Dear Tradd and Jackson, Today was your last day of Preschool and to say it's bittersweet is an understatement. The entire week has been very emotional, not because I expected it to last forever, but because I literally blinked and it was over. When a baby is born everything is measured in "firsts"...first steps, first haircuts, first beach trips and just as miraculously as these milestones happen, they are gone. Suddenly these "firsts" become the things that fill the ordinary days. That same baby, unsure of his steps just months earlier, is running a thousands steps a day...that same soft baby hair we painstakingly saved in a little envelope just months earlier falls to the floor of "the haircut store" to be swept away with a stranger's...that same baby runs straight for the waves instead of running from them every time it touches his tiny toes. "Firsts" are ordinary happenings....until they start to become "lasts".
Jackson
You started Preschool at 18 months old at Holland Avenue Baptist Church. We started at HABC because Mama's best friends, Ms. Carla and Ms. Stephanie had children enrolled there and I knew nothing about the preschools in Lexington. It was really a time for you to play with other children your age {besides each other} and it gave me an opportunity to go to the gym and run a few errands. Your teachers, Ms. Melissa and Ms. Lisa, were wonderful and loved you very much.
Tradd posing with his bookbag
First Day at Holland Avenue
The next year we decided to move you to Lexington Baptist in downtown Lexington...we loved Holland Avenue, but Mama was driving from Lexington to West Columbia and back again. I was spending an hour of time driving too and from so we just needed somewhere closer to home. I had one friend, Ashley Jackson, who was going to be enrolling her little one, Price at LBC. Your daddy was out of town the morning that I was suppose to be up at the crack of dawn to enroll you, so Ms. Ashley came by our house to get your forms and enrolled you when she enrolled Price. So many times I think about how thankful I am that she was kind enough to do that for us.
First Day of Two's
Last Day of Two's
From the Two's with Ms. Liz and Ms. Tara, to the Three's with Mrs. Dunlap and Mrs. Boyd and finally the four's with Ms. Linda and Ms. Brandi, you have been blessed with teachers who loved you. I know you would be different had you not gone to preschool. Sure, you would most certainly know your numbers and shapes and even the alphabet, but these Godly women helped mama and daddy teach you about sharing, friendship, and MOST importantly about Jesus. I do think "it takes a village to raise a child"...but I also believe it takes the "right" village. We found it.
First Day of Three's
Last Day of Three's
At your 3 year program
As with everything in life, the relationships that grow from experiences are often what you remember. I had no idea how much my own life would be changed by the families we would meet through preschool. As a young mother, I needed validation. I needed someone to listen to me about potty training and naptime and tell me I would make it. And just as God would have it, from these conversations grew friendships with women whom I now love. They have made me a better mama to you.
First Day of Four's
You are ready for Kindergarten. You have asked me a million times when it starts {soon enough}, if you can take your lunch {yes}, and if you can ride the bus {no, mama's not ready for that}...You are ready to move on. So the end of Preschool marks our first major "last" in your short little life.
Your teacher, Ms. Linda
Last Day of Four's
At Your Graduation from Preschool
My precious ones, your daddy and I have so many hopes for you both. We talk about what we think you might be when you grow up...we talk about letting you go a little at a time...and we are already praying for your spouses. We are anxious to see what God's best for your lives will look like....from the very front row. I love you.
Size of baby: 14 1/2 inches long, head to heel, and weighs about a two pounds
Maternity Clothes: Took the boys swimming with friends today and I have decided that being pregnant in a bathing suit is the bomb...no worries that you just ate lunch and 2 cupcakes!
Stuff is bulging out everywhere so it doesn't matter!
Gender: It's a BOY!
Movement: Feeling him move ALL the time...It is so hard to describe the feeling of a baby moving inside of you to someone who's never felt it, and I will miss this most about pregnancy. I love that it's "just between us."
Sleep: Sleeping well...
taking one Tylenol PM on the nights when I have a hard time falling
asleep and i don't feel foggy the next morning.
What I miss: Small-ish thighs
Cravings: Still lovin' regular Coke and just saw a commercial for a
DOUBLE STUFF OREO SONIC BLAST...
sweet mercy
I don't want to forget....I have been going through the clothes that I kept from the boys and they have been so precious with the teeny tiny stuff....saying "awwwwww this is so cute, mama...is our baby gonna be this tiny?" So sweet...I wish I could bottle their excitement and give it back to them in a few years when this one destroys one of their toys...ha!
I have to say that I have been proud of myself for posting so consistently with these weekly {or close too it} updates...but there is more to the story. My best girl, Micah, said she'd make me a GIaNT chocolate cake if I kept it up...so here's to the challenge! love you, M!
I have been a total slacker lately...mainly because I am almost 7 months pregnant. That's all I got. So in an effort to bring you up to speed on our little life let's use bullets, shall we?
Tradd and Jackson and I had a hankering for some homemade chocolate chip cookies (read: their mama is almost 7 months pregnant and sometimes these things just come over her) After Kelly and Nina both mentioned them, it just had to be done. You can find the recipe here. Only change I would make is to add less salt...maybe 1/2 teaspoon instead of 1 teaspoon.
