Introducing...

Anna Katherine Candler

Our first family picture of three on Dec 13, 2011.

Thanks to Aunt Lisa for the cute door hanger, lots of compliments from the nurses :)

Anna Katherine and Mom

Proud new Daddy

All packed and ready to head home from the hospital.

One of our favorites.

About 2 AM Monday night (as I'm writing this it would be 2 weeks ago tonight) Anna Katherine decided to make her appearance about 3 weeks early.  Were we prepared?  Not really.  Surprised?  Very much.  Excited? Yep.  Nervous?  Like you wouldn't believe.  That Sunday and Monday I had apparently been nesting and had no idea.  I even told Mollie that these Braxton Hicks contractions were getting to be ridiculous - ha, not Braxton Hicks... oops!  When my water broke, I thought surely not and it literally took me about 15 minutes to realize we were really going to have a baby by the end of the next day.  Wow, our has life changed and we love it - every single minute of it, even the sleep deprivation.  She is so perfect and we are learning lots and lots about her every day.  Each time I look at her, I think "goodness, you're big and you're supposed to still be inside my belly until Jan 9!!"  She would have been a big baby and I would have been an uncomfortable, exhausted Mommy.  I'm so glad to have my skinny feet back, along with the best Christmas present ever.  Welcome to the world, Anna Katherine! :)



Mom's craftiness

Here is her first sewing project with her new awesome sewing machine :)  She has finally gotten a new one after many, many "fixes" to keep the old one running.  Here's Anna Katherine's new bassinet skirt!  Didn't she do a great job?!?

And a close up for good measure.

Barbara, my great aunt, gave AK this beautiful bear that just looks so angelic in there :)

Side note - If you haven't already guessed, I'm not going to be finishing the photo challenge.  Just too much going on around here lately!

Day 15: Warmth

Mmm... you guys know warmth is something I just love from the last photo challenge we did.  It makes me very happy :)  These are my awesome isotoner gloves, Tommy absolutely hates them.  He just doesn't understand how functional they are while keeping you very warm at the same time.  That's just difficult in a pair of gloves.  Maybe they do look like grandma gloves (as he says) but I can't make it through a winter without them.  I almost bought a new pair last year when they went "missing" and all of a sudden they reappeared when I showed him that they are not cheap to replace.  I win!

Day 14: Denial

I miss sweet tea, with caffeine!  Decaf just isn't the same but I would rather deny myself the tea than my lunchtime Mountain Dew.   Who knew I drank so much caffeine?!?  oops.  I didn't drink tea every night, I think it's just the fact that I can't have it that makes me want it so much more.  Here's my wonderful tea maker that has probably been used twice since I found out I was pregnant.

Sweet tea - denied!

Day 13: You Choose

I never did show you guys what my chair looked like after we got it recovered.  The guy did a great job and it matches the den so much better than that blue/green pattern!

Tah Dah!

Day 12: Art

I have writing thank-you notes down to an art!

Day 11: Glittery

Anyone been in the store Justice?  There is more glitter in that store than a Mardi Gras ball.  My little cousin Allyson is in love with Justice and anything girly.  This is the scarf I purchased for her and of course it matches a cute little tunic perfectly :) Boy am I in for it when Anna Katherine gets that age.... not sure how excited I am about that!!

Day 10: Nature

This picture makes my little plant look kind of pitiful but it's really not.  It has just survived a traumatic journey of being repotted.  I actually have two of these, one in the kitchen and one in the den.  They are both from my brother's funeral and I'm so proud to have kept them alive this long.  They have gotten so huge and full that Tommy decided he needed to put them in new planters this past weekend.  If they continue to grow I think I may have to split them into 4 plants.  Anyone need a pretty green plant that's super easy to take care of??  It's amazing how resilient these have been.  After vacations they look like there is no possible way the will come back to life but they always do :)

Baby Showers!

Shower at Mollie's

Cute cake!!

Yummy snacks!

Svea's welcome sign :)

Having a bite before opening gifts

Note the tiara and princess chair that Svea got together for me, I love that she loves parties as much as I do!

The wonderful group of friends that put it all together!!

Shower in Monroeville at Mrs Dawn's

Aunt Lisa made a cute door hanger for the hospital, we just have to fill it in once AK is here!

Granny girl made me this pretty teddy bear afghan, she's been working on it since Tommy and I got engaged :)

A little something for Gran, too!

My favorite church ladies from Monroeville!



Day 9: Interview

Slowly but surely - I'll post a picture but the video is the actual interview.  She and I have a conversation every afternoon about her day and why she won't eat her food etc.  I love my Aspen! :)  She's my first baby.

This is the first video we have taken with our new camera and my first video post.  Let me know if it isn't working.

Also, I haven't forgotten about baby shower pictures.  I have to get some from my mom because she took them with her camera and things are just getting busy!  I'll be honest, I'm pretty sure I will not finish this photo challenge but I'll see what I can do.  I haven't even been catching up on my blog reading and don't mention time for pinterest, that hasn't happened in a long time!

Nursery

The nursery is starting to come together. I promised pics a little while ago so here are a few. 

these are the million pieces the changing table and crib started out as

final product with the bedding :)

closer view of the bedding

and the mobile

i'll add more pics of the entire nursery once i get it all together!  it looks like we could welcome anna katherine at anytime if we just had to (but i don't want to until january!!)

