Phoenix and PJ's

On our drive home from Thanksgiving we got to stop off at the UNC hospital and meet our newest nephew Phoenix Wake Roten weighing 7lb 13 oz and measuring 21.5 inches. I always thought Molly was small until I saw him and now she seems like a giant or at least bigger. The whole McPherson clan was there and it was a nice prelude the Christmas when we will all be together at the cabin. While Molly has always known she had to share her Granny and BertBurt with 8 others she has not had to share Grandmommy and Grandaddy McP and I think it will take some time. Phoenix got the evil eye a few times from Molly when Grandmommy was holding him and Molly got as close as she could to stake her claim.
Jon with Phoenix while Molly looked on with Aunt Jenn.
Molly's thoughts - who is this kid that thinks he can take my place in Grandmommy's arms??
One day I will be able to get pigtails even but until then Molly will just have to keep up her cute smile to compensate.
Molly showing off her new PJ's! This is the one pair that fit the best and she refused to take them off once we tried them on her at 3pm. Jon's were a little snug and since I used the same pattern for myself let's just say with a pregnant belly it is a good thing shirts run long!! But it only took 4 hours of cutting/measuring/going to the internet over and over/sewing to get all three pairs done with a short break to drive and pick up the broken down truck!! I think we might keep up the tradition since we are only out $20 between fabric and elastic and next time I will know to give us all a little extra room in the waist. Once again my 3 years of Monday afternoon sewing with Mrs. Frew our neighbor in VA have paid off.

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving this year Jon, Molly and I got in the car Wednesday and drove up to MD to visit my parents. We realized a few hours into the drive his parents were driving down I-95 at the same time we were driving up, thanks to the droid we found a middle exit with food and stopped at exit 92 for a Wendy's dinner with his parents and sister Jenn on their way to have Thanksgiving with his other sister Kaitlin. Molly loved seeing her grandparents and aunt and she was so glad to be out of her carseat that she was nonstop entertainment having us all laughing as she danced and wiggled. We hit the road after dinner and finished the drive to my parents and Molly once again was in full spoil me form with my dad. Granny didn't get to see her because she is in Tennessee with my grandfather who has been having some bad days but we are thankful for all that she left us with. She had gone shopping so we had all the food we could ever imagine even if we had to split responibilites between Jon, Molly, my dad and myself. We were all assigned dishes to make our Thanksgiving feast and they turned out - the only person with a problem was me and the deviled eggs. We did not prepare everything my mom had bought for us but we did manage to get 7 dished on the table for 3 adults and 1 kid. Later that night we had our friends the Williams stop by for a dessert break on their drive home and we got some homemade cheescake and reesecup brownies. We have been playing games, watching football and having a good time. On our way home today we will get to meet our newest nephew Phoenix Wake Roten born yesterday to Katilin and Thomas!!

Attempt one at hard boiled - they were more soft boiled and could not be salvaged. Attempt two was much better!
Molly helping BertBurt with the chocolate dessert. She unwrapped the chocolate for him.

Molly showing BertBurt how to work the microwave.

Not too bad but not as good as if Granny was with us!

Our Thanksgiving Feast! Molly crashed watching the Auburn/Alabama game while her mom was beating BertBurt and her dad in a few games of Settler's of Catan.

Devo times with a 21 month old

Molly and I attempt to have Bible/devo time with some days better than others. I found some sticker coloring books and we have read those and done the activities. Today she brought me her Bible so we read the story she found flipping through the pages. As we were reading about Moses taking the people to the promised land Molly jumped off my lap ran and got her nerf gun and came back pointing it at pharaoh while we talked about crossing the red sea. I guess she wanted to be a guard??

All this to say I am super excited about what we are going to do for advent this year. A lady in my bible study told us about Jesse Advent Tree and we did an ornament exchange Monday. Each ornament tells of the story of salvation throughout the bible. When you put the ornament up you read the devo, scripture and sing a song. So in 25 days Molly will have had 25 stories in the Bible that tell of Jesus coming and what that means for us. I am excited to have structure, activities to do each day and something daily to remind me what a blessing it is that Jesus stepped off his throne in heaven and came to earth as a baby walked earth without ever sinning and then died and rose so one day we can join him in heaven!!
Now the hard part waiting until Jon is home each day to do the devo - I am no patient but I really want this to be a family thing so I guess I will have to be!!

