It Must Run in the Family

Just a quick note to show y'all a little evidence to prove once and for all that being a chocolate lover is something you are born with. No doubt about it... So many people tell us over and over again how much Tate takes after Brad - and I have to agree. They do look an awful lot alike. However, my little Tater LOVES his chocolate and that, my friends, is all ME!

Back to the Grind

So it's official... school is back in session. For the past two years, I haven't dreaded starting the school year that much because I only worked three days a week. There's not much to complain about when Wednesday is your "Friday," you know? But as many of you know, my school district decided to change some things, including getting rid of "job shares" - which is what my position was considered. So I was given two choices: take the position full-time or resign. It really wasn't a hard decision, because I love the job and want to keep it, especially since Tate will hopefully be coming with me to school in just a couple of years.

So here we are on day three of a new school year. It's always good to see everyone and I have to admit, I miss my kiddos over the summer... Okay, so not ALL of them, but a lot of them! I've been busy with first week of school "housekeeping" and stuff. And because my room is located in the kindergarten hallway, I get the chance to be around all those little babies during their first experiences at school. I've overheard lots of things that crack me up...

A kiddo was lost in the hallways and said to his friend, "Oops, wrong alley."

Another kid was lost and when I asked him who his teacher was, he replied with tears in his eyes, "Mrs. Wiggles." "You mean Mrs. Wiggins?" I asked him.

Within the first five minutes of being in class on the first day, a kid ran up to his teacher (who was talking to some parents of another child) and yelled out, "I don't want to sit by that girl! She SMELLS!" Nice.

At lunch, a little one had the following conversation with a brand new teacher:
Do you have a husband?
No.
Do you have a kid?
No.
Do you have a baby?
No.
Do you have a dog?
No.
...Well... do you have a hamster???"

Ahhh, the joy of five year olds...

Anyway, good luck to all the kids heading back to school... And for those of you in Plano, only 176 more days left - not that I'm counting.

Love to y'all,
Tracy

D.O.N.E.

WHOOOOHOOOOO!!!!!! The floors are done!!! With the help of some amazing friends, Brad got done putting the floors down a couple days ago and this weekend was spent doing the finishing work and a heck-of-a-lot of cleaning. UGH. But the important thing is that all the hard work is done and now we can enjoy the fruits of our labor. FINALLY.

We still have to get everything back on the walls and continue cleaning the floors because the dust is still finding it's way back, but for the most part, we are now able to relax. I love the way the floors look (sooooo much better than the old ones) - they're much more our style.

I'm so thankful for all the hard work Brad put in to make this all happen as quickly as he did. As soon as he'd get home from work, he'd get started and usually come to bed around 1:00 every night for the past ten days or so. Needless to say, it's been a long month and boy am I glad it's over!

Love to y'all,
Tracy

Fifteen Weeks

I just wanted to write a quick update about my pregnancy... I'm about fifteen weeks now. I'm still feeling pretty good, except I've noticed my patience is not quite what it used to be (and it needed some work to begin with) - although I'm not sure if this is hormone-related or just three-year-old-little-boy-related if you catch my drift...

I went to the doctor this morning. The baby's heartbeat sounded great and I'm measuring right where I should be at this point. Because of the heart problems that Nash had, my next round of appointments will be a little different than a "normal pregnancy." I'll have a Level 2 sonogram at a perinatologist's office in a couple weeks and then a fetal echocardiogram of our baby's heart at a pediatric cardiologist's office a couple weeks after that. Please, please keep our little one in your prayers as the results of these appointments should tell us a lot.

Okay, better go... a certain little boy "NEEDS" some apple juice. Deep breath... Ahhhh......

Love to y'all,
Tracy

Why?

Of course I have a million questions surrounding what our family has endured over the past thirteen months. But the question of "why?" pops into my mind more often than I'd like to admit. I know that I will never get the answer to this, and most days I accept this for what it is. But this summer, I have found myself asking this question not only about me, but about many of closest friends as well. This morning I found myself asking it yet again, with some terrible news I received from a good friend.

For the sake of privacy, I won't go into details about any of my friends' situations, but I know three amazing women that all found out they were expecting in the past couple of months. These women all come from different heartbreaking circumstances of losing other children and then had regained hope with the news of their upcoming miracles. Their joys were short-lived when they lost their precious babies before they got the chance to hold them in their arms.

Any person's heart breaks for these friends of mine. And I wish there was something I could do to help them through this horrible time. I just feel like saying, "Enough is enough!" Why do things like this happen to these wonderful families, whose only desire is to have healthy children? I just don't get it... as I'm sure, they don't either.

It's a very scary realization that no matter how hard life is, no matter how many tears you've cried, or how many pieces your heart has broken into, you are still suseptible to more heartache. It's not like there's some master list, where once you have dealt with the most unbearable pain of losing a child, you are now immune to having other terrible things happen to you.

So please, please pray for the healing of my friends. Pray they find moments of peace and comfort. I know their little ones have now joined their siblings in heaven and they are all watching over their mommies and daddies.

Love to y'all,
Tracy

What Have We Done???

Sorry it's been so long since I've written... We've had a bit of a mess on our hands around our house for the last week or so, and there's no end in sight. Maybe I should start at the beginning...

So y'all know we moved in to our new house right before we headed off to Iowa. While we were gone, we had painters come and put new fresh paint on the walls to make the house more "ours." Once we got back, I began the arduous task of unpacking box after box after box. After a couple weeks, things were pretty well settled - we even got the pictures hung on the walls.

