Ahhhhh...the beach

We recently took a very quick trip to NC, and got to visit Nathan's family while we were there. On that Saturday we took a bit of the day to enjoy the beach. The weather was perfect, and the company was great. Thank you to Nate's dad and Michele for letting us crash at your house! You are always so accommodating.

Brody stayed with a trainer for the week, so we only had Lola. It was her first road trip, and her first time at the beach. She was so funny. She wasn't too sure about the water, but had LOADS of fun digging in the sand with Nathan and laying in the holes. Here are some pictures of our trip.

Nathan and Lola digging a hole.

Lola laying in her hole in the sand. She had sand all over her face and in her eyes, but she was having a ball!

Nathan Sr. in the background fishing from the beach. Nathan Jr. enjoying some relaxation.

L to R: Chrystal (21 weeks pregnant), Michele, two friends of Nathan Sr. and Michele.

A Tribute to My Mother

20 weeks

(This photo does not reflect how HUGE my belly feels)

This was nearly 3 weeks ago. I started writing this post, and then was interrupted and never made it back to finishing it. Even though it's just over 2 weeks since Mother's Day, I still think this blog worthy.
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Today was my first unofficial official mothers day. I say that because as a mom-to-be I don't think I qualify to celebrate mothers day as a mother until I have a child that has actually been born. My husband and a few others disagree, so I got to celebrate for the first time. It was a lot of fun, and I have to admit that sitting in church listening to the talks on mothers, I actually had a new perspective to the whole thing and understood much more from a mother's perspective. I find it interesting that even though the little guy isn't born yet, I already feel such a bond to him and a love for him. Nathan and I were discussing that tonight--that I get to carry the little guy around 24-7 for 9 months. It's no wonder mothers are attached to their children!

So after thinking all day about what it means to be a mother and hoping I can teach my son all the things he'll need to know, I started thinking about my own mother (and grandmothers, aunts, sisters, friends, and other women who have helped shape and mold me into the woman I am today). As I was thinking about my mother I started listing in my head some of the things she taught me. I could also list the things my father taught me (most of them the same things), but seeing that it's Mother's Day, I decided that I would like to send out a tribute to my mother and put those things in writing so I can look back at them later as a mother myself and see how I'm measuring up. By all means, this is in no way an all-inclusive list, but just a few of the things that came to mind today...

Things My Mother Has Taught Me:

1. Unconditional Love - This is something that I didn't fully understand until I was a teenager/young adult. It wasn't until I REALLY messed up that I understood that my mother loves me no matter what and that nothing I do will ever diminish that love.

2. Patience - Any mother who tries to teach her child something new has some measure of patience. My mother was very patient with me and taught me so many things.

3. Faith in the Lord, Jesus Christ - My mother is an amazing example of what it means to live her religion. Day in and day out my entire life I have seen my mother serve our family, serve others, study the scriptures, kneel in personal and family prayer, hold weekly family home evenings, etc., etc. The list could go on. I know my mother has a deep, personal testimony of the Savior and his atoning sacrifice for each one of us. I can always rely on my mother's unwavering faith, no matter what trial is upon any of us at the moment.

4. Hard work - My mother taught me the importance of work by giving me chores in the house, in the garden, in the yard. She taught me that if I keep something clean and tidy, it will usually last longer and look like new for a very long time. Thanks to my mom, I am a bit of a clean nut. I also learned how to work hard, and to finish tasks. No half-way for me.

5. Play and Friendship - My mother also taught me that after work comes play. I have vivid memories of my mother playing dolls with me--she being the grandma. She was always very supportive of my imagination as a young child. I played with my dolls almost non-stop. In 1st grade I remember her letting me bring a doll to dinner and sit him in the baby high-chair. I also remember my mother singing with me often (I loved to sing), and doing all sorts of other things that I enjoyed. As a teenager and young adult, I knew I could talk to my mother about anything.--and I did. I always felt lucky to have a mother whom I could talk to. Not all teens have that. To this day my mother and I are very close friends, even though I live 1500 miles away. Our current favorite thing to do is "phone shop" together. One of us is usually running errands when the other calls, sometimes we're both shopping at the same time and we'll ask each other's opinion about things. Distance has not withered our friendship.

