Happy Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to my wonderful dad. Thank you for being a wonderful dad for Jenni and me and a wonderful grandfather for the littles ones! Wish I could spend the day with you!

Prom in 2000

Lucas having a great time with his Opa

My baby sis with our dad

Cuddling Lucas a few years back

And a Happy Father's Day to my wonderful husband and the best dad our kids could wish for. Thanks for all you do! We love you!

Day#1 of being a father of two

All smiles

Getting used to pink (and bows)

This little boy LOVES his Daddy!

Cuddles!

Dad in charge of bath time 

My favorite family!

And of course there's one more special father and grandfather in our lives! Paul, thanks for being such a wonderful presence in our lives! 

For Matt

Matty,

Happy Anniversary to the best husband a girl could ask for! I cannot believe it's already been 5 years since we tied the knot. It seems like yesterday that we stood at the altar, exchanged rings, and had our first dance.

It's been an amazing five years filled with so many experiences and it has meant the world to me to have you by my side for everything from the little daily things to the big events.

In the past five years we have:

Graduated from Medical School & survived Residency (almost)

Traveled

Venice, Italy

Dubrovnik, Croatia

2006 World Cup in Germany

Moved Back to Nashville & celebrated many Homecomings

Bought our 1st House

Oh the Memories of the beautiful original colors

Found out we were Pregnant!

And most importantly, spent an amazing 2 years being first time parents

Our baby on the day he was born

And now the most amazing toddler we could wish for

Some days it might seems like a rollercoaster but it's been a wonderful and exciting one. I would never have thought it possible but I now know that I love you a little more every day and that sharing a life and loving you only gets easier every day. You are my best friend and the best father in addition to an amazing husband and I am thankful for you and for us. Makes me think back on my dad's speech on our wedding day "I hope this is not the happiest day of your lives but instead that every day after today is even better."

I Love You!

Steph

January Fun

We spent our first few days of the New Year in Birmingham. We also amazingly both got a holiday on for the first Monday that we were supposed to be back and extended our vacation by a day. That one extra day felt amazing! Then we went straight back to full time craziness. I had my Infectious Disease rotation in January -- really interesting but long days! Matt spent some time (in theory) doing different clinics -- really just cardiology, go figure. He's been getting to practice doing echos (echocardiography or ultrasounds of the heart for you non-medical people:) and has been loving it! Great sign for his future career choice. Here are a few random pictures from the month.

Lucas and Jenny in matching green monkey jammies.

Taking the new Trike for a spin

Checking out Daddy's headphones... or playing pilot?

Jenny & Luca on the playground. Who's heavier?

Lego Time

My beautiful sister on her way to her Sadie Hawkin's dance

On Call Visits

Today I realized once again what a wonderful husband I have. After spending most of his waking hours for the past 2 years in this hospital, Matt still spends some of his few hours off visiting me at the hospital when I'm on call. He surprised me with a visit today (with cookies!) and spent an hour chatting with me since luckily it's been a slow day for once. Instead of sitting in our call room lounge he could have been lounging in a far more comfortable place at home. He has visited several other times this month and the past few months (I've been on call a lot) with Lucas in tow post daycare. It always makes my day! Getting to at least lay eyes on my family makes all the difference even though somedays I don't get to do much more than say hi and give my boys a kiss.

What happens when I'm on call

With permission from Matt I had to share this email he sent me on call the other day:

"Yes yard fairy; our fairy mowed, weeded, weedwhomped, weed killed, and then some. I did help the yard fairy with the garage. Cleaned everything out, swept, blew; sweated like crazy. Went to Target, picked up 2 new shelves, spent money (sorry). Went to Lowes, got tool hanger, more weed killer, spent more money (sorry again). Came home, put the new shelves together, put up the tool hangers, got everything up off the floor and organized. Awesome. Spent an hour looking at the back yard and talking about what to do with it. So hot out. Mom told us there was some water in the unfinished part of the basement. Crap, but whatever. Went down to check it out on the way to the backyard to haul rocks. Found a small puddle of water in front of the dryer. Yes, dryer, not washer. Trying figure out where it came from, thought the dryer hose felt heavy. Pulled it off, realized it was full of lint. And water. Crap. Completely pulled it off and threw it away. Looked in the dryer vent pipe. Full of wet lint. Double crap. Pulled the vertical pipe out. Took a wooden pole to clean it out. Worked okay, not great. Took a look in the pipe running to the outside. Eesh. Not good. Tried the wooden pole. Minimal improvement. Back to Lowes. New dryer connector, duct tape, and what can only be described as the worlds most awesome pipe roto rooter, spent even more money (seriously, REALLY sorry). Roto rootered the vertical pipe. Cleaned TONS of lint out. Sweet. Next up, the horizontal pipe. In goes the roto rooter, get out a lot of lint, then, just stops. Double crap. rotor rooter from the outside. Lots of difficulty, then break through. Pull out... pine needles? Mud? What the hell? Bird must have nested in there at some point. No joke. Spent the next hour roto rootering and getting more mud out. Shit was raining down on us. Like, probably literally fecal matter. Real nice. Spent the next hour doing that. Made it MUCH better, but not perfect. Getting an extender kit this week, going to work on it more Wednesday when my parents come back up. Dryer is fine, but have to wait till Wednesday to use it again (sorry to keep apologizing, but sorry). On the upside, clothes should dry MUCH faster now. So we have that going for us, right? Parents just left, just showered, going to now melt into the couch. Sorry I haven't been able to talk earlier, been working all day. Your son has been adorable though. Such a little mimic. Thinks he's super cool, too. Keeps clapping for himself. Hope you're having a good night. Missed you lots today."

Email cracked me up. Bottom line, I now have a fantastic garage as compared to the trash dump it used to be and a functioning dryer! (And a very sweet husband and very sweet in-laws. Thank you!)

Congratulations Matt!!

Matt will officially be a cardiology fellow at Vanderbilt starting July 2011!!

I am so proud of you, sweetie! It takes a lot to be a star resident, get ready for fellowship, be a wonderful husband and dad all at the same time and you manage to do it every day. Lucas and I look forward to taking this next big step with you. And we're excited to stay in Nashville. I was ready to buy those parkas for Michigan but am glad that we won't have to.

Heart the heart!