Mother's Day came and went almost under the radar this year. It was Mitchell's college graduation, so the day started out hectic with trying to get everyone in cars and headed to Auburn, and then the whole day revolved around the graduation. Selfishly, I was pretty annoyed that my first Mother's Day was less than special. (Shout out to Adam for being the best, and putting up with my whining. Even when he was sweet enough to get me cards and some pampering.)

But something else kept weighing on my mind. We have a handful of friends that are joyously expecting their first babe, and others who are not-so-patiently waiting for their turn. My mind kept drifting to the latter group. Mother's Day has to be a painful day for so many people. Those who have lost their moms, those who long to be a mom, those who have lost those that called them mom. It has to be one of the toughest days of the year. 

Last year, I was so proud to stand up in church and be handed a rose on Mother's Day. I remember cradling my belly and beaming thinking of my little family. I was bummed we were going to miss church this Mother's Day, because I once again wanted to stand up and be recognized. Before we got pregnant, and especially while I was pregnant, I was so excited to be able to wear a 'Sunday School sticker' one day. It's what I call the stickers parents get when they drop their kid(s) off at nursery or Sunday School (for security purposes, of course). It shouts out to the rest of the church, "I'm a mom! I have a kid! I brought that kid with me this morning, and s/he's also learning about Jesus right now! Because I'M A MOM! And look how put together I am at CHURCH with my KID."

I was always expectantly excited to get to wear a sticker. Not once did I have to look at it and think "Will I ever get to wear one of those?" I thank God everyday that I am an outsider looking in on the subject, but I know that is the reality for so many people. Now on Mother's Day, a big piece of my heart aches for those. I pray that one day all who long to be a mom get the opportunity.

Now, I'm going to [try to] quit whining about not feeling "special" on Mother's Day and enjoy the fact that I am lucky enough to even celebrate the day.

Thank you for making me a mama, Aiden Grace. Being your mom is truly the greatest honor.

These two. Gosh. They're the best.

Happy Mother's Day to all! May 2016 be the year of the babes who are so longed for!

Celebrating Moms and Grads!

We have really lucked out with (at least) three weeks of gorgeous weather! After a gross, rainy winter - I'll take it.

We joined my parents and Papabear at the Braves game on Tuesday night, and the weather just made the win even more enjoyable!

Thanks for the awesome picture, Dad! Don't mind us not looking...

My adorable hubs found me some soft serve ice cream - something that always sounds good now that I'm pregnant. (Also, if anyone knows where I can get this without buying my own machine - trust me, I've looked into it - I would greatly appreciate it.)

Fun times!

On Thursday, it was back to Taste of the Nation! (Didn't I quit this job?) My friend/old boss, Allison, is still on board consulting for the event and her C-Section was planned for the day before the event. I was happy to help her out and run day-of logistics in her absence. In exchange for working the day-of, I was able to grab a few tickets for family. I was most excited that Meagan and Nathan got to join in on the fun this year!

How cute are these centerpieces??

This year's Honorary Chef was Wylie Dufresne and Honorary Chair was Dr. Sanjay Gupta. Not too shabby. (And both very nice!)

Allison's new intern, Jessie, did a great job!

With my handsome! 

After a long day (and night), my feet and my belly were so ready for bed! Then it was up and at 'em Friday morning to get ready to head to Milledgeville for Kelsey's graduation!

Debbie, Meagan, Gram, Jude and I headed down in the early afternoon and then we were joined by the boys later in the evening. We all enjoyed a fun little concert on campus before heading back to the hotel for our beauty rest. 

Kelsey's graduation started at 8:45am (goooood morning!), so that was a fun alarm to set. But who cares, we are so proud of her! Her heart has always been called to Africa, and she turned down a pretty awesome job opportunity to do just that in January 2016. We will all miss her, but know God has better plans for her than we could ever dream of! Yay for Kelsey! We love you! 

I sadly don't have any pics of us with the grad, because that girl growing in my belly decided to cause a little scare. Saturday morning I was getting ready and had a gush of (what felt and looked like) water. I thought it was really odd, but tried not to stress out about it. During graduation it happened again and I figured it was just another weird thing my body was doing during pregnancy. (In case you didn't know, pregnancy does some crazy things to your body.) Regardless, I felt like I should call the doctor just to make sure. Because there was a chance it was my amniotic fluid (aka - my water breaking), they recommended I head to the hospital to get checked out. (Who knew they couldn't diagnose fluid over the phone??) After some prayers (and a car ride full of prayers), Adam and I jumped in the car and made the two hour trek back to Atlanta. She kicked a couple times on the ride home, which was comforting! (She had also been pretty chill the last couple days, but I figured it was because I had been nonstop and didn't really notice her. Still, it was a bit unnerving.) 

