Future athlete?

Greg says he appreciates the fact I document our lives in pictures that end up in scrapbooks. But it's not often he encourages me to take a picture of something. Not specific. Not "Hey, Kristin, take a picture of Cate doing this."

But he did today.

Yes, he was impressed that Cate liked playing with his basketball. Like it's a sign of what's to come. We're not going to be those parents who push their child into activities that don't interest her, but it's no secret Greg hopes Cate shares his love of the game. Any game really.

Good thing he's leaving it wide open because ...

... the basketball became a soccer ball in her world.

And, yes, it's OK if she prefers to be in the marching band!

Tall + Talkative

"I’m what I am and I’m what I’m not/and I’m sure happy with what I’ve got/I live to love and laugh a lot/and that’s all I need/ ... I never wanted nothing more/and I never wanted nothing more"
-Kenny Chesney in "Never Wanted Nothing More"

That's seriously how I feel as I spend my days with my 15-month-old daughter. Yep, 15 months. Can you believe it? Yeah, me neither. Even so, it's true.

She's tall and verbal, according to the nurse practitioner today at her check-up. I even overheard her say that to the nurse who had initially seen Cate while we were still in the room and they were talking in the hallway. Good thing they only said nice things!

Anyway, she's in the 95th percentile for height (32 1/2 inches) and 50th percentile for weight (23 pounds 2.6 ounces). Tall and thin. Every woman's dream.

The nurse practitioner asked if she could say 5-15 words. I knew the answer was yes, but later I made a list of all the words she says regularly ...

juice
shoes
ball
book
dog
duck
watch
mama
dada
bye
hi/hey/hello
no
yeah/yep/yes
bite
uh-oh
whoa
walk
eyes
ears
nose

She also rather entertaining, as you saw in the last blog post. In addition to dancing, she ...

... finds her belly button, usually pulling her shirt up more than necessary.
... cheers whenever she sees sports of any kind -- live or on TV.
... laughs often.
... finds her blanket when she's tired. Usually this requires pulling it through the slats of the crib.
... says "hello" when my phone rings or when she's holding any object up to her ear.
... says "hi" in a higher-pitched voice to babies + small children who are actually bigger than her + animals.
... says "hi" to anyone we pass in the grocery.
... likes to sit in chairs of any size.
... takes two naps a day, usually.
... sleeps 12 hours at night.
... has 10 teeth (I think) and is working on four (I think) others.
... mimics nearly anything.

Dancin'

This is how Cate dances ...



At first she doesn't realize I'm recording, then she does. But then the music stops, so turning it back on is a priority!

Celebrating in St. Louis

Greg + I enjoyed celebrating our sixth anniversary in St. Louis ... without Cate. Mark it down as a successful first overnight trip without Cate. Our goal is to do one trip like this a year. And I'm certain Cate had a great weekend with Grandmom + Angela, my mom's best friend. We left Saturday morning and got back late last night, well, this morning. It was a good amount of time because we enjoyed ourselves but were still ready to get home to Cate.

First we went to Six Flags, something we obviously haven't done in awhile. We rode several roller coasters, cooled off with a couple water rides + talked about how fun it will be to go to an amusement park as a family once Cate is tall enough, like 36 inches, then even more fun when she can ride roller coasters, like 48, then 54 inches.

In the background is Mr. Freeze, a pretty fast + loopy roller coaster. It shoots out of the building + goes through some loops, including that rather large one in the background, and then goes up that straight part you can see. Then it repeats it all ... backwards! The lady in front of us in line said it lasts 37 seconds. I believe it. Fast. But a fun 37 seconds.

I mentioned the water rides ... Well, this is after the first one we went on. It was that rafting one where the signs warn riders that you will get wet, maybe even soaked. Let's just say I was among the half of the raft that got SOAKED. And Greg barely got wet! I don't know if you can tell how wet I am. Let me just say, my wallet is just now dry. And we're talking two days later!

We slept in comfy Marriott bed with lots of pillows that night, and didn't wake up until 9 a.m. Once we got around, we went to see "Swing Vote"; ate at Chevy's, where we last ate while on our honeymoon in Lake Tahoe; and shopped at St. Louis Mills, including Archiver's and Carter's, and then Target.

Then we went to watch the Cardinals. They played the Phillies. It was a pitching dual through the first seven innings. 2-1 Cards. Then the Phillies had a couple homeruns and other runners on base, so it was 5-1. Then 5-2. Then 5-3. Then 5-4. The Cards just couldn't quite do it, which was frustrating because they had the bases loaded in both the eighth + ninth innings. Stranding runners is irritating. So is a bullpen that is quickly building a reputation for blowing games.

