The day has come

Baby William arrived Wednesday, April 25th at 3:57pm

All 8 pounds 3 ounces, 21 & 1/2 inches of him. He is perfect and I love him. Mama and baby are doing great.

More (lots more) pictures and a story about his arrival coming soon!

Easter, Chicago, and the Hamburgular

Hey friends and family,

April has been full of highs and lows. We'll start with the highs...

First up, Easter

Here's a shot of our bunny door and rose bush.

We spent the majority of Easter in Dothan. Most of the weekend was spent checking up on my grandparents who are having health issues. Friday, my mom, sister and I went to visit my dad's mom and then we went to see my cousin Stacey's baby, Anna Beth. I had not met her yet and I was dying to get my hands on her. She is precious. I think she looks JUST like Stacey did when she was a baby. Anna Beth slept most of our visit and only opened her eyes a couple of times (probably to see who the crazy lady poking and prodding at her was) but I really enjoyed holding such a sweet baby. After visiting Anna Beth, we went to my mom's parents house and spent the afternoon with them. It had been a long time since I had spent an afternoon with them. It was nice chatting with them. Where was Kyle the whole day? Fishing with my dad.

Saturday we chilled out by the pool and did a bunch of nothing. Sunday, the Easter bunny came and made a visit right before we headed to church with my parents then lunch in Montgomery with Kyle's parents.

The weekend after Easter, Virginia and I went to Chicago to celebrate Megan's upcoming wedding. What was supposed to be a small trip with just the three of us catching up in Chicago turned into a full-fledged bachelorette weekend complete with a lingerie shower and a Derby-style around the house shower. We had a really fun weekend hanging out with Megan, her mom, new sister-in-law, some college friends and new friends from Chicago.

Friday Virginia and I got into Chicago and were greeted by the MOST beautiful tulips around the city. Seriously ya'll, I have never seen so many tulips with a variety of colors. You would have thought we were in Holland. They were everywhere. None of the native Chi-town peeps could tell me any history or reasoning behind the tulips so I did some online investigation myself. Check it out.

Friday night we met up with everyone and caught up before our long day on Saturday.

Here's some of the group with our scarfs Megan bought us as a thank you for coming to Chicago. Each person got their own unique scarf and cute label. Megan is such a friend who would do something like that. So sweet.

Saturday we went to a Derby bridal shower hosted by Megan's female relatives. With Megan living so far away it was nice to be able to jam-pack the weekend with as many wedding related activities as possible. I enjoyed getting to visit with some of her relatives and watching her open wedding gifts. The derby theme shower was inspired by the fact the Megan got engaged Derby weekend at the races and will be getting married in Lexington this June.

Saturday evening we partied. The night started out with a lingerie shower where we gave Megan her bachelorette duds and played some bachelorette related games. On a fashion note, we had a black and pearl theme for the evening.

Megan's mom got us a limo after the lingerie shower for us to continue the party in. We all agreed it was our favorite part of the party. We stopped around several spots in Chicago for photos.

After our limo ride we went to dinner at a place called Paris Club. Megan was pretty excited we had reservations there because it is apparently the new trendy restaurant in Chicago. I tried to calm my inner redneck. The place had a cool "city vibe" and we just so happened to spot a celebrity...Chad Michael Murry from the tv show One Tree Hill.

Megan with her new sister in law Meg and her mom Marilee

I enjoyed spending the weekend with my wonderful friend and hate that she lives so far away. I'm trying to convince her she should move south but I'm thinking she will be in Chicago for life.

I got back from Chicago tired and really needing some rest. Monday was a full day at work for me. I had to work until 8. I kept telling myself all day that if I could just make it home I would eat dinner, have a glass of wine and go to bed. Instead I went home to find Kyle out in the front yard informing me that our house had been broken into.

Yep...we got robbed. Sparing all the details I've shared over 100 times, it was a classic robbery. They kicked in our back door, took some electronics and ransacked our house looking for hidden cash (which we don't keep around). I've heard people say being rob is the most invading feeling and trust me people...it is. It has been a very tiring week emotionally. Kyle has been really supportive because as you can imagine I've been a huge spaz. It just feels weird knowing strangers were in our home. With that low being shared, I'll bring it back to a high...we bought a HOUSE and will hopefully be moving soon. Ha, no we didn't buy the house after we got robbed. It was just a coincidence that two months before we were supposed to move we got robbed. I really had grown fond of our first little house but after the robbery I'm ready to move on and move out.

Good bye house in the hole. It's been real. I'll do a whole post on the new house once we sign the papers and get ready for some small renovations. Yahoo! We are really excited.

This weekend we laid low. I have a small break from school (1 week) until I start studying for my comps so I took full advantage of the weekend and completely relaxed...not. Duh! I have the shakes when I don't have school work so instead of watching t.v. and eating candy I decided to clean out closets and drawers. Very therapeutic. We did get out of the house and went to the zoo after church on Sunday. It was a gorgeous day spent with the animals.

Quick and Easy Meal

I'm all about the quick and easy meal at our house. While Kyle doesn't expect me to make meals every night of the week, I still like to cook something for dinner. Okay, there is an exception, nights where work makes me want to pull my hair out. I swear some people are out of it but that's a whole different post. Anyway, a couple of nights ago I got home and thought we were going to end up eating sandwiches because I couldn't come up with anything for us to eat and I wasn't going to the grocery. That's when I remembered a dish my mom used to make for us back when I was in high school...shrimp scampi. It's a really simple Southern Living recipe that uses only four ingredients: shrimp, butter, Italian dressing mix and angel hair pasta/spaghetti noodles. I decided to look online for the exact measurements and ran across this jazzed up recipe on Southern Living. We happen to have all of those ingredients so shrimp scampi it was!