Day 8: Newspaper

told you this photo challenge would take a bit more time than the last one...

see the newspaper?  it's what we use to help get our fires started.  yay for the first fire of the year :)

Day 7: Scattered

This week our house has been an absolute war zone.  We got our new countertops put in on Friday but that meant in the mean time we had to demo our backsplash, existing countertops and remove everything from the cabinets.  A small clutter doesn't bother me at all but this was more than I could handle.  We had kitchen stuff everywhere!  This isn't really something I wanted to take a picture of but it fit perfectly with scattered. 

Here's what the new countertops look like :)  So exciting!  Now, I've got to pick out a new backsplash and we'll hopefully be done.

Check out the new sink... yay, I finally have a garbage disposal!!

Day 6: Treasure

This little treasure jar used to be a decorative martini glass (don't think it wasn't useful though) in college and then we found a new purpose for it after college.  Anytime Tommy empties his pockets of change we put all the change in the glass.  Then when it comes time for a SnoBiz snow cone, I have a little change for a treat :)  It's really crazy how much money you can accumulate in change.

Day 5: Sweet Dreams

Shhh don't tell, he would not like that I posted this... But isn't it sweet?? He stayed up until 1 am studying for a test that night.  It makes me very relieved to be finished with school and not having to study.  Tommy will graduate in December with his MBA, yay!

Day 4: Jewelry

Wear these about 99.9% of the time.  Not much of a jewelry person, I wear the same earrings and necklace pretty much everyday.  Tommy gave me the pearl and diamond necklace for our first valentines and the earrings used to be set on the sides of a ring that my mom had. 

Go Spartans!! Day 3: Fly

Friday, Tommy and I headed with my aunt and uncle to watch my cousin Paul play football.  We have been to watch him all through high school and this year he his a senior.  Mountain Brook has had a great season so far and I hope it will continue for them because Friday night they beat.... Hoover!!  I think it was the first time in more than a decade or something.  It was so much fun being there and watching the excitement of the student, fans, parents, coaches etc!  We didn't have that opportunity at my high school and it was fun to feel apart of that win.  While I was there I took my "fly" picture - I really wanted to wait until the Alabama game Saturday night because there was going to be a fly over by a couple F16 jets.  I went with the Spartan flags, though.

Excuse the blurriness - I got to the came took the first picture and my camera said "no memory card"!!  Argh!  I had left it in the computer from uploading day 1 :(  Back up - IPhone that didn't take such a great picture with everyone running everywhere.  I was trying to zoom in on the flags flying, zoom takes even worse pics lol.  You get the idea.

Congrats to Mountain Brook and my cousin Paul (starting right tackle) on the huge win!!

Day 2: Something You Love

I didn't go mushy this time around.  This isn't something that I'm obsessed with and want 24/7.  I just look so forward to it everyday at lunch time :)  I think I started this habit in college and it has continued but since I don't drink coffee in the morning it's the perfect midday treat!

I love my Mountain Dew!! I have to keep the stock pile in the fridge full at all times!

Another photo challenge - Day 1

This is another 30 day photo challenge.  Things are a little busier around here this time around but I'm going to do my best to keep up!

Day 1 - Open Door

There's alot of curiousity about what I do and how I deal with the radiation.  When I worked in x-ray, before I graduated in Radiation Therapy, I got a decent amount of radiation.  You have to hold children for their films, stand in surgery to take images and run all over the hospital taking portable chest x-rays.  The good thing is there are lead aprons that can be worn to shield the highly sensitive areas of the body because the energy of the radiation is very low.  In Radiation Therapy the energy is very, very high and no apron could shield us from that but we don't ever have to be in the room - yay!  So even though the radiation is much higher my dose is pretty much nothing, we stand outside the room with this 2 ton (i think someone told me 2 tons one time) door that we close with a button while the patient gets treatment.  There's my open door!  Questions, anyone? :)

Anna Katherine Candler

I thought I would give a baby update since I haven't really given one.  We are entering the third trimester this week - whoa!  Reality might be just now settling in that this is for real :)  Baby showers are getting planned, furniture for the nursery has been ordered (not much else has been done to the nursery... it'll get there), we've already received some of this teeny, tiny baby stuff that is so stinking cute and my belly is just now really starting to grow for others to notice.  All fun stuff and all keeping me very busy! 

It's funny how these websites give you sizes of your baby, they don't say she's the size of a cucumber they say she's the size of a hothouse cucumber... what??  I mean who knows what that is?!? Not me so I have to go google images of all these strange vegetables and then still really don't know what size they are.  What I do know is that she is currently about 2 to 2.5 lbs and is about 14.5 inches in length.  We still have a ways to go before the arrival of our little girl and that's a good thing because we still have alot to get done before Jan 6!  (not to mention somehow getting all the Christmas shopping done, too)  We are very excited and can't wait to meet her :) 

Here are a few pictures from the pregnancy

Oct 1 - I'll take another one probably Nov 1

6 weeks and then 26 weeks

Look how much she's grown!!

She loves having her hands up by her face in all the ultrasounds

6 weeks and 26 weeks

I'll try to post nursery pictures as we get that all put together and maybe some new belly photos since I actually have one now :)