Happy Birthday, Volume 1...Me

July 3rd is my birthday and July 4th is my mother-in-law's (and America's!) so it's always a fun-filled couple of days at our house. Everyone made me feel so special again this year with all sorts of birthday wishes, so thanks!

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James and I had decided to not do any gifts for birthdays/holidays anymore until the job situation gets worked out, but he still did several things for me because he's such a great husband. When I got out of the shower yesterday morning he brought in donuts (which I LOVE ...definitely one of my favorite foods) that he and Hunter had gone to buy when I got into the shower. Then once I had left for work, he called my cell and told me to look in the glove box for a surprise (I also love surprises). I found 2 bags of candy - gummy strawberries and cherries and cherry sours that you can get at the mall candy stores...two more healthy treats that I lu-huv. Then when I got home from work, I found a pie that James had made me while I was at work. Yes ladies, my husband made me a pie. I know you're jealous, and I'm gonna make it worse by telling you it was a recipe that I'd cut out and put in the junk drawer because it looked so dang good. I just hadn't gotten around to making it yet. It was awesome though.

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In case you didn't notice the pattern, I obviously love sweet food, and my husband is well aware of this, so those "gifts" made me feel so special because even though he couldn't get me a diamond necklace like he usually does;), he thought of specific things to make me happy.

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Okay one more story then I'll get to the pictures. I've been telling this to everyone because it makes me feel so encouraged about the good in people. At work we have a committee that selects employee of the month every month based on staff nominations. As EOM you get several perks, one of which is a parking spot right by the ambulance entrance. So you actually get to park in the OCH lot instead of walking from down the street, which in 100+ weather sucks. The July EOM is from our therapy department and she is probably the sweetest person I've ever met. Literally. Well when I got to work yesterday (my bday) morning, she came up to me and told me she was GIVING ME HER EOM PARKING SPOT. She had already cleared it with the people in charge and everything. Since it's so hot and I'm so pregnant, she wanted me to have it. Y'all I started crying right there in the office like an idiot. I'm sure part of it is my hormones, but I felt really moved that she would think of me. Mercy (that's her name) is so selfless (always, not just with this), and I feel so encouraged by her and challenged to live the gospel, as she does, and not just to teach it.

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Okay, now that you have that happy, fuzzy feeling, here's my bday pics...

Since the LuAnn sign is probably giving it away anyway, yes, we are at Luby's. How do you not love that place?

And here's a little preview of Charlotte's room (and my belly for those of you that care...i.e., Laura and Marcy)...

I plan to take shots of the whole room soon.

Big Boy Hair

So my dream for Hunter's hair has always been for him to have long (not girly long) locks that curled up at the end. You know. The preppy boy look. Yes, although I have no desire for my son to ever actually pledge a fraternity, I am a sucker for that frat daddy look.
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But as you've all seen, God didn't give my son that gift. He gave Hunter fine, thin, straight as a board, refuses to grow past the top of his ears hair. So last week I decided it was time to give up the dream and move on to a new style.
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We went to barber James (our James's barber), and I told him to cut it off short enough for me to style. (I think the words "spike with gel or something" were actually used). Barber James looked at me kind of funny and said, "You know it's going to be a lot different?" It's like he knew about all of the tears I've cried over the years from bad haircuts resulting from spontaneous, poorly thought out decisions. (I assure y'all, though, this man has never been near my head. I prefer stylists of the female type.)
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Here's the picture story from the day.

This is my before shot. Barber James had to do some coaxing before Hunter would let him near his head with the scissors, and heaven forbid!, the clipper-razor thingy...
(I think that picture is so precious by the way. How cute is my son?...and my hubby:))

The aforementioned, clipper-razor thingy in action...
The final product...

Hunter's not sure how he feels about the new look. Either that or he's frustrated that he didn't get his sucker yet...especially since he told us, "I wanna sucker" over and over for the entirety of the hair cutting process.

We did get that sucker to him asap though...
...and boy was it good...
This one's for you Marcy...

(That's the gun I told you about Hunter playing with in the barber shop. It looks like it is just inherent in boys to play with weapons from a young age. Luckily Will and Hunter don't get much opportunity to use their weapons against each other.:))

And this one's just so y'all can really see what his hair looks like. I feel like since it's blonde, it didn't show up well in the lighting at the barber shop...

Gratitude

Most of you know that James's office was closed at the end of March, and like many others are experiencing right now, the job hunt has been a bit of a struggle up to this point. It's been a humbling experience to say the least.

