Just a few pics

For whatever reason, he LOVED this paper towel holder.

Cute little rascal.  I love how his hat folds his ears down. 

Johnny Jumper is a fun new exercise contraption for Marcus.

Daddy feeding Marcus bananas.

Eating Daddy's "Happy Birthday" card.

Marcus loves his bunny puppet from his Grandma in Canada.

Grandma also bought him this outfit when they were in town last.  We couldn't wait until the summer to try it out.  Good thing we didn't because it fits perfectly NOW.

One more "tie" shot.

Happy Birthday to the man I love

 

     Today is Mark's 32nd birthday!  And I must say, he gets better looking as he gets older.  He's currently taking a nap or he'd never let me leave a post like this. :)  Humility is one of his strongest virtues and boy, is he a hard worker!  He gets it from HIS daddy, and he says it all the time to Marcus and I..."Schuurmans work HARD!"  Not only is Mark hard working, good looking, and humble, but he's an amazing Sunday School teacher who proclaims the truth with boldness and clarity.  He studies all the time, pushing ME to become closer to our Lord like he is.  One of my favorite things about Mark is hearing him pray.  I love it when they ask him to pray at church because he paces the aisles, using his hands, praying for specific items, and always for God to reveal Himself to us as we draw closer to Him, showing us how to be obedient as well.
     You'll hardly ever see Mark in a bad mood or mad at someone.  He lets issues slide off his back and says, "don't worry about it," when I get mad FOR him.  The other night at a church volleyball game, the other team was cheating and I said, "Say something!!!" and he, as always, just smiled and said, "it's ok" and kept playing.  But speaking of sports, many of you know how amazing of an athlete he is.  Hopefully his love for and talent in baseball will carry over to Marcus, but in the mean time, Mark is still giving lessons to a former student of mine, showing him the proper ways to throw and hit a baseball.  He's the star player on the church volleyball team and when our gym is available, he opens it up on Monday nights for all to come play pick-up basketball.  You can just look at him and see how fit and in shape he is.  He even drinks this green concoction that smells like...well, I won't go there.  But it's super healthy!
     Finally, Mark is an IN-CREDIBLE father.  From the time Marcus came out of my womb, he and Mark have had a great father-son connection.  When Mark comes home from work, Marcus and I meet him on the front porch and I say, "there's Daddy!"  You can see his little eyes trying to focus, and when he finally realizes it's his daddy, I can hardly hold him in my arms as he smiles and wiggles in an effort to get his daddy to hold him.  Even though he's been up since 3:30am and is probably dog tired, he snuggles and plays with Marcus while I'm fixing supper.  He changes poopy diapers, bathes Marcus, and feeds him any time he can.
     Mark Peter Schuurman, I love you.  You're better than I deserve, but luckily you're stuck with me!  Other than deciding to follow Jesus Christ, marrying you was the best decision I ever made.  You teach me patience (in a good way), how to put others needs before my own (you before me) and how to love like Jesus.  I love you with all of my heart and hope that today you enjoy getting older...you old fart.  Just kidding! :)

Here's Mr. Fix it, fulfilling all of my "honey-do" dreams.

In the O.R., right after Marcus came into the world.  I know it says the 17th, but my camera was wrong. 

Mark and the nurse gave Marcus his first bath.

A good looking man and a sweet baby boy.

This is one of my favorite pictures of all time!  Mark was changing the never-ending poopy diaper.

Love

First family photo at UNCA.

"Daddy, I love you."

What's your life verse?

"All Scripture is God-breathed and useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be fully equipped for every good work."  

