Play hard, sleep harder.

Summer is flying by and Nate is growing more and more with each passing day. He recently celebrated his four month birthday and is becoming an active little monkey. I spend most of my day entertaining. It's somewhat hard to entertain a four month old, but somehow we manage. I have a lot of pictures to post this week of our various activities of late so here goes...


Nate likes to play on his activity mat. He sometimes gets really involved and has all four limbs flailing at once. I stepped away the other day to get his bottle and I returned to this...

Apparently he got a little carried away and flipped the mat over on top of himself. He was in no distress. In fact, when I lifted the mat off his face he was smiling and laughing at me. Go figure. Anyway, I started to put the mat back where it belonged when I discovered the problem....

Yes, a little foot got stuck in the ring holding on a toy. He's such a stinker!


As I mentioned above we celebrated Nate's four month birthday on July 9. I did the picture with Mr. Potato Head and did not have much cooperation from Nate. He was way more interested in his feet than smiling at the camera for me and the following is what resulted...

Several (and by several I mean a lot) pictures later, I finally got a good one...

You can see that the feet are about to head towards the hands, but thankfully I snapped it just in time!!


Matt had a day off last week and we decided to watch the movie Kick Ass. Surprisingly, it was good. Nate decided he wanted to watch, too!

When he's not busy with life, Nate does like to sleep. I greatly appreciate the fact that he is still sleeping through the night. Some nights he'll sleep for 12+ hours. What can I say? He is his father's son! I still love to take pictures of him while he's sleeping because he just looks so darn comfortable. 

 He still has not figured out how to roll off his belly and this day he decided to give up the fight and nap instead. Most days he naps in his swing...

He absolutely loves his crib. I love how he kicks back with his hands behind his head and settles in to slumber!

T minus 4 days until I completely lose my mind and take Nate on his first plane ride this Saturday. What am I thinking?!?! It will be just Nate and me. We'll see how it goes. I'm hoping he will surprise me and be an absolute angel. However, knowing my son, it will not go that way. Stay tuned to see what happens! In the meantime, have a wonderful week and say an extra prayer for me Friday night!

When Daddy changes diapers....

Somehow I end up with pants on my head!!

When Mommy takes me shopping.....

She wears me out!!

When Moose wants attention....

He has a unique way of demanding it!

Up, up, and away!!

My friend Erin and I got really brave today and decided it was time to take Molly and Nate on another date. Our venue -- the beach to see the last shuttle launch. With only a 30% chance of launch I wasn't expecting to see the shuttle go today. I rolled out of bed at 6am certain that it would have been cancelled. Nope. It was still on. So, I got up and began to figure out what in the world I would need for a day long trip to the beach with a four month old. After packing the car full of bottles, diapers, a Bumbo, a Moby wrap, towels, sunscreen, and various other things, Nate and I headed out to pick up Erin and Molly. We made a quick stop by Chick-fil-A and made it to their house about 20 minutes late. In my opinion, that's not too bad all things considered!

We loaded up and headed down 95. We were very afraid that we'd get down there only to find out the launch was cancelled so Erin made a call or two to her husband just to be sure everything was on. It was. We decided to stop at New Smyrna Beach. Thankfully we got a very good park right by the sidewalk. We loaded up our arms with the necessities and headed to the beach. It was drizzling and we were still weary that it would be scrubbed. We set up camp with the babies and settled in. By 11am we were hoping against hope that it was going to launch. It got closer and closer and we heard one person say a minute until liftoff. That was followed up with a comment about a failure. Apparently there was some camera that needed to be readjusted on or near the shuttle. Then, at 11:29 liftoff!! It was very overcast at the beach, but we were able to see Atlantis take off on it's final flight. We even heard the roar of the boosters. Awesome!! Of course, Nate and Molly slept through it, but later in life they can say they were there!! Here are a few pictures from our adventure....

 Chillin' while the moms set up camp

The conversation probably went as follows...

"So why are we here again?" 

"I don't know, just humor them." 

They refused to look at the camera. Something to the right was more interesting. 

Nate and me ready to watch! 

Molly caught a quick nap.

Erin and Miss Molly getting ready to watch Atlantis.

