Dear 2009,

Whew! Where do I even begin with this? You have been a year of lessons; lessons learned... most of them learned while I was kicking and screaming; bottom lip pressed firmly out into a big, fat pout. It has been a really tough year. Like; didn't-know-if-I-would-make-it-through-with-my-head-still-attached tough.... I know that it has been for a lot of people.

But, oddly enough, I would like to thank you, 2009. I would like to thank you for the lessons learned. I have learned how to be a mother - this lesson has been the most difficult of my life (by far) as it is backbreaking, really, for an entirely selfish person to learn how to be.... well... not. Learning how to be a mother implies learning all sorts of other things; like changing a diaper with one hand, for example.

I have learned how to be a dreamer - which is directly opposed to the feet-on-the-ground-make-others-happy person I have always been. And let me tell you, allowing your passion to take flight is both exhausting and wonderful. Oh, and totally terrifying. But I am in this wonderful place right now, where I know that anything is possible. Actually possible.

So thank you, 2009. I am so looking forward to 2010. In a different way than I have ever looked forward to a New Year. Because I am a better person than I was last year and, with the help of my friends and family, I am certain to be even better yet. I. Just. Cannot. Wait. So, I will be bringing in the new year in a easy, low-key way: sitting on my parents' couch watching a rented movie and sipping champagne in my sweats. There is nowhere I would rather be.

Lovingly and Optimistically,

Ashley N. Scobey

P.S. - Look, 2009, at what we made!! How great are we?!?

* photo by the amazing Carla TenEyck *

Six Months (and one week)

With grading and finals and travel and family I have been a slogger lately (that's a slacker blogger... obviously). Sorry about that...

In other news: Evie is the most oddly proportioned child on the planet. Her six month checkup was last Tuesday and here are her stats:

Weight: 13.5 pounds, 6th percentile

Height: 24 inches, 50th percentile

Head Circumference: 67th percentile

The pediatrician was a little bit concerned because her weight percentile had dropped from the 13th to the 6th percentile... but I promised that we feed the child as much as we can. She is just such a busy baby. All she wants is the be a part of the action, and it seems like she thinks that eating gets in the way of that... so unless you are in a quiet room with nobody else within earshot, Evie gets distracted.

Her personality keeps coming out more and more... and we are going to have our hands FULL. She is such a ham and really outgoing. It is so much fun to watch her interacting with other people.

Here is Evie before bath-time last week (Graham normally doesn't let me post naked-babu pictures... but this one got the OK because it doesn't show her hoohoo).

More to come on our SIXTEEN HOUR DRIVE to Atlanta this past weekend... after which I am just thankful to still be breathing.

Two Months Till Christmas

It does not feel like Christmas yet. This is a really difficult thing for me to admit because Christmas is my absolutely completely 100% favorite holiday and I am usually mummified in Band-Aids from all the wrapping paper cuts, pine needle pricks, and glass ornament nicks by the first week in November. But not this year. This year it does not feel like Christmas.

Things have been sooo busy and stressful around here. Not only has this been the longest semester of my life, but we also have a staggering amount of obligations, and then there are those things that we WANT to do like, oh, I don't know, SIT DOWN maybe once a day. I am so ready for a break. I know that Graham is ready for a break too. And by the amount of screaming that Evie has been doing over the past 48 hours I will assume she is thirdsies on that list. (maybe she has brain damage)

This weekend I finally found a little bit of time to put up our Christmas decorations. First, though, I had to remove the scarecrow and two giant hay-bales that were still left over from Halloween. Classsssy. It took me about an hour, but it was a miserable 27 degrees outside and I kid you not when I say that I'm fairly certain my ears were bleeding and I'd lost 50% of my hearing from the cold by the time I got back inside.

One big difference between Graham and me is that he thinks things all the way through. I don't. I think them through until that thought process takes a maximum of 10 minutes and I get bored and/or distracted by shiny objects.

The part that I didn't fully consider about the Christmas lights was the fact that they might need a place to be plugged in. And that might require an extension cord. By the time I figured this out I had frozen hands and bleeding ears, so now we have a wreath on the door and lights that can't be lighted.

So it feels a little more like Christmas than it did on Thursday... and I am hoping that it starts to feel even more like Christmas soon.

I mean, I have snow on my blog now, too, so that has to count for something.

