who would have thought it would be today...

It all started back in May.

May 23 to be exact.

I was heading out the door for a wedding in Stone Mountain while the rest of the family was staying home and grilling out for Ruthie's graduation. We had a baby shower for Jessie that morning, so babies were on our mind. So as I walked out the door, AB offered to help me carry my overnight bag.

We got to the car and she said something to the affect of, "I wanted you to know that we are going to tell the family today that we are having a baby!"

Oh. Ama. Gahh.

AB & J were going to be parents! And I had to miss the family announcement! After debating on whether or not to go to the wedding (yes, being there for the announcement was THAT important), I decided to head to Atlanta. I thought about this little baby all night.

7 LONNNNG months (and 6 days) go by and here we are.

Last night after having coffee with the girls, I couldn't sleep and normally, coffee doesn't keep me awake. Strange. I finally went to bed around 1 a.m. only to wake up several times in the middle of the night. I was so frustrated thinking about having to get up by 6:30 and here I was wide awake. Well, 6:48 rolled around and my snooze alarm was going off. I debated sleeping for ten more minutes, but decided to go ahead and get up so I could pick up a coffee at Starbucks on the way in to work. Give me a little pep in my step, you know?

For some reason, I finished getting ready really fast this morning and headed out the door. I pulled into Starbucks about 20 minutes later, decided it was a Triple Venti kind of morning, drove around to the window to pay and got ready to pick up my morning BOOST.

And then my phone rang. I saw that it was my Mom.

Now this is a pretty normal occurrence for her to call me in the mornings. Sometimes she checks to make sure I am up and haven't slept an hour past my alarm (which I frequently do) or to remind me of something going on at the house later that day. I answered the car speaker phone as I gave my money to the barista and I heard Mom say, "AB is at the hospital and she is already dilated 4 and a half centimeters!"

Hold. The. Phones.

"AB is not scheduled to deliver little Cotton until January 13th, two weeks from today," I thought to myself. But Mom reassured me that we were going to get to meet Cotton two weeks early!

So I rushed to work, sat in the parking lot for 2.5 seconds, then decided I would go on to the hospital. Luckily, my boss was very understanding!

I sped all the way down Vineville and then onto 75 and finally to 16. Thoughts were flooding my head about this little babe that was soon to enter our world. I was the first one to get to the hospital and walked in to find Joel near the waiting room. He told me that she was progressing pretty quickly and that they were doing the epidural as we spoke.

He eventually went back to be with AB and I sat in the waiting room texting, calling and emailing any one who would listen.

Later family and friends began to arrive. After spending about 3 hours in the waiting room with all of them, we got the word that she had reached 9 centimeters but were going to go ahead with a c-section. As we stood in a circle as family, we joined hands and lifted up in prayer our sweet AB and the little one that they were about to deliver. A sweet memory that I'll always remember.

A few minutes went by and Ruthie, Madie and I decided to take some pictures on our computer to document Cotton's birthday. As we were taking the first, someone else in the waiting room told us that they had just brought a baby to the delivery room and that the Dad was with the baby. I jumped out of my seat and RAN to that nursery in my skirt and 3.5 inch heels. (praise the Lord I didn't bust it!)

And there HE was. Little Cotton. The baby that I had felt move around in AB's tummy for all those months. Little Cotton was a BOY. Joel came out shortly after and made the announcement that our little babe that we had called Cotton for the past 6 months was named Kale Bryant Sizemore.

BLESS. I love this little boy, Kale.

So today was yet another special day for our family even though some couldn't make it or are on another continent right now.

Our family went from 16 to 17.

December 30, 2009. Two weeks earlier than we expected.

We as a family are so blessed.

a picture of His love

Tonight I had coffee with two sweet friends that I grew up with.

I feel right now that the three of us are all in very different parts of life due to different zip codes, the relationships we are (or aren't) in, careers, plans for the future, etc.

But the thing I love about these two girls is that we can still have sweet, meaningful fellowship regardless of where each other are. We can rejoice with one another when one talks about wedding plans that are being made, we can relate to each other when we find out we are taking the same medicine and we can encourage each other in faith and in love. I know, I know... it's the small things.

For these friendships, I am grateful; they give me a glimpse (a very small glimpse) of what Christ love is like for us.

Incredible.

Virginia Highlands 5K

I ran. I walked. I finished (slowly).

Giving Thanksgiving at Christmas

Tomorrow I will be grateful for: a half day at work & being reunited with friends from camp life.

Saturday morning I will [try to] be grateful for: legs and a friend that help me complete another 5k.

Saturday afternoon I will be grateful for: all of my family gathering and celebrating Christmas.

the evidence of things not seen.

I am racking my brains trying to remember where it was that I read this... I might have even posted this before - but it is so convicting and applicable [to me] that I think it's worth a re-post.

"It would be awesome if you went to your mailbox or checked your e-mail or found a message in a bottle the day after you were saved and found a detailed, 39-page timeline that described the rest of your life. You would be so excited to find out the answer to every question you had about your life — where you’d go to school, where you’d live, what your job would be, whom you’d marry and how many kids you'd have. Everything you needed to know would be nicely and neatly presented in one document. It would be a great message to get.

