Maternity Pics

Last week, Hayden and I went down to Morris Avenue for a maternity session with Elizabeth Ann from eakphotography. We know her from church and absolutely adore her. Not to mention, she is barely 15 years old and can out shoot most adult photographers. She is amazing! Here are a few shots from our day.... it was HOT!! I was 23 weeks here:

Short Trip Across State Lines...

This week Curtis had to be in Atlanta all week for trade shows with work, so we seized the opportunity to get out of town for a few days (free hotel stays!) Hayden and I dragged Curtis' 13 year old sister, Nikki along with us. I had originally planned on doing EVERYTHING in Atlanta ... White Water, Six Flags, Zoo.... but being so pregnant and it being SO hot, we settled on the Georgia Aquarium and the World of Coke. Things seemed to be working against us the first couple of days (I topped off the oil in the car before departure, and I somehow managed to drive across 2 states after forgetting to replace the oil cap .... I only discovered it because God just told me to check under the hood after we arrived!) .... Hayden broke his only pair of shoes as soon as we got there ... My phone quit working for half a day .... My quest for an old fashioned "Orange Julius" led me on a wild goose chase all over ATL ... but we still had a great trip! Curtis had the entire day off on Wednesday so he was able to come to the Aquarium and World of Coke with us. We also took full advantage of having Nikki with us that night, and we left Hayden with her and had a little date night. Curtis took me to "Fogo de Chao," a brazilian steakhouse chain that Curtis has been telling me about for over a year since he started traveling. He describes it as "Willy Wonka and the Meat Factory." LOL! It was truly amazing... you are given a card, green on one side and red on the other, to signal the waiters when you want more food. They walk around with these huge skewers of meat and give you all you want. And it was seriously amazing meat... we're not talking "Golden Corral steak on the buffet" style stuff. Seeing that I have the appetite of a linebacker these days, this was quite a treat! We also spent an hour or so driving around Buckhead drooling at the real estate. Wow. I can't believe people actually live in some of those houses!

As much as I loved seeing all of the sea creatures, seeing Hayden's face light up with amazement was SO much better!!

Here I told Hayden "Look at me and smile!" and he said "Mom, I just really want to look at the fish." Can't argue with that!

Hayden absolutely adores his Aunt Nikki!

Time for a change...

When we bought our house 3.5 years ago, we knew we wouldn't be here forever. God blessed us with this house at a time that we needed it more than ever, and what He gave us was above and beyond what we ever deserved. We absolutely LOVE this house, but it is in a very unfortunate location. Where we are now, our house is zoned for Birmingham City Schools, and Hayden will be starting Kindergarten in exactly one year. WOW. I always knew that we would attempt a move about 6 to 8 months before he started Kindergarten (he could go to private Kindergarten if we couldn't relocate in time), but Curtis decided that now is the time! He seeked the advice of several RE agents, who advised us to sell now. Interest rates are low, house prices are low, and the market will most likely begin to pick back up and our neighborhood will most likely not go with it. So while now may not be the ideal time to sell, it is the ideal time to buy. Luckily we bought this house out of foreclosure, so we are pretty confident that we will be able to walk away and break even. We had always hoped that we would make a few bucks on our house, but it doesn't look like it is possible in today's market. We are putting our trust and faith in God and we know that if we are obedient to Him, everything will go according to His plans. He has never let us down before!

Ultimately, I would love to get Hayden into Trussville Schools. Paine Primary and Intermediate Schools are beyond amazing, and I love how they are still kind of the unsung heroes of Elementary Schools. It looks like we wont be able to get what we need (house-wise) within that school system though. I grew up Over the Mountain and went to Homewood Schools K-12, but there are a few reasons while I am not rushing around trying to get him in there. I would be thrilled to send him to Vestavia, but that is definitely not in our means right now. So we narrowed down to Springville or Moody, and it looks like Moody is winning the race. I like the location and proximity, as well as the things the town has to offer. We have picked a neighborhood and a floor plan, and it looks like we will be going to "new construction" route! We are very picky, so this is going to be our best option. And we are certainly not in the mood to be doing any home repairs or painting ourselves. We will be sacrificing some things (a big yard, back deck, storage and huge bedrooms), but gaining others (More square footage, Separate offices for Me and Curtis, bigger kitchen, updated features, etc.) The biggest drawback... building process will take 3 months. Luckily my mom has 2 extra bedrooms at her house, so if everything goes as planned we will sell our place, sign the papers on the new construction, shack up with my mom for 3 months and then get our new place. Know what that means? We will most likely be 'bringing home baby' to Momma T's house! Yes, I am crazy.