The Club I Least Wanted to be Part of

This past Sunday we loaded up the Scobey Clan and spent the day at Carla's for a family portrait mega event with all of the other peeps from the studio. It was so much fun. And Evie, in typical Evie fashion, was a trooooo-per. She was incredibly patient and smiley. Especially considering that she only took a 20 minute nap the entire, 6 hour day.

I guess that shouldn't really surprise me. She is a really happy, good-natured baby. But this one time, when Evie was about 12 weeks, I drank caffeine and by the time it got to Evie it had apparently morphed into rocket fuel and she was all schooooooooom, kazoooooooommmmm, wablammmmmoooooo for the next 12 hours.

I spent the majority of that day crying. It was enough to scar me for life.

It is also the reason I am still a little shocked when Evie is her typical, awesome self.

At the end of the day we all sat down and watched a slide-show of the images: they were unreal. It got me all jazzed up and made me want to take more pictures.

So on Tuesday I got Evie all dressed up, put her in a little tutu, and we had a little mini portrait sesh of our own.

Super cute, yeah? Mommy-daughter bonding time, right? Except that exactly .45 seconds after this photo was taken I look down at my camera to check my exposure and Evie rolls off the chair. Does a full 360 degree flip in the air. Lands smack on her big 90th-percentile-head. On the hardwood. And starts screaming.

Yeah. I am officially one of those moms who drops their children on those-things-that-HOUSE-THEIR-BRAINS.

I felt/feel awful about it. Like, seriously terrible. So much so that even after Evie had stopped crying I kept the good ole' Tear Train going for a solid hour.

If life were a video game I would have had little "Mom-guilt + 2,000" signs popping out of my head for the next four days. My mom assures me that every parent has accidently hurt their child in some way, but that doesn't really make me feel better about it.

What have you done that has caused the most self-inflicted-guilt?

Holiday Thrift List 2009

This afternoon... for an embarrassing number of minutes... Graham and I played Dirty Mad Libs. What's Dirty Man Libs? You ask? Well... it's this, only dirty.

I want to tell you in explicit detail what our Dirty Mad Libs said. I really really do. Because, as Graham says, I have no filter. And he's right. I don't. So I really really want to tell you what they said. But I can't. I have been strictly forbidden by the SCC (that's Scobey Communications Commission) to just....please....don't.

So, instead, here is my first annual Holiday Thrift List. All gifts featured here are under $28... and they are pretty much guaranteed to make someone in your life very happy (but my Dirty Mad Libs would have made everyone happy. just sayin'.)

This beautiful Cuckoo clock is by Decoylab... and I just dream of all the walls in my house that could be hipenized (ya know. made more hip.) by it. $28

These wooden teethers are all the rage in eco-friendly baby stuff. Problem: they're freakin' ugly. Solution: Mr. T-Rex here. $15

Every little girl needs this book. Except Evie... because her Dad forbids it. And he is heartless. And he doesn't want her growing up dreaming of living in the Plaza Hotel. But, as anyone who has read this book knows, that is so not the point. $14

LePapier Studio makes these beautiful, custom sibling prints. I love them. But not enough to make Evie a sibling. $20

One of my friends from Atlanta takes ordinary old buttons and turns them into these beautiful, stylish rings. I want one. They're so FANCY! $10-15

Hark Industries does some of the most beautiful hand-lettering I have ever seen. In. My. Life. These monthly calendars are among the things for sell in her Etsy store. And did I mention that every detail is done by hand!? Amazing. $16

Things to be Thankful For

Relationship. It is pretty much my favorite word. I study relationships, I am in relationships, I love to give relationship advice. But this past week... this past week I got to capture relationships with my camera. And y'all: it was so much fun. Here are just a FEW of my favorites.

Everyone, meet the S. Family. Talk about some EN-ER-GY! These kids were so much fun to chase around. Everyone had such great senses of humor, too. They had Graham and me laughing pretty much the whole time we were there.

Miss Emma and Mr. Tripp... climbing on the Japanese Maple

And then Drew joined in the fun.

Sweet Anna has the most beautiful smile.