I am so proud of my husband and all that he has accomplished. Unfortunately, I don't do a good enough job of letting him know this, but likely add more stress onto him during my (near daily) questioning of why this whole job thing isn't working out. James is hard working, intelligent, well spoken, has his Master's degree, a professional certification in his field (that isn't required) and years of experience. So why aren't these companies beating down our door begging him to work for them? It's honestly perplexing to me.

The only explanation possible is that, for right now at least, it's not God's will for James to have a job. For whatever reason His plan is for me to work and James to stay home. The thought that there's a high chance this scenario could continue after my maternity leave is over, is a hard one to accept...and believe me, there are days that I don't do a good job of accepting it. But when I sit and am still and listen to God, really listen to Him, He helps me to accept, embrace even, His will...and I am overwhelmed to tears. Not tears of anger or frustration or resentment or disappointment - the kind that so easly overtake me when I try to carry the burden alone, but tears of humility and appreciation and unbelievably, tears of gratitude.

This is my 200th post, and like my 100th, I wanted it to mean something. And although I could write (and read!) all day long about the cute things Hunter does, my true role while I'm living in this temporary home is to glorify God. So, hopefully, this small, insignificant post, will do just that.

Every morning after I drop off Hunter at school and turn the corner to start heading to work, I start this song. It brings me to tears every single time. No exceptions. It is the best reminder I've found - other than scripture - that God's plan is the one that I need to accept. And although He longs to fulfill the requests I make to Him, He may not do it today. But at the very least, He will conform my heart and will to His, if I trust in Him. For His way is perfect and He has a plan for my family that He will reveal to us in His perfect timing.

I hope you can take the time to listen to the entire song. (Don't forget to pause the music I have going on my blog. It's on the bottom now.) I encourage you to close your eyes (because I feel like the pictures actually take away from the song) and really listen to the lyrics and their meaning...and then start really listening to God and the plans He has for your life...

James

Top ten reasons he's the best father EVER (in no particular order)...

He watches Hunter the entire time I'm getting ready in the morning...which on days like today can be a really long time. As you can see, this morning was a shoe dilemma kind of a day...

(Here's my shout out to all of the pregnant women who've endured the swollen feet phenomenon. It's really hard to find shoes that work with your church attire when you have feet swollen to 50 times their normal size!)
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He teaches Hunter to have good manners. I love that James has great manners...this is one of the things I listed at my lingerie shower for my on-the-spot reasons I love James list. I think I actually said, "I love that James takes his cap off at dinner."

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He gets Hunter ready for school everysinglemorning while I get ready for work in our peaceful, quiet bathroom:)

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He feeds Hunter breakfast everysinglemorning while I get ready for work in our peaceful, quiet bathroom:)
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He plays outside with Hunter anytime he wants...and this weekend he even put on his swim shorts and sat in the kiddie pool with H in our backyard. Totally wish I had a picture of that one.

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He plays fun, silly games that any 2 year old would love like ride em horsie and Hunter's favorite Brooks Family game creation..."bonk head".

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He models the love of a husband. James greets me with a hug and kiss everyday when he (or I) gets home or leaves for work. And as I've said before, that man serves me like no other. He definitely keeps his promises. I know Hunter is going to be the best husband to one lucky woman one day after watching his daddy for 18 years.

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He spends hours...days even...slaving over putting toys together for our son.

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He loves changing diapers:) Okay not really, but he never complains about doing it!

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He passes down some awesome genes. Everyone says Hunter looks just like James, and even though I don't see it as clearly as them, they both are pretty dang good looking.

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Happy Father's Day James, Dad and Frank! I'm so thankful for all of you...and so is little H!

Ummm Yellow

Get ready for more speech path talk y'all. This time it's about my kid, though, and he's totally cute, so I know you're completely excited about what I have to say.

Hunter has had several dysfluencies in his conversational speech lately. (Translation: He's been stuttering a lot when he talks to me.) I didn't worry about it at first because I know it's typical for kids at his age to do this when they're developing MASSIVE amounts of language in their little brains. Okay. I admit I did get a teeny tiny bit concerned when his dysfluencies turned into these same syllable repetitions before almost every phrase he uttered. It was this really nasaly "ma ma ma ma" or "wa wa wa wa" that would come out before he could get his sentence started.

Luckily those days are long gone, and we've replaced it with what we call an interjection in the speech world. Hunter's interjection of choice is "um". It's so interesting to hear your 2 year old say "um" when he's thinking about the answer to a question you've asked him.

