favorite quotes ever

"When you're pregnant, you can think of nothing but having your own body to yourself again; yet after giving birth you realize that the biggest part of you is now somehow external, subject to all sorts of dangers and disappearance, so you spend the rest of your life trying to figure out how to keep her close enough for comfort. Thats the strange thing about being a mother: Until you have a baby, you don't even realize how much you were missing one." ~Jodi Picoult; Vanishing Acts

I love this quote because it describes perfectly how I feel about my daughter.  She's more than just my child, she's an extension of me; a part of who I am.  I cannot imagine my life without her, nor do I want to.  I am who I am because of her and whether she's near or far away won't matter--because she'll always be close to me.  

"Sometimes parents don't find what they're looking for in their child, so they plant seeds for what they'd like to grow there instead. I've witnessed this with the former hockey player who takes his son out to skate before he can even walk. Or in the mother who gave up her ballet dreams when she married, but now scrapes her daughter's hair into a bun and watches from the wings of the stage. We are not, as you'd expect, orchestrating their lives; we are not even trying for a second chance. We're hoping that if this one thing takes root, it might take up enough light and space to keep something else from developing in our children: the disappointment we've already lived." ~Jodi Picoult; Vanishing Acts

Happy New Year!

 I can't believe this year is over!  It has been a very eventful year, but mostly in a good way.  Savannah started preschool, I am finally getting into my major, Early Childhood Education, at Mercer University, I've been working as an After School Education Program teacher at Flippen Elementary and loooove it, Savannah is still loving ballet and just finished performing in the Nutcracker (pictures to follow), and we have great friends and family that keep our days filled with fun and excitement!  Savannah is at a great age right now--a little tough because she is constantly testing the boundaries--but fun because we can actually communicate and have conversations.  She is learning to read and write and is very eager for anything educational!  

Christmas was wonderful this year!  Santa brought everyone wonderful gifts--new speakers for my car for me and a Sleeping Beauty vanity (plus about a thousand more presents) for Savannah.  It was the first year celebrating Christmas without my brother, Sean, but thankfully he was able to celebrate with my other brother Jay, my sister-in-law Jenny, and my nephew James in South Bend, Indiana, where Jay and Jenny study at Notre Dame.  Down here in Atlanta we had a lovely relaxing Christmas day.  Although we started opening presents early, Savannah woke us veeerrrry early busting at the seams to see what Santa brought, we did manage to string out the presents for nearly 4 hours--for just 5 people!  We stayed in our cute pajamas all day (even to eat Christmas dinner) until we finally got dressed to drive around and look at Christmas lights.  It was a just a really great day.

I'll stop writing now and post some recent pictures below.  Hope you all have a Happy New Year!  See you in 2009!

My adorable God-son River, who Savannah and I got to keep for a weekend!

Another cute shot of Riv

Beautiful Savannah at the park

Savannah and her preschool class singing songs at their Thanksgiving feast

Savannah and her fellow ballerinas at a Nutcracker performance

Savannah playing on starfall.com dressed in her Christmas gear

 

Savannah and her class singing at their Christmas Program

Mimi, Melissa, and Savannah in our matching pajamas that Mimi sewed herself!

Hello Again!

Yeah, so its been a while since I've blogged.  We've just been so busy and by the time I have a minute to be on the computer the last thing I want to do is think enough to write a blog.  But, its a rainy day outside, Savannah is playing in the bathtub, and I don't have anything to do until 2:00, when I go to work, so I thought I'd write a little.

Savannah is in preschool now at St. James the Apostle.  Its a Catholic church and it is really really fabulous.  She has learned so much and it amazes me more and more every day how sponge-like her little brain is- just taking in everything around her.  She memorizes songs, prayers, and poems, learns how to take care of plants, learns letters and numbers, and so much more!  She is even learning sight words, where she can look at a word and recognize it.  Her most consistent ones are 'and' and 'me' and 'God made'.  Those teeny words may not seem like a big deal- but they are the stepping stones to reading!  And I cannot wait for this child to be able to read.  She wants to so bad.  She is really good at memorizing books (literally word for word) and then she'll sit in her little rocking chair and recite the book while flipping pages.  I am beginning to wonder if she is going to have a near-photographic memory like my brother, Savannah's Uncle Jay.  That sure would be nice!  Savannah is also in ballet.  This is her second year and she still absolutely loves it!  Atlanta Festival Ballet is a great ballet school and we love all teachers!  Atlanta Festival Ballet is also a company of professional dancers (whohappen to be the teachers in the school) and they put on incredible productions every few months.  Right now they are in the midst of practicing for, of course, the Nutcracker and Savannah is going to be in it!  I cannot tell you how excited I am.  It is a lot of extra work- an extra practice every Saturday (we already have weekly lessons on Tuesdays), and lots and lots of performances.  But it is such a great experience for Savannah and she loves it so much, I am willing to sacrifice my time.  We cannot wait until the spring when the company will be putting on "Beauty and the Beast".  

