today, the hubby and i are celebrating four years of wedded bliss.

(yes, that’s the ocean in the background — our wedding was amazing!)

we have our moments, but he’s a pretty great guy to put up with all of my crap. and i’m a pretty great wife to put up with his other wife.

her name is Sports. playing tennis and then watching pretty much any other sport on tv. or at the stadium.

some of our friends are getting married in september, and the first words out of ken’s mouth were, “i wonder what [football] game they’ll be missing?”

gotta love him.

and i do.

so very very much.

happy anniversary to my best friend.

Why do men not care as much about their age as women do? Ken will tell anyone who asks that he turned 41 today. Happy Birthday, honey!!

Of course, he’s in great shape. People always tell him he looks younger than he really is. He still plays tennis, runs and cycles. And he can kick my butt on most Wii games.

Sometimes, he forgets how old he is and plays flag football with guys in their early 20′s. And ex-NFL football players.

But all-in-all, he’s pretty amazing.

As a husband, he puts up with all of my crazy quirks and mood swings without complaining. He lets me go off and take pictures, he waits on me when I lag behind taking pictures, and he endures my hours of sitting at my computer editing pictures. He provides for our family quite well as a business owner, and he works hard to make sure that we have all of our needs met.

As a father, there is no other like him. He is so patient and kind with Emma, always treating her like the princess that she is. He may spoil her a little bit, but aren’t all fathers that way with their daughters? He was the only one who truly understood her separation anxiety, and he helped me to treat her with love and kindness when it was so hard for me to understand.

He changed her cloth diapers, even when he didn’t understand why we used them, and he does her entire bedtime routine on nights that he is home. No one can read a book quite like him.

No one can make her laugh like he can.

He is her hero.

And mine, too.

But don’t tell him – I’ll never be able to live with the ego.

We drove down to Georgia on Saturday to celebrate Mom & Mema’s birthdays.

Everyone had a LOT of fun.

I’m still amazed at the difference between Emma now and the Emma 6 months ago. We honestly thought she’d never grow out of her separation anxiety, but now, she cuddles and snuggles and goes places with just about everyone.

She still needs time to get used to people that she doesn’t see often, but she is definitely coming around a lot faster than she used to!

Now, her and Sydnei play in their own room without Emma needing to check in with either me or Ken every 5 minutes.

I feel like she’s a normal kid. Not that she wasn’t before … but now I get to actually talk to people without having her hanging all over me.

Don’t get me wrong. I love my baby … I love spending every second of the day with her. But sometimes, you just NEED to not be touched, talked to, whined at, or sat on.

I’m finally getting that quiet time, and I am just so proud of my girl.

Now if I could just teach her that crayons are for paper only.

Twenty-four months ago, I looked like this …

27 weeks along

I loved being pregnant. Now, I was one of the lucky ones – no morning sickness, no obscene weight gain (34lbs), no stretch marks, light heartburn, little to no discomfort (other than my ribs). The only downside of being pregnant was that it couldn’t last longer. Oh, and the restless leg syndrome that had me putting bars of soap at the foot of our bed and doing crazy stretches at 3am.

on our babymoon to disney world

I understand if some of you now hate me and never want to read anything I write ever again.

And that’s okay. I understand.

I mean, you can hope that whenever I have baby #2, I’ll be sick as a dog 24 hours a day.

But please don’t.

Being pregnant for the first time was really amazing. In fact, it was so wonderful that I often think about trying for baby #2 JUST to be pregnant again. But then reality sets in, and I realize that we are paying our bills and that’s about it. Babies just don’t fit into the equation at this point in our lives. We’re okay with what starting our own business has done to our bank account, but we also know that having a baby right now just wouldn’t be smart.

But the actual point of this post was to say that twenty ONE months ago, I looked like this …

And then like this …

And then like this.