We got there about an hour early and watched the grounds crew get the field ready. Have I ever told you I want to spend a summer traveling across the country, stopping at all the baseball stadiums to write about people? But not the players. Rather then grounds crew, official scorekeeper, the guy/girl who plays the organ, ticket takers, etc.

So while we were riding roller coasters Saturday , Cate went to the annual Fancy Farm Picnic. For those of you unfamiliar with the western Kentucky tradition, it's a picnic with lots of tasty BBQ + old-fashioned political stumping. It's a very partisan crowd, like literally Democrats on one side and Republicans on the other during the speaking. Before + after (+ even during) the speaking, there's much heckling + campaigning. Some people wear clever shirts like this ...

Cate apparently enjoyed her ice cream cone at Fancy Farm. Mom was going to feed it to her with a spoon. Then she remembered Cate prefers to feed herself!

All sorts of angles ...


While we were rooting on the Cardinals on Sunday, Cate enjoyed some time at the park with Grandmom + Angela.

She likes the wood mulch as much as anything!

(Thanks to Angela for the pictures of Cate!)

Us

Six years ago today ...

Worth celebrating

When we celebrate, we exercise our ability to see and feel goodness in the simplest gifts of God. We are able to take delight today in something we wouldn't have even noticed yesterday. Our capacity for joy increases.
-John Ortberg

While cleaning, organizing, throwing away, and putting up stuff in our basement/office/scrap area, I happened upon an old journal. It's actually a nice journal that Greg got me for our first anniversary. That's the same weekend we moved to Murray, so that's when it starts. The thing that kind of disappoints me about it is I stopped writing in it March 6, 2004 -- seven months after I started. There are so many blank pages that deserved to be filled.

August 2003 was a time of searching for me. I was sure I wanted to be in Murray. I didn't have a job, and I didn't even want to work at the newspaper here. There wasn't an opening anyway. I was reading "The Life You've Always Wanted" by John Ortberg. And, to be honest, I'm not sure I finished it. I must have liked it, though, because I have a ton of quotes in my journal from it.

About joy. And celebrating. Every day.

It took me a while to get adjusted, although it only took me a month to get a job. We moved to Murray on Aug. 4, 2003, and I started at the Ledger & Times on Sept. 8, 2003. I worked there for four years, and surprisingly loved it. In fact, I like living in Murray and can't see our family growing up anywhere else. (I know that's impossible to explain to some people!)

Never say never. And never think you can plan the details of your life. You'll miss pleasant surprises if you're too caught up in what you think you want. It'll change anyway.

Gosh, in some ways it seems like we just moved here, and in others it seems like a lifetime. We're celebrating our sixth anniversary this weekend, Sunday specifically. That means come Monday we'll have lived in Murray for five years. (That's not including the four years I spent in here in college or Greg's entire childhood.) I'm talking about us. Our little family.

We decided the first few years of marriage were rough, and we're glad to be out of them. The past year as definitely been the best -- in terms of peace + joy -- that's we've experienced together. Between our company, which is Greg's day-to-day job, and our daughter, we feel like our family has a purpose that is motivated by passion. It's like we've discovered who/what we're supposed to be, together and individually.

How about some more of those quotes from John Ortberg:

If we don't rejoice today, we will not rejoice at all. If we wait until conditions are perfect, we will still be waiting when we die. If we are going to rejoice, it must be in this day. This is the day the Lord has made.

Love and hurry are fundamentally incompatible. Love always takes time, and time is one thing hurried people don't have. ... That's why Jesus never hurried. If we are to follow Jesus, we must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from our lives -- because, by definition, we can't move faster than the one we are following.

I'm thankful God worked on me through the little things and the big deals. Since we've moved to Murray, I've been diagnosed with diabetes and dealt with infertility. Talk about some life-changing issues thrown in with the everyday that was made up of many deadlines, family functions with the in-laws and trips to see my family.

Meet today's problems with today's strength. Don't start tackling tomorrow's problems until tomorrow. You do not have tomorrow's strength yet. You simply have enough for today. -Max Lucado in "Traveling Light"

That idea about today's strength makes more sense to me today than it did on Jan. 31, 2004 -- three days after I was diagnosed with diabetes. Time is such a teacher.

In fact, time also is a funny thing.

Newspaper stories are fleeting things. The thing that makes this business so remarkable, that every day we get a new canvas to paint on, is also what makes it so unsatisfying. The story, almost always, dies with the day, the pages of the day-old paper turning yellow in the sun. -Journalist Rick Bragg in "Somebody Told Me"

Thankfully, our lives don't yellow and get tossed out. Here's to nearly five years in Murray and six years as Greg's wife. Seems worth celebrating to me.