We went straight from the S's to the Scobey/Chamblee Family portrait session. This family is near and dear to my heart because...well... it's mine! People, I cannot stress this enough: DO NOT DRINK THE WATER IN THE SCOBEY'S HOUSE. I am pretty sure that everyone who has in the past 2 years has ended up pregnant. Between the two families, we have SIX babies under the age of two. Six. But you guys? They are all so stinkin' adorable. So at least we have good genes if we are all out there trying to set the Guinness World Record for procreation.

My sweet niece, Sophi.

Ryan, Amy, and Miss Ella Grace. These three are so in love with one another. It is contagious.

There is just something special about a Daddy's boy. Maybe that is why I love this picture so much.


Two of my favorite people in all of the world. Belle and Rach.

The last portrait session of the week was with the E Family. Margaret and Steve have built a beautiful home that is so full of love. It is really wonderful to be around. I had been DIEING to meet little Kherington ever since she was born in May (exactly one month before Evie made her debut). And may I just say she totally lived up to the hype. And then some.

Ayton made me want to go out a buy Evie like ten-thousand cable knit sweaters. He just looked so dapper in them!


Kherington was even sweeter than I had anticipated. We all know that I am a sucker for cheeks... and I just wanted to nibble on hers all day long!

Thank you to everyone for letting us spend time with your amazing families. We had a wonderful time soaking up the love that you all have for one another.

I will leave you all with a little bit of Evie... because it keeps the Winter blues away.

Merry Scandalistmas

whoooaaaaa now... break me offa piece of THAT!

Merry Christmas from The Scobeys

Just Plane Lucky

People, the travel gods seriously smiled down on us yesterday. Evie slept the entire way to Providence (that's 1 1/2 hours in the car, folks). The agents at the security gate were super kind and helpful. My husband didn't get a hernia from the umpteen carry on items he was lugging through the terminals. We got to board first and there were SEVEN vacant seats all around us. Then Evie did not have a giant poop on the airplane (a possibility that Graham had been waking up in cold sweats over for weeks).

And then? AND THEN?!?! Evie fell asleep! The first 1.5 hours of the flight were spent in complete silence. I got to brush up on my Tap Defense skills. Very important. Have I mentioned how I like Evie the best when she is asleep?

Well, asleep-Evie is my fllllaaaaavorite.

So she naps. And then? AND THEN!?!? She wakes up and is all "Hello. I feel incredibly rested and would like to giggle at you for the remainder of the flight."

So of course I'm all "Yes please. And thank you. I'll make moronic noises to further exacerbate your laughter."

So, to summarize: Thank you Jesus.

The only bad part: my foot fell asleep during her nap. And instead of doing the it-tingles-in-a-bad-way dance I just sit there. I take one for the team. Because, people, only an idiot would chance waking a sleeping baby at 20,000 feet. In fact, had the plane been an ocean and a shark had swam up and begun slowly gnawing my foot to a bloody stump, I still wouldn't have moved. Not in a million years.

We got really lucky, and that is not lost on me. This trip was infinitely better than the last plane ride we took with her: when I had to pump in the lavatory, proceeded to spill my hard-earned milk all over the nasty, urine-caked floor, and then threw myself out of the exit door. Or maybe I just thought about that last past.

Regardless. It is so good to be home. I hope that you and your's have a wonderful and blessed Thanksgiving.

Weekend Visitors

Ya'll (anytime I am around Wynnes, talking to Wynnes, or talking about Wynnes my Southern accent comes out like hillbillies at a Stone Mountain laser show); ya'll, this past weekend one of my Dad's sisters and her Daughter, Haley (my Cousin, for those of you with no sense of deductive reasoning) came to visit us.

I have been going to Pickens, Mississippi (I bet ya'll didnt know that I was from a place called PICKENS. There is an actual story about how it got it's name: something about a man with no shirt on, picking his nose and falling off a bridge to his death. No lie. I am not making this up. This is what they told us as children. Right before handing us the keys to the riding lawnmowers so that we could pretend they were cars and the backyard was the grocery store -- in hindsight maybe not the safest practice ever -- but so much fun) anyways... I've been going to Pickens at least once a year since I was little, but since my life has gotten a little move-across-the-country-then-back-to-the-northern-most-tip-of-the-other-side-of-said-country-have-an-unexpected-baby-in-the-middle-of-a-research-heavy-graduate-program-support-husband-beginning-new-career busy, we have not been able to visit Pickens in a couple of years.