*2 Timothy 3:16-17*

     Back in January, as Mark and I made our yearly goals, we decided to learn one new set of scriptures each month.  It may sound elementary to some of you, but we had to start somewhere.  January was Proverbs 4:26-27, February was the verses above (2 Timothy 3:16-17), and March's verses are James 4:6-8.  In an effort to look ahead and find the verses for the upcoming months, I asked a few other Christians what their life verses were or if they had any suggestions as to crucial verses that we should teach Marcus.  Now, to be fair, I didn't survey the "top 100 Christians," or even give them a head's up that I was asking. We were just having a conversation.  One person told me something that she lived by, but didn't know if it was a scripture or not (which in the end...it was).  Only ONE other person I spoke with could give me a verse to teach him, and it was John 3:16.  Granted, that's probably THE most important scripture of ALL TIME, but I guess I was looking for something more personal to each of their lives.  The rest of the people either said, "no" or "let me think about it."  I left the game disappointed and befuddled.
     Are we being lulled to sleep by reality tv and secular radio?  Do we feel good when we go to church on Sunday and say "Amen" with the preacher, yet don't look any different from those who are "of the world" around us?  I'm not worthy of condemning anyone, so that's not my point to writing this.  My point is that to be TRANSFORMED (Romans 12) and to LOOK DIFFERENT from the non-Christians, we must, must, MUST be in God's Word, allowing Him to mold and shape us.  I thought about this the other day when a lady from the gym said she was a Christian and I was stunned.  I didn't think she was just because of how she acted, seeing her in the classes, working, etc. but I wondered, "is there anyone who would be stunned when they found out I am a Christian?"
     So, with all that being said, what's your life verse?  Or what's a verse that you will or have already taught your children and one day we should also teach Marcus?  We'd love to hear your responses.  You can leave a comment or e-mail me at leahistall@yahoo.com.  Mark's favorites are Proverbs 3:5-6:  "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.  In all your ways, acknowledge Him, and He will direct your paths."  Mine is Proverbs 31:25 which says, "A wife of noble character is clothed with strength and dignity and can laugh at the days to come." Looking forward to what each of you has to say! :)
    

Surprise at the Doctor's Visit

     Today at our 6 month check-up, Marcus sported his new Carolina gear (courtesy of Pam Hunter) in honor of Carolina's win yesterday (hey, who cares if they BARELY won...a win is a win).  Anyhow, when we got there, they called us back pretty quickly and I undressed Marcus for the nurse.  He is 28 1/4 inches tall (95-97%) and he tipped the scales at 18 pounds, 12 ounces, which put him in the 75%.  He has a big ol' head, like his mama, and that too was in the 95-97%.  When Dr. Love arrived, he was having a blast looking at himself in the mirror and wiggling all over the place.  He had drooled and picked at the paper on the bench so badly that we had to take it off all together.  We asked Dr. Love about teething and while he was checking Marcus' gums, Marcus thought it would be a good idea to spit in his face!  Luckily, we have a very cool pediatrician, so he laughed at it as hard as we did.  He was finishing up the check-up and said, "will one of y'all hold his arms down while I check his ear again?"  I did, and Dr. Love confirmed...ear infection in his right ear.  Booooooooooooo!  Other than his cold symptoms last week, we had no idea.  The past two nights, he's slept MUCH better than last week, and his eye goo is clearing up.  So I thought he was getting better, all to find out he has an ear infection!  To add insult to injury, our sweet baby had to get shots again today, too.  Now, the great part about this whole thing is that he's a baby and has no memory of any of this!  It's great.  Since we gave him a little medicine, he's been more smiley than before and is in a great mood.  He's in his walk-around-table right now, playing with Mark, who's sitting in the floor with him.   We praise God for a great doctor, for modern medicines to help comfort our baby when in pain, and for a precious little man we like to call our little buddy.

 Just because I don't want to give you a blog with no picture OR video, here's one from the other day.  