6. How to cook and clean - Mom made a big effort when I was in high school to teach me how to cook. By the time I left home I could cook many kinds of major family meals on my own. She also taught me the importance of having a clean home, and how to get it that way. It drives Nathan crazy that I still spend 2-3 hours every Saturday morning cleaning house. And if I don't I make up for it somewhere else. He can blame this 100% on my mother.

7. A Love of Reading - As a young child mother always read to me before bedtime. I recall her sitting in the hallway between my bedroom and my brothers' and reading novels to us. I couldn't have been more than 8 years old, and I remember one summer her reading all the C.S. Lewis Chronicles of Narnia to us that way. We used to make frequent trips to the public library as well. She would also usually allow me to order one book off book orders in elementary school, and helped me pick good literature all the way through my teenage years.

8. The Importance of Service - I remember being young and feeling down about myself. Mom told me that the easiest way to feel good about yourself is to serve someone. I remember Mom taking meals to families that had a death in the family, or a new baby born, or some other hardship. I remember her helping ladies clean their houses, or do laundry. I remember her saying that it was always much more fun to clean someone else's house than your own. She also started a tradition at Christmas that helped us serve our immediate family members for the whole month of December and keep Christ at the center of our celebration. She was always very supportive of my service projects as a teenager. I went through a stage where I was very involved in community service. One time I had a clothing drive and collected so many clothes for the needy that it filled the entire family room. She was excited to help me sort through them and take them to the shelter. She was also willing to drive me to the homeless shelter early on Saturday mornings to feed the homeless. To this day I love to be involved and serve others.

9. The Importance of Strong Family Relationships - My mother is so devoted to our family. She was a 100% stay-at-home mom my entire life. She didn't spend her time at home watching tv or being self-indulgent. No, no--Mom was ALWAYS busy spending time with her children. We had so many fun family vacations, family home evenings (every Monday night was family time), nightly family dinners together around the table...I could go on and on. She taught us the importance of attending a sibling's sporting event or recital. She taught me to reach out to my younger siblings and play with them, even when I was at an age when they annoyed me. I am so grateful for the closeness of our family--parents, siblings, in-laws, nephews and nieces. We have such a special family bond and always have so much fun together. That is the thing I miss the very most about living so far away from home. My parents, siblings, and in-laws are truly my best friends.

10. To appreciate Nature - Mom always had a vegetable garden and flowers. She loves to have the sunshine beam through her windows. She loves to sit in the morning and listen to the river and to the birds chirping. She enjoyed camping and being outdoors. She loves the smell of rain. A children's song from church comes to mind....

"I often go walking in meadows of clover, and I gather armfulls of blossoms of blue.

I gather the blossoms the whole meadow over; Dear mother, sll flowers remind me of you.

O mother, I give you my love with each flower To give forth sweet fragrance a whole lifetime through;

For if I love blossoms and meadows and walking, I learn how to love them, dear mother, from you."

I could go on and on with this list, but I'll stop at 10. Thanks Mom for being for being one of my bestest friends, and for being a woman I can look up to and want to emulate. I love you. Happy belated Mother's Day.

It's a......

Today we had our 20-week ultrasound, and we finally got to find out the gender of our little one. The baby was moving and wiggling all over the place as soon as the ultrasound started. It was so fun to watch the little human inside me be so active.

The baby cooperated very well, and not too soon into the ultrasound, the technician ran the wand over the part that would tell the gender, and I saw right away that we're definitely having a BOY!!!!! It was SO obvious, and he was very happy to show off his family jewels to lets us know it is a he. Nathan was VERY excited, and soon thereafter announced that, "Now I get to coach pee wee football!" Tonight he was ruminating about being able to have a little fishing buddy and hunting buddy. He's going to be such a great dad.

The rest of the ultrasound was just as fun. The baby was sucking his thumb and had his left hand against his face most of the time, so it was hard to get a clear picture of his face. His right arm was very actively waving around like he was saying hi.