Ya'll, (see how I did that?) no trip that has ever been made by any human being in the history of the world has ever meant so much to me. It was Haley's first time on an airplane ever, and while I was a little bit sad that her premier trip on a big steel bird took her from one podunk town RIGHT to another, I had so much fun with her. I am in the process of staging a hostage-negotiation-scenario so that her parents will let her come back up in February for her birthday.

Here are some pictures of them loving on Miss Evie. Watching Angie with her was really emotional for me because it was exactly what I imagine it would have been like to watch my Grandma with her... Angie has every single one of her good qualities: her selflessness, tender heart, and steadfast values. And I just love her so much. And I love her daughter. And I loved watching her daughter with my daughter.

Please come back soon! (as if you have a choice... hostage. negotiation. remember?)

Consequences

For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Newton must not have ever cared for a newborn because, according to his law, a little thing like giving a child formula should never result in the ABOMINATION that finds its way into Evie's diaper once every two days. The smell is enough to fry your brains and make your eyeballs bleed.

Seriously, formula is super convenient and all, but I'm not sure it is worth the entire second floor of our house smelling like the public restroom at a refried bean factory. We had an...err...episode...today, and here was the precaution that had to be taken in order to make sure that neither myself nor Graham threw up all over Evie's cute, polka-dotted rug.

Parenting makes you quite resourceful.

For reals: I have the best husband in the world.

Stinky McNasty Face

This look is specifically reserved for her parents.

And yes, I know that this is the "gonna-be-crawling-in-less-than-a-month" stance.

I don't want to talk about it.

CIO

We have been slowly Ferberizing Evie over the past week. Or trying to, anyways. That said, I haven't actually studied his method, but rather have taken bits and pieces of what I know about Cry It Out and used it with the little one.

I know that this method isn't always looked kindly upon by Moms, but I had to. HAD TO.

Lately, I have been getting no sleep. Like, you know those National Geographic shows with the mangy, flea infested Lion who is knawing on the once-whole leg of a one-whole Zebra?

That Lion? That's Evie. And that dead Zebra with no hope for a future or happiness? That's my sleep.

See? HAD. TO.

We have run into a few glitches along the way. Like finding out that Evie is as addicted to her swaddle as some people are to Heroin. Yes, my daughter is a swaddle junkie. She is currently looking for a sponsor if anyone is interested. I can't do it because, frankly, after about 15 minutes of her screaming I am all "just do it. just USE already."

*As I am writing this Evie is log-rolling across the basement floor. Completely. Mobile. I am terrified.*

Cough, Cough

Ugh... this was the worst Halloween ever.

Graham and I have both been feeling really crappy and, well, it seems as though we have been struck with a case of

THE SWINE FLU

(insert canned laughter here)

I am a big fan of the trendy-social-phenomena costume.

Plus I DESPISE sexy halloween. And what is less sexy than an infectious pig?

On Using the F-Word

Things have been busy around here. And I dont like busy. I like lazy. If my entire life consisted of getting out of bed solely to shower and use the toilet I would be quite pleased. But things have been busy around here...and I can honestly say it has been the most blissful kind of busy.

It's a dizzying dance of kisses, cuddles, and coos...and suddenly I am in love with busy.

But with work and school and graham and studying and evie and my hoppin' social life, pumping 5 times a day has really begun to cramp my style.

Solution: Formula. Cover your ears, sensitive readers, because I'm gonna say it again.

FORMULA!

Before you go dropping an anonymous tip to www.reportaterrorist.com let me tell you - I am still pumping twice a day. Evie's diet is still about 80/20 breast milk to formula...so just go ahead and unwad those panties. I'll give you a moment.

So we are not the worst parents in the world. Maybe somewhere down there with Courtney Love, but still not quite as bad as John Phillips or Charles Manson. She is still getting breast milk... so we are not the worst.

But it does mean that we are officially slaves to the soul-sucking-price-gouging-Similac-Empire. Oh, hello there, poverty line, how did you get above me?
It also means that Evie's little baby poops are going to start smelling. This is according to the "experts" (read: people who spend their time giving moms all around the globe unnessecary anxiety and guilt. Those who preach and don't do. The crappiest people ever.) But that's a risk I'm willing to take. Plus, her poops smell pretty bad already. Like father like daughter.


