Music City 1/2 Marathon

I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but I’m planning to run the Music City ½ Marathon this April.  When I did it several years ago, I made Ryan promise me that he would never let me do it again and here I am, planning to run it again.  I’m running with one of the other coaches wives and her sister.  Mandy & Michelle run at a slow pace so I’m able to actually enjoy the run (well so far anyway J).   They asked me to join them and I always enjoy spending time with Mandy so thought, why not!  It’s good company and will hopefully help me shed these last few pounds! 

The first Saturday that I met up with the girls to run it was 30 degrees outside.  Crazy!  I don't ever run outside, and if I do run outside, I don't run when it's cold and rainy.  I layered up and went to leave the house and Ryan started laughing.  I was wearing a cute cream wool hat that is more of an accessory than anything, but I didn't have anything else to cover my ears, so I went for it.  I thought it was cute - Ryan was embarrassed for me.  Oh well!   I made the 3 mile run and it was actually enjoyable.

So far I've only done up to 5 miles, so there is still a long way to go to get to 13.1.  Wish me luck!

Pinterest

I resisted for a long time but I’m definitely addicted now…ruh roh.

Small Group

One of the biggest challenges for us in moving to Memphis has been trying to find a new church.  We loved our church in Nashville and were blessed to be really invested in that church community.  Coming here, we knew that finding a church home would be paramount to our feeling connected.  We tried several different churches – what I like to call the good, bad and the ugly J.   We finally found a church and are really excited about it.  It’s called River City Church and if you are ever in Memphis, we’d love for you to join us!  We are serving on the host team and started meeting with a small group in January.  There are 6 couples and 19 kids!!  The church has a great sense of community amongst the women as well and I’ve been having fun at Pampered Chef parties, Bunco parties, and just hanging out.  What a blessing & answered prayer!

Madison Claire

Madison Claire is turning into such a big girl.  She communicates so well and some of the things that come out of her mouth just shock us.  She likes to pick out what to wear to school, she loves to comment on your outfit, shoes, etc.   A few weeks ago, she woke up around 2am yelling for me.  When I went up there, she had pooped in her little potty and needed help wiping (hence the yelling for me).  As I was helping her, she said in a cheery voice “Mommy, I really like your blue pants.  They are so cute.  One day, I will have blue pants like that”.  And I’m thinking to myself “it is 2 in the morning, go to sleep!”.  She uses that statement frequently.  Think “Mommy, I really like your (fill in the blank with all sorts of things).  One day I will have (fill in the blank).”  It’s actually quite adorable.  She also loves picking things that “match” and pointing out to everyone who will listen when she matches them.  At the beach this week she would frequently exclaim – “look, mom!  He has flip flops just like me.  We match!”  

She is still obsessed with all things princess, and when she wakes up she wants to put on one of her princess dresses.  She loves to watch Tangled, Beauty & the Beast, and her new favorite, Lady and the Tramp.

Here are a few pictures of her over the past few months.  She is our angel!

Mac - 7-9 months

The buddy has had an eventful few months.  He started crawling, learned how to crawl fast, learned how to pull up & cruise.  It seems like all of this happened literally over night!  He is such a big boy!  His favorite thing to do is eat.  He has always been really interested in eating.  When he was little and we would have him at the table with us, he would lick his lips and fuss if we were all eating and he wasn’t able to have anything.  Partly because of this interest and partly at the urging of our new doctor in Memphis, we have been more aggressive in trying things with him than we were with Madison Claire.  He eats pretty much anything we eat (provided it’s not a choking hazard) and is in small pieces.  I gave him some turkey sandwich bites yesterday – complete with 2 pieces of bread, turkey & cheese.  He loves eggs, turkey, noodles and oranges.  Oh – and sweets.  He LOVES to eat some ice cream, whipped cream, donut, etc.  I know, I know – you are probably thinking why are you feeding him those things, but I swear if we are eating some it is just the cutest thing.  He will open his mouth wide like a little birdie and just look at you with these big blue eyes just begging to have some. 