The technician was having a hard time getting pictures because he was moving around so much, so she said, "Ok baby, stretch so I can see your spine." And he did. Then she said, "Ok baby, give us a high five so we can see your hand." And he did. She needed him to stop wiggling so we could listen to his heartbeat, and she said, "Hold still baby." And he did. She said, "Your baby operates on voice command." I said, "Yeah, he's very obedient." Nathan responded, "That won't last long."

We got to watch him stretch, kick, touch his feet to his head, move his hands to his face, swallow, yawn, and turn around over and over.

Here he is for his first blog debut (these are scans of prints, so they're not very clear). This one is the best profile we could get. So cute!Here he is kicking his feet and legs up near his head.

Here's his profile again.

Watching our baby was one of the most amazing experiences I've ever had. The pregnancy is so real to me now. I am awestruck that we have actually created this little human who will be joining our family in a little under 5 months. Now let the naming games begin...

A little PTO and spontaniety

Nathan and I spent all weekend searching for houses to rent. What a tiring process. This evening we put a deposit down on a place, which I'll share in a future blog, but don't want to share too much in case something falls through.

Anyway, so we were discussing things all weekend, trying to be sure we are getting the most for our money, something that will fit our needs and growing family, etc., etc., etc. Sometimes I think we suffer from analysis paralysis when it comes to these decisions. But then I also think that we can never discuss it too much or be too thorough.

So this morning I was getting ready for work and still wanted to check out a few places today before we had to put down the deposit on the other place. Nathan is pretty much out of school (one lingering independent study project he'll have finished this week), and so of course he had planned on continuing the search, but I had my own qualms. So at the last minute as I was ready to head out the door for the Monday commute, I...wait for it--this is big coming from a workaholic...decided to take the day off.

So we were off on another adventureous day of house hunting. In between all this I decided that, hey, how often do I get a day off "just because" and decided to make the most of it. It was raining all day, but that didn't stop us from getting out. After making a decision on a house, we went baby shopping, got the dogs vaccinations, and then were driving around killing time before we had to meet up with the agent about the house. We were by one of the malls and saw something about a "Top Chef Tour."

Now, ya'll know what foodies Nathan and I have become. Very little excites us as much as food. On the weekends we can usually be found eating at either some favorite restaurant or trying out a new one. That is what constitutes most of our "entertainment." Forget dinner and a movie--how about just a good dinner? To us food is a passion. As such, I devour (pun intended) any TV show dealing with good food, one big one being Bravo's "Top Chef." So when we saw something about Top Chef at the mall, we HAD to check it out, and it totally made my day!

There was a trailer in the parking lot with a little station set up for the chefs to cook at.

Here's what I got to end my fun day off with...


A FREE class/quickfire challenge with Richard Blais (Season 4 runner-up and Atlanta local) and Nikki Cascone (otherwise known as the pasta queen--although she's says she's a victim of editing when it comes to that).

Richard started his own restaurant called Flip here in Atlanta after the Top Chef show. We haven't made it there yet, but now we can't wait! It's an amazing, over-the-top burger and shake place. In the quickfire challenge Richard demonstrated how two of the burgers from his menu are made, and we got to sample one! Oh my. I won't bore you non-foodies with all the gory details, but the ingredients and presentation were A-M-A-Z-I-N-G. And then he also made us an Oatmeal cookie milkshake in a Kitchen Aid mixer using liquid nitrogen to freeze it (so Richard).

Nathan had to skip out early to go meet the housing agent, but since it was my day off and he gets like 45 more of them before he starts his new job, he let me stay and enjoy. He missed the whole tasting at the end, and I got to describe every bit of it to him as my mouth watered.

And then to top it all off while I was waiting for Nathan to come back I wandered around the mall and found a great maternity clothing store and bought a bunch of much-needed but cute shirts for work. What a GREAT day!

Stay tuned for pics and more info about the house we'll be renting for the next year, and for this Thursday when we find out the gender of our little bun in the oven. Can't wait!!!