Seriously: like father, exactly-identically-completely-totally-utterly like daughter. IN EVERY WAY. I don't even think she is mine. I know that I have not always had the most positive things to say about parenting...but everyone should go out right now and make babies. Because you will never know a love like it. It's totally worth it. Totally. Sore boobs, saggy belly and all.

Things That Go Bump

It doesn't take much to scare me. Scratch that; it takes absolutely nothing to scare me. Chances are, you could be telling me a funny story and I would start shaking uncontrollably in my Michael Kors boots just because it's dark out.

And my mind wanders.

Sometimes I wonder what it says about me that my mind can go to such dark places. But it does. So who am I to dwell?

And you may think it could be explained away. Like: girl watches too many scary movies. Except that I don't. Not even scary commercials. When those come on I cover my ears, close my eyes, and LALALALALALALALALALALALALALALALALALALALALALALALALALALAAAAAA until Graham smacks me; signifying the commercials' end. So no, there is no explanation except that I am a weenie. A big oscar-meyer-scardy-mcweiner-face.

So imagine my sheer horror when, the first time I made my way up to my advisor's lab, I was faced with THIS:

An elevator so scary... soooo old... so absolutely terrifying that every time I am in it my internal dialogue goes something like this:

Dear God, Please don't let a face pop up in that window. Please, please, please don't be a face. Pleasedontbeaface! Pleasedontbeaface! Pleasedontbeaface! PLEASE DON'T BE A FACE!!!

If I fail out of grad school I am blaming it, solely and completely, on that elevator. And then I'll go to the Dean and complain because HOW CAN THEY EXPECT PEOPLE TO FEEL SAFE IN A SCHOOL WITH ELEVATORS LIKE THAT?!?

Happy Fall Ya'll

Now that we have gotten past the snow (oh yeah, uh huh, it SNOWS here in October...) the air is perfectly crisp and the leaves are perfectly vivid. Fall in New England is, by far, the only thing that redeems it from the harsh winters. It is beautiful; except that "beautiful" does not even begin to describe it.

Driving down the roads right now, you find yourself completely enveloped in what can only be described as the most awesome display of God's ability to paint.

So this past weekend we bundled up the little one, threw on our scarves and went for a hike.

She has really started to enjoy being put in a carrier. Thank GOD, because I was not too keen on living the rest of my life with my arms randomly falling out of their sockets in an effort to rebel against me for those three years that Evie would not let me put her down.

Add to that the fact that going on hikes is one of our favorite past times as a couple and, well, it's just really convenient that little bit likes it, too. I hope all of you out there in the blogosphere are enjoying the change of seasons as much as we are.

*pictures by the ever-talented Graham Scobey - my miniature beefcake of a man*

Procrastination

I should be finishing a paper right now. But no, I am blogging...and then? I am going to take a nap. Something about school teaches us to put things off until the very last minute. I mean, I am a good student. I have practically made a career out of being a student (scratch that, nothing practical about it -- I have ACTUALLY made a career out of being a student) and I still procrastinate.

We are taught a dance: think about work, plan to do work, put work off, nap and repeat. It is still one of my FAVORITE dances to do. I have to add that I hate it when people spell favorite with a "u". Like: favourite. Give me a break. Who are you? The Queen?

Favorite.

So: It is still one of my favorite dances to do. Right up there with the cha-cha slide and the cabbage patch. I just cannot make myself not procrastinate. There are too many other things I would rather do. Like nap. And let me just tell you: I take the "nap when baby naps" axiom very seriously. I do not mess around.

Tumbleweed

I have this really bad habit of getting antsy when I have lived in one place for more than...oh...two years. Antsy like I have little creatures who normally live in a hill marching around in my underpinnings.

In fact, we move around so much that we have our own moving crew. And our own T-SHIRTS...and everyone knows that having your own shirts makes you legit. For reals.


And so I talk about it. And talk and talk and tallllllk. And plan. And Graham mostly looks at me like: girl's crazy. And then I talk some more.

We have lived in Connecticut for a little over a year now...so (although we still have another solid two years here) I am all bored with it and ready to go someplace new. Here are my top choices:

Los Angeles: *THUD* That was the sound of my mom hitting the ground somewhere in the Metro Atlanta area from the coronary that she had when she read that. But, I mean, Southern California is just so beautiful...and sunny...and beachy -- all of the things that I love the most. And my favorite place on the planet, Pepperdine, is there. And, well, if I ever got the opportunity to teach there it would just make me jump so high that I would be the first official Grad Student to ever orbit the earth without a space-suit.

