Anniversary Pictures

A while back I thought it would be nice to have good pictures taken of the two of us for our tenth anniversary. If at all possible, I wanted them to be taken on the exact date of our anniversary. I asked my friend Brenda if she would be available for about 30 minutes that day for an anniversary photo session. Thankfully, she said yes, even though our anniversary is also her birthday!

We took them at Prairie Creek Park, which is where Brenda took our maternity pictures almost two years ago. We took them right before we went to Dallas for dinner and the Anberlin concert.

These pictures are by Brenda Cook and posted with her permission!

I think we finally look like adults in our thirties, right?

I'm wearing my new wedding ring Will bought me for our tenth anniversary!

Brenda gave us the rose for our anniversary!

365: February 22-28

One month down! I'm starting to get into the habit of taking at least one picture a day for this purpose. It's kind of neat to see some of the events from the past week in pictures. This week, you can tell that Liam was the focus, as he's in all but one picture. You can also tell I don't get out much! I wouldn't trade getting to spend all this time with Liam for anything, though.

February 22: In my effort to lose weight, I'm eating a lot more fruits and vegetables. This was my breakfast that day, and I think I've had that same meal for breakfast twice since then. Now I'm out of cottage cheese, though.

February 23: Liam is pretty good about not messing with our glasses, but he is all about placing items on his head or face. I think Will might have handed these over willingly for a quick photo, but Liam put the death grip on them when he tried to get them back.

February 24: We went to Bible Study at our friends' house that night. They have two girls. It was only a matter of time before Liam found the necklaces and tried them on.

February 25: Liam has recently become obsessed with washing his hands. He calls it, "Hah hands." I think he really just likes to play with water. The stool is still a little short as he can barely reach the water.

February 26: Liam woke up with this lovely hairstyle that day, and I could not get it to lay down at all. His hair looked like that all day long.

February 27: The weather the past few days has been sunny but cold. It's the wind that's caused it to be more frigid than I like to experience. However, we couldn't stay cooped up inside all day, so we put on some layers and took an hour-long walk around the neighborhood. Liam likes to stop every ten feet or so and play in the dirt and mess with sticks. That's why it takes an hour.

February 28: Liam loves to sit at his table and color these days. He also can't resist dumping out all the colors. This is an accurate picture of what happens around here every day.

Celebrating Ten Years

Will and I celebrated ten years of marriage last Thursday. Months ago, we started thinking about what we wanted to do on that day. One of our favorite bands made it an easy decision by announcing they would be playing in Dallas on our anniversary. So we bought tickets first and worried about the babysitter part afterward. Thankfully, my parents agreed to come and visit from Louisiana and hang out with Liam.

Before heading Downtown, my friend Brenda took some pictures of the two of us for a little anniversary photo shoot. I knew I wanted good pictures of us from that day. We went to the same park where she took our maternity pictures. Although the morning was cold and rainy, by the afternoon, it was sunny and 70 degrees. Perfect picture-taking weather.

Then we headed toward Oak Cliff to eat dinner at our favorite restaurant, Spiral Diner. I know I've written about it before, but we love this place so much. It was a natural choice for our anniversary dinner. Everything is vegan...and crazy delicious. Will had the Cowboy Burger, and I had the "Mitch" Tofu Club sandwich, which is one of the best sandwiches I've ever had. (Bonus points if you know it was named after a Mitch Hedberg bit.)

Yummmmm

A fun little thing I want to remember: The guitar player for Anberlin (the band we saw) is a vegetarian and typically asks for restaurant recommendations on Twitter for each city he's in. Will got on my Twitter account and told him about Spiral Diner. The next day, he posted a photo of the restaurant with the caption, "Thanks for the recommendation, Jennifer C." So yeah, he took our advice.

