Technically, since you have net my baby and my wife, it is time for me to introduce myself; however, my cousin (who is my oldest friend) and his wife just had a baby Saturday, so I thought I would drop in a quick post with a link to her new baby page so you could all meet her. Be sure to look at her other photos and sign her guest book while you are there.

Here's her site: http://www.babiesonline.com/babies/t/taylorreed

And here's a photo of me loving on her yesterday:

We'll get back to me soon enough.

Meet Stacy...

also known as "Mommy" around our house, Stacy is a Speech and Language Pathologist who works for ETMC in Rehab. She works mostly with adults with brain injuries, including stroke patients. When I met Stacy, I thought that Speech Therapists taught little kids how to speak better--and some therapists do that, so I am not completely off base--but I didn't realize how much an SLP really does.

I was impressed with how quickly Stacy got through college and grad school (she got through both in 3.5 years, if my math is correct); I was soon more impressed when I found out that Stacy gets to teach people how to swallow and speak after they survive strokes, which is a very emotionally difficult time for most adult patients of hers.

Work aside, Stacy sings like an angel with a local church praise band on Sundays, but the best thing about her (to me, anyway) is that she is an amazing mommy to Mia and she puts up with me. Either would be a full-time job, but she usually handles both with a certain amount of grace. She is usually a no-crap kind of gal, so she keeps me in line, but she is also silly and fun a lot of the time.

Stacy took good care of Mia right from the start.

Stacy and I re-met at Christmas Eve service at church back in 2002. I saw her from the balcony and wondered who the new girl was; to my surprise, when she turned around she was Stacy, whom I had met back in 1998 while I was working for Marvin UMC and she was an intern in the music department. We swapped email addresses and the next thing I knew she was driving from Dallas to Nacgodoches to visit. We were off to a great beginning! Little did we know all that we would go through together.

Flash forward to today; Stacy and I have been married two years, yesterday, and every day we learn more about one another. Year one was a time of adjustment for us both--on top of the usual rigours of marriage, Mia came early. Year two has been a comparative paradise!

Here we are at the movies where we saw Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

I highly reccommend everyone try to make it to year two before calling it quits....

My first blog post about Mia!

Meet Mia Emmeline

Welcome to Baby Mia's new blog space. True, she is too young use the computer for much, and her little fingers are not yet nimble enough to handle the keyboard, but this is her new blog--I am just updating it for her until she is ready to take over.

She won't likely address current news topics, like Iraq or the poor missing girl in Aruba; nah, this site will probably be just a "lookee-at-what-Mia-is-up-to" site, bo-ring to all but her most die-hard fans. To me, Mia is infinately interesting and amazing. She has done more to change my life (just by existing) than most anyone else. I swear, everyday is better because I know I will get to cuddle her sometime in it.

Mia on the day after she was born: can you say "tiny and bruised"?

If you have ever visited her old babies online webpage, you know her back story. If not, here it is: Mia's baby page.

Since that time, the teensy baby has grown until she is about 30 pounds (that's 13.64 kilos to our European friends). She has been called "juicy" by our next-door neighbors, and "healthy" by random people in public (a veiled way of commenting on her new large size--she's a BABY, you freaks! She is not a member of a gym!). To me, she is beautiful, all the way; it is nothing short of a miracle that she is as happy and healthy and cute as she is today.

Mia just discovered Dairy Queen's Soft-serve ice cream.

Mia sings, plays, somehow manages to scoot all over the floor (she does not crawl or walk yet, due to weakness on the right side of her body. Don't worry; she will get there soon enough!). She smiles at me, kicks her legs, and says "da-dee, da-dee, da-dee" when she is really happy to see me, and she has given me a new reason to do everything, especially to smile.

All the crap that "baby people" say about children--you know, the stuff that makes you want to kick them in the head and tell them that their children are not special--somehow became true for me when Mia arrived. All the corny pop love songs on the radio (that I usually tune away from) suddenly became poems about my daughter. We actually took "Emmeline" from the title of a Ben Folds song of the same name (different spelling) because it fit how I felt while she was inside her mommy (don't let me walk away from Emeline for stupid reasons...).

So, I am that sad schmuck that you pity in the grocery store...the one with the ball cap (though he's too old for it) and the large package of diapers under his arm. He whistles some dumb tune and smiles at the checkout girl and at you--you wonder if her is retarded or something. He certainly doesn't go out to meet exotic friends for drinks and all-night raves, nor does he keep up with the latest indy music. You think that he has sold out, and he has, but he sure did get a good price. :o)

I can't believe this happy little person is mine to love.