Nashville: I lived in Nashville for a few years and it has this great balance of city and country. Plus it has the Puffy Muffin. And Baja Burrito. And Mazatlans. Mostly I would want to move there for the food. Obviously.

New York City: Everyone likes a happy spouse. And moving to Manhattan would make my husband the happiest human being on the planet. ON. THE. PLANET. Plus I have always wanted to live in a truly, truly walkable city. And the take-out options! Geeze-Louise!

Atlanta: There will always be a pretty hefty chunk of my heart traveling, in a little heart-shaped-vehicle, up and down 400 and around 285; because that is just how much I love this city. It is where I grew up and where all of my very favorite people live.

Where would you live if you could move anywhere?

October Tenth

Today is an anniversary of sorts.

Exactly one year ago: Sunday, October 10th, 2008, there was wailing and gnashing of teeth. There was profuse eating of mass quantities and varieties of chocolate. There were boxes upon boxes upon boxes of tissues being used. There were lighthearted movies about childbirth being watched.

Exactly one year ago today there were seven (onetwothreefourfivesixSEVEN) pregnancy tests lined up on my bathroom counter. And one year ago today I was scouring the internet to find if there had ever been a case of seven false positives.

There had not.

It boggles my mind how much life can change in a year.

Here I am, governer of Alaska, hoping against all hope that no-one noticed the five pounds I had already gained.

Three 1/2 months along over Christmas break. We didn't know it at the time but Evie's cousin, Sophi, was already on her way, too.

About seven days late: a very pregnant, very anxious Ashley. I wish I would have listened to the dozens of people who told me to enjoy those last few weeks as a family of two (sorry, Bear: a family of three).

And here is the best surprise I have ever gotten; just hours old.

And now, FOUR months after her birth, we are remembering the day we found out we would be having a baby. Life has never been so full.

Anger Management

It may be the fact that I have a baby now... and it might be just one more thing that I can blame on my raging hormones... but I find myself, on a very regular basis, wanting to kill my dog. Like, MURDER-him-with-my-bare-hands kill him. Maybe this makes me a horrible person. It just never fails that the barking and the loud, growl-inducing-humping happen right when Evie has gone to sleep. RIGHT when I was GOING to take a nap. And, God, there are only so many times that you can pick poop up off of the floor with a smile on your face after you had just let him out for the sole purpose of deficating IN THE YARD!

But I haven't killed him yet. When the rage threatens to overtake me I look back at this picture: taken a couple of days after I brought Bearsy home (completely against my husband's wishes)...that was exactly three years ago. Life has a way of moving much too quickly, but still passing very slow. The first person to be able to explain this phenomena will, no doubt, win a Nobel Peace Prize.


But this picture, it does the trick. It has saved Bear's life on a number of occasions.

Mission: Sanitization

I have a problem that I feel ready to admit to. Ready; and willing to seek out the appropriate avenues of help if necessary.

I probably go through an entire family-sized container of these babies a week... Seriously. The way I scrub my kitchen on a nightly basis you would think that I was taking precautions against an army of Turd People whose only mode of transportation was to roll around on my counter-tops. And you know what? I'm not sorry. Granted, I may be singing a different tune on the day that I wake up to the first four layers of my epidermis PEELING off... but for now you'll get no apologies from me.

Donations to the ScobeyLysolWipe Fund can be made directly to me. Do your part, people. Do. Your. Part.

DOUBT

Doubt is a very powerful thing. It can be good: I firmly believe that no harm can come from a willingness to question things. On the contrary; one of the greatest dangers in life is just going along; refusing to let yourself challenge what you know.

But doubt can also be harmful. Especially when you make a habit of doubting yourself.

I have always been a glass-half-empty kind of person. Whenever I do things that are difficult, there are these voices in my head whispering: "you're not good enough", "you cannot possibly go that far -- do that much"...

Since Evie, that's changed. I mean, since Evie everything has changed: but THIS, this I never thought would change. I have been battling self doubt my whole life. There is only one possible explanation for this. Evie is my Horcrux. When I had her, my soul split... and now there is nothing I cannot do.

Something more powerful than doubt: being a mother.

