A Family Celebration

Sophie's about to enjoy a cupcake!

our family-yes, we are looking different directions but at least we're all smiling!

Abbie & Sophie love playing with their cousins-here's Abbie & Sierra hanging out!

One of Sophie's favorite gifts was a Barbie head where you can style her hair with tons of accessories. Here, the girls are playing together somewhat nicely. Sharing toys is always a challenge at our house.

On Saturday evening, we had planned to have a birthday dinner at our house to celebrate Nana and Sophie's birthdays. Nana's birthday is on April 30 and Sophie's is on May 1st. Well, Saturday it just rained and rained and rained. Our area received 10-12 inches on Saturday alone. Some of the roads around us were closed on Saturday afternoon, including I-65. It ended up some of the family who had planned to come on Saturday night were not able to make it because their street was flooded or they just realized how bad the roads were. We had a birthday dinner but Nana and Paw-paw didn't get to make it until later that night. Aunt Patti, Uncle John, Randle and David were able to come. It was a nice surprise that Uncle Mike, Summer and Sierra were able to come because the girls had been at the Cool Springs mall when tornado warnings started coming in so that they couldn't leave the mall. It continued to rain all day on Sunday too and it has caused a lot of people around Nashville to lose their homes or have significant amounts of flood damage.
On Saturday night the tornado sirens started going off after we went to bed but no tornadoes touched down. On Sunday morning, after watching the news, we decided to try to head to church. It was barely raining at our house. When we got to Brentwood though, it started really pouring. We made it to church but parts of Franklin Road already had significant amounts of water flowing over it. Our church didn't have power. We decided to just head home and hang out. Matt was afraid that if we went somewhere else for church, we might not be able to get home since so many roads were already flooded and it was raining so heavily. We already knew from talking to my mom that several streets in the Crieve Hall were badly flooded. I think we made a good decision because many parts of Nashville were badly flooded on Sunday. It's the worst disaster I've ever seen in Nashville!

Goodbye Charleston, Hello Nashville

On Friday, July 27, we packed up a moving truck (with the help of movers). As moves typically go, there were a few hitches and they ran late, etc. so we didn't pull away until about 9:30 that night. We had already planned to get down the road a little ways and stop at a hotel. By the time we stopped at a hotel, it was pretty late. Then, the next day, we drove about 12-13 hours (ugh!) with Matt and his dad trading off driving our 26' Penske truck and Paula and Matt's mom trading off driving our mini-van and entertaining Sophie. Needless to say, it was a very long trip! What usually takes 9 hours or so to drive, took 15. There was a lot of construction, a wreck, lane closures, etc but we made it. We were all so exhausted. We got to Nashville on Saturday night. Matt, Paula & Sophie stayed at Paula's parents' house while Matt's parents stayed in a hotel. We closed on our house on Monday morning and moved in afterwards.

Before our move, Teresa, Matt's mom, came and helped us prepare to move and then stayed for about a week after the move to help unpack boxes. What a huge help that was!! His dad came down for the move and helped Matt drive the truck. Paula's dad was a big help in finding our house, getting movers, moving, etc. Paula's mom helped with unpacking boxes and with babysitting Sophie. We are lucky to have such wonderful parents!

Anyways, I've probably bored everyone to tears with his entry. Sorry!

Overall, we are really excited about being back in the Nashville and close to so much of Paula's family and Matt's extended family. We will enjoy having free babysitters. =) We are also happy to be close to so many of our friends again! However, we had grown to love Charleston with it's beautiful beaches, wonderful historic places to visit and a very nice downtown to explore. We will have to go back and visit when we can. It's a very charming city and we grew to love many of the people there too! I left with a bit of nostalgia.

What will I be when I grow up?

Sophie and Paula spent about a week down in Nashville visiting Paula's folks and several friends before Matt joined them a couple of days before Easter. Sophie enjoyed playing doctor and she had some really exciting things happen while visiting her Nana and Paw-paw. One was that Paw-paw drove a school bus to the house one night and Sophie got to get up on the school bus. She loves pointing out school buses and had been playing with a school bus a lot recently. When Paw-paw had to leave and go pick up some inner city kids, Sophie ran over to her car seat and said, "Sophie's seat" "school bus" because she wanted to ride with Paw-paw (but she didn't get to go). Later that week, Paula's uncle, who is a captain at one of the fire halls in Nashville, invited our family over to visit the fire hall. Sophie got the "grand tour" of the fire hall and fire engines. She got to get up on the fire truck and see the lights and sirens in action, etc. She loved it! So which will it be-doctor, school bus driver, or fireman. Matt wanted to be a trash collector when he was little because he thought the trucks with the special mechanical arms were cool. So, in other words, you just never know what your kid will end up doing. =)

Memorial Day weekend in Nashville

We went to Nashville to visit family over Memorial Day weekend. Sophie got to become reacquainted with a couple of her second cousins from VA and some other family. She also spent time with her great great aunt Mary Tom. She is nearly a century older than Sophie, and she is still clipping along at a pretty fast pace. Later, Sophie pulled out her maracas and hat for a little fiesta with the family. On her last morning with the grandparents, Sophie made everyone laugh by trying to stuff a biscuit in her mouth at breakfast. When we went through airport security on our way back to Nashville, the whole family was selected for thorough screening. Sophie received her first "pat down" by law enforcement agents. We always thought she looked suspicious. We made it back safely.