New Smith Home...

Check out our new place on the famdamily blog! We finally posted the pictures so you can peruse until your hearts content. Just go click on the famdamily link (bottom right hand side of this screen), then select Famdamily Photos, then click on Our House "McCallum St". Let us know what you think!

We'll get another belly shot this week, since these days I seem to wake up with a new stomach each morning :0) FINALLY since today marks my entrance into the sixth month, per my midwife...yeesh, where is the time going?!

We're looking forward to a packed weekend, with Schmitters at McNalleys tonight...YUM! A friends b-day celebration in the city on Saturday evening. And then Sunday, heading to the Sixer's Play-Off game. Not that I'm a Sixer's fan...we just got court-side tickets and a parking pass from the guys here at my work for "Administrative Professionals Day". Not that I've EVER celebrated that before, even though I guess I've been an "admin prof" for three years now...ha, ha! It's nice to get spoiled every now and then though.

My parent's are off to St. Thomas today with a some of their friends today and my sister, Callie, is still in Costa Rica. So my other siblings and I wait expectantly for our own beach trip in June. Which won't seem to come quick enough! Matthew and I will get a "semi-vacation" over Memorial Day weekend when we head down to visit my family for a 5-day trip. We always like that drive and enjoy the 'Ville in the spring time.

Hope everyone enjoys their coming weekend as well!

Burgers n' Sweet Tea

Yesterday we had my brother and some South Carolinian friends over for a modified cold-weather-cookout. Well, Matthew was the only one who braved the weather to cook the burgers while the rest of us waited inside and drank our good ol' SWEET southern tea. It was fun to carry on the tradition of Sunday meals with friends. Now that we're closer to our church, maybe we can do more of that.

The rest of the weekend was nice and chilled out. We finally got our DSL up and running at our house (Woo-hoo!) and got some pictures of our place that we'll put on the famdamily blog sometime this week. I had a scare last week with some pretty intense headaches and loosing my eye sight at times on Wednesday. My midwife sent me to the doctor to rule out pre-eclampsia (a random pregnancy issue that some women have...not QUITE sure what it is, but I know it's not good). Well they did rule that out and guessed that it was probably just migraines. So that was the "good" news...even though there isn't a great solution to getting rid of them. Today one hit so hard my eyes started watering...weird.

And the babe is definately getting stronger...working on those soccer legs (to take after his "Aunt" Amberleigh :0) Last night laying in bed he started kicking up a storm, which was so much fun for Matthew since he hadn't felt that many kicks and such forceful ones yet! We sat there and watched my stomach bounce as he rolled around and flailed his arms & legs. It's so surreal to see that and know it's a person doing that who's living inside me and not just my stomach growling or some muscle spasming. Yes, we continue to be in awe of this whole process of God fusing genes into a whole new person and soul!

Mmm, and if anyone is a mexican food buff, we found an AWESOME recipe for green enchiladas with...get this...cottage cheese?! Sounds sketchy, but holy mole, they were incredible! Ask birthday girl, Mary O (if you know her :0)...they were her bday meal at our house this past week. It was a random recipe we played around with to suit our tastes and they definately worked!! If you want it, feel free to email me: amy@artiswork.org.

Here he comes!!

...he's starting to push his way OUT, instead of UP, in his mom's belly! We'll be headed into the last month of the second trimester in just under two weeks. Right now I'm in week 22, moving towards week 23. I can't believe all this seems to be going so fast...and yet slow, at the same time!? I guess that's like all of life though. You're tired of days that drag on, but constantly want to go back to those "past moments" that seemed to fly by. We're enjoying this stage of finally having a visual reminder of this change to come and our little boy growing. Matthew & I were able to rest a ton and sleep, sleep, sleep over the weekend and are both starting to feel our strength restored. This incredible 80 degree weather really helps aid in that as well :0) Hope the spring is treating you ALL well!

thoughts from a frustrated momma

I was just talking to my best bud from high school and having to postpone her trip up here to visit because I've been feeling so poopy. I had a pregnancy scare/issue that kept me in bed all weekend and has persited throughout the week. It's made me realize what a controlling person I am, in regards to myself and what I "should" be able to manage.

When I was 6 years old I was obsessed with re-arranging my room. I would push around my huge mahoganey double bed and 5ft. dresser. A scrawny 6 year old! Each time I'd get punished, but each time after that, I'd think Mom would be SO impressed by how amazing my re-organized room would look that she wouldn't care if I permanently damaged my 6 year old back and our hardwood floors :0) Now, being a young, active, healthly gal I'm used to being able to handle anything. I could always bounce back from sickness or fatigue and could push myself physically (like when moving apartments or cleaning, etc...) Now I feel as if I have to take everything extra slow and constantly refrain from wanting to push myself. Lifting weights now makes me sweat and makes my heart race, which never happened before. And my runs have turned into, run-walk-run-walk-run-walk...argh. I have to wait for Matthew to move a big box for me or come home and rest before starting dinner or do things that just DON'T fit with my schedule for the day...I know you all are laughing, especially my friends who know how Type A I am :0) And yes, in my MIND it makes sense that I'm pregnant and my body is working overtime anyway (what you all are thinking...or wanting to scream at me :0), but I can't reconcile that with my emotions that feel like I'm constantly "sick" or something.

So after getting off the phone with my friend dissappointed, I began to think of how good this time probably is for me. In that not-so-fun refining way. Because I am forced, in a way I've never been before, to slow down, to toss the "schedule" out the window, to sit and read when I want to unpack or organize, and to accept my "weakness" in a new way. There are lots of layers to that, but one branch of that is that I think talking about weakness for me is easy but BEING weak is not. I talk about weakness being so good for us and such a learning lesson (hear my sappy sarcasm?) but I run from it as fast as I can...now I can't waddle fast enough to get away from it. I HAVE to depend on other people. I HAVE to let go of my plans. I HAVE to find life in Christ and not in being capable or on top of life. Yuck. I hate learning lessons.

