Fall 2009

Here some pictures of some of our adventures this past fall. The girls loved going to the orchard to pick apples. We took several hikes to Graveyard Fields, Blowing Rock, and Water Rock Knob. Our church had their annual Fall Fest and Ellie and Maggie won the costume contest as Strawberry Shortcake and a Strawberry! Halloween was rainy, but we still had fun!

Blue Ridge Relay from September

I know I am so behind, but I had to blog about one of the neatest experiences I have ever had, The Blue Ridge Relay. It is a running relay made up of teams from 4-12 people. There are 36 legs in the relay and the distances and difficulty vary from leg to leg. It starts in Grayson Highland Park in Virginia and finishes in Asheville, NC, for a total of 211 miles. There were 100 teams in the relay and the starts were staggered throughout the morning of Sept. 11. This relay takes you through the back country of NC mountains, through some towns, on the Blue Ridge Parkway, and up a 1400 foot mountain, which I will get to. You must stay in order of the legs you run. Our team had 10 people so that meant 6 of us ran 4 legs of the relay. My legs were 1, 11, 21, 31. Teams usually have two vans and you drop the current runner off and pick up the one finishing at the exchange zone (usually a church parking lot) and drive to the next zone to wait. The relay runs through the night into the next day. We finished around 2 pm on Sat. I was lucky enough to be asked by a group of professors from the PT dept and athletic training dept at Western Carolina. They knew Grant's wife was a runner and needed another person so that is how I ended up in this crazy, insane, exhilirating, inspiring relay.
I ran the first leg for our team, which was 4-miles downhill. It was wonderful! I talked with a PT from another team the entire time and we ran it in 26 minutes! I handed off and hopped into the van to rest and eat and take a break before leg 11. It was so fun at exchange zones chatting with other runners from other teams and watching and cheering for others as well. I even met a team from Memphis and one of the guys knew my brother, Andrew. Go figure!
Leg 11: My second leg was 6.2 miles, rated difficult, on the Blue Ridge Parkway. I am sure the people passing us in the cars thought we were a little crazy! I think this was my favorite leg. It was hard, but I was still feeling good and not sleep deprived yet. Oh, and I was wearing my, "Running is my Prozac" shirt!
Leg21: By this time I had used more port-o-johns then I ever cared to in my entire life. I had trouble getting any rest and it was around 2am when the bracelet was handed off to me. Luckily, this was a very short leg of only 2.4 miles and fairly flat. It ran through downtown Spruce Pine, NC so I had some street lights. At night the runners had to wear head lamps, reflective vests, and blinking lights. I was looking good :)! I handed off in a 24 hour Ingles Grocery parking lot and had to go in to get some cough medicine and fluids! I was tired and questioning my sanity at this point knowing my last leg I would run is arguably the hardest leg of the relay.
Leg 31: Okay, I had hardly any sleep, more port-o-johns, an upset stomach, and telling myself I will never do this craziness ever again! This leg is famous and known as mountain goat hard. It is 6.5 miles straight up a mountain. You gain 1400 feet in elevation and never go downhill. Oh yeah. I took the bracelet about 8:30am. I told myself it was okay if I had to walk. However, my competive nature and mental games kept me from walking. Just run 10 min, then it was go another 10. I passed some walkers and felt inspired I was running. As vans passed to go to the exchange zone at the top they would cheer very loudly and one team even jumped out of their van and made a bridge for me to run through as they encouraged and said, "you're our hero"! I didn't even know these people. Just as I thought this leg would never end, I saw the promised land. The top! Waiting were my teammates cheering along with some other teams waiting on their runner cheering and giving me high fives. As I handed the bracelet to my teammate, Jeremiah, for his 9-mile downhill run, I had never felt a feeling of victory for running the entire mountain in under an hour (barely), but also a feeling of "dang I am done. When can we do this again?".
We were all able to run the last 100-yards across the finish line together as a team at around 2 pm in Asheville. Our team finished mid-pack of the 100 teams, but that was not the point. The experience and challenge is incredible and I am a relay junkie now! Ready to do it again! Can you tell??

Graduation and Perdido Key, FL

Grant graduated Physical Therapy school on Aug. 7, 2009! We are so proud of all of his hard work. He has passed his boards and is now working at Haywood Regional Outpatient here in Waynesville. On Aug. 8, we left for Perdido Key, FL. We met my mom and brother, Andrew, AKA "Ah Ah" there. We had a great time and had great weather. Maggie really liked the water and liked eating the sand even more! Ellie had fun playing in the waves, but this year wanted to go to the pool every chance she got. We got to go see the Blue Angels practice in Pensacola, which was awesome. We also toured the National Aviation museum and Ellie loved getting to get into several planes and pretend she was flying. We also ate at Wolf Bay Lodge, which is somewhere we used to eat as kids when we went to Gulf Shores. My cousin Rebecca and her family were at the Beach as well and came ove one night. Ellie loved big girl Tiley and Tiley was so sweet to read books to Ellie and play hide and seek with Ellie and Andrew. Ellie kept calling the condo, Lynndy's house, so I told my mom she will be disappointed next time we go to Lynndy's house and we don't go to the beach! Enjoy the pictures.

Pics from DC and 4th of July

I am backing up a little bit to our trip to see my brother, Bo, and family in Washington, DC in June. Ellie had alot of fun playing with Brinson and Maggie hung out and watched most of the time! Brinson did a lot of loving on Maggie, which is good since he is about to have a baby sister. We also visited Arlington National Cemetary. My great-great uncle, George Grant, is buried there so we found his tombstone. He is buried near boxer, Joe Louis.
My younger brother, Andrew, came to visit over the 4th of July weekend. Ellie refers to him as "Ah Ah", which is the sound a monkey makes. We went to the river, East Laporte, and swam and played around. On Sat. we went to the festivities on Main St. and then that afternoon we headed to our church, where I was in charge of the 4th of July festivities. I was busy making sure everything went as planned, but we all had a wonderful time and the fireworks were fantastic as usual.