He continues to have a super sweet disposition.  He is happy pretty much all of the time (unless you aren’t sharing your food with him).  He  LOVES his mommy and while he doesn’t really have stranger anxiety, he does get upset if I leave the room and just lights up when he sees me.  It’s precious.  He also loves his big sissy.  He loves playing with her toys and anytime he has her attention he just smiles and squeals.  We have been working on some signs with him and he is close to being able to use the “more” sign, even though his preferred mode of communication to say more is just to stare at you with an annoyed looking face and grunt. 

The biggest (and best!) news is that he is finally sleeping through the night.  It took him 9 months to get there, but I’m just happy he finally got there –I was beginning to think he may be the only 5 year old to still wake up 2-3 times at night J.  I thought it would make more of a difference for me in terms of how I felt during the day after having 9 months without consistent sleep at night, but I honestly haven’t really noticed.  That’s been a bit of a bummer.

Here are some pictures from the past few months...can you see why I'm head over heels for him?!

"Asherwitz"

On our way home from the gym we will usually ask Madison Claire what she did and who she played with.  One day she said she played with Asherwitz (or at least this is what it sounds like to us).  She has proceeded to pray for Asherwitz every night for the past month, name her stuffed animals Asherwitz and talk about him (assuming it is a boy here) most days.  I asked the nursery at the gym if there was anyone named anything close to Asherwitz that she could have met there and they said there is a little boy named Asher that she plays with sometimes – so that’s our best guess.  Too funny. 

Prayer Time

Thank you God for Annie, Buddy, Grayson, Mandy & David (Grayson’s parents)  & Jesus.  Amen.  *Mommy & Daddy are apparently chopped suey J.

The movies!!

We heard in December that Beauty and the Beast was going to be out in the movie theatre in mid-january, so we bought the movie for Madison Claire so she could learn about the story.  She grew to love watching “Belle” and we were so excited to take her to the movies to see it!  We got her a Belle dress, and a big Belle doll and set off to the movies.  We had a great experience – complete with a big bucket of popcorn (that she didn’t like), twizzlers (that she loved!), and a big sprite.  Poor thing had to sit on Ryan’s lap for most of the movie because she didn’t weigh enough to keep the folding chair down.  Lucky princess!

Tornado Warning

When we moved to Memphis, several people warned us that the spring would be full of tornado warnings.  They begin testing the tornado sirens every day at noon around the first of the year and we had our first serious scare in late January.  The sirens were going off around 10pm and the news showed the warning going right through our area of town so we decided we needed to head to the closet.  Only problem was the closet was FULL of boxes from our move.  Ryan and I unloaded a little section of the closet so we could fit and then we went to get the kids.  They were so confused!  Annie came down to join us – complete with her Tornado preparedness bag which included all of her important things/documents, diapers for the baby, etc.  Good that someone was prepared – I didn’t even have on shoes!  Reason #1001 why we love Annie.  We stayed in the closet for 15 minutes or so until it had passed through our area and then headed to bed with plans to deal with the boxes (that were now all over my office floor) the next night.  Wouldn’t you know we got a call the next morning that we had a showing that day at the house so Annie and I had to quickly reload the closet.  Ryan got the good end of that deal! 

Here we all are hunkered in the closet with Ryan watching the TV with one foot in the closet.

6-month pictures

We had the buddy’s 6 month pictures taken in late December.   Karen Halbert did a great job and they turned out adorable, as usual!  She always makes it so hard for me to pick!   Here are just a few of them: 

You can see more on Karen's blog at:

http://www.karenhalbertphotography.com/2011/12/six-months-ryan-nashville-baby-studio-photographer/

You can see the whole session here:

http://karenhalbertphotography.zenfolio.com/mcswain6

password = mcswain

Enjoy!