Even labor and delivery was a piece of cake …

6:15pm – water broke at our house
7:15pm – arrived at the hospital
11:45pm – got epidural
5:00am – started pushing
5:59am – Emma Grace arrived

Ever since then, life has been anything but easy.

But just as my pregnancy and then delivery was wonderful and amazing, so is our life with Emma.

She’s not the kid that’s going to entertain guests and make everyone laugh. She’s not going to be the kid who screams and yells to get attention. She won’t strive to be the center of attention or the class clown.

Instead, she will be the kid that everyone is drawn to because she’s so quiet. She’ll be the old soul that everyone falls in love with. She’ll be a listening ear and a strong shoulder for her friends. She’ll love everyone, no matter their faults or shortcomings. And she’ll be generous and kind.

Happy 21 months on this earth, my sweet soulful child.

You have brought us more joy and peace than we ever thought possible.

Ken now has whatever Emma has, so I feel like I have 2 sick kids. And only one of them took a nap today.

Hint: it was NOT the one that usually takes a nap.

So needless to say, when it got up in the low 60′s, we all went for a walk just to get.out.of.the.house.

That’s about as exciting as it could get around here today.

1| I’ve never been really good at replying to my blog replies, because I don’t like mass replies. But then I noticed that one of my most favoritest bloggers, Secret Agent Josephine, edits a comment with her reply. So I’m totally stealing the idea from her. And now I’ll be able to reply to those of you who respond. Thanks, SAJ!

2| I think I’ve convinced Ken to let me move my work area downstairs.

me: hey, hon. when you’re in a really good mood and totally stress-free, can you read my blog post?
him: i already read it. and it does not put me in a good mood.

But I think he knows how frazzled I am every other day, because I don’t know what’s going on in our lives, so he’s willing to make ONE MORE MOVE to make me happy. Gotta love him.

Plus, I’m going to totally convince him with this picture.

See, honey! Emma likes playing on the computer, and we need one down here!

I am totally not above bribing him with his princess.

3| Speaking of pictures (how about that segue!) – are you following my Project365? Did you even know I’m doing Project365? Do you even care? Well, if you do … I’m taking/posting one picture a day for a year, and it’s been really fun so far! I’ve gotta admit, it keeps me busy and creative. Okay, I haven’t really had to be creative, yet, but I am making lists of things to take pictures of. [Ack, I know you're not supposed to end a sentence with a preposition, but I don't feel like changing it.] You can either bookmark it or just click the little picture over there on the left if you want to follow along with me (and Emma). :)

4| I made cinnamon & raisin bread this morning — um, I even got up at 5:15 to go put the raisins in the machine. But it did not turn out that well. So if you have a recipe for a yummy cinnamon & raisin bread [for a bread machine] and preferably non-yeasty, please please share!!

I think that’s it for today. I may have had one more item, but I don’t like odd numbers, so it can wait for another day.

* I pronounce “ketchup” like “catch-up” … just a little play on words today

I’m the church pianist for a small church on the other side of town, but there are never any kids there on Sunday nights, so Emma has the nursery to herself.

Clearly, she doesn’t waste any time making herself at home …

Hmmm, what’s down here?

Once the toys are cleaned up, she likes to watch Dora on Ken’s iPod

And Ken practices his pitching skills in case the big leagues come knocking on our door (with a soft foam ball, btw)

And then it’s time to go home.

There are a lot of good things about having your husband work from home – like I can ask for help with my blog or store or message board anytime. I can have him watch Emma for just a few minutes while I take a shower. I can ask him to please run to the store to get some more soda.

He does go into an office 2 days a week, and it’s refreshing, because Emma and I just kick back in our routine.

But now my Mr. is going to be out of the house more often. His secret identity? Professor H.

He’s been studying and working on lesson plans all weekend and all day today — it’s really quite cute. (I was going to say sexy, but our family members read this blog)

His first day is tomorrow, and I can’t wait to hear how it goes. I also can’t wait to see how in the world he’s going to get through a 6,000 page book in 2.5 months.