After a great meal, we headed to the House of Blues for the concert. As mentioned before, the band we went to see is Anberlin. I'm sure most everyone reading this has never heard of them. That's ok. They're still good! They've been around ten years, but aren't super well-known. Thankfully, that means it's still cheap enough to go to their shows! This was our SIXTH Anberlin concert to attend. You could say we're fans. The first time we saw them live was in 2003. They opened for Relient K at the Strand in Shreveport. We actually saw them the night before we left for our honeymoon (which was 9 months after the wedding). Before that night, we had never heard of them, and I don't remember a whole lot about their performance. I do remember, however, that a few days later we both had their songs stuck in our head after only hearing them once. We decided they needed a second listen, so we got their first album, and we still listen to it almost 10 years later. They've released 6 more albums since then. We listen to those too. Every other time we've seen them live has been in Dallas. We saw them in 2007(came from Louisiana for that one), 2008, and twice in September 2010, with one of those being an acoustic performance at Good Records. Their show at HOB in 2010 was actually the LAST concert we attended before this one. Liam attended both of their September shows as well as a Smashing Pumpkins concert that month, as I was pregnant but didn't know it yet! As you can see, this band has been important to us over the years, and we were thrilled to get to celebrate our anniversary at their concert. They get better live every time we see them! It's neat that we know how they've changed and improved performance-wise over the years.

Anyway, I think we've established our love for Anberlin. Moving on. We got to the HOB after the doors had opened, so we didn't have to wait in line. We checked out the crowd situation, and there wasn't much of one yet, so we took some pictures in the photo booth there. You know, anniversary souvenir. I think this is the first picture I've seen where I think we actually look like a couple in our thirties as opposed to college students.

Our tickets were general admission standing room only, so we made our way to the area in front of the stage. It wasn't very crowded yet, so we got as close as we could and waited for the first band to go on. They were called All Get Out. I didn't like them. It was a little too screamy (thought it was 2005 for a minute), and the lead singer cussed too much while talking to the audience. Low class. The second band was Paper Route. We actually liked them and enjoyed their performance despite not knowing any of their songs.

By the time Anberlin came on, we were almost at the very front. There was one person between me and the fence, so we were about 5 feet from the stage. Will claimed he had never been that close before at a concert, but I had. When I was 15, my first real rock concert was Bush at Barton Coliseum in Little Rock. My friend Glenda and I were at the very front of a rowdy mosh pit. We had to duck to keep from getting hit in the head from people crowd surfing. We could only breathe when the crowd swayed backwards. There was a real possibility of being crushed against the fence. However, I was only a few feet from the picture below, so I was ok with it!

After what seemed like forever, Anberlin took the stage, and then the fun began. It's always awesome when you know the words to every song and sing along...loudly. The lead singer, Stephen Christian, sounded great and looked like he was happy to be there. I really love live music. I like being able to feel the bass in my chest. Fun, fun times! There was also great pit hospitality (are they still called pits?). Anyway, I wasn't pushed up against strangers. I had room to move and breathe, and the only person touching me was Will. Perfect!

Lead singer Stephen Christian

All in all, I think it was a perfect tenth anniversary. It was very much "us." I'm looking forward to many more decades and many more rock shows with the best husband ever!

Let's Go "Pay"

Last Thursday morning, my mom and I took Liam to the Indoor Safari Park in Plano so he could play. That morning was cold and rainy, so it was a great opportunity to check out an indoor play place.

We got there shortly after they opened, and I put Liam in the soft toddler play area first. It had a tiny slide, but Liam thought it was fun anyway, and some large blocks he could stack. Then we went to the small play table area. A couple other little boys around Liam's age were in there too. They played at the train table together (i.e. beside each other) and occasionally took trains out of each others' hands...the usual. No one really got upset, though.

Then Liam played in the large play area meant for 2-4 year olds. Since the only other kids there were around his age, I let him. If there had been 4 year olds thrashing about in it, we would've skipped it. I plopped Liam in the ball pit, which was his first time in one. He was a little cautious at first, but quickly started digging it. He spent a long time just falling down (on purpose) on top of the plastic balls. Eventually, Liam decided to climb to the top of the really tall play area. Since there was no way I was letting him go up there alone, I had to climb up too. Liam did a great job climbing and going through the tunnel. They announced the train ride while we were up there, so we slid down the slide into the ball pit, and headed over to the train. No one else wanted to ride it then, so we had the entire tiny train to ourselves. It was a pretty lame train ride, as it just went in a circle a few times while an employee held stuffed animals up to Liam's face. Thankfully, it didn't last too long.

After that, he went back to the ball pit. He escaped several times and ran to the large play area meant for 5-10 year olds. I had to carry him away from it with him yelling, "Why? Why?!" No one was playing in it, but I still got the impression from the employees that it was off-limits.