Awesome weekend in Charlotte

This weekend Jon had a single soldier retreat so Molly and I hide in his suitcase and went along - ok we really just hoped in the car and added our clothes to his suitcase. Every few months chaplains get to throw some amazing retreats thanks to Strong Bonds (some government funding) for the soldiers in their unit. Jon rotates between family retreats and single solider to cover all the needs but Molly and I go along either way. Jon and his assistant get to choose where they go and the past two retreats have been in Charlotte. He gave the soldiers a free afternoon Saturday so we went to Discovery Place and we had a BLAST!! Afterward we went to Dish a restaurant featured in Diner, Drive-in's and Dives and had some amazing food. Once we did all that we went back to the hotel for Molly to crash. The one reoccurring theme in his soldiers wanted was more training time which surprised us both but I guess they really do want to be people of character and wanted all they could get on it.
Molly singing with the wiggles the night before we left.
Pretty happy to be going somewhere with daddy since he was a training all morning.
The toddler section which Molly LOVED!! Water, blocks and toys who could ask for more?
The ramp that Molly claimed as her own. We had to work on sharing when other kids wanted to use it. I think she wanted to charge them for being on her ramp and getting her in trouble. She got a little better at sharing - but not much, at least not this one toy.
Look at the water dad - this was before she threw a bucket down the front of herself. They did have water aprons to wear but daddy didn't think it was necessary. (Molly was the only kid without one)
Upstairs in the big kid area - we were listening to a demo on neon lights. The lady asked how many kids watched CSI and not many kids raised their hands - Jon thought it was ridiculous to ask that question of kids. Then she asked about ChuckECheese where they use black lights and most every kid raised their hand - Molly saw this and raised both her hands. They best part was the ROYGBIV song and Molly busting out in dance moves that rival Dancing with the Stars. As you can see in the picture she did not want to sit with us she chose a bench in the front by herself.
The Air Chair - Jon pushed the buttons and air lifted them up a few feet. Molly was somewhat impressed.
Me laying on a bed of nails - not something I would want to sleep on but ok for a once in a lifetime experience.
Taking a break for a snack before going back for more.
Molly on the go again - we all had so much fun laughing and doing hands on things.
There are no pictures of dinner because we were right at the breaking point so we ate and got back to the hotel as fast as possible (with a few geocaches along the way) so Molly could take a nap at 6pm. The great thing about a single soldier retreat is that Molly and I get to sleep in as late as we want not having to worry about eating breakfast early so I can get her to childcare and be apart of the teaching with married couples.
I can't wait until the next retreat!! Only one more until things get a little crazy for us before Baby Girl McP joins us.

Finally getting there

*Note - I did not take pictures this week so it is just all words.

So we have lived here since July and I think we are starting to finally get to where NC feels a little like home. Molly and I finally had a lunch date with another lady and hung out and talked for 2 hours. We went to a cabin with some people who are now our friends in Boone, NC and this past week Jon and I took over the children's ministry at the chapel we are attending.
Now to expand
Lunch with my friend - so Jon and I have tried to go to some random places and two of the times the restaurants no longer existed. So when I picked up Migdalia I asked what she liked and she said Italian. After a facebook survey taken earlier I said I think Luigi's sounds Italian - want to try? So I blindly drove her to a restaurant I hoped was open and that 3 friends had not lied about and that it was Italian just because of its name. We were both pleasantly surprised - it was Italian, the lunch menu was reasonable and the food was AMAZING! Now to try the other suggestions given on facebook.
Cabin Trip - We had another chaplain couple over for games one weekend and they asked us if we wanted to go to Boone during the next long weekend. We agreed having really only spent 2 hours with these people. We got there to the 6,000 sq foot cabin to meet our friends and then some more of their friends. It was like 60 hours of non-stop fun, laughing and just hanging out. Molly was the only kid but no one seemed to mind since she would just smile and run from the boys. We hiked which made me think of all our great times in Alaska with friends, we geocached which made me think of our great times in Waco with friends (and the not so great chigger time) and we played hours of games every night which made me happy since I won a few!! Molly now has a favorite person in NC - at the chaplain hail and farewell last night Molly refused to be with Jon or I she only wanted to be in Lauren's arms or standing right next to her.
Children's Ministry - this should be a fun group of kids to work with. There are already around 40 who attend regularly and there are even 15 volunteers who rotate so we are getting to work along side people who love children and are already committed! It is nice to have a place to serve as a family again.

Can't wait to update the blog with pictures of our weekend!!

Sleeping Beauty

So this morning Jon didn't have to go into work so after breakfast we were all playing around. He started to take a nap and I told Molly that he was like Sleeping Beauty and needed a kiss to wake up. And she proved once and for all she really is my kid!!!!

Thinking how best to wake up sleeping beauty - option 1: the kiss, option 2:SURPRISE ATTACK
option 2 of course was the choice of champs!! She slapped him in the face while I started to laugh and ran and got the camera and asked her again to wake Jon with a kiss again. Obviously she likes option 2 better.She did give him a big juicy kiss after a little nudging.

Rainy Day Fun

What do you do on a rainy day in Fayetteville?

Make a moving box tunnel.
And climb through it for many many minutes

Hide things in it and play chase with mommy who refuses to get in and then convince her to take you to Chik-fil-a for 2 hours. It didn't take much to twist my arm though since I had a new good book I was reading and while I love playing with Molly I really wanted to read the book (which I finished!!).

Why do we have so many boxes 4 months after moving in? Our shelves did not make it in the move so we bought some really good sturdy shelves that Jon finished and once he got home he loaded them with his books.
Molly gets 2 shelves for her books and toys also. We have some organizing to do with the shelves but we wanted to clear the storage room (aka Molly's room when baby girl McP comes) so we could start thinking about how to set it up.

We are having . . .

another girl.

We had our ultrasound today and it seems like everything is going well, she weighs 1 lb 2 oz right now and sleeps with her arms up (a McPherson trait). We go back next week to have the doctor tell us what all they learned from the ultrasound.
Jon's first response was - wow I am really going to be outnumbered.
Ashley's first response was - man I really wanted a boy but at least she is healthy
Molly's response - why is someone else getting to touch my mommy's belly?

We celebrated with a pink cake - I know girls mean pink but I think I will go for a darker shade and stick with red in the future!
Jon and Molly enjoying the moment while we throw out some names to think about. Probably no more family names since the ones left by our grandmothers are: Velda, Hattie and Donie Mae.
Molly enjoyed the celebrating - now just a few more months and we will see if baby girl McP will survive her loving big sister.