In the Cards

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." - Jeremiah 29:11

From the very beginning of my pregnancy with Grayson, I called him my surprise. A friend commented very early on that sometimes God gives us what we need rather than what we want. Now as I sit here at my kitchen table listening to the click-clack of the baby swing in the living room, I know just how true that statement was.

Even though I didn't recognize it as God's plan at the time, I can't imagine our lives without Grayson. He's only been here a week and he has already added something to our family that I didn't know was missing. I've realized he was in the plan for us the entire time...I just hadn't bothered to read that far ahead! Grayson needed us and we needed him. It was already in the cards!

Finding Nebo

In my 28 years of life, I've never lived outside the great state of Alabama, which means I am no longer caught off guard by three things: unbearable humidity, tornado season and Dan Satterfield. I knew storms were coming last night, mainly because my grandmother doubles as a weather radio! Since there's really nothing I can personally do to combat a tornado, I went to bed and told my 3rd shift husband to call me if I needed to scoop up the baby and crawl in a closet. No phone call = no danger.

All was fine and good until about 11:30. Okay, so I'm going to assume that you have all taken your car through a gas station car wash. You know the sound of the air and water pounding against your car? That was the sound against my bedroom window. I picked up my phone to text the hubs. "What's going on with the weather?" I asked. "Raining," was the response I got. Well, thank you Captain Obvious. So I got out of bed and turned on Doppler Dan to get the scoop.

If you aren't from North Alabama, there's no way you can possibly appreciate the utter passion local meteorologist Dan Satterfield has for severe weather. He eats, sleeps and breathes watches and warnings. It didn't take long for me to realize that the carwash sound was really the worst of it for Hartselle and that we weren't in any real danger. But I stayed glued to the tube for a few more minutes because as the storm moved out of Morgan County and into Madison and Marshall, the names of the communities in the line of fire got more and more interesting. I began texting JB just to ask him if he'd ever heard of these places...Nebo, Fishtrap Ford, Blackankle, Cushion, Hebron. But it may have actually been funnier just watching Doppler Dan struggle with some of these no-stop-light communities, or skip pronouncing them altogether for fear of saying them incorrectly.

So while I'm glad last night didn't spawn too much tornadic activity for NA, I'm sure happy I didn't miss an ever important geography lesson for my home state.

And He Shall Be...

As of today, I'm 33 weeks pregnant. That's 8 months and 1 week in case you're terrible at math. And in my nearly 28 years of life, I don't think I've ever taken as much time making a decision as I have in naming this baby. In my defense, naming a boy is tough. Let's face it, boys are stuck with their name forever. Girls at least have a "drop the middle or maiden name" option should they get married. But not boys. Without legal name changes, the name on their birth certificate will be the name on their head stone.

Jason and I started out with good intentions, each making lists of names we liked to see if any matched. Nope. It ended up in a battle of wills to see who could hold out the longest without giving in. I can only imagine now how my mother must have felt when she wanted to name my brother Zeke and my dad wouldn't have it. But after all, it was 1990 and Zeke was the lead man in a TV show "Tour of Duty."

So after literally months of deliberation and striking names off one another's lists one-by-one (no seriously, we marked names off with a pen), we have a name for our soon-to-be-here baby boy.

We can't wait for Grayson Rhys Brightwell to make his appearance so that you all can love him as much as we already do!

And You Are???

There are many things, as you can imagine, that really get "stuck in my crawl" as some would say. One of those such things is maiden names, or rather the lack thereof, on FB.

Now I'll be the first to tell you that I'm just about as traditional as traditional can be when it comes to getting married. For all legal purposes, I dropped my maiden name like a hot tamale to become Mrs. Brightwell (although I think of my MIL when Mrs. Brightwell is tossed around). But when my darling friend Amanda Smith came to me shortly after my nuptials saying, "You've got to check out this Facebook thing!" I quickly enrolled as Tiffany Brasher Brightwell.