This is what we often want. We crave a nice package in which God explains everything to us. But the truth is that God doesn’t work that way. If He did, we wouldn’t need faith.

God calls us to step into the unknown so that we can find Him standing right there. He wants us to come to Him in faith. He wants our belief in Him to move us into the unknown. He wants us to act so that we can learn to trust Him more and more."

Humbled.

Reindeer Fail

I keep reminding myself it was for a good cause... for the Children's Hospital of Macon.

But that does NOT erase my time that will forever be on the back of the tile I created today.

Some people like to call it the 2009 Reindeer Run & Santa Stroll. After today, I like to call it my "Reindeer Fail". When Jill, Mark and I drove through Mercer's campus last night and caught a brief glimpse of part of the course I knew I was in trouble. T-R-O-U-B-L-E. I saw hills. And I dislike hills (unless I am in a car or another MOTORIZED vehicle). Oh and last night as we were walking around, it was a cool 50 degrees and we were freezing our butts off with layers on! The forecast for this morning was predicting 43 degrees with a chance of rain.

Awe-ome.

But we did sign up for the race so we would complete it, although I have to admit there was some talk of backing out of the race... I mean we had still made a donation, who cares if we didn't run? But we did. So last night during dinner in downtown Macon, we realized we had some work to do to uphold the idea that we created back in September... the Triple T Tradition. (you like that, Jill?).

So tie-dye... we didn't have ANYTHING tie-dye that would keep us remotely warm and after a trip to Academy that ended probably 20 minutes later... we forgot about the tie-dye tradition... maybe next time.

After heading to Kroger to pick up some things for this a.m., we came back to my house with plans to watch Run Fat Boy Run again. FAIL. I crawled into bed feeling like I had taken a dose of Nyquil (maybe from the "carb-loading" we had done at Luigi's?) and Jill, well she will have to tell you how she felt. But it wasn't good! Luckily, RFBR was not one of the traditions so we were just 0-1 and not 0-2 for. Whew.

Then came our song... or "Tong" as we like to say. Well, at about 8:10 when we arrived for the race, this of course after crawling out of bed 25 minutes after our alarm clock did NOT go off, hurrying to get to the race on time, stepping out into the FREEZING wind, we decided our song, or excuse me, t-onggg, would be CRAZY by Gnarls Barkley. While Mark said it was a terrible running song, we did not care. The title perfectly summed up the emotions Jill and I felt about running at the moment.

So after waiting around for the race to start, seeing some awesome and awesome costumes (see below) and contemplating pouring the vat of hot coffee all over my freezing legs, the man called our attention and began the race... and we're off.

Uphill.

The 1/4 mile was UPHILL. What the heck.

And the hills did not end. While they were not major hills, they were consistent on the course. And I hate to admit - I walked some of the race. I am embarrassed. Normally my goal is just to at least jog REALLLLLLY SLOWWWLLLY, but I couldn't even do that. So I power walked like a soccer mom. And at that point, I think my walk was faster than my "run" could have been anyways. hahaa... that's pitiful.

Towards the end, I realized where I was and about how much further I had to go and luckily it was DOWNhill. Praise the Lord. I got close enough to the clock and it said 33:40. And I was going to force myself to get to the mat before that minute rolled over. I ended up with 33:57 (GAG).

So with my loser red-faced head hanging high, we grabbed some drinks, ran to the one stall bathroom and then headed to Panera for a bagel and Starbucks for a coffee. After walking into Starbucks, two women saw my and Jill's 5k shirts, and one said, "We just did it too - our first 5k!" She was so excited, which made me start to think about how excited I would be if I challenged myself with say a 10k and completed it? Crazy talk right now, but I'll do it.

We finished up breakfast and called the pottery place where we complete the tiles. Little did we know today was going to be ALOT different then our last calming visit.

We walked in to see about 6 or 7 people in the store. Not bad for a Saturday morning.

But then we found out that there was going to be a birthday party. Of five year olds. 18 to be exact. And with each 18 - 5 year old, there accompanied 2 parents. That makes for alot of people, paint and pandemonium (I was going to say noise but I like the 3 P's better.)

So here we are, two girls who like their tiles to be just right, so we get a gameplan and then go snag every color we are going to need for the next two hours because we know if we don't get it now, it will be gone FOR-EEEE-VVVVERRRR.

And we got to work. About an hour into it, another family came in and sat at the table next to us. Apparently this was their first time because the dad that talked like he was from Souuuuuth Jorrrrrrjjjahhh (complete with his camoflouge collared shirt) was giving instructions (LOUDLY) to the little angels (sarcasm) on how to paint.

Although there were some bumps and distractions on the road of our tile painting, we finished and after many failed attempts at taking pictures of our self with the tiles, we asked the lady at the counter to help us out.

So there you have it. My Reindeer Run 2009 experience. Have you ever run a 5k? How did you do? Any tips for novices like me?

*edit: I just looked at race results and I was wrong! I actually completed in 33:41. Every second counts.