I laid him down for a nap and he was quiet and happy.  I heard him grunting as if he had rolled over 

and sure enough, he did.  You can tell from the video...he wasn't that tired anyhow.  I just needed a break. :)

Chronicles of a 6 Month Old's Mama

     I said it last week, and again tonight, "I'm so happy where we are right now."  Yes, we want more children one day, but right now, it's so amazing to be a family of three.
     We were in Marcus' room a few hours ago, watching him play with his new toy.  He was happily exploring the new colors, shapes, and sounds of this contraption while Mark and I sat on each of his sides, gazing on in proud delight.  We borrowed this toy from a friend at church and so far, he loves it.  I used antibacterial wipes to clean the small, intricate parts while Mark urged Marcus to "walk" or move towards him.  He showed him how certain actions caused different reactions...physics, you know.  Just kidding. :)  Anyhow, Mark showed him how to pull the life saver on the boat to make the paddle twirl and how pushing the keys on the keyboard makes different sounds.  It was such a sweet little moment with our 6 month old. 
     I realize not all babies are created equally but we're quite happy with the one we were given.  He's doing some things ahead of schedule, some things right on track, and he's probably behind in a few as well.  In an effort to condense this blog, here is the latest information on our sweet little blessing:

• He just started this recently, but when we're holding him face to face, Marcus likes to grab our faces with his sweet little hands and suck on our chins or cheeks.  It's the wettest, gooiest, funniest feeling while he's gumming us to death.  If we try to talk to him while he's doing it, he laughs as he chews.
  
• He takes five 6oz bottles a day and usually eats solids once in between his last two feedings.  We mix rice cereal with different types of baby food.  So far he's tried sweet potatoes, peas, green beans, and carrots.  I tried smashing up a banana the other day and feeding it to him but he wanted no part of it.  We'll keep trying different foods, though.
  
• He's currently wearing 6-12 month or 9-12 month clothes, depending on the brand.  It's nice now that it's warming up because he can wear more shorts, t-shirts, and go without socks.  He absolutely LOVES his own feet!  He loves touching, kicking, and stretching them to his mouth.  He can absolutely eat his toes and that's just the cutest thing ever. 
  
• As soon as we put Marcus down on his back, he usually rolls to his left, onto his belly with no problems.  He moves his arms and legs like he's trying to swim and he's gotten pretty fast about it!  He moves like the hands on a clock, where his butt stays in the same spot but his head points in different directions.  He's quite the active little wiggle worm!
  
• Finally, Marcus has been a great sleeper up until recently, and even then, he's better than other babies I've heard of.  We sing to and rock him around 7:45-8pm and put him into his crib awake.  On a good night, like tonight, he'll fall asleep without a peep and wake up between 6-7am.  For the past two nights, however, he's woken up between 4-5am, crying inconsolably, and the only thing that has helped was actually feeding him.  Rocking him, the pacifier, or the combination of the two just didn't cut it.  We think his cold could have something to do with it and I always like to blame "bad" behavior on teething, but who knows if it's really that or not.  It's gotta be coming soon...right?

Marcus thought it would be a good idea to flip over in the tub, even though I was standing right beside him.  I drained the water and got my camera to snap a picture of that cute little tush.  He'll kill me later for this.

We're working on sitting up with the help of his boppy.

You can see his left eye is a little weak looking due to his cold.  Poor fella.

I got a smile out of him as he chewed his favorite toy.

This is the result of what happened when I took the giraffe & gave him the paper.

It got up to 80 DEGREES today, so he napped in his onesie.

"Swimming" while Daddy watches basketball. :)

In this thing, he can "walk" around the whole table.

It's the perfect size for him right now because he can actually stand up in it.

A beautiful sunset over the mountains of North Carolina.

 

And the winner is...