Lee has been working so hard in our yard over the past 2 months. He (and some REALLY GREAT friends) laid the sod, and he has planted every shrub. He has saved us so much money and I am really proud of him...our yard is just beautiful. It makes me smile just to pull in the driveway.
The boys are wrapping up their second season of t-ball and it's been a really fun year. Lee was not planning on being a head coach this year, but a week before practices were to start we got a call requesting that he consider it because the t-ball league was 6 coaches short. He agreed (after quickly asking a few buddies to help him) and so team Gilligan's had a Head Shrimp. Both boys have really improved this year, but they still get distracted when a butterfly makes its way on to the field or if a friend from preschool is on the other team, but I digress.
I also have to tell you about E-mealz! My cousin told me about this months ago and after moving and getting settled, Lee and I decided to try it for our family. Basically, E-mealz is a service to help you plan dinner for a week. It can be customized for the grocery store at which you shop and even diet requirements (low carb, low fat, etc). The BEST news though is that I just won a free three month subscription on another blog! Yay me!!!
Size of baby: 13 1/2 inches long, head to heel, and weighs about a pound and a half
Maternity Clothes: Wearing all maternity clothes now, but my workout gear looks weird...still wearing my normal shorts and they look ridiculous! ha!
Gender: It's a BOY!
Movement: Feeling him move ALL the time...especially when I lay down at night to finally go to sleep. This this little one will be a night owl like his mama.
That cold February day wasn't Mother's Day, but it's the day that I became a mother. That day is etched into my mind as the day I came into the fullness of what God intended for me to be.
A dream realized.
This was the first time I saw Tradd...
and Jackson....
This was today. Every Mother's Day we go on a picnic...today we talked about picnics past and what next year's picnic will be like. The boys giggled when we told them that their baby brother will probably be crawling around on the blanket. I try every chance I get to talk with them about how our lives will change with this new baby...I want them to know that things will different, but some things will never change.
I will always hold them when they ask me.
I will always tuck them in at night.
I will always stop and play with them.
I will always hold them in my lap.
I want them to know that love does not divide...it multiplies, so there will always be enough.
I need you to do something for me...yes, you. Some of you reading this are my family, some my best friends, some of you are in my small group at church, some are friends on Facebook, some of you I workout with, some of you are in Junior League with me and still some of you I've never met...but I need you all to do me a tremendous favor. Give me 5 minutes of your time.
First, let me tell you why. I don't believe in coincidence. I don't believe in luck. I think that when we have a "chance" meeting with someone, or when things "go our way" that God is tapping us on the shoulder to remind us that He is very real and at work in our lives. I know that both of these are shallow examples, but my point is when good things happen to us we give God credit. Athletes point to heaven when they make the winning touchdown, singers (sometimes) thank God when they win a Grammy, when we think our prayers are answered we say another prayer of thanks.
But what about when things don't just fall into place for us?
When we don't get the new job we want. When we can't get pregnant. When our parent dies to young. When friendships fall apart. Who's in charge of that?
The song that I am about to share with you has changed me. I heard it one day on the radio, but didn't quite catch all the lyrics. Then a few weeks later, another blogger mentioned it. I thought to myself "there's that song again," enjoyed the post and moved on. A week ago, I was talking to my cousin Elizabeth and in the course of our conversation this song came back to me. I immediately had to pull it up and read part of the lyrics to her over the phone. And then yesterday it happened again...I was all by myself riding down the road thinking and talking to myself. When I came to a stop light I realized the radio was off, so I clicked on the radio and this song was just starting...GOD was tapping me on the shoulder. I earnestly believe that He kept putting it in front of me so that I would stop long enough to not just listen to it but to hear it.
Today while HEARING it for the 1,000 time I thought of so many of you that I want to hear this song.... some of you are my family, some my best friends, some of you are in my small group at church, some are friends on Facebook, some of you I workout with, some of you are in Junior League with me and still some of you I've never met. Will you take 4 minutes and 43 seconds to hear this song?
We pray for blessings
We pray for peace
Comfort for family, protection while we sleep
We pray for healing, for prosperity
We pray for Your mighty hand to ease our suffering
All the while, You hear each spoken need
Yet love us way too much to give us lesser things
Cause what if Your blessings come through raindrops
What if Your healing comes through tears
What if a thousand sleepless nights
Are what it takes to know You’re near
What if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise
We pray for wisdom
Your voice to hear
And we cry in anger when we cannot feel You near
We doubt Your goodness, we doubt Your love
As if every promise from Your Word is not enough
All the while, You hear each desperate plea
And long that we'd have faith to believe
Cause what if Your blessings come through raindrops
What if Your healing comes through tears
What if a thousand sleepless nights
Are what it takes to know You’re near
And what if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise
When friends betray us
When darkness seems to win
We know the pain reminds this heart
That this is not, this is not our home,
It's not our home
Cause what if Your blessings come through raindrops
What if Your healing comes through tears
And what if a thousand sleepless nights
Are what it takes to know You’re near
What if my greatest disappointments
Or the aching of this life
Is the revealing of a greater thirst this world can’t satisfy
And what if trials of this life
The rain, the storms, the hardest nights
Are Your mercies in disguise
I'd love to hear what you think...won't you leave me a comment too?