Peanut Butter Cup Pie

(It's basically fat-free and sugar-free ... AND still tasty!)

1 graham cracker crust
1 8-ounce package fat-free cream cheese
2 heaping tablespoons peanut butter
dash vanilla
2 or 3 packages/spoons artifical sweetener
1 container of free Cool Whip

1 1/2 cups skim milk
1 small package sugar-free, fat-free chocolate pudding

Mix cream cheese and 2/3 container of Cool Whip with vanilla and artificial sweetener until creamy. Add peanut butter. Pour mixture into pie crust.

Prepare pudding per package directions, using only 1 1/2 cups milk. Spread over top of pie. Use remainder of Cool Whip on top of pie.

Refrigerate at least 2 hours before serving.

Makes 8 servings.

SERVING = 1 slice
EXCHANGES = 1 starch; 1 meat

GO with the FLOW

Shelley challenged me to scrap more than one picture on an 8 1/2-by-11 page. So I did. I like how it turned out. I'm used to filling up bigger pages, so I actually had to get creative to make it all fit yet not seem too busy.

See, I am doing a new thing! ...

Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland. Isaiah 43:18-19 (NIV)

I don't consider myself a fearful person. I don't worry about sugar substitutes giving me cancer or whether talking too much on the cell phone will do weird things to my insides. If I spent my life worrying about stuff like that, I'd be a wreck because every day there's a new study verifying the importance of one thing while discouraging other things because they *might* be harmful. I'm not afraid of spiders. And while I don't like birds, it's not fear as much as I'm weirded out by them.

When it comes to matters of the heart, the stuff that really matters, I'm not all that fearful either. I trust people. I like people. I realize my life is deeply enriched because I let people in. I realize I'll be disappointed, likely more than once, but that hasn't stopped me yet.

This is why I remind you to fan into flames the spiritual gift God gave you when I laid my hands on you. For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline. 2 Timothy 1:6-7 (NLT)

Like the first verse says, our God is one who gives us new days. That's the beauty of grace. We constantly get to start over, and hopefully go into the new day with less fear than the day before.

My fears are more abstract than spiders, or even cancer. I'm afraid of forgetting. That's why I blog, and take pictures, and scrapbook, and write notes to myself. I'm afraid of forgetting little commitments I said I'd do. And I'm afraid of forgetting how amazing being the mother of a little one has been.

And forgetfulness frustrates me, especially when it's plaguing me.

Then I'm also fearful of losing people. I guess to death, but even more so to circumstances infected by human imperfection and emotion. That's definitely rooted in a past situation that tore my heart to pieces. But I definitely don't have control over other people and their reactions and decisions.

I cling too tightly sometimes. Maybe sometimes it's more in head than in my actions. But still. That past situation seems to creep in to my new days every now and then. While I'd embrace my old friend if she walked in the door right now; I still fear what happened to our friendship might happen again with someone else I love.

But God tells me not to fear. He tells me to love. And that's what I'll do. Today there is less fear than yesterday and tomorrow is yet another day. Thankfully, I'm not alone.

{lake fun}

A two-page spread I scrapped during Cate's naptime today ...


(left page)


(right page)

friends + water

Three moms, two 2-year-old boys, one 15-month-girl and one great friend who loves being with us and our kids went to a water park yesterday. Cate + I went with other friends earlier this summer, but it was even better this time because Cate can walk. She especially loved the family tube slide, which we didn't go down last time. I'm training her to be my roller coaster girl!


Luke + Cate were definitely more interested in getting back in the kiddie pool than posing for a picture!


The tubes were poplar, as was "falling down" in the shallow water.


Cate had an important phone call to take ... on Pierson's shoe!


I guess she had a message for him! He's listening to whatever she's saying!

There are more pictures here.

totally terrific tubing

I went tubing for the first time this weekend on Lake Barkley. And it was so, so much fun ...



There are more pictures here. I like the way Facebook organizes pictures, plus I don't have to upload them again!

8 1/2-by-11

This is the first 8 1/2-by-11 page I've scrapped. It was fun to do something different. Plus I really like the paper I bought last weekend on sale at Hobby Lobby.

Fellow scrappers, what size pages do you usually make?

(For you non-scrappers, I usually make 12-by-12 pages, meaning the paper is 12 inches by 12 inches. Although I have made 8-by-8 and 10-by-10 albums about trips, etc.)

Red Letters Campaign: Attachment

How did attachment go during your first year? Describe what you did to prepare for attachment as well as the joys and challenges of attachment during your first year home.

A friend of mine who has adopted her two children domestically warned me that bonding with our baby might be a challenge. She encouraged me to let Cate sleep close to us, like in a bassinet beside our bed. Until that conversation with her a few weeks before Cate was born, I hadn't even considered not bonding with my baby.