After being there a little over an hour, I could tell Liam was about done. I tried to get him to sit on one of the walking animals, but he didn't want to at all, so we left!

I know Liam had a good time, but the place was pretty underwhelming. I'm not saying we won't go back again, but it will be a long time.

365: February 15-21

It's a day late, but yesterday was a busy and fun day. There was no time to be blogging.

February 15: Liam was pulling all of the toys out his closet I had put away in there. He's always intrigued when I open the closet door in his room. That day, I let him have some fun in there and get out all of the toys I think he's outgrown or that weren't getting much play time. Of course, when he discovered them in the forbidden closet of mystery, they became awesome again...for a few seconds, at least.

February 16: These days, our Saturday mornings are usually spent looking at houses. This particular home had a faux stone wall in a bedroom. Lovely, right? We actually ended up making an offer on a different house that day. However, 4 other people did as well. We didn't get it. Oh well. It just wasn't the one for us!

February 17: This is an extra picture from all of the ones I took after church that for Liam's 21 month post. I think this is a funny face. He was cutting those eyes at something...or probably someone.

February 18: This past week, Liam decided to dabble in non-napping. By the time we got to this day, he had skipped napping three out of the previous four days. My solution was to head outside and wear him out. We walked around the neighborhood a while, and of course he had to do a lot of sliding. It worked, and he took an awesome nap that day. Thankfully, he decided napping wasn't so bad after all this week.

February 19: This month, I've gotten serious about losing weight. (See? A month late again on something else.) Will dug out his old scale so I could keep track of my weight. I typically just have it out in the living room. Why? Not sure, but it's there. Liam decided it needed some decorating, so he added color and stickers. I think it's pretty cool.

February 20: My parents got in to town that evening, and after dinner we went to Target. Will let Liam walk around the store while I shopped, since it wasn't busy. As we were leaving, Liam decided he wanted to push the buggy.

February 21: My mom and I took Liam to the Indoor Safari Park in Plano so he could play since it was cold and rainy outside. It was pretty basic as far as stuff to do goes, but he certainly played his little heart out. By the time we got him home, he was out.

Ten Years

Will and I are about to celebrate our tenth wedding anniversary in a couple of days. That's right. TEN years! I know this blog is about Liam, but there wouldn't be any Liam without Will and Jennifer, so it counts!

I dug up some old pictures, scanned them with my cheap scanner, and now I'm posting them here. I will also share a little of our story along the way.

This is what I looked like in the Spring of 2001 when Will first noticed me in the college Sunday school class at our church.

I guess I stood out with my pink hair! I originally started with bright red chunks, but since the dye wasn't permanent, it got a little lighter each time I washed my hair, leaving me with progressively lighter pink hair.

I had noticed Will as the cute guy who sometimes came in late to church.

We didn't officially meet, however, until June 26, 2001. We met at a summer Bible Study at our college pastor's house in Ruston, LA. We ended up in the same discussion group, and we were the only two in the group who actually talked. Afterward, we were standing around talking in a group, and I mentioned that I was in the process of moving and that every muscle was sore from lifting heavy stuff. I expressed my desire to move my huge stereo but I couldn't lift it. (It was 2001. Stereos were large, in charge, and important.) Then Will offered to move it that night. I told him that wasn't necessary, but he persisted. We then left together (crazy!) and he moved the stereo. I probably shouldn't have left with a guy who was pretty much a stranger, but I did. Thankfully, it all turned out fine!

Over the next couple of weeks, we talked on the phone some, and hung out together maybe once with other people. In July, I invited him to go with me and some of my friends to "Presents," which is a program put on by the Tech orientation leaders. It's for the incoming freshmen, but anyone could go, and it was an entertaining show. Will accepted the invitation, and came with me and my giggly girl friends!

While they were giggling and whispering about us (ha!), Will was asking me out for our first date. Thanks to one of my friends who was there that evening, I have a picture taken minutes after he asked me out.

Our first date was July 21, 2001. It lasted over 12 hours and involved attending a wedding, playing Scrabble, and eating at the Olive Garden in Monroe.

The words "I love you," were said September 11, 2001. That was an extremely emotional day, but we meant what we said!

I knew we would be together forever in January 2002. A friend asked me (probably jokingly) if we were going to get married. I really thought about it for several minutes, and I told him that yeah, I thought we would get married one day!