It must be in the water...

So many of my friends and people I'm around all the time are currently pregnant. A few months ago at church there were 12 of us expecting babies from Feb-Sept. I think it's still somewhere close to that number. They better expand the mother's lounge!

Needless to say, I've been spending a lot of time at Babies 'R Us and baby showers in the last few months. A couple of weeks ago this picture of me and a few of my pregnant friends was taken at one of the baby showers (thanks LaLona!--took it from your blog). We are standing in order of due date.

L to R: LaLona (July 5th), Katrina (July 13th), Megan (July 29th), and Chrystal (September 22nd). These are several friends we have a lot of fun with (as couples and then also as just us girls). Katrina, Megan and I are all due with our first. They are all ahead of me by about 6-10 weeks, so I always get to know just what I'm in for or get to look forward to. It has been so unique to have friends to share in this experience. Love ya gals--and hey--it's time for another girls night before these babies decide to make their debuts!

A lot of catching up to do...and a lot of big news

I have been absent from blog land for almost 4 months now. Everyone has been asking, "Where is Chrystal? What is going on?" and I've even had a few people tell me my blog is at the bottom of their blog list. That was incentive to get me back on here.

There's been a really good reason for me not blogging in so long....I'M PREGNANT!!! Yep, it finally happened. After trying for what felt like an eternity to us, Nathan and I were elated to find out we are expecting our first child. It was SO hard to not spill the beans to everyone before the 12-week mark, well, at least for the first two weeks and then it hit me--"morning" sickness. Oh my--I had NO idea what I was in for. It lasted from week 7 to week 14, and thank goodness since then only hits about once a week. PHEW! SOOOOOO glad to be out of that! Now I'm feeling good and we're anticipating finding out the gender of our child in about 3 weeks.

Here is "the bump" at 14 weeks.

And here it is again today, at 18 weeks.

About a month ago I went home to Utah to visit my family and meet our newest family member, Calvin. My little sister, Camyll, had her first baby back in February. I couldn't wait to go out for a visit and meet Calvin, see my sister as a momma, and see the rest of my family whom I also miss so much. It was a fun, whirlwind trip of 3 days, jam-packed with family and fun. I couldn't have possibly fit any more into three days if I'd wanted to, which I did want to, but it just wasn't possible. So I apologize to all of you that I wanted to see, but just didn't get the chance. At least I got to meet and hold and cuddle and "practice" with this little guy. This is Calvin at 6 weeks old--I couldn't resist getting a picture of him in this cute little hat.

Lola has been growing, and growing, and growing. I loved this picture of her Nathan took a few weeks ago. Too cute.

In March we had our first out-of-state family visitors. Yay! Nathan's Aunt Denise, her husband Jim, and their daughter Alison were visiting from Columbia, SC, for Alison's high school orchestra competition. It was a national competition, and they did VERY well. I wish our work schedules would have allowed us to attend. At least we got to go out to dinner with them that night. Nathan likes to push Denise's buttons and get a good conversation going. It is always so much fun visiting with Nathan's family. We have such good conversations and a great time. Thanks, Alison, for indulging 4 adults and putting up with us through an entire dinner. Thanks also for visiting us while you were in town. We loved it!

Over the weekend that I was in Utah we added a fourth member to our family. This one was also planned, but arrived a bit earlier than we had originally intended. Nonetheless, he's too precious and we're so glad to have him, especially Lola, because now she has a pal to play with while we're away at work. Say hello to Machtree's Land Shark, more often known as "Brody" (named after the policeman on JAWS the movie). Get it? Ha ha, Nathan came up with that one. So this is Brody, our little black lab who is getting bigger and bigger every day.