Ingredients

• 1 pound peeled, large raw shrimp (31/35 count) (fresh or frozen)
• 1 (12-oz.) package angel hair pasta (Spaghetti noodles are okay too)
• 1/2 cup butter 
• 1/4 cup finely chopped onion (I've never included this ingredient)
• 3 garlic cloves, finely chopped (I use minced garlic from a jar)
• 1 teaspoon salt-free Italian-herb seasoning (I use a whole packet of Italian dressing mix)
• 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce (Only use this if I feel like it)
• 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice (Only use if we have lemons)
• 1/4 cup freshly grated Romano or Parmesan cheese (You can use parmesan cheese from a can...no one will judge you)

Preparation

1.  Devein shrimp, if desired. Or just unfreeze your frozen shrimp.
2. Prepare angel hair pasta according to package directions.
3. Meanwhile, melt butter in a large skillet over medium-high heat; add onion and garlic, and sauté 3 to 5 minutes or until tender. Stir in Italian-herb seasoning and Worcestershire sauce.
4. Reduce heat to medium. Add shrimp, and cook, stirring occasionally, 3 to 5 minutes or just until shrimp turn pink. Stir in lemon juice. Toss shrimp mixture with pasta, and sprinkle with cheese. 
5. Serve immediately.

The first time I made shrimp scampi I used frozen shrimp from Publix. Gasp. Chill out people. It was still good. The second time I made it we happened to have some fresh shrimp. I even peeled and deveined the shrimp myself. Look who is turning into Lila! Kyle was proud. To be honest, the flavor of the butter sauce is so strong you can't tell the difference between the shrimp.

Speaking of butter sauce, I realize this meal isn't the healthiest thing you could serve your family. I suggest this meal on a night where you are craving pasta or just need something really quick to make. We probably eat this dish once every other month if that. Honestly though, I could eat it every week. Sigh.

*Note: this is a salad plate not a dinner plate. Way smaller portion. It's all about the balance. Serve this dish with a salad and you've got yourself a quick and easy meal.

How we Celebrated...

We decided to celebrate the big one year with events throughout the weekend. In a perfect world, we would have gone to the beach. We wanted to go so bad! I tried my hardest to get caught up on school work but it just wasn't happening. Boo. Staying in Bham was probably best though. Because I don't necessarily love going out to eat nice dinners on week nights, I requested we do a celebratory dinner Friday night (I know technically that is a week night but I consider that a weekend night). To me, a nice dinner means good food and conversation, not feeling completely beat from a long day of dealing with complaining families. Those are margarita nights. We both decided on Bottega since neither of us had ever been. It was a delicious meal and a good time to spent reminiscing about our year of marriage.

Saturday was a gorgeous day! We spent the morning doing house and yard work then Grant and Caroline came over for a mini crawfish boil. Grant has been harassing asking us if we could throw one together this spring and we figured it would be the nice thing to do since he's about to be tied down to midnight feedings and stinky diapers.

Saturday was what I like to call "Kyle Whittington Day." For a day to be considered "Kyle Whittington Day" it must be a bright, sunny, cool day. Preferably on a "Kyle Whittington Day" Kyle Whittington likes to be outside (of course) doing one of the following activities: watching football, fishing, hunting, drinking a cool beverage, boiling crawfish/smoking ribs, or doing yard work. He's a simple man.

        Caroline only eats the sides and the occasional piece of crawfish meat I pick for her.

                       Come and get it!

It doesn't get better than this group shot using the self timer in front of our feast.

Actually, it does. Kyle put the t.v. outside so we could watch basketball. Sweet.

I also made this delicious appetizer called rotel cups I found on pinterest. They were delicious! I decided to take a picture 2 minutes after I brought out the tray. I will definitely be making this easy appetizer again. Here's the link to the recipe.

On Monday we celebrated on our actual anniversary by eating the top of our cake and exchanging gifts. We both thought our cake was delicious and looked pretty good for being in the freezer for one year. I wasn't sure what type of cake I had chosen for the top b/c I had different flavors for each of my 6 tiers. I was pretty pumped that I had chosen coconut with butter-cream icing for the top. O my word. It was amazing!!! I had two pieces. I justified that by saying that the only piece of my wedding cake I had the entire wedding was the piece Kyle fed to me for pictures. Makes sense right?

We also did a small toast using the champagne glasses Kyle's parents gave us for the wedding.

         Fancy

The last piece of cake was eaten by yours truly on Saturday. I am in mourning.

Next up, gifts. Kyle was pretty creative and got me two gifts. The first gift symbolized the traditional wedding gift of paper and was a children's book I discovered a couple of months back called Dick Whittington Finds a Cat. It's a Caldecott Medal book. We both thought it was cool that it had our name in it. The second gift symbolized the contemporary wedding gift of a clock. Kyle got me a mantle clock. I was really surprised! The neat thing about this clock is that it has a chime called the Whittington chime. Yeah, I'm not making that up. Check out the info here.

I had the brilliant idea of getting Kyle a wind chime. Kyle always talks about how much he likes his parent's wind chimes so I thought that would be a cool 1st anniversary gift. Also, I'll admit the cheesy side of me thought it would be a nice reminder of our 1st year together as a married couple when we heard the chimes. Awww. I lucked out and found wind chimes called anniversary chimes. Special.

 We've got all kinds of new sounds in our house.

Now that we have the first year behind us, we are focusing on the second. This past Sunday we officially became members of Dawson Memorial Baptist Church here in Homewood. We are both excited about our decision. We have been attending there now for a couple of years and wanted to join as a married couple once we found a Sunday School class we liked. Kyle has also decided to join the church and officially become Baptist by getting baptized. I am so proud of him for making a public commitment of faith by being baptized. It makes my heart swell. Kyle hasn't chosen a baptism date yet but I'll keep all of you posted.