He mostly does this at night during our bedtime routine. We read a Bible story and 1 or 2 other books during the putting him down process. For about a month now Hunter has wanted to read The Snake Shapes Book (or as he calls it, "the circle book") every.single.night. I'm getting really sick of it, but there's no fooling him. He will find it when you attempt to hide it...not that I've done that or anything. So he pretty much knows all of his shapes now, except for cylinder and cube (he still calls it box), but the boy can name some crazy ones like diamond and oval and heart...and octagon. Octagon people. I'm telling you, he's obsessed.

As good as he is at his shapes though, he has serious trouble with colors. So now we read "the circle book" and "the color book" every night. Only we should really call it "the yellow book" because every color is yellow. When I point to a page and ask what color it is he consistently replies with, "uuummmm yellow". Like he really needs the "um" anyway. We all know what the answer's gonna be.

The good news...I get a new camera tomorrow, so my posts will be much less speech therapy based. Just for sentimental value - and because there's no way I can post twice in a row with no pictures - here's the last picture I took of Hunter with my old camera. Stupid Kodak.

Your Annual Speech Pathology Lesson

I have no camera y'all. It's been a sad, sad couple of weeks at my house without any picture taking ability. My camera broke 2 weeks ago at my baby shower, so I have NO pictures from it. (Actually, my sweet friend, E, sent me a picture of the Kappas that were there, but I think she'd agree that it's pretty much horrible of all of us, so I'm not going to count it as existing. That's a rule I allow myself when I look about 15 pounds heavier in a picture than in real life).

Anyway. Sad. That's me. No pictures from my shower. And no pictures of life over the past two weeks because the repair people are SO slow. They better get on it or they will have one crazy pregnant woman up in their store. I need a camera for the birth of my child, which in case y'all haven't been paying attention, is due to come 7 weeks from today.

So since I don't have any cute pictures of my kid to share, here's what's been on my mind lately. How come when you get pregnant your brain turns into such a big pile of mush? I've been having word finding problems lately, which I had with Hunter's pregnancy too. (In the speech pathology world, we call this Aphasia.) The difference is, this time I've been using a lot of paraphasias, which are word substitutions that can be real words or non-words. Here are my paraphasias for today...

As I'm walking into work this morning I notice that there is a really loud helicopter above flying really close to the hospital. (The fact that I didn't realize that it was Care Flight immediately, is a prime example of the brain turning to mush phenomenon). I say to myself - out loud - "why is that elevator flying so low?"

Then tonight James and I were talking about when girls gain weight and are still wearing their old clothes resulting in a muffin top...only I called it a mushroom top. And y'all, I DIDN'T EVEN REALIZE my mistake until my husband started laughing his butt off at me. In the speech world, this would be referred to as poor awareness or insight or recognition of errors.

Let's hope my camera is fixed soon or this is the kind of stuff y'all get to look forward to reading:)

There's No Business Like Show Business

So it's looking like Hunter is not going to follow in his mommy's footsteps and be a lover of the stage. (Actually if I were to have to get up and perform on stage now, I'd probably have a heart attack from all of the anxiety...that or at least be mortified from the serious pitting out going on as a result of the stress of people staring at me. But growing up - pretty much my entire life until I finished college, I LOVED being the center of attention. This is a completely separate post altogether, though.)

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Several weeks ago, we went to Hunter's first ever performance at his school's spring program. When Hunter walked out with his class into the church sanctuary he looked as wide-eyed as I've ever seen him. He was looking through the crowd probably trying to figure out who the heck all of these people were and why they were ooohing and aaaahing at him and his friends - it was the construction paper hats, but obviously he's totally oblivious to the cuteness of wrap around the head school-made hats at this point.

Being the novice show mom that I am, I didn't think about what an idiotic thing it would be to stand up and wave my arms around like a lunatic calling my child's name. Hunter did eventually find me (and Poppy) waving at him in the crowd holding our cameras like the proudest people ever. And about .5 seconds later, he shouted, "Poppy! Mommy!" and started to take off and attempt his get away. Why wouldn't he run to us? Remember we're waving our arms like lunatics and calling his name. Ms. Regina quickly pulled him back into line which resulted in this...

Hunter was able to calm down before his class started singing, but he was so emotionally drained that he just stood there looking terribly frightened not singing one single word of either song. And that boy LOVES him some singing.

I've learned from my mistake, and hopefully next time I can fight the urge to be one of those parents. Yeah. Right. That'll happen.