Nothing new is really going on with me.  I just started classes for my (hopefully!) final year of school.  And I will finally- FINALLY- have a freaking college degree- in Early Childhood Education (a major I never guessed I would have ended up in).  But I really am loving my classes at Mercer.  I can already tell these teachers are going to be some of my favorite college professors.  My favorite class so far is Children's Literature.  It is fun to be learning about the classic books that I read when I was young, that I read to Savannah, and that Savannah will one day read to herself.  Every week we have to bring in 3 children's books and discuss them in our groups and a lot of people were stressing about where they were going to get so many books over the course of our class- but I am really looking forward to it because I have an endless supply of children's books.  Savannah's room is swollen with books but I just can't get rid of any of them!  I want her to grow up with the same love of reading that I always had and still have now.  I am a complete dork when it comes to reading.  I always have a book going and very often I have to force myself to stop reading so I can accomplish other things like...I don't know...taking care of my child!  No, its not that bad.  Well, at least not most of the time...  

Lately I have really been into Jodi Picoult.  I read "My Sister's Keeper" this summer and I seriously think it was one of the best books I have ever read.  She always writes on such controversial topics, but always manages to conclude the book so as not to offend anyone, but still with power and emotion.  In my opinion, the story does not weaken at all just because she doesn't take a side on the issues she is writing on.  I don't have time now, Savannah is getting wrinkly, but next time I am on I am going to list out all the books that I have been reading (mainly Jodi Picoult) with a little synopsis.  I'd really like to get opinions on the books I've been reading, as well as ideas for some new books to read!

Here are a few pictures from the past few months!!

Savannah on her first day of school right before walking in!

My adorable and perfectly precious little nephew, James, from our trip to South Bend in September.

My sister-in-law, Jenny, and me and our darlings- trying to get a good shot and not succeeding!

the sweetest thing i've ever seen...

my world, my heart...

I'll post some more later!

Holy crap I cannot wait...

ssssssst- love you

I seriously have the sweetest, most adorable child ever.  Some of you may be wondering why the sub-title of our blog is "ssssssst: love you".  Well, a few months ago Savannah created this sort of secret handshake between the two of us where we touch our pointer fingers together and say "ssssssst- love you".  I don't know where she got it from, but I do know that I love it when she wants me to do it.  Now we do it whenever we're going to be apart or when she's going to bed or after she's gotten in trouble and she's apologizing.  I hate disciplining her so whenever I am forced to I want to make sure that she knows that I will always love her and am only trying to do whats best for her.  I think our secret handshake helps her remember that.

Little River!

So one of the most recent fun thing that Savannah and I have been able to do is visit one of my best friends, Kinser, and her 9 month old, River, up in Kennesaw.  River, who just happens to be my God-son, is one of the cutest little boys ever!  He is such an incredible little boy, too.  When he was born he had a sort of heart murmur.  The doctors were thinking (and hoping) that it would basically just fix itself and it would never be a problem, but it became a problem.  He was always very healthy and alert and bright and Kinser is just such a great mom, but he never put on very much weight.  So about two months ago he had to undergo open-heart surgery.  Talk about scary!  But he did amazing!  He healed so much faster than anyone thought he would and since the surgery he has become a different baby!  He has put on about 6 pounds, he has doubled his intake of food, has begun sitting up and crawling, and saying words!  Its just the most incredible thing to see how this baby has healed and thrived in the past two months! Savannah had so much fun playing with River and I had a blast seeing Kinser and another of my best friends, Ashley. Here are some pictures we took while we were there!

Click on the picture to enlarge it.

pool time!

my beautiful girl

little riv and me ready for the pool

cool riv

kinser and river- check out his buddha belly

savannah leaping into the pool

bangin' on the bongos

cute cute kids

admiring a cool toy!

Hello blog world!!

So I've given in!  I have wanted to start a blog for a while now, but just have never gotten to it.  So, I'm finally doing it.  Pictures and real posts will be up soon, so enjoy!