Easter in Nashville 2012 (part 2)

James got a kite in his Easter basket.  It was the first time he had really seen one.  Pop's and Nonie's yard is the perfect place for kite flying!

Daddy got it started...

James even held on to it for awhile ;)

The sun was a little much for James' eyes.

Naw...he's ok ;)

Mommy got to give it a try.

James' favorite part was running after the kite tails!

Love this face!

Nonie and Pops hid eggs for James to find in the yard.

Here James is shaking the egg to see if this one has a piece of candy in it.  If it didn't, he would throw it back on the ground!  (hmm...I think he might have learned that from some of his cousins!)

Here is Pops trying not to be obvious, but being VERY obvious, as he points out eggs to James that he had missed!  hahahaha.

Playing on the play set :)

So during naps one day, I decided to try out Reese's kite.  It was a mini kite, and it was seriously the funniest thing you ever saw.  This tiny little kite flying in the sky.  You can't tell how tiny it is in this picture, so you have to try to find it in the picture below.

The yellow kite is the normal sized kite.  The mini kite is the red one in front of the tree kind of above my head.  (I guess you had to be there :)

Boy, Kramer has it made here in Franklin, TN

It's his home away from home :)

Yeah, this is the life!

Easter in Nashville 2012 (Part 1)

We celebrated Easter in Nashville this year.  What a restful, fun time as we remembered what Christ did for us!  

Early on Easter Sunday morning, Daddy and Pops got up before James (which is EARLY!) and set out the jelly bean trail leading to his Easter basket.  James loved it!

Good Morning!

Following the trail (eating a few as he went a long)

Cheese!

around the couch...

almost there!

Found it!

(Reese was still asleep so we gave her basket to her later)

There was a beautiful garden area at Nonie and Pop's church where we found a perfect photo opportunity!

Nonie and Pops

With the kiddos :)

Sweet ;)

Trying to get some good Easter pics of her, but she was just too much on the move.

Oh BOY! All Boy!

Our son is something else (at almost 3 years).  We LOVE him, but can I just say he is a wonderful mess right now!  Here are some pictures from day to day that sum up our sweet, but busy, James.

James still loves to be outside.  He found a caterpillar the other day and drove it around in his dump truck.  Poor caterpillar :)

James enjoys getting away with whatever he can concerning Reese.  I left them alone in her room for a minute, and when I came back, James had gotten as many blankets as he could and nearly covered her up!

Even though we are working with James on "sharing" with Reese, and even though she gets the occasionally shove, James completely adores her.  

He still loves loves loves bath time and enjoys the occasional mohawk curl :)

He ALWAYS wants to be outside, and now he has a little observer :)

Soaking wet from playing in water....he is yelling "mommy I all wet!"

Recently James has been showing a "sneaky" side where he "hides" things.  He loves Reese's puffs, so one day the house got really quiet, so I went to look for James.  I found him under our dining room table, the chairs all pulled in, and he was stuffing his mouth with puffs.  Of course, me taking a picture of him didn't help my disciplining.  He saw the camera and said, "cheese"!

We are finally over the "dumping" stage, as I used to call it.  (When James would just go and destroy anything in a room, dumping things off book shelves, knocking things over, creating the biggest mess.  Thankfully we are in a different stage right now.  He is lining his toys up in a row everywhere you can imagine.  This is a more "organized" stage to go through, but the hard part is that NO ONE can touch his toys when they are in the line.

Here he has taken up the entire couch with his lined up toys.  Don't even think about sitting down there!  Ha

James sure does continue to love his daddy time at night.  Daddy is the best at reading stories!

We are also going through a little season right now of deciding whether or not James should nap.  I think it is totally too early to drop his nap, but bed time is ridiculous right now.  It takes 45 mins to an hour of spankings, taking away stuff animals, promising rewards in the morning....anything we can think of to get him to stay in bed.  If he has a nap in the afternoon (usually 2 hrs) he doesn't seem tired AT ALL even at 9pm.  We have experimented a little with skipping naps and he handles it pretty well. He has an hour of "room time" in the afternoon and then usually goes to bed around 7:30pm.  What to do???

Reese is 10 Months

Our little munchkin turned 10 months old on March 27th, 2012.

Weight- 16 lbs 14 oz (10th-25th %)
Length- 27 inches (25th%)
Head- 17 1/2 inches (50th%)

She is still just as smily as ever and is such a good, easy baby.

(I don't remember ever saying that about James :)

*Taking 2 naps each day for about an hour each

(she goes down great without much fuss)

*Wakes up around 7:30am and goes to bed around 8:30pm

*Sleeping usually 11 hours

*Crawling finally! (pretty slowly though)

*Waves hi, bye-bye, night-night

*Says ma ma and da da

*In her high chair she does this funny thing where she waves her arms back and forth, shakes her head back and forth in the opposite direction, and her eyes are rolled up to the ceiling!  We have got to get that on video!

Germantown Half Marathon 2012

On Sunday, March 18th, 2012, I ran the Germantown Half Marathon.

I trained really hard for this race hoping to reach my goal of running 13.1 miles in 2 hours or less, which would be close to a 9 min pace per mile. My good friend, Amber, trained with me and ran the race with me, keeping me on pace! During the race, around miles 5-7, I got a terrible side stitch that made my race a miserable run. Good thing for Amber's encouragement, or I might have just bailed out.....I haven't been in that kind of pain in a long time, nausea, headache, cramping side, dead legs.....What happened to me???!

Well, I finished the race close to my goal time and came in at 2 hours 6 minutes (2:06:52). I was happy with that because it is my best time for a half marathon. Maybe next time I can get under 2 hours!

Justin brought the kids to cheer us on!

Look how happy Amber is! She was feeling so great and could have run this sooo much faster. But she stayed by my side the whole time. What a great friend! Look at my face....I needed the encouragement! haha.

This is where I see Justin and the kids and I manage a smile...barely :)

It's amazing how family supporting you can make you feel so much better...I only had .1 of a mile left to go!

Of course, it was a slight incline...

ahhh...done and resting with my babies ;)

Me and Amber. Did I mention what a great friend she is?

Michelle and Josh came to support me too! They camped out in the back of Josh's truck around mile 6. I could hear Josh yelling out my name! What a big help.

My sweet husband. Seeing him seriously helped me finish strong. I probably would not have PRd this day if he had not been there at the end of the race :)

Love this crew!

Rectus Diastasis

I have been so frustrated with my tummy after having Reese.

I have run 2 half marathons and have done plenty of core workouts and lots of abs, but it still looks like I am 4 months pregnant. The rest of my body is back to normal and starting to tone well, and my weight has dropped to below where it was when I got pregnant with Reese, but the "ball" won't go away.

This picture was taken 9 months after giving birth to Reese, and it hasn't changed much in the last month either. :(

So I went to my doctor and she told me that I had Rectus Diastasis, which means that there is still a separation between my abdominal muscles. Pretty much, my abs didn't fuse back together and I don't know if they ever will! Sounds like the only way to correct it, if they don't go back together, is surgery. I don't mean to sound vain. And I don't mean to complain....just venting, I guess. I am going to try to be patient, and just see if it takes much longer than I am giving it, but in the mean time....I'm just plain frustrated.