Curtis has been working his butt off in this August Alabama heat sprucing up the outside of the house, while I have been knocking out the inside. Our Real Estate agent hired a "home stager" to come through our house and detail out what we need to do to have our house "show ready." Lots of decluttering and packing stuff away, which is great because we will be that much farther ahead for moving day, but it is a little sad because we had to take all of our personal photos and things down, so it doesn't really feel like home anymore. But it will all be worth it!.... Right? :)

Trip to our Nation's Capital

Washington D.C... what a place! Ok, so here is my theory on D.C.... as American's, it is something we all need to visit at least once in our life. It is a very significant place with a lot of great sites to see. But once you have seen them once, I don't see the point in going back! This is coming from someone who is very non-political and not very into history, but that is just my take! I am so thankful that I had to opportunity to fly out with Curtis last week. He had to go on business, so we stuck Hayden with family here in town and I tagged along. I will admit, I was much more mesmerized by the sites than I anticipated being. Seeing the White House and all of the monuments in person was very awe inspiring. I had a great time getting a few days away with the hubby!

Now... for the FUN part. The trip home. We were scheduled to fly out of BWI at 8PM on Friday night, go through ATL and get to BHM a little before 11PM. With D.C. traffic and all, we decided to head to the airport around 2:00 to ensure we had time to get checked in and make our departure time. We arrived at the airport a little after 4 PM, and gasped at the line for baggage check. Luckily (ha) Curtis is a Platinum Medallion member with Delta (weekly trips to and from Kansas City for a year will do that), so we were able to get in the "shorter" preferred guest line. After waiting in line for about 2 hours, we were checked in and ready to go. Even had a little time to relax and get a snack before our plane took off! Departure time started getting pushed back a little at a time, until it got to the point that we would not make our connector flight in ATL. I, being pregnant and uncomfortable, started getting a little freaked out facing the fact that I could have to spend the night in the airport. Delta was claiming that the delays were caused by air traffic control, so they would not be comping hotel rooms for the night. Remember, I am PREGNANT, and Curtis is a Platinum Medallion member! So anyways, our flight out of BWI finally departed a little after midnight, we arrived at ATL a little after 2AM, and we got booked for the first flight home at 8:30 AM. So we found a cozy corner in the ATL airport and fell asleep! Sleeping in the ATL airport is about the equivalent of trying to catch a snooze in the middle of Times Square. A very cozy and quiet place. NOT. We got up (or stood up) in the morning to discover our 8:30 flight is now delayed 2 hours. SERIOUSLY! So we got to play the waiting game a little longer... finally departed ATL at 10:45 smelling like sour milk, and safely made it home. What a trip! So again... I don't think I will visit D.C. again until I have to take my kids to see the sights :)

Washington Monument

A little camera fun

Lincoln Memorial

Capital Building

Dinosaur at the Smithsonian

Dorothy's Slippers at the Smithsonian

Kermit the Frog (The highlight of my trip)

And one for the road....

20 Week Belly Pic

4th of July Fun

The 4th of July was wonderful this year! The weather was beautiful and we started the day with a BBQ at the Meacham's house. We are so blessed to have them right next door! Curtis and Bobby have been best friends for 15 years. After lunch at their place, we came over to our house and put Hayden's new pool to use. The kids had a blast swimming and a pretty heated water gun fight took place! We then headed down to see Thunder on the Mountain... the first time in a few years! Baby Hayden was never a fan of fireworks, so we have avoided them for the past few years. Last year Curtis and I were able to watch the fireworks out on the lake in a boat with some friends, but this year Hayden was super excited to see them too!

*Before the big show, there were some people shooting fireworks right near us and they were LOUD. Hayden was not digging it, and kept requesting for us to hold his ears, because it was making his shoulders tired. Curtis whipped out these earphones and voila, Hayden was happy!

It's a....

That's right! It's another boy for the William's family! I cheated and went to a local ultrasound school and let the students use my preggo belly as a guinea pig in exchange for finding out the sex of the baby a few weeks early. There were clearly boy parts there, and we are thrilled! We will get the official anatomy scan at the doctor in a couple of weeks, and will hopefully have a few ultrasound pics to share then. We have decided on the name Garrett! Still playing around with the middle name, but Garrett Williams will be gracing us with his presence around Thanksgiving of this year! We feel very blessed!

18 Weeks

Super Mario Galaxy (Number 2!)

As some MAY know, Hayden is a pretty big fan of the Nintendo Wii. Has been since around his third birthday. He can stomp us in any game, and we often find ourselves asking him how to do certain things in games. (Yes, we play too.) He sits on You Tube and watches strategy videos for his favorite games... it is pretty comical. Well, he caught wind about the fact that the sequel to his favorite game, Super Mario Galaxy had recently been released. However, we had to make some kind of deal with him before running out and spending $50 on a new game. Since he had gotten into the habit of sneaking into our bed in the middle of the night, we seized the opportunity to break that habit. We told him that if he stayed in his bed all night for 5 straight nights, he could get his game. He stepped up to the plate! Task was complete exactly 5 days later and he became the proud owner of Super Mario Galaxy 2. We have had a lot of fun with the game, and I'm happy to report that he has continued his streak of sleeping in his own bed!