Brody is much different than Lola, his partner in crime. While Lola is spunky, has a bit of an attitude, and is very snuggly and likes her cushy pillow to sit on, Brody is laid back, tender-hearted (sulks after being punished), likes the hard concrete floor, and likes his space as you can see from this picture of him sleeping on the couch.Being a puppy is a rough life in the Smith household. But it's not all fun and games. There's been lots of puppy training going on. Brody already knows: No, here, sit, fetch, hurry (Nathan's version of potty), kennel, and good boy. Not bad for a 10-week old pup. He currently weighs 16 lbs, just bigger than Lola now. He was smaller than her by a few inches when we first got him, and he's quickly going to pass her up. She's in for a real surprise as he continues to grow and she starts to slow down. I think she'll still be the boss though.

Our favorite thing to do is take the pups to various parks, but especially one that is only about a block from our house. A few weeks ago we took them to the park and took a few pictures of them after they had played in the river and had a grand time chasing each other around. Brody is still soaking wet in this picture, but that makes him even more adorable.

This week Lola weighs 15.5 lbs. Here is miss attitude herself. She's really turning out to be a great dog, easily picking up training. She knows: no, sit, here, out (like out of our bedroom where you're not allowed), kennel, potty, fetch, and is starting to really understand "heel." And of course she understands "good girl." The best part is she's FINALLY house trained. Happy Birthday Nathan!!!

Today was Nathan's birthday, and the pups helped us celebrate by ripping to shreds all the tissue paper from Nathan's gift boxes. That is one of their favorite things to do. Nathan wondered if we left it there long enough that it would get into small enough pieces to disappear on its own. As you can see from this picture, they had a really good time on Nathan's birthday.

Nathan is on the home stretch for school. He has two finals and one paper left to do, and then he's done with school--FOREVER! HOORAY! He is so excited, and I am so proud of him.

Last week we finally heard from Bank of America. After being asked for our first two picks of locations out of a list of about 10 places (we had selected Charlotte, NC as #1 and Jacksonville, FL as #2), we got an email saying we were being assigned to.....wait for it.....Atlanta, GA. What the...? Yeah, that was our reaction too. It wasn't even on the list of choices. Needless to say we have mixed feelings about staying in Atlanta, mostly because Charlotte would have put us much closer to work and would have meant a more manageable workload for me, along with a promotion. That would have been awesome. But oh well, at least now we don't have to move very far, I don't have to transfer jobs, and I know my doctor and the hospital I'll be delivering in. That's a relief.
So we'll be in Atlanta for at least another year. We'll be moving at the beginning of June from our 1-bedroom, 800 sf apartment to something more fitting for a family of 3 humans and 2 dogs. We hope to find a place with a spare bedroom, and have plans for a queen-size bed for visitors, so we hope that will entice more of you to come visit us. ;-)
We are very excited about all these new developments in our lives, and are happy to share such great news with all of you. And if you read this whole 4-month catching up of news in our lives, you get a gold star.

Lola's first big outing

Lola has not been outside much because of the cold weather. She's so small that she starts shivering uncontrollably when it's cold. So today was full of adventures for her. She met lots of other dogs, and children and adults who always stopped to admire and pet her. We are used to her smallness, but I guess she was something of a novelty to strangers.

Today we decided to take advantage of the warm, sunny afternoon (after 2 weeks of temps in the 30s) and get outside. We took Lola to one of our favorite spots in Atlanta, a trail/picnic area along the Chattahoochee River. It was a beautiful day, and thinking about it now I wish I would have thought to take a picture of the sun on the water. It was breathtaking.
Here she is having a great time going for a walk.
This is her "what did I do?" look. Oh, and this is her FAVORITE spot to sit--right on your feet.

She loves to snuggle on my shoulder, right up against my neck. I think we should have named her parrott. When she whines she sounds like a little pig. I think we should have named her piglet (and she has the short, curly tail to match). She's finally getting the house training thing, and when she does something wrong, but we haven't figured it out yet, she runs and hides in her kennel. She's a smart one! But she's also so sweet. She never tires of snuggling on our laps and loves to play. We can't believe we've only had her for one week. She is a great incentive for me to come home from work at a decent hour, and we just can't get enough of her.

The funniest thing she does is chase her own shadow. We thought at first that she had an imaginary friend or something. But then I noticed that she was actually pouncing on, biting at, and running at her own shadow. What a nut. Pure joy.