Anna Stays with Sa and Ja

If you want to see what Anna was up to while Will and I were away last weekend, check out Sarah's blog. She did a great job describing the weekend and the pics are priceless! We had no worries knowing that Anna was having a blast with Sarah and Jason!

Dying Easter Eggs

Anna and I started the annual tradition of dying Easter eggs yesterday. She had so much fun measuring out the lemon juice and watching the tablets dissolve to make the colors. She loved the little egg holders and picking them up. If only eggs didn't crack when you dropped them! Anna was a little sad that most of the eggs ended up with cracks in them, but putting stickers on them made it better. Look at our beautiful eggs!

Yes, Anna does have a palm hair...she wanted a pony tail like Mommy's, and this is as close as I could get. I think it's kind of cute!

Bath Time Buddies

The other night, we needed to give both of our kids a bath. When Anna found out that Miller needed a bath, too, she wanted him to get in with her. After she was clean and ready to get out, we plopped Miller in for a couple of quick pics before we got her out. This is definitely NOT Miller's favorite activity, but he loves it when it's over.

The Windy City

Last weekend, two of my closest girlfriends from college and I headed north to the Windy City of Chicago to visit our friend, Michelle, who is finishing up her plastic surgery residency up there. Michelle has been so sweet to fly home to NC time after time for baby showers and birthdays. We decided it was our turn to go see her.

Thursday night, I drove to Cary to stay with Melissa and Wes so I wouldn't have to drive so early Friday morning. I was excited because I got to hang our with their little man, Lawson, who I haven't seen in several months. What a cutie!

Melissa and I got to Chicago around noon and checked into our hotel, the Essex Inn, which is only 3 blocks from Michelle's place. I got tickled by the sign at the elevator...

After settling in our room, we headed to the train to take us to the heart of Michigan Avenue so we could do some shopping before Michelle met up with us after work. It was gorgeous weather, sunny and 68 degrees, so we ate lunch outside at the Ralph Lauren Grill. We later found out that Oprah is often spotted at the RL Grill. I would have died if I had seen her. It was delicious!

We shopped, met up with Michelle when she got off work, and shopped some more. Then we took the train back to Michelle and Lucien's place. Michelle and I were roommates for most of the time at UNC, and she and Lucien started dating about the time we moved in together, so Lucien is like a brother to me. It was so good to sit around and catch up with everyone.

For dinner that night, they took us to an Ethiopian restaurant. It was very interesting. It was a lot like stir-fry, except they don't use utensils. Instead, you tear off pieces of this spongy, pancaky-type flatbread to pick the food up. It was good and definitely not something I would find in NC.

The girls before dinner.

Saturday morning, we woke up to our friend Carrie arriving in town...and a blizzard! Carrie had to work on Friday, but still came up to hang out on Saturday. The gorgeous weather had disappeared and we were stuck with wet snow and sleet. We braved the elements and made it to the Bongo Room for an awesome breakfast...they had red velvet pancakes! Yum!

Lucien helping Melissa and Carrie through the blizzard. The wind is so bad that the snow is always in your face!

Melissa and Me

After brunch, we headed down the block a ways to the Eleventh Street Diner, a true Jewish deli, for some after-brunch cocktails. Mimosas and bloody Mary's were pretty good!

After drinks, the girls had a relaxing couple of hours with manis and pedis. This time turned out to be not so relaxing, as Carrie realized that she had lost her driver's license and we spent our nail drying time calling all over trying to see if she had left it somewhere. We ended up getting her hubby to scan some documents and send them over email. Before we headed back out into the elements, they wrapped our toes in cling wrap in hopes of saving our pedis as we put our boots back on. Good thing, too, because it worked!

The funny part of the whole trip was that Melissa and Carrie are both still breast-feeding their babies, so had to pump throughout the trip. Before going back to Michelle's, we went back up to the hotel room for the girls to pump. Carrie was still freezing, so threatened to pump with her jacket and "scood" (scarf with a hood) still on. Michelle couldn't get over the fact that three breasts were being pumped at the same time. Hilarious!
After the pumping was done, we headed back to Michelle's to obtain the needed documents and to hang out before dinner. Since there was nothing on, we sat around and chatted while watching Aladdin on the Disney Channel. I hadn't watched that in years! How fun?! It's so interesting to me how when you're with true friends, it doesn't really matter what you're doing as long as you're together.

Saturday night, Michelle took us to a swanky restaurant called Province. It has a modified tapas menu, so we were able to order quite a few dishes to share. It was delicious!
We were sad that the trip was so short, but we had such a great time together again. We got back pretty early on Sunday, and there were lots of mamas that were happy about that.

Tired mamas, happy friends.