Sure, I wasn't physically birthing this baby, but I had all the peace that the birth mother was carrying a baby for us. That's even how she talked. It's what I knew in my hard, even though a couple people tried to instill fear in me.

After Cate was born and the nurses took care of her immediate needs in the nursery, a sweet nurse brought her to me at 4 a.m. I fed her and held her for three straight hours. Greg was trying to sleep. But I was falling in love with the little person who was going to change our family in more good ways than I can ever begin to count.

I guess I should say: We bonded.

And we haven't stopped bonding since.

We spent the first week of her life in a hotel in southern Indiana waiting for the green light for state governments to go home. That was a bonding experience in itself. Cate slept in a travel bassinet near our hotel bed. Then when we got home, she spent a night, maybe two, in the bassinet in our room. We decided we'd all probably sleep better if we had our own space. So she went to her crib, and that's where she's slept since. We're just down the hall so we can hear her, but my baby likes her sleep as much as we do.

Cate is almost 15 months old, and bonding hasn't been a challenge. Of course, she hasn't known any other caregivers. We were there when she's born and she's been with us since.

How's that for not really having an answer to the Blog Buzz question?!

Road trip!

Cate + I took a spontaneous road trip on Monday. Mom had called to tell me Laine was admitted to the hospital and being induced. I went back and forth about whether I should go at the beginning of the week or later in the week. I opted for the beginning, and I left about two hours after deciding. I was excited to meet our new nephew Jaxson and I think I subconsciously was ready for a road trip!


I hadn't been to Oldham County in awhile. I went to a friend's house at Christmas, but that's it in the last couple years. The last two days were the most time I spent in Oldham County in a long time.


This was Milla at the hospital after playing (and eating) at McDonald's, which she calls "Old McDonald's." I really was trying to get a picture of her shirt, announcing her role as Big Sister, but she wasn't exactly standing still!

Milla wasn't sure what to think about her mom laying in that little hospital bed that didn't provide much room for her. Turns out Cate was a great distraction!


We took them to play ...


While it looks like Cate is escaping ...


... she totally went back for more!

Cate didn't much napping in yesterday among the visiting Laine, Kevin + Jaxson; having lunch with an old friend; shopping at Kohl's + Sam's; visiting Poppy; and eating dinner. But she was a trooper, and then promptly crashed when we hit I-65. She slept all the way to Calvert City. (That's a couple hours for you people unfamiliar with the trip from Louisville to Murray!)

Jaxson Noah Hill

Kevin + Laine had their baby boy on Monday night. He was born at 11:46 p.m. July 21, 2008. He weighed 8 pounds 6 ounces and was 21 1/4 inches long. I took this picture of them a little after midnight, so little Jax was so new!

Then these are not quite 12 hours later ...

Salvaged (The Page)

I've had this page in my head for awhile now. So it didn't take that long to make, especially because I already had the collage of pictures printed out from my computer.

Sundays ...

... are lazy days. At least the afternoons are.

We go to church and eat lunch with our friends. Then Cate usually crashes, and Greg rests in front of the Cardinals baseball game. I usually rest too, although then I'll think of something that I could be doing and do that.

In this picture, Cate + Greg had both just woken up from naps. I guess when I carried Cate out (I was going to have her jump on Greg ...) she realized maybe she wasn't quite done laying down. It only lasted a few moments longer, though.

Game Night!

The other day I wrote about how motherhood has taught me about a go-with-the-flow spirit. Well, that came into play the other night when we had friends over for Game Night. A couple of the guys wanted to play corn hole, so the party moved from the kitchen to the back yard. I should probably mention that there were seven kids ranging from 4 years old to 3 1/2 months. Five of those seven are very mobile, so they were immediately attracted to the sand + water table, plastic pool and small slide. We hadn't intended on swimming or playing in sand, but that didn't stop them or us mothers.


Cate never really made it into the pool, but as you can see above she had her moments in the sand. Luke + Pierson, who are both 2, ended up swimming in pink Dora Little Swimmers after their clothes got wet from them jumping in the pool.

There are more pictures from Game Night here.

And, yes, we actually ended up back inside to play Pictionary. Maybe everyone was just eaten up by mosquitoes.

Golf, anyone?

Greg went golfing this afternoon, and apparently Cate wanted to go to!

She's very into balls right now. She says it every time she sees anything round, like the cantaloupe and grapes at Kroger today. We went to sign something at the bank, and the lady had a basketball on her bookshelf, so Cate repeatedly pointed it out.


She was not happy when Daddy put the golf balls into his bag, but she forgave him.