But here's where the problem came: once everything was put away, I started my normal routine of cleaning (which took three times as long to get done as at the old house - UGH!). It was during these cleaning episodes that I began to notice the RIDICULOUS amount of grime, dirt, food, dog hair, and who-knows-what-else all over our floors. When we first bought the house, the one thing I wasn't crazy about was the white tile and light wood floor that pretty much covered the entire downstairs. But I told myself that in time, these were things that could all be fixed...

Let me interject here that I am by no means a clean freak. In fact, I'd much rather sit on my couch watching The Bachelorette or Big Brother than get on my knees and scrape nasty stains off my kitchen floor. But every time I turned around my eyes would focus on all the gunk covering it. I would put the vaccuum away and what do you know? More filth! It was never-ending. Of course, I constantly complained to Brad about it, but he gently reminded me that we just bought a new house and eventually we could talk about it.

Then came the turning point... we went over to our friends, Mary and Travis' house, who had just completed tearing up their floors and putting down a beautiful dark wood. As soon as we walked in, I was SOOOOO jealous! It looked amazing and it was exactly the way I wanted our house to look. I mentioned it to Brad, who actually looked equally as impressed. By the time we left their house that night, Brad was sold on the idea of ripping out our floors and putting in some wood!!!

Maybe I should tell y'all that once Brad gets something in his head, he's ready to start. So four days after our night with Mary and Travis, guess who's house turned into a complete disaster area? Yep! Brad and some friends completely tore out all our tile (which was a ton!) over the weekend. Then Brad decided that if we're gonna do it, we might as well be thorough, so he also tore up the yucky colored wood in the family room and the carpet in the office and the dining room as well. Why not, right?

So needless to say, our house looks like a warzone. DUST IS EVERYWHERE!!! I love my husband, but boy would it have been nice if he'd used some drop clothes to cover the cabinets, new couch, etc. He did make sure to cover the tvs though - go figure. For the past three days, I have done nothing but clean dust from every imaginable place in our entire house - including the game room upstairs! I am now quite talented at dusting and washing the walls, individual crayons, boxes of cereal, toy cars, each separate spice in the spice rack, and everything in each kitchen cupboard had to be washed and put back (after I cleaned out the actual cabinets of course!). RIDICULOUS!!!

So the floors are supposed to come in by August 9th, but Mary and Travis have warned us theirs took six weeks before they got them. AHHH! In the mean time, we'll just be as content as can be with our cement floors and dusty feet. Oh, Lord, what have we done???

Love to y'all,
Tracy

Tate's Big Birthday Weekend!!!

My sweet little boy turned three today!!! I cannot believe how quickly time has passed. I remember the day he Tate was born like it was yesterday... the anticipation, the excitement, the worry, the overwhelming joy, and the true love at first sight. What a miracle God sent to us that night.

So this weekend we were busy with our little man, doing all of his most favorite things... Friday night we went to a Ranger's game. I will say it started out a little shaky when Tate started screaming and crying every time the crowd would cheer. I still have to idea what the problem was, but for a good fifteen minutes we had pretty much the entire section of fans staring at us as he screamed his pretty little head off. Embarrassing? Totally. But so freakin' cute... Then all of a sudden he just snapped out of it and ended up being the loudest kid in the ballpark, cheering on all the players, yelling how many outs there were, and even booing the umps bad calls (I know, I know, not the best sportsmanship!). At one point, the Twins hit a homerun and it literally landed two rows directly in front of Brad and Tate. The crowd started chanting, "Throw it back! Throw it back!" to the woman that got the ball. And our little boy yelled it right along with them... His daddy was so proud.

Yesterday morning Tate woke up to find an early birthday present that Brad picked out for him: a new set of golf clubs... They're real clubs that had been cut down so kids can use them. And the best part is they're left-handed so he doesn't have to use the back side of Brad's anymore! Then Brad took our own little Tiger to the golf course and shot nine holes with him and some friends. Tate had a great time hitting his new clubs and driving the golf cart.

To celebrate his actual birthday, this morning Brad took him to pick up donuts for breakfast... (is it bad that he ate two glazed donuts with frosting and sprinkles and then three donut holes???). Then he opened his presents and played for a bit. For lunch we went to Chuck E. Cheese's with my parents. Tate has been OBSESSED with going there since a recent trip there with my dad. He was sooo excited and ran around that place for two hours, playing every game and riding every ride he could get his hands on. After the tokens ran out, we came home and opened presents from my parents and then had some cake.

All in all, I think it was a pretty fun birthday weekend for our little Tatertot... I wonder when he's gonna think it's embarrassing that I call him that. Before I know it, he'll be thirteen and I'll be begging him to go to Chuck E. Cheese's for old time's sake...

My Sweet Tate... Thank you for being my boy. Thank you for teaching me about baseball and how to hit golf clubs. Thank you for sharing my love of country music. Thank you for the cuddles, the kisses, the tight hugs. Thank you for giving me strength when I need it most. Thank you for bringing so much love into this house. You are a gift to all who know you... I am so blessed that God chose me to be your mommy. I love you bunches.

~Mommy

Love to y'all,

Tracy

***QPTU (Quick Potty Training Udpate): Doing really well. A couple pooping mishaps (like in the play area at McDonald's). Tons of stickers. A lot less nakedness.