Maggie loves to climb!

This is a video of Maggie climbing into a stroller yesterday. She is spiderwoman! Good thing we were near her the first time she did it! She is so different from Ellie it is amazing. She loves to climb up the stairs now, too! And she can be up them in no time! We used to sit Ellie on the bottom step before the landing and have her practice standing up and taking steps to us. SO we tried this with Maggie. She sits on that step for a second, looks at us, turns around, and starts climbing! We have to watch this one like a hawk.

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Hotty Toddy!

I am a proud mama! Ellie has learned all the words to the G-rated version of the Ole Miss cheer, "Hotty Toddy". She was so cute doing the cheer with the pom poms. The words to the G-rated cheer are "Hotty Toddy gosh almighty who the "heck" are we. Flim flam, bim bam Ole Miss "yes mam".
She is quite the little girl these days and is so amazing. She has her daddy's memory and can sing a song after only hearing it one time. I asked her the other day if she was going to be a dcotor and she said, "No. Maggie, doctor. Ellie, climber. I climb hills!" Another funny story is that we tell her when she is naked that she is "naked as a jay bird" an old saying that both Grant and I heard growing up. SO the other day she was naked and I told her to put some clothes on. She looked at me and said, "I wanna be jay bird". :)
Maggie is slithering everywhere. She is now pulling up on everything and standing on her own for several seconds. She is trying to walk so she can keep up with her big sister. She is into everything and we have to keep an eye on her at all times!

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Maggie's Baptism- June 14, 2009

Maggie was baptized on June 14 at our church, Longs Chapel United Methodist Church. Our wonderful pastor, Rev. Chuck Wilson, along with our associate minister, Alan Mears, performed the baptism. It was so sweet. Maggie did great! When Pastor Chuck took her she started to grab his microphone off his shirt. She grabs everything! The cutest was when they put the water on her head she sneezed. Pastor Chuck walked her up and down the aisles and sang, "Jesus Loves the Little Children" to her and then had the congregation sing along as well. It was a wonderful celebration and blessing. Our Sunday School leaders also stood up front with us. We had many friends there as well as family for the celebration. We went to Lake Junaluska afterwards for pictures, but Maggie was zonked! We still got some good pictures.
The dress Maggie wore is the same one Ellie wore when she was baptized last year. It was made for and worn by Grant's sister, Maigan, and also worn by his cousin, Allyson. It is a beautiful dress and very special that both girls have gotten to wear it.

Ellie's 2nd Birthday Party!

We had Ellie's 2nd birthday party on June 13th. It was a princess celebration! She wore her special outfit and thanks to my mom, Lynndy, Ellie had a party fit for a princess. She made a castle for Ellie and turned our garage into a fairy land. We had several neighbors come and some friends as well as many of our family members. I believe everyone had a great time. Ellie really enjoyed opening her presents! Maggie even snuck some cake when we were not looking! It was a grand day and we were all very tired after all of teh festivities!

Ellie's 2nd Birthday! June 6, 2009

We had a wonderful day celebrating Ellie's 2nd birthday! We left Waynesville around 8:30 am and headed to Knoxville to go to the zoo. Grant's parents, DeeDee and RonRon, met us there. Ellie had a blast looking at all of the animals. She kept wanting to pet all of them! We were looking at the snakes and she said, "Ellie pet them". She really loved the red pandas. I am pretty sure her favorite part of the day was the carousel. She rode it 5 times in a row and we had to drag her away from it! Maggie did a lot of sleeping during the day, but was a trooper.

Probably the most historic part of the zoo trip was the giving up of the pacie. We explained to Ellie at 2 she is now a big girl and does not need a pacie. She only was sleeping with it, but it was time to part ways. That morning Grant talked with her about it and that she was going to give it to one of the animals because their babies needed it now. Ellie chose the giraffes. She has been using this green pacie for about the last four months. When it was time she let daddy "throw" it to the giraffes! We were very proud. We knew night time might be rough. Well, when it was time to go to bed, without flinching, Ellie looks at Grant and says, "orange pacie"! We about died! She had not seen nor used this pacie in four months yet this child was thinking as she threw her green pacie to the giraffes, "You suckers. I have an orange pacie at home so sure I'll give this one to these giraffes"! We did not give it to her, though, and she has done very well.

After the zoo we came home and Ellie put on her special shirt and tutu a friend of mine made. It was for her party, which was a week later, but we went ahead and let her wear it on her birthday. We also went and got birthday ice cream. Gotta have ice cream on your birthday! It was a wonderful day and we are so blessed. We cannot believe our baby is 2, but she is so fun and we are loving every minute of it, even the tantrums :)!

Ellie and Maggie: Two very different babies

When you have two babies so close together and of the same sex I think people have a tendency to say how much they look alike, etc. So I thought I would write a post about my two very different baby girls because it is amazing that I can already tell that they are going to be so different from each other, but of course great in their own unique ways!
To start with you can compare the pics above. That is Ellie on the left at roughly 6 months and on the right is Maggie at roughly 6 months. To me they look very different! Ellie has dark eyes, while Maggie is holding on to those blue eyes! Their face shape is different as are their eyes and nose. Ellie was about an inch taller than Maggie at their 6 month appt. and about a pound heavier as well.
Personalities: Ellie has always been our serious, observant child since she was a newborn. It took a lot to make her smile. She takes everything in and is cautious around new people. Ellie was a wonderful sleeper as a baby and easy to get on a schedule. She never