And the leaves are changing which means that I get to drive to school through fiery tunnels and it is beautiful and all is right in the world.

Here is little Miss playing airplane on Mommy's legs during a picnic on Friday.

I know what you are all thinking: "That is not Evie. That is GRAHAM. It has to be Graham." and although I have this very same thought at least seventeen times in any given day: no, it is not Graham, it is my baby daughter. I know this because Graham is much too big to play airplane on my legs.

Pending Further Investigation

Graham and I have decided to re-sub our World of Warcraft account (I'll pause to allow those of you who didn't know I play WOW to regain your composure.... are you done laughing at me? Ok... I'll continue). When we lived in California we played WOW every Wednesday night with a group of friends from all over. Seeeeeeee, it's social, and therefore completely acceptable.

So I am typing in my user name and password to recover my account info and it's all "invalid information" and I'm all "noooo it isn't, idiot computer". And it went on like this for some time until I decided to call the service help-line (mostly because, since I tried logging on so many times with "invalid information" it locked me out of the site. Computer, 1. Me, 0.)

Then, forty-five minutes later: FORTY-FIVE MINUTES, PEOPLE... this just proves how many people play MMO's. Seeeeeeee, it's pervasive, and therefore completely acceptable. Forty-five minutes later a woman is explaining to me that my account has been hacked in to and, pending further investigation, may or may not be reopened.

All of this to say that, for the first time in my life, I am a part of an INVESTIGATION. It's like a murder mystery... only ONLINE. There has been a scandal in Outland, folks... someone has killed my Druid. YOUR CHILDREN ARE NOT SAFE!

Long Overdue

In August we went to Atlanta and, besides the part where I had to milk myself, it was an awesome trip. Evie got to meet all of the amazing Southern Folks who love her so very much. And suffice it to say that there are a LOT of them. So we did what any good Georgian Family (albeit a transplanted one) would do: ate a lot of food and traveled around handing out free hugs everywhere we went.

I'm just gonna say it: Southerners do it better. And I don't just mean cooking, decorating, and partying. I mean they are better at being humans. (Oh, wait, what's that sound I just heard? The tapping noise of my non-southern readers clicking UN-FOLLOW). But really, once you dip below the Mason Dixon Line it's hard not to compare everywhere else you go to That Place where the people are just soooo naice (that's "nice" in Georgia-speak)... and I'm not gonna lie: there is a piece of me that dies every time I think about the little, twangy accent that Evie could have had.

And the love. Ohhhh the looooove. There were people who we saw on this visit who have loved us our entire lives, so to see them snuggling on Evie just made my heart look like a scene straight out of Disney's Fantasia.

Three cheers for Grandpa. Hip-Hip, Horray!

Snuggling with the Meemers...who drove all the way from Mississippi to hold Ms. Evie.

And the man who has, on more than one occasion, been single-handedly responsible for helping me maintain my sanity.

And the man who has, on more than one occasion, been single-handedly responsible for keeping Graham's mother from murdering him.

As you can see, the trip was a success...and we cannot wait to take Evie back to the ATL in November so that she can meet her new cousin, Sophi.

I will leave you with some sweet, sweet second cousin love.

**PHOTOS TAKEN BY THE UBER-TALENTED GRAHAM SCOBEY, DUH**

This is What Happens...

...when you throw a string of spaghetti on the ceiling to check if it is cooked...

and then you look up SIX HOURS LATER and realize that you forgot to get it down...

Five Years

I'm just checking my e-mail... like any other day when, imagine my surprise (slash dread slash disbelief) when I find an invitation to my 5 (really it's more like 6, but who's counting) year High School reunion.

Seriously?! Weird. Super freakin' weird with strange sauce on top and a cherry, too.

Now, I didn't hate high-school. There were parts I loved and parts that I didn't love... but I was definitely not one of those people who loathed every day of the four-year-experience. "So what's the issue?" you ask? The issue is that i am SO not the same person who I was five years ago. Not even close. If I was North America she would be Nepal. And if I passed that over-made-up, under-secure girl on the street, she would not even recognize me. And I'm glad. I wouldn't like her, anyways.

So why go back? Why even think about going back? Aren't we alllll about moving forward here? But then I am hit HEAD ON by the mack truck of curiosity...

We meet again, GACS class of 2004...

I am the one smack dab in the middle with an orange shirt on. Wareagle!