We spent a lot of time together over the next year. A lot. Will graduated from LA Tech in August 2002.

Many of my friends got engaged that year. Then on November 20, 2002, Will proposed to me. It happened early in the morning. He had borrowed a key from my roommate (she wasn't there at the time), and come into the apartment while I was getting ready for the day. I thought it was my roommate, but it was Will. I thought that was strange, but didn't question it much. I had ruined his plan of waking me up to propose by already being awake. Oops. After I was ready, we were sitting on the couch talking. We were talking about getting married, which was actually a common topic of conversation for us. Then Will slid off the couch onto one knee and asked me to marry him. I said yes! (If I hadn't, you wouldn't be reading this.) It happened in this room:

We had already decided to get married in February 2003, which was just 3 months away at the time. I might have done a little wedding planning before the proposal. That was the best time for us because I was graduating March 1, and so was my roommate. She was moving back home and getting married in March. We didn't want to live together before we were married, so if we hadn't gotten married then, I would have needed to either move home or find another roommate. Instead, we just had a really short engagement!

In that three month span, we planned the wedding and I finished my last quarter of college (Tech does quarters instead of semesters). I took my finals the day before the wedding. One teacher let me skip it since I was getting married! We also went to pre-marital counseling because we got a covenant marriage. It was a busy three months. I also was given two wedding showers and had my bachelorette party during that time. It was hosted by my friends Jenn and Naomi. They did an amazing job, and to this day I still think about how fun it was! It was retro-themed (people did dress up) and featured karaoke and Will and Jennifer Trivial Pursuit (since that's my favorite game). Yes, it was super tame compared to most parties, but it was perfect for me. Jenn and Naomi dressed up as me and Will and invited people to the party. Here is Jenn (dressed as Will) "proposing" that I come to the party!

Our wedding rehearsal took place after church the Sunday before the wedding. It was super casual, and we all ate at Ryan's (the buffet place) afterward.

We were married on a Friday night, and our wedding was very casual. Many people were invited by word of mouth. Most of the attendees were our friends from college! We were married at the church we both attended, even though it didn't look like a traditional church. I think it had been a dress shop before. However, the place meant a lot to us, so we didn't consider getting married elsewhere just so it would look good in pictures. The next year, Christ Community moved into a brand new facility, so we can no longer go back to the place we were married.

I remember that it was really rainy that day. Will and I saw each other before the wedding. I think we were just determined to not be super traditional about it all. My sister was my maid of honor, and our friend Ryan was Will's best man. That was it for attendants. There were 5 other friends I wanted as bridesmaids, but that seemed like way too many. So we chose to keep it simple. The music was just two acoustic guitars played by friends (who happen to be really talented musicians). I walked down the aisle to Blackbird by The Beatles. The processional song that played when everyone except me entered the church was Patience by Guns n Roses. Sounds like a strange choice, right, but it's a beautiful song on acoustic guitar. Will and I walked out to God's Romance by Delirious!

Our reception was held at the Association of Baptist Students center. Once again, we chose a place that meant a lot to us, since we had spent a lot of time there while in college! Since our wedding was small, it worked out!

I'm still having a hard time believing we've been married ten years. We were really young, so we've been together a third of our lives. Marrying Will was the best decision I've ever made. The past ten years have been amazing, and it's all because of him.

That's from our wedding scrapbook that is still not finished ten years later.

Liam at 21 Months

Valentine's Day, Liam turned 21 months old! In three short months, I will be the mom of a two year old. Wow!

At 21 months old, Liam is a very busy and curious toddler. I think I write something along these lines every month, but goodness, it's the truth! He wants to check out and touch everything. When we go for walks, part of the time he's running as fast as he can, but most of the time, Liam's bent down playing with acorns, rocks, sticks, and all the other various choking hazards found in nature. He also loves to dig in dirt. I'm pretty sure he could be happy doing that all day long.

As previously mentioned, Liam now says "Please" and Thank You" when he wants something ("Peas. Dee Doo.") He had started to do it without prompting anytime he wanted something we had to give him, like colors or stickers. However, in the past month he did figure out that he could use this phrase as a tool to try and get what he wanted, even things that we maybe didn't want to give him! However, I want to keep teaching him to associate please and thank you with asking for something, so as long as it's not going to harm him, we give him what he asks for. He's had a few extra "pips" recently as a result of this.

