Cuteness

Just thought I would post three cute pictures of Charles that I ran across while downloading from our camera. The first one is a quite awkward pose we found him in one night - we check on him nightly, and it was a priceless photo op! How can that be comfortable? The second one is of him in his new shoes. He loves them and brings them to me every morning, sits down, lifts his feet and says, "shoes, shoes" until I put them on him. The last picture is of Charles sitting on his UGA stool acting like a gorilla. Jacob taught him how to beat (pat) his chest and say, "oh, oh, oh," to impersonate one. His favorite book is Goodnight, Gorilla so we get to see this trick often.

For Sale By Owner

Yes, we put our For Sale By Owner sign out today, with a tear or two shed as well. Even though we feel like it is our time to close the chapter on our time here in Birmingham, it is still difficult to imagine life in a new city. I feel like we just arrived here in a U-Haul after 4.5 hours on I-20 from Augusta. I have been through a roller coaster of emotions these days thinking about leaving B'ham and starting new friendships and routines in Charleston. Yes, the pregnancy hormones are playing a part in the ups and downs, but this city holds many memories over the last four years. During our time here, we bought our first home, traveled to Europe and Africa, nursed my dad back to health after a triple bypass surgery at UAB, had our first child, and celebrated our 5th wedding anniversary and 10th New Year's Eve together.

We will greatly miss our first church joined as a married couple, Red Mountain Church, and our community group that we have been a part of over the years. We will miss our friends and extended family that we spent so much time with. We will miss our afternoons at the Zoo, Botanical Gardens, library and our typical Thursday night takeout at Shangri-La or dining out at El Cazador. We will definitely miss our comfortable house that we put so much love into and made our own.

With all this being said, we do look forward to starting our next chapter in Charleston. We will have our second child shortly after arriving and hopefully a few more while we are there. If it's in the plan, we look forward to buying our second home and setting up a big boy room for Charles and nursery for Baby 2 (and maybe even a second bathroom)! We will hopefully find a new church home and a new community of friends along with reconnecting with old ones. We look forward to being closer to Jacob's parents, siblings, and my dad. Jacob is ready to begin his cardiology fellowship (the last stop before private practice) and beginning a new phase of learning. We dream about having the month of June off with days filled with naps and beach time - I can not wait for long walks in the sand with cute little bare feet and backs to nibble on. Jacob has even discussed with Charles his future plans of special fishing trips. It will be fun to be tourists for a while in our new city and visit the Battery, Fort Moultrie, the beaches, Rainbow Row, City Market, and the Aquarium - of course, we welcome visitors to share our new city with!

Yes, I know you might be wondering why am I already bidding farewell to B'ham, but at this moment of less than four months left and putting the sign out in our yard, I felt it was an appropriate time to share my memories, anticipations, and fears. I might not have the time to blog this much over the next few months - I have a feeling that life is about to get a lot more hectic!

Snow in the South?

Yes, it's hard to believe, but the final winter we are enjoying in Birmingham provided a short snowfall last Saturday morning. We had fun wheeling Charles around in his little red wagon and letting him eat the snow!

And Then There Were 4!

Yes, it's official....we are pregnant! I've slowly started telling people, but felt I could post it on the blog after we heard the heartbeat. I went in for my 12 week checkup yesterday, and heard that wonderful fast paced heartbeat. I am definitely feeling pregnant - tired all the time, starting to "pooch" out, and a tad bit emotional these days! Thankfully, I have escaped the morning sickness once again so I should not be complaining. We are due at the end of July, about 7 weeks after moving to Charleston. Speaking of, please pray for that period of selling and buying houses, moving, and welcoming Baby 2 into the family. Also, please pray that Charles is as excited about this little one as we are. They will be about 21 months apart so hopefully they will bond in the years to come. Well, I'm off for my daily nap...

Welcome to the 30 Club!

Jacob just turned 30 on a few weeks ago, and I just wanted to announce this milestone to our friends and family! I surprised him by setting up a night away at Ross Bridge Resort here in Birmingham. It was one of the most difficult things I've decided to do - leaving Charles for the first night ever was easier said than done. Our sweet cousins, the Watts Family, volunteered to have Charles come have a "slumber party" with their children, and so the planning began.

On the day of Jacob's birthday, I filled him in our plans, and he was so excited to have a nice romantic dinner and a night with just the two of us. Even though Charles is normally asleep by 7pm every night, it's never a night away from the tv, email, and phones. So, this night would be totally devoted to each other and celebrating Jacob's day. Yes, I cried all the way to the Watt's house with pictures in my head of Charles waking up in the middle of the night crying out for his mommy or him screaming the whole time. But as we were saying our goodbyes, Charles barely looked up from this fun keyboard the kids were playing with. I felt much better to see he could survive without mommy, and we were off to our date night!

We had a yummy dinner and night alone. I am embarassed to tell anyone what time we were asleep, but let's just say we did not make it to the David Letterman show. We were quite refreshed the next morning and ready to pick Charles up by 9am. He gave the biggest grin when we walked in the door, and he got rave reviews from the kids. He had a ball playing with his cousins, which was a special time for all of them. Thank you Watts Family for our first night away! Should we book New York next?

Christmas in the South

Better late than never for a Christmas post, but here it is! Charles and I traveled to to SOWEGA, aka Albany, Georgia, the weekend before Christmas to visit my family. It was nice to relax there and spend time with Nana and Uncle Jim. We came back to the homestead for a few days and went to the Zoolight Safari - it was fun for Charles to visit and pet the animals which he is quite interested in these days!

Then Jacob, Charles and I traveled to Augusta to spend Christmas with Jacob's entire family - all 18 of them! Yes, we all fit in his parents' house, quite comfortably I might add. There was plenty of closet space to fit the pack 'n plays for all the grandkids. We filled our days with catching up with each other's lives, cooking yummy food, playing Guitar Hero and ping pong, and playing with all the grandchildren. We gave Charles a red wagon which he was not too keen of on Christmas morning, but he has grown to love it now that we're home in familiar surroundings! I think he was more interested in the books than the wagon - we think he will grow to be a mini-Jacob as far as reading is concerned!

It was a neat to start looking at Christmas in Charles' eyes - yes, we want it to be filled with Santa and presents, but more importantly, we want the true meaning of Christmas to be at the forefront of his mind. Our hope in the years to come is to instill in our children that Christmas is about Jesus and his birth - we started traditions of Advent, reading the Christmas Story and some other things that I hope Charles will understand in the the coming years. And I would love for him to be just as excited about Jesus as much as Santa and Christmas lights - such a balancing act.

Priceless

I just had to post this cute picture - it was taken a while back when we were visiting Jacob's parents for Thanksgiving. He is just learning to walk (Charles that is) and is on his way to bed. Notice he has Elvis the elephant in his right hand - he usually carries him by his trunk.