sun to make this excellent 4-layer chocolate cake (we almost ran out, despite it's humongous size!)

Party decor prep... (Yes, it was the end of August - ignore all the autumn-like leaves.  The river birches become unhappy in hot, dry weather and start throwing all their leaves on the ground!).  We had lots of food and played outside in the water.  Even though our grill ran out of gas (oops, poor planning), everyone still had a great time!

Sneaky Ezra got past my party balloon garland, meant to deter the kiddos from getting into the gardens

We waited until the party ended, and after rest time, to start opening presents.  Thank you to everyone who has loved on our family (and especially on Samuel) and for coming to celebrate with us!

Baby Markers

Many of you already know, but it's official:

Introducing Baby Markers (James has already named our baby, who is due March 25, making me 15 weeks! Apparently, the name is pretty much non-negotiable. And, yes, he does mean the things that you color with.)

Also, after this past year, I know that pregnancy announcements can be bittersweet for some women (including this one, for myself). If you are one of these women for whatever reason, please know that you are never alone. ❤️💔

Fellowship > Residency

We are almost 2 months into Stuart's career as a fellow physician, and it is already SO MUCH better than residency!  Last week, the boys were just finishing up dinner when I got a text from Stuart.  Expecting him to say that he was headed home, I was sorely disappointed when he said something came up so he would be at the hospital for a while.  I was so irritated!  That has never really been my reaction to that sort of text (which was very frequent during the 4 years of residency), but I realized it was the first time he had texted that in the past two months as a fellow, and so I had gotten so spoiled by him being home in the evenings like a normal person!  My attitude quickly changed and I realized how thankful I was for this new change of pace.

He is still working far more hours than an average full-time job, but compared to residency, it is just so lovely!  There have only been a handful of evenings that he has not been home in time for bedtime, whereas in residency he was more often than not home much later than the boys' bedtime.  And weekends!  One weekend a month, he has to go to the hospital each morning to round, but then he gets to come HOME!  He is still on call from home for the rest of that day (and night), but it means we can do normal weekend things together every single weekend (farmer's market! church!) as long as he doesn't leave Chapel Hill/Durham.





It does seem that there is far more work at home as a fellow than there was as a resident, but that just makes me look forward to the days that he is finished with training and has more control as an attending over his own schedule and research projects. But for now, yay fellowship!  The boys and I are very happy to spend more time with dad!

September lately

We have had a pretty relaxed month around here... Here's a brief idea of what we've been up to!

A trip to the dentist - the 1st time that Samuel sat in the big chair (though, it didn't last long... he wouldn't let them clean his teeth or anything!).  James did great!

While I was at work, my mom came down and found James making breakfast for himself (parenting win!)

Last weekend we moved James to a big boy bed, and he has done pretty well!  We talked about it some before making the switch and his response, every time, was that he wanted to stay in his crib. But once we switched, he hasn't looked back!  (The Paw Patrol sheets make him happy... much to my chagrin.  I got the cutest little woodland creature sheets that I will switch out when it's time for sheets laundry day!)  He certainly loves the freedom to play with toys instead of sit in bed (or go play in the sink in the bathroom...)  We currently have a baby gate up in his doorway to minimize him bothering Samuel in the other room during "nap time," but he has figured out how to stack up books and/or toys and jump over the gate if he wants to.  But at night, he falls right asleep and hangs out in his room until the clock turns green (his signal that it's actually morning and time to get up).

Brother shenanigans at home

Out for an evening picnic with best friend Ezra, who became a big brother recently!

Lots of relaxed mornings at home - I have really learned that a good balance for us is to have several mornings a week at home that aren't rushed.  We usually leave the house at some point, but sometimes it's not until 11am.  Other mornings we are up and right out the door (to church, Side by Side, morning exercise, farmer's market or appointments), but if we have time to linger at home and play, I always try to let us do that!

Sam is just awesome and hilarious these days... A 2 year birthday/recap post is in the works!