When we got to the hospital, I checked into triage and they hooked me up to the heart rate monitor. We immediately heard her strong heartbeat, which was a relief. The amniotic fluid test came back negative (yayyy!!!), but we hung out for a few more minutes to meet with the midwife on duty, Leah. While we were waiting, baby girl decided she was sick of the heart rate monitor and kept kicking it. It would make a funny bump noise on the machine every time she did it, and I thought it was the cutest thing ever. Leah finally came in and she was awesome! Apparently sometimes things like this just happen. However, since there's no way of telling unless they do a test, I'll need to go back if it happens again. All in all, I was really pleased with our experience! We were in and out in about an hour (including the time it took to run the tests, etc.), and everyone was very pleasant. Now hopefully we won't be back for another 14 weeks!

After that crazy afternoon, it was time to relax. We spent the rest of the evening laying on the couch watching movies, and baby girl decided to take it upon herself to practice gymnastics. She had a lot of pent up energy after those busy couple days! And even more exciting, Adam finally felt her move... twice!! 

Sunday was Mother's Day (how fitting), and I was so excited to spend the day with my awesome moms! Adam was also the sweetest and made me pancakes and bacon for breakfast! He also got me a pool float (life saver!!), a puzzle and a Baby on Board sign for the car. I complain about how stupid those signs are every time I see them (sorry I'm not sorry), and he thought it would be hilarious to buy me one. It was! 

I also have to brag about Adam, because I don't think I've done it enough. He has been so amazing throughout this entire pregnancy, and I love him more and more each day! It was the best Mother's Day, but to be honest - he's that awesome to me on a daily basis! He was also the perfect combination of calm, comforting and funny during the drama on Saturday, which was so necessary. My heart could explode just thinking about how much love he has for me and our little girl already!

We spent brunch with my family, and Mamabear read her Mother's Day card three separate times. We couldn't help but laugh! This was after she told me my stomach was "HUGE", without knowing I was pregnant. Good to know she's ok just going around saying that to people! Regardless, we love that she's still around to celebrate! (And we would not laugh at her if she was in a bad place. She's happy as a clam!)

After a lazy afternoon, we all headed over to the Bakers for a Baker/Reaves/Causey celebration (plus Gram, too!). I love family time, especially when it's spent celebrating some of my all-time favorite women! I feel so blessed to have my mom and Debbie in my life - they are both such amazing women and I pray I become a fraction of the mom they are!

At church on Sunday, all moms got a rose. Guess what? I'm a mom!! (Adam recommended I pose smelling it - ha!)

In true mom fashion, she wanted to pose with a prop.  Only three more months until she's officially Nonna!

We had a great, fun-filled week and we're looking forward to a busy three months before the babe makes her debut!

{blessing!}

I was going to write a post today about how life is hard. No matter how many amazing things you've been blessed with - life is hard. Instead, I sighed, saved my draft of pointless ramblings and decided to focus on the those said blessings that were apparent this weekend (as they are every day).

My big brother, Jeff, is a charter pilot and his plane needed to go into maintenance for the weekend... a mere two hour drive from Atlanta {blessing in disguise}! So he headed to our place on Friday afternoon and we went to surprise mom - what a perfect Mother's Day gift, huh? (I love surprises! But much as I love being surprised, I love being part of the surprise even more.)

His rental car looked a lot like the Vitz we rented in New Zealand for our 8 day excursion when I studied abroad over there in 2008 {those memories - blessing!}. They could be cousins!

Some old family friends were also in town, so it was just a big reunion on my parents' deck {blessing!}.

Adam, Ruthie, Jeff and I walked up to the Marietta Farmers' Market on Saturday morning. You read that correctly, we can walk to the Farmers' Market from our house {blessing!}. Jefe put together an awesome Mother's Day goodie basket full of things he purchased at the Farmer's Market. As if his surprise wasn't enough!

That evening, we hosted a Mother's Day cookout for my wonderful mother-in-law. It's the least she deserves for raising some pretty amazing kids {blessing!}.

Sunday we were up bright and early to go to church, and we dragged Jeff along. Adam and I were both holding our breath hoping the music would be amazing, since Jeff is a big music guy. They didn't disappoint - he was pretty impressed {blessing!}. The sermon was one of my favorites since we've been going to that church {blessing!}, and I'm glad Jeff was there to hear it.

The rest of the family headed over to our house and we celebrated mom's Mother's Day with brunch at Chicken and the Egg. None of us had been before, but we had all heard pretty awesome things. I can now first hand say that it was delicious! I'm also a big fan of the decor.

Jeff found out at lunch that the company was flying him to New York for one last trip before his shift was over. We were sad to see him leave, but so happy he got to spend the weekend with us {blessing!}. The rest of Sunday was spent napping on and off, watching the Braves and cheers-ing my fabulous mama {blessing!}.

For the biggest blessing of them all this weekend... thank you to this pretty lady for raising my brothers and I into some pretty awesome people (if I may say so myself). I can't imagine how chaotic life was with us as kids, but you somehow lived through it - and we thrived. I love you! {blessing, blessing, BLESSING!}