In addition to please and thank you, Liam has started adding the word "Yes" to his requests. So a typical request would be, "Colors. Peas. Dee Doo. Yes." Ha ha, he's letting us know what answer he wants to hear!

Lately, "yes" is actually a word we hear a lot. He correctly answers yes or no questions, which is making it a lot easier these days to know what he wants and what he wants to do. He gets better at communicating all the time.

As far as the alphabet goes, Liam now knows them all! He still loves to call out letters when he sees them. He can recognize them all by sight, but he can't sing the ABC song. The alphabet puzzle is still a hit with him.

We've started taking Liam for walks around the neighborhood where he actually walks with us, instead of being in the stroller. We just follow him for the most part. If we let him out the door to our apartment, he pretty much always walks straight to the street anyway (unless he gets distracted by the playground slide). Now we just direct him down a street and go! This is what typically happens: Liam runs for a few seconds, then stops, sits down and plays in the dirt or messes with acorns. So we have to expect the walk to take awhile, because he's always stopping to mess with something! Yesterday, the three us walked around the neighborhood. Liam actually walked a long time, but wanted to be carried eventually.

Liam has also mastered the slide outside our apartment. It's smaller in stature, so it's just the right size for a toddler. He does a great job walking (at first he climbed) up the stairs, sitting down, and sliding. He could do that all day if he could. That and playing in the aforementioned dirt. He recently went down one of the big slides at the park by himself. I followed him to the top, and someone was at the bottom to catch him. He did fine, but it still made me nervous. So I held him and we slid down together after that. However, Liam put his foot between me and the slide while we were going down, and it got caught and twisted. He was crying when we got to the bottom, and he couldn't walk on his foot. I felt so bad! Liam is a trooper, and kept trying to walk and keep playing, but he plopped down every time he tried to put weight on his foot. We left the playgroup at the park then, and thankfully he started walking on it normally after his nap. It was never swollen, and I'm thankful he was ok.

January 27th, Liam's ninth tooth popped through. It was the last of the four middle teeth on top. He also has a molar that has partially popped through, so that will be his tenth tooth. He has really taken all this teething like champ. Before last night, I could have written that he's had no noticeable pain with them. However, he did wake up several times last night with teething pain. Poor little guy. I hate teething pain for him!

These days, art is actually more popular with Liam than toys. He always, ALWAYS, wants to color and play with stickers. Paper, crayons, and stickers pretty much stay out all the time these days. Thankfully, I found a stockpile of stickers in my teacher supplies box, and he got some for Valentine's Day from his grandparents. Stickers are everywhere now. There's pretty much always one (at least) stuck to the bottom of my socks. I even pulled one out of my hair the other day that Liam had stuck there. He loves placing stickers on my clothes.

Liam got his second haircut a couple weeks ago. His bangs were getting in his eyes all the time. Our friend Nikki cut it while Liam sat on Will's lap. We distracted him with Nikki's iPad, and hair got all over it! Part of me does wish we could grow out his hair, but I also think he looks pretty handsome with a traditional haircut. Either way, he's the cutest kid ever.

Liam has eased up on his love for Curious George this month and given Elmo some space in his heart. I think he might love Mr. Noodle and Big Bird as much as Elmo, though. I much prefer Curious George, though.

A very new thing is that Liam has had several day where he refused to nap. I went through the naptime routine with him every time, put him in his crib, and left the room. As long as he didn't cry, I left him alone. This only started this past week, but so far he's skipped his nap 3 times. I don't know what's going on with him. Today, we were outside for an hour this morning, and he took a great nap this afternoon! I think as long as we can get outside and play, he will be worn out enough to nap.

These pictures were taken on the church playground yesterday morning. Man, it was so tough getting ones of his face. Constant motion. I took way too many pictures.

Protesting being helped while in the big kid swing. He is not ready for the big kid swing on his own!

Walking up the slide on his own. Will is cool with it, but I've spent too much time tellings kids not to do that in childcare situations that it just feels wrong to allow it!

Breeze blowing through his hair

Mid stride

The only one I got with him looking at the camera. It's too bad that I cut his head off.

Real talk when it comes to Liam

Liam and daddy. One day, Liam will be that tall!