Seriously…it’s 2013.

Absent blogger, here. Since it’s 2013 (SERIOUSLY?!?!?), I figured it was time to update my blog since I haven’t posted anything since AUGUST 2012! But honestly, life got extremely overwhelming not two weeks after I blogged about Sweet Harry Baby’s 8 month birthday. So to rewind a bit…

In April last year, Andy’s work partner was diagnosed with Stage 4 Pancreatic cancer and from the beginning the outlook wasn’t good. We learned swiftly how nasty cancer is and just how nasty pancreatic cancer is and how quickly it progresses. Andy has been working with Brad for almost ten years and for the majority of the time, it’s just been the two of them. Needless to say, they had quite an interesting relationship – not quite besties but they knew each other for more hours and days than most people know each other as work colleagues or some spouses. And to top that off, they were in a small office a lot of the time. Pretty much immediately, Brad stopped working and Andy assumed a lot of Brad’s clients and spent a lot of time on his own. We knew that if (when) Brad passed that it would mean a major change for Andy’s career, we just weren’t sure what exactly. Then two weeks after my last post in August, Brad went to be with Jesus. He has such a sweet family – an amazingly gracious and beautiful wife and three talented and beautiful kids, the youngest still in elementary school. His memorial service was bittersweet with lots of tears, lots of laughter and lots of people. But most importantly, the name of Jesus was proclaimed because of this man’s life and family to many people who may not hear it again.

Immediately following Brad’s death, it set us into an unknown tailspin of what may or may not happen with Andy’s job. We knew he wouldn’t lose his job but the location and look of it would most certainly change and we didn’t know when the changes would be coming. Almost a month exactly after Brad died, Andy was asked to go to Charlotte (Wells Fargo municipal group HQ) for meetings with his bosses and during his time there, they told him that they would be shutting down the Richmond office that he and Brad had been working from and that Andy’s job would be moving to Charlotte at the first of 2013. That weekend after they told him this, we were headed to Cashiers, NC for a dear family friend’s wedding. I truly believe it was Providential – we didn’t have Harry and it gave us a few days to breathe and process without the neediness of a, at that time, nine month old. And it’s the NC mountains – I think that’s what heaven is going to smell like. We got to hike Whiteside Mountain, an easy easy hike but oh so beautiful, with my mom and dad, Mike the Bike and Kaper-doodle, and Erin and Trent. (sweet sweet friends!) And also that same weekend, I began to suspect that I was pregnant again.

And on Monday morning when we got home from our adventures, I took one (or two) of my pregnancy test stash. I don’t ever believe the cheap Dollar Store tests so I have to go out and buy the expensive First Response kind that digitally tells you yes or no. Of course the cheap Dollar Store ones are accurate…they both said YES just in very different ways. Yes, that’s right, Harry was only 9 months old when I got pregnant unexpectedly for the second time. The kids will be 18 months apart. But I keep telling myself…my mama did it without a children’s museum or playdates or a car for that matter most of the time. My brother Micah and I are 18 months apart and then my youngest brother, David, is only 22 months younger than Micah. So she was a busy busy woman.

We find out soon what we will be having – girl or boy?? This pregnancy feels much much different than when I was preggers with Harry. Just this week, I was looking at pictures of me when my family went to the beach when I was pregnant – I looked like I was about to pop. I think I was like 22 weeks at that point. This pregnancy – you can barely tell I am pregnant and I’m 20 weeks. My mid-section is definitely thickening but I’m not huge like I was with Harry.

So then fast forward a few months after finding out we were pregnant again, our sweet baby Harry started getting “the sickness” as I’ve been calling it. Literally, he has had something germ-y since the week before Thanksgiving plus he’s been teething. The week before T-giving, he started a cold, which is cool. He’s had plenty so far. Then the week of T-giving, I think he started teething — all four incisors. Woke up T-giving morning with a fever which I still chalked up to teeth and then by Sunday had full blown ear infections in both ears. Antibiotics are a miracle but Harry was just off. I think we had two days of non-sickness then he got the stomach bug two days before his 1st birthday 😦 Then I got it and then Andy (kinda). A week and a half later, when he was finally not pooping weird and eating okay, he got another cold but this time, he started running a fever of 104. It wasn’t the flu or so the doctor said but it lasted the whole week of Christmas. Then I got it. And I kept it for over a week before it turned into a wicked sinus infection. And the week after Christmas, Harry started teething again — molars this time.

And I’ve brought us up to the present. I think Harry is still teething. When I brush his teeth, I don’t feel molars in the back but he’s still putting his fingers way in the back of his mouth and gnawing. I was ready to try just about anything to help the poor guy so we got a hippie dippie amber necklace that is supposedly a natural analgesic. It seems to be working. He’s not waking up at 2:30am, 4:30am, from naps or any other time screaming like he was just last week…we shall see if it really does work.

Sorry for such a long post. It’s been a long two weeks since Andy started working in Charlotte and I’ve felt the need to dump a bit. Thankfully he can come home to Richmond on Thursday nights and work here on Fridays. It is still up in the air as to what is going to happen to us. We long to stay in Richmond and for the sake of this being the internets and who knows who is reading this, right now, Andy is working in Charlotte for Wells. I’ll keep you posted – promise. But for me right now, this means being a single mama from Sunday night until Thursday night. And pregnant. But I am learning and failing to hear at times how good God is all the time. I am not a pawn in some cosmic manipulation. I am treasured by Jesus and He is for me. Even when life is blurry because of tears.

In the meantime, how cute is this little man?? This was from one year old pictures that Lauren Massey Matthews, fellow City Church-er, took for us.

And another…

Can’t believe this was him 13 months ago…just an hour old.