I'm so glad we finally made this trip happen since we've only been talking about it for years now. It feels so good to be back with old girlfriends, even if it is for just a quick weekend.

The 2 1/2 Year Check-Up...and Celery

Anna had her 30 month, or 2 1/2 year, check-up today. This was really the first time that she has been old enough to be aware of what was getting ready to happen. Several times last night and this morning she asked, "What's the doctor going to do?". So, we went through the whole ordeal: listening to her heart and chest with a stethoscope and using a special light to look in her eyes and mouth and ears. She wasn't too sure about this whole doctor thing. And I left off the part about the immunizations because she didn't need to stress about that any longer than she had to. All she knew was that she got a sticker at the end of it and that made things OK.

She did really great while we were there. It was really cute, because Dr. Silkstone had a little conversation with her and I could have been in the other room. When she asked Anna what her favorite thing to eat was, Anna answered, "Celery!". Dr. Silkstone looked at me, like "for real?". I had to nod and agree that she really liked celery and that we probably had the Wonder Pets to thank for it.

Some milestones for this doctor's visit were the following:

• She finally hit the 25 pound mark-- 25 pounds, 4 ounces. Woohoo!
• She is 36 inches tall, exactly 3 feet.
• Her head circumference was 19 inches. This is the last visit that they will do a head circumference. How sad!?
• Her percentiles were 55th for height, 50th for head, and an increase to 15th for weight!
• She didn't need any immunizations, so this visit was great!

Anna left thinking the visit to the doctor was pretty fun. She was also the proud owner of a Cinderella sticker. I was shocked that she passed up Elmo and Backyardigans for Cinderella.

This evening at dinner, she asked for...you guessed it...celery! When I put it in front of her, she said, "I'm eating celery just like the Wonder Pets!" Yep, you sure are! So, I had to get a few pics. Notice her snazzy sticker.

Anna and the Dogs

Sunday night, Sarah and Jason had us over to grill out. Yum!! Anna thought it was hysterical that all the dogs were standing at the back door waiting patiently (or not so patiently) to get in while we were eating. Silly puppies!

Girl's Night Out in Chapel Thrill

Melissa is turning 30 this week, so we converged upon Chapel Hill Saturday night to help her celebrate. We had a fabulous dinner at 411 (one of my favorites!) and then headed out for a night on the town. Sarah G and Jenn had never been privileged enough to go out on Franklin Street before, so we were obligated to show them a good time. I think we were successful!

Sisterly love...Melissa and Sarah Y

Our new group name...Jenlie and the Sarahs (ha!)

Happy Birthday Melissa! You are a beautiful, fun, and fabulous young woman and I am honored to call you my friend! Thanks for letting us crash your place! Love you bunches!

For This Child We Prayed...

On Saturday, I was so incredibly excited about going to my friend, Kelley's, baby shower. You really can't understand how excited I was...

Kelley and I went to nursing school together at UNC and were part of the same study group for the 2 and 1/2 years we were there. We were there for boyfriends and break-ups and graduation and engagements and weddings. All seven of us did a good job of keeping in touch. Then, a lot of us started having babies...and Kelley didn't. She and her husband Adam have been trying for the last 5 years or more to get pregnant. They even left her family in Raleigh and moved near Charlotte to be able to get assistance with the in vitro procedure that was their last chance at conceiving. We have prayed and hoped and wished and begged for them to have a baby. Well, God is good! Sometimes, it's just on his timing;). Kelley is due April 12th with a little boy named Logan. How incredibly excited are we?

She got tons of great stuff and verbalized being so overwhelmed. I remember that feeling from our showers for Anna, but can't imagine the added feelings of having waited so long and prayed so hard for her baby. Her good friend, Alana, gave her this painted plate that put the last several years in perspective. Now Logan is on the way. And he is so lucky to have a mommy and a daddy that love him so much. My heart is just brimming over with excitement for them! And I can't wait to meet Baby Logan in person!

My Nose is Falling Off

Anna and I ran errands today like mad women. I had so much to get done before naptime! Target, Michael's, Button's for Easter pics (I will blog about that in the future), Babies R Us...

Anyway, we were heading into one of the many stores and Anna started wiping her nose with the back of her hand. She said, "My nose is about to fall off!" I chuckled and asked, "Do you mean that it's about to run away?" Then she says, "No, it's just falling off. I need to fix it so it doesn't fall off." Oh, OK. Glad we got that cleared up!

Finally, Some Sunshine

We have been outside hard core the last few days as temperatures have finally reached the 60 degree mark. Hurray! Spring really is on it's way! Here are some pics of Anna enjoying her swingset and a playdate at Tanglewood.

Notice the shades...

Go Heels...sort of.

Daddy and Anna enjoying the fire pot!