     The third picture!  I loved them all, but most of you said that you liked this picture best to be our header, so here it is!  I played around with the blog a little bit, too, changing the background colors and fonts.  We'll see if it sticks.  Marcus was just napping so I had an extra second to change it, as well as the photo. 
     In other news, Marcus saw all THREE sets of grandparents this week.  Mark's parents were in town from Tuesday to Saturday, we saw our dear friends Matt & Mary Clark Hauser on Friday, then all five of us (Mark, myself, Marcus, and Mark's parents) went to Mt. Airy to see my mom & John, then up on the mountain to see my dad and Sonya. We even got to see his great-grandmother and hang out with Uncle TJ and Aunt Liv some on Saturday.  Poor Marcus was wallowed to death by all his relatives, but I'm sure he loved it (and I know they did!).  Below are the pictures from our time together with loved ones.
     Finally, Marcus will be SIX MONTHS OLD on Friday.  I've become such a sap since being a mama because that just brings me to tears to think of how quickly it's gone by.  My fear is that the rest of his life will go by just as quickly, so I'd better act now and play a major role.  But back to the crying thing, my sister was laughing at me this weekend because I teared up, thinking of what Marcus would be and do when he grows up.  Her time will come one day and I'll get to make fun of her when she cries over little things concerning her baby as well.  Naa...I probably won't.  I'll probably just join in and cry with her, sweet tears of gratefulness that we have children at all.  (*Note* My sister is NOT, repeat NOT pregnant.  Do not go ask her and tell her I said she was.  She might have a heart attack.  I'm just speaking about WHEN she and TJ have kids.  Ka-peesh?)
     I'll take my regular monthly pictures on Friday of him and then when we go to his doctor's appointment on Monday, I'll post the results.  Just to give you a head's up though, he's wearing 9-12 month clothes (mostly due to his length and feet size...they're huge!) and he weighs 18 pounds.  And if one more person calls this child fat, I think we might have a, "Come to Jesus" meeting.  For those of you who aren't familiar with that phrase, just hollar at me and I'll explain it. :)

Papa John and Grandma were cracking him up, as usual.

Sweet smile.

Here's Marcus in between his two grandmas.

Daddy, Grandad, Marcus, and Grandpa.  What a good lookin' bunch of men!

Mark took his dad on a 4-wheeler ride to see the tree stand where he hunts every Thanksgiving.

Here's the whole gang, right before they left to drive back to Canada.  You can even see Marcus smiling through his paci.

Aunt Liv held and played with Marcus as Grandmother looked on.

A nursing home doesn't have much for children, but this fake fish tank kept his attention for a while.

In honor of his granny's 40th birthday, all of us wore black...even Marcus.

Do you think she ever thought she'd be a granny at age 40?

Here we are, back at home, playing in his walker.  His feet BARELY touch the bottom now, so he'll be moving in no time.

Photo Shoot

     So have you ever been to the mall and people try to stop and give you, "free" stuff?  Well, my friend Kristen and I try to exercise and talk at the mall weekly by walking, just like all the old folks do.  There's a cute children's photography place constantly trying to stop us with a free 10x13 picture, but but I'm always like, "yeah, yeah...nothing's free."  This past Monday, I finally stopped and asked what the catch was.  She said I could get a "FREE" 10x13 picture of Marcus, no sitting fee, nothing else...it was just a way to get me in the door.  Well, since Mark's parents are in town, his mom and I decided to take Marcus there and get a free picture for his parents' home.  We put Marcus in his fancy Sunday shirt and vest and headed for the photo center.  Once in front of the camera, Marcus was a natural.  He smiled, cooed, and drooled all over three different backgrounds and props.  Every time we spoke to him and tried to make him smile, he did, on command, as if he'd done it before.  Although he hadn't had his picture, "formally" taken before, you'd never know it by his reaction.
     When it was all over and they showed us the pictures, I knew why they were giving away a free picture.  Because there's almost NO WAY you can see these adorable pictures and turn them down.  Especially when she says, "you'd better act now, because all these photos will be deleted by the end of the day."  Ooooo, that was a dagger to the heart!  Luckily, Mark's mom decided to buy a CD with the pictures and the copyright so we could print however many we wanted, at whatever sizes we wanted.  WHAT A BLESSING!  She did, keep the big free print, and then we printed a few more copies at CVS later this afternoon.  Anyhow, all that's said to introduce the following shots.  Enjoy!

 

 

 

Seriously, he did that himself.  We did NOT put his fist up there.

Check out the drool on the left.

Check back on Tuesday when I blog and share pictures from our time with Mark's parents, the Hausers, and my family back in Virginia.  We'll be back Sunday, but I plan on napping after church! :)  Also, leave us a comment as to your favorite pic.  We'll put the winning photo as our new banner on the top.