I wasn't able to get a good picture of the shuttle shooting through the sky. Thankfully we didn't get stuck in horrible traffic on our way home. Nate and Molly were troopers at the beach and decided to nap on the way to our next stop -- Daytona Beach. We decided to stop at Daytona Beach and find some lunch. I called my friend Shannon who has vacationed there most of her life for some tips on a good place. She sent us to Aunt Catfish's. Yummy! Erin and I gave it two thumbs up :-)

Nate and Molly did a great job at the restaurant and, as luck would have it, the rain started just as we were about to leave. Thankfully it let up enough for me to grab the car and pull to the curb so we could get the babies in without soaking them. They were so exhausted from the busy day that both of them slept on the way home! Nate and I dropped off Erin and Molly and headed home. We unpacked, ate, and bathed when Nate decided it was time for another nap...

Worn out!!

We had a blast watching the shuttle launch and hanging out with our friends. Maybe Molly and Nate will be super exhausted tonight and sleep well for their tired mommies!!

Happy Anniversary!!

Wow! It's hard to believe that five years ago today Matt and I tied the knot. We have had so many adventures along the way that I decided to devote this blog post to us. We have only spent 2 of our anniversaries together, but Matt has promised me for our tenth anniversary we can go to Vegas and renew our vows with Elvis. I can't wait!!


For this blog I have done a little research. I think my nerdy side is about to show through a little, but I was curious about some of the facts and figures. It entertained me for a little while and I guess that is all that matters! So, before we get started, here we are five years ago on our big day!

We look so young and less stressed back then. What's up with that?!?!


Let's start with some facts from when/where we met -- August 2000, Tuscaloosa, Alabama
The number of....

• days we have known each other:  3,975 (or 10 years, 10 months, and 19 days)
• colleges we applied to:  3 for Matt, 2 for LeeAnn
• apartments lived in in college:  2 for Matt, 3 for LeeAnn
• combined years in undergrad:  10

Here are some random facts from the years we have been a couple (married and dating).
The number of....

• days we have been a couple:  3,550 (or 9 years, 2 months, and 2 days)
• times we have been snowed in in North Carolina:  1
• Dave Matthews concerts attended:  9 (we're fans, can you tell?) I highly recommend you see him live at least once in your life.
• cruises we have been on:  4
• states visited together:  13
• iPods owned:  5 (including Matt's two iPhones)
• of miles Matt put on the Jetta during our first year of dating: 25,000

Here are some random facts from our married years.

The number of....

• days we have been married:  1,827 (or 5 years, 1 day)
• days we were married until Nate arrived:  1,705 (or 4 years, 8 months, 1 day)
• combined years in graduate school:  5.5
• times we have moved in five years:  3
• years Jeffery lived with us:  3
• times Chanlee tried to burn down our house:  1
• fire extinguishers Jeffery bought after Chanlee tried to burn down our house:  1
• days of residency competed:  373 (or 1 year and 8 days)
• murals painted on our living room wall:  1
• Halloween yard displays created by John and Matt:  2
• little girls Matt made cry with the yard displays:  1
• National Championships won by Alabama:  1
• degrees in Rochester, MN when we visited:  17
• days left in residency:  1,819 (or 4 years, 11 months, and 29 days)
• miles traveled to move between Birmingham and Jacksonville:  460
• miles we will travel if we move from Jacksonville to Seattle:  3,019

I know, these facts were random and crazy, but sum up our many years together. We've had many adventures along the way and I cannot wait to see what the next five years will have in store for us!

Happy Fourth of July!!

Happy Fourth of July everyone! I hope you had a nice, relaxing long weekend. Matt had to work so Nate and I hung out at home. While he took his morning nap, I decided I had had enough of our carpet and steam cleaned it. Thankfully it did not wake him. The floors were disgusting!! It was amazing how black the water turned out. I'm glad I did it because Nate is becoming more mobile and quite often I find him off his mat and on the carpet. I'm sure I'll do it again before he starts to crawl. Apartment carpet is so disgusting and I want to get it as clean as possible before it becomes his new playground!

 The finished product and Moose.

The water was disgusting!

Matt got home around 7:30 and we grilled some hot dogs. Exciting, huh? We thought about going to see the fireworks show, but it didn't start until 9:30. Matt was in bed by 9 so Nate and I hung out a little more until he decided to crash. I got him to bed and then what do I hear? Some idiots outside shooting off more fireworks. Okay, I don't mind people shooting fireworks, but it was late, I had just gotten Nate to bed, and it was outside his bedroom. Ugh. Thankfully my good little sleeper did not wake up. I was amazed because they were out there for about an hour and these were pretty loud fireworks. Anyway, we had a pretty good fourth around here even though it was pretty low key!