Cheesin'...

When Anna first saw the "car," she wanted me to come and drive with her, which I did (barely contorting myself onto the bench seat). Then she said, "Mommy, you need to get out. I'm going to say bye to you. You just sit over there." So, I did and we waved bye and Anna "drove off". Oh, that day is going to come sooner than we know...

Being a Mom

My mom sent me this magnet when I was in college and it has been on my fridge ever since (that's going on 13 years, people). Anna pulled it off the fridge today when we were hanging one of her pieces of artwork from school and I suddenly felt this wave of emotion come over me. I've spent the last couple of hours trying to sift through these emotions and just felt like I needed to write them down. Beware, this may get a little deep...

First of all, I am in the middle of a Beth Moore bible study at church and we are doing her updated Breaking Free study. It is amazing. One of the things that we have been required to do is to look back at our families for possible "ancient ruins," or things that have been passed down for generations that could be strongholds on us: prejudice, alcoholism, abuse, fear, anything that keeps us from being free in Christ. She emphasizes the importance of doing this without blame and with respect, so that we may simply be aware of the condition, not necessarily point fingers. After sharing some with my group, it became obvious that beyond the obvious things like abuse and alcoholism, a lot of the women in my group were very affected by their mothers. I think this is true for most women.

After hearing some of their stories, I became so overwhelmed with gratitude towards my mom. Not only is she one of my biggest sources of inspiration, but I really can only think of positive ways in which she's influenced me. She taught me the importance of faith. She taught me how to be a confident, independent woman. She showed me unconditional love for family. She was a true parent when she needed to be and a friend later. The list could go on and on. I am so grateful that there are not wounds and unfulfilled expectations that exist between us. I am so glad I have her as such a positive role model.

Secondly, this leaves HUGE shoes for me to fill when I look at Anna. I only hope that I can be all to Anna that my mom is to me. I pray every day that I am leading her in the right direction and encouraging her spirit and potential. I hope I can be a parent when I need to be and a friend when it's time. I hope I can instill in her the confidence necessary to avoid all the dark holes that this life can throw at you without it. I also understand that only by God's grace can I make it through to this goal with peace and without constant anxiety and worry. I don't have to do it alone.

Finally, my heart breaks for all of the girls and women out there who do not have this kind of relationship with their mothers. I want healing for all those relationships overrun with selfishness, bitterness, pettiness, and unmet expectations. How sad would it be going through life without that extremely important cheerleader standing behind you? Or one that was there, but for all the wrong reasons? I can't even imagine. No wonder so many girls and women suffer from such poor self-esteem. I think one of the reasons that the world today is so broken is because our women and mothers are so broken.

I feel a true calling to do everything in my power to remain whole and true to myself and raise my daughter to do the same. I want to show her to be proud of and satisfied with the body God gave her. I want to teach her that men are wonderful, but you never NEED one. I want her to understand that only you can make yourself happy.

These are lofty goals, I know, especially in this day and time. As long as I remain in faith and continue to show Anna the important things that my mom showed me, we will make it there one day. I have no doubt.

Buh-nected

Last week, I brought down all of my Easter decorations. Last year I felt like they weren't out long at all. Lent was starting and with Easter really being the basis of our faith, I just feel like the reminders need to be out longer than a couple of weeks. I realize that society has turned Easter into cute animals and some plastic eggs, but those things do help remind me of the greater celebration: Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection.

So, Anna has loved the bunnies and chicks and the Easter eggs. She had a fit over the dancing duck doing the chicken dance that Judi and Bren gave her (which I quickly remember being excited I could pack away the year before). She carries around her basket full of eggs of all sizes.

Today, she came up to me and pulled one of the eggs apart. It was one of those eggs that has the little plastic piece that connects the two halves together so you can't lose them. She looked at me and said, "This egg is 'buh-nected'." It took me a minute to realize that she was saying "connected"! I just love the things that come out of her mouth!

Grapefruit Girl

Anna's new favorite food love is grapefruit. I know, it's shocking isn't it? Who knew 2-year-olds could love it so much? And I'm talking about looooooooves it. She sits in my lap while I spoon out the wedges, all the while informing me if it's a big piece or a small one and whether or not it has seeds that I have to remove. She thinks it's hysterical when the juice squirts out. She can eat the entire thing. And then you have to squeeze the juice out into the spoon so she can slurp it up. The. Entire. Thing. She has asked for one almost every single morning lately. When I tell her that we don't have any more, she tells me, "Mommy, we need to go to the grocery store and get some more." Just recently we have had to slow down to just one every other day because her bum-bum was not handling an entire grapefruit a day very well. Anna wasn't too thrilled with that plan, but that's better than a red bottom!