Wednesday, May 26, 2010


Happy 27th Birthday to you, Kevan.
My best friend.
My babies' daddy.
My boy.

Happy Birthday to the guy who stole my heart almost 10 years ago, 
and asked me to be his wife on this very day 6 years ago.

To the loving son, selfless husband, 
and SiLLy daddy, 
I say, you deserve the best
and more.

Happy Birthday to the guy who took his girl and moved to Nashville 5 years ago, 
knowing nothing other than that he had
a dream to pursue.

Here's to you for pursuing it,
and teaching me along the way that anything is
possible.

I love you and am more proud of you than I could ever express.

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

i've got some catching up to do...

...in all areas of my life, but what better place to start than the ole blog? I've been to Texas and California in the last couple of weeks, but before I get to those, I wanted to post some pics and a video of Merit from about a month ago. We went to a free Earth Day concert at a park in Nashville to see Sara Watkins and Bela Fleck. Sara was in Nickel Creek, pretty much my favorite band of all time, and Bela Fleck is one of the greatest banjo players there ever was. So to see these two for free, well, I didn't hate it. This was also Merit's first live music experience, and you can't imagine the pride I felt that Sara Watkins was part of that experience. I played Nickel Creek for her all the time when I was pregnant and we attended two Nickel Creek concerts during that time, as well. Here are some pics from Sara's show. (Her brother Sean joined her, so 2/3 of Nickel Creek was there!)





We then went to grab some treats, then came back for Bela Fleck. As you'll see in the video below, Merit enjoyed her first concert. You can't help but move when there is good Bluegrass being played!



She's pretty cute.

Talk of cuteness isn't the greatest segue here, but here are some recent belly pics for those who care. This baby girl is going to be here before we know it (deep breath)!

23 weeks
25 weeks - Mother's Day

Sunday, May 9, 2010

happy mother's day to you!

I took these videos this morning as Merit ate her cereal. As you can tell, she loves all 4 of her grandparents, but today we are celebrating Nina and Grammie! Thank y'all so much for teaching Kevan and I how to be parents, and especially for showing me how to be a Mama. I'm nowhere as good as either of you, but I am thankful to have great examples to follow!



Monday, May 3, 2010

naShville floodS

As you may have heard, we got a drop or two of rain this weekend here in Tennessee. Franklin received 17 inches of rain in 2 days...Nashville received about 15. Things are really, really bad for a lot of people--loss of life, homes, businesses...but we were blessed to not have too much damage from the storms. 

There was once a river running through our carport and down the driveway, but it went down as soon as the rain (finally) stopped.


The only thing that happened to our house is that the crawl space under the house is completely filled with water. We'll be having it pumped out soon...so thankful that this is all we have to deal with. This is the entrance to the crawl space.

We were able to get out a little today, and we went and saw a street less than a mile from our house that was badly flooded.


notice the white car in the next two


view of the street

Again, we are SO blessed, especially to be where we are. Things are horrible in the part of town where our last apartment was. 

the interstate right by the street that our last apartment was on

a nearby car dealership that we passed by everyday
downtown Nashville before the floods

and after :(

even the Grand Ole Opry has been flooded

It is just devastating. Please be praying for all who have been affected - especially the families who have lost loved ones. I know I talk a lot about my allegiance to Texas, but I will say that this town has grown on me. After all of the pictures and footage that I have seen the last couple of days of people helping friends and strangers alike, I can say that I am proud to live here.

And just to lift the spirits a bit, I will leave you with a picture I took of Merit last week when it was raining - a few days before the flooding rains. She had been sitting on the potty and wanted to go look at the "wain". 

She is going to love me for this someday.