Spittin'

Highlight of our Trip

     It's very rare that Mark and I go out of town and NOT visit family.  Our "vacations" usually consist of going to Mt. Airy, Dugspur, or Canada.  Well, because my husband is so amazing at his job, they asked him to be on this council and we got an all-expenses paid trip to one of my favorite Southern cities, ATLANTA!  Yes, I know I told you all this in the last blog, but I'm just recapping for those who have short term memory loss. :) 
     Thursday, was our last day in Atlanta, so while Marcus was taking his morning nap, I packed everything and called a bellhop.  He took it all down to valet (yes, we had valet, too!  I had to pinch myself!) and I loaded Marcus into his stroller (conveniently borrowed from the hotel.  What hotel has a stroller to pass out?  The Westin!!!).  Ok, sorry for the side notes.  After everything was loaded, Marcus and I went back to Turner Field.  He, of course, was wearing his new Braves cap and t-shirt.  We made it JUST BARELY for the 12:00 tour.  We raced in the door and handed Andy, our tour guide, our ticket.  It turns out, I really shouldn't have rushed that much because Marcus and I were the ONLY ONES on the tour!  How great is that?  We had our own, personalized tour of my favorite ballpark in America.  Andy gave us great history of the team and stadium, a few things I already knew, but LOTS I didn't!  He took us up all the way to the top of the ballpark and then down, level by level.  Marcus and I went into a luxury suite, the broadcast booths, press box, BRAVES CLUBHOUSE, umpires tunnel, and then we got to go ONTO THE FIELD AND INTO THE DUGOUT!!!  I write in caps because I want you to feel my excitement.  Marcus will have no memory of this other than the pictures I took (and I took tons), but it was SO AMAZING.  I'm telling ya, it was worth a ton more than the mere $12 I paid for it.  It took 60 minutes and that was one of the fastest hours of my life.  Our tour concluded in the Braves Hall of Fame Museum and that, too, was VERY COOL.  Especially for a Braves fanatic like myself. 
     People all throughout tour were telling Marcus how cute he was and how impressed they were with his behavior.  He was great, as usual.  Hello?  He's his father's son, and we all know how wonderful he is.  When the tour was over, we met Mark back at the hotel when his meetings were over.  We went up to the SunDial again so Mark could see the 360 degree view of Atlanta before we packed it up and headed out.  We ended our Atlanta trip with a visit to the Varsity.  Last April, when Mark and I went to the season opener for the Braves, after the game, we went there to eat.  It was so full and being prego I was DYING for food, FAST, we left and went elsewhere.  This time, we walked right up to the counter, ordered, and enjoyed our food as we watched the Braves in Spring Training on a wide screen TV.  Could this trip have ended any better???
     I'm so thankful that I am a stay-at-home mother, because otherwise, Mark would've gone to Atlanta on his own and Marcus and I wouldn't have known WHAT we missed out on.  It may seem silly, but I even enjoyed the drive there and back, just talking with Mark while Marcus slept in the back (most of the time). 

Marcus slept well in his crib, but for whatever reason, liked napping on our bed best.

Sitting on our bed, here's our view.

Fun Fact: The Chick-Fil-A cow does the Tomahawk Chop.

I'd never seen these chairs, but apparently, from the highway, they look like 6-packs of Coke.

Radio Booth

If you're a Braves fan at all, you know this name!

TV Booth.  They just pull the screen when they're on TV.

Press Box

Which way do you think I went?

BRAVES CLUBHOUSE!!!

Chipper Jones' was closest to me, on my right.  Brian McCann's was closest to me on my left.

Marcus thought it was cool, too.

This was the SunTrust Club that leads to the seats right behind home plate.  They are $300 a game.

Here's Marcus and I in the dugout.  One day, he'll be in here due to his own talents. 

Can you smell that, son?  Breathe in the air from Braves Country!

Braves 1995 World Series Trophy.  Think about how many of my favorite players have kissed this thing!

Here we are, back at home, sweet as ever.