Here's my theory:

If we were high school classmates who haven't seen each other in a month of Sundays, I don't know you by your husband's name - especially if you married some boy - Heaven forbid - from outside Morgan County. I understand that we may have originally entered into a FB friend commitment before your wedded bliss. But if you a) got married and totally removed your maiden name from your profile, b) lost 50 pounds and don't look a thing like you did in high school, or c) use only a picture of your children - I'm not judging because I've done it too - for your profile picture, chances are I don't know you from Adam's house cat!

So ladies, please do the entire world a favor and leave your maiden name on FB when you get married. I know it would make my life easier. And let's be honest, isn't that what it's really all about? Y'all have a good weekend and call your mama & 'em to check in!

Milk Cows are for Milk

Today is my darling husband's 26th birthday. We celebrated last night with dinner at Connor's Steakhouse. Thank goodness for reservations, because we were at our table in no time flat. The waiter came to take our order and I didn't even need the menu. I had been thinking about the meal all day. House salad with ranch dressing. A 6 0z. Oscar filet cooked medium. Cheese grits. Now, I'm sure I'll catch some flack from all you who believe pregnant women have to eat steak well-done. Well in my humble opinion, a well-done steak isn't fit for human consumption.

The meal arrived quickly and our dinner conversation went from the crying little girl who had to be escorted out by her several-months-pregnant mother (sounds familiar, huh) to the quality of the food. For those of you who think we must have the most interesting dinner conversations ever, I hate to burst your bubble. Let me just break it down for you:

Me: Oh dear lord this steak is fantastic (as I push the asparagus aside).

J: Mine too.

Me: I wonder where they get their steak?

J: Not Wal-Mart. Hey, do you think we should buy a cow and have it slaughtered for steaks like this?

Me: What kind of cow?

J: I dunno (with a shoulder shrug). A brown one I guess. Or maybe a milk cow.

Me: That's just dumb. Milk cows are for milk, not steak.

And that's pretty much how are date night went! By the way, the baby loved that I fed him steak for dinner and kicked happily all the way home. Maybe I can use him as my tool to get Connor's more often!

Adventures in Potty Training

Personally, I think 19 months is too young to try this whole potty training thing, but sometimes kids just get things stuck in their heads and you can't fight it. But OH how I'd love to decrease our diaper-spending...especially since diaper consumer #2 is soon on his way!

Birdie has fallen in love with sitting on the potty like a big girl. So I broke down and bought a cute little pink potty seat that fits on the big toilet seat, thus keeping little booties from having a splash landing. I must say that I am appalled by the thought of one of those seats you have to empty and clean out after each go 'round. Yuck. I'd much rather flush the thing and be done with it.

So when she gets home from "skoo" every afternoon, she runs to us and screams "I Potty I Potty I Potty" until someone takes to her sit on the throne. This is typically repeated every 15-20 minutes. I'm telling you the child is determined. Keep in mind that we're just beginning to grasp the concept of what it actually means to "I Potty" so she's usually running on empty (if you're picking up what I'm putting down). But last night was different. Last night we celebrated a small victory. On one of our many "I Potty" runs, an actual potty occurred. I was parked in my usual spot on the couch watching The Sing Off (don't you judge me, lest ye shall be judged also) and heard "TIFFANY COME HEEEERE!" from the bathroom. And pretty as you please, Birdie is perched on her pink seat grinning ear to ear saying "I Potty!" Don't worry folks. She was handsomely rewarded with leftover Halloween Smarties.

I can't believe how fast my little bird is growing up. It seems as though I just brought her home from the hospital last week...sniff sniff. But such is life! And I wouldn't trade these days for anything. In fact, I think it will only get better (at least until she turns 13)!

Oh Boy!

I thought I'd take a minute and introduce the world to our baby boy! He doesn't have a name yet since no compromise has been reached. I figure we'll have to come up with something soon since they won't let us leave the hospital with a nameless baby. I can already tell he has big feet like his daddy...that probably won't hurt when it comes to kicking a soccer ball around!