Especially when they reveal layers of junk in my heart that I've carefully grown and tended all these years. I think "No, this is how I cope with life. I can't let that go or let it be "pruned away"! I HAVE to be efficient and independent and capabale to function properly! I can't go around depending on people all the time or letting the dishes sit in the sink for over 5.63 seconds!" Hmm...is that really TRUTH or is it just the paradigm I've lived with for so long that moving away from it feels like taking on a whole new religion or something? That's what the world tells me - be hip-young-capable-superMom! Don't let that pregnancy drag you down! Eat right, exercise, keep working hard, don't stop! That's what I hear, that's what I WANT to be/do...but I think it's a far reach from what I'm called to be as a daughter of Christ. Dependant on HIM, not on myself. Resting in HIM, not in getting the house cleaned or dinner made. Letting things go and knowing that it's not only good for me, but for our little baby as well.

As always, I have a lot more to learn than I ever think. This pregnancy has been good for me in more ways that I would have expected. But those thoughts are just ONE aspect of this pregnancy that I thought I should share and not just all the fun things. Like anything in life, pregnancy is a process of good days and hard days. It's real life like any other stage we go through. I typed in my journal this morning, that even in the hard days of pregnancy, I'm constantly amazed at the miracle of it. Seeing my stomach bounce as baby Smith kicks will never cease to amaze me. That there's this little person in there. A real soul that will live for eternity!? I think I thanked Christ for the first time for this gift to be able to carry this little boy. I just hadn't thought to thank Him before. But wow, it is SUCH a gift to be so intimately invovled in this process of a life being created.

Thanks for listening and bearing with my Type A ways of thinking...especially you mothers who are burning to shake me and tell me to LET GO ;0) Christ is in the process of working through my thick skull!

Spring is FINALLY here

Soakin' up the rays. Matthew and I made ourselves s-l-o-w d-o-w-n yesterday afternoon after racing around for the past, almost 2 weeks...if not more. We let the dinner get cold and decided to instead enjoy this new Philly sunshine (and Matthew a beer...I WISH it was mine!) that we haven't seen for months it seems! We're enjoying our new home and cozy little yard and starting this next phase in our lives. Now having a "baby room" really makes us feel like this journey into parenthood is coming soon! And the little active punk reminds me of that daily. Right now I can literally SEE him kicking around in my stomach. It looks like my stomach has it's own heartbeat...in a dozen different spots! He's not one to stay put. I think he's enjoying this freedom to float around, before he grows too big to "play" much. At 21 weeks, he's about 8 inches long and almost a pound. Not too much longer before he has to stay put...at least somewhat. We also finally posted the "20 week" shot on the belly shots page, although it's a bit fuzzy. We're going to try to take some more fun ones, in normal clothes and all, as soon as you can tell I'm prego in normal clothes...which might be a few more weeks in my case. We'll be on to month 6 at the end of next week...woah! Hope you all are enjoying the beautiful weather in your various parts of the country. Besides our Colorado folk who just got dumped with 10 inches of snow?! Hmm, this might be the first time we were glad, weather-wise, that we weren't in Colorado :0)

First Pictures!

Finally...here are the ultrasound pictures! As you know, ultrasound pictures tend to be confusing and even freaky for the most part...but they're also pretty amazing when you consider that little body/skeleton/soul is a person growing inside MY BELLY!? Here are the first ones of our little boy. You have to lean your head sideways to the right to get the idea. It's a sideways shot of him. The head on the right hand side and the body stretched out to the left and his little hand "waving" at the top. You can see his eyes, mouth and everything if you look really hard :0)





Then this shot is a little weird (kinda creepy, in my opinion :0) but it shows his hands, which are so cool. The nurse said he was stretching out all his fingers, which is pretty unusual since they usually keep them balled up in a fist.



Crazy, isn't it!?! That's our baby boy! There were some others, but I thought that'd be enough to share for now. My belly shot is still on our digital camera so we'll try and post that one of these days. Enjoy the coming weekend everyone! Love, A&M

Pictures Coming

Sorry for the delay with the ultrasound pictures (and no, that's not our ultrasound pic two posts below...that's a random 19 week baby from some baby book :0). Moving has slowed us down a bit and last night we just pulled out the scanner and set it up. We also took another belly shot that we'll upload this week, although it's not too exciting. Still not much growth on the outside, even though there's a 1 pound little boy floating around inside!

We're finally getting semi-settled in our new place after a whirlwind unpacking session this weekend. I'd say we definately overworked ourselves on Saturday, which ended in random tears for me as we left IKEA at 9pm that night. But our place is coming together, which feels great. Once we get the last boxes out of site, we'll take some pictures for the famdamily site for you all to check out. It's SO great to be near our friends...especially my two other pregnant friends, now less than a mile away.

Last night we began organizing the "nursury/office" room that was freshly painted by our landlord. It was purple-pink and now is a nice soft tan...whew! Thankfully! I didn't think we could handle the purple for long! It was so crazy to unpack some little boy clothes we've already received from people and put them in his soon-to-be dresser/changing table. Wow, all these little steps are making this life-change a solidified reality. We've been so blessed to receive many much-needed baby things already - a newer hand-me-down crib, a dresser, some clothing items. What a gift for our meager budget that wasn't fully prepared for this "surprise" boy back in December :0) We're amazed at how God keeps providing and reminding us that this is HIS story where HE is the Provider & Author...not us. We recently registered for the other things we'll need, which was so much fun now knowing that it'll be a BOY!

So stayed tuned for pictures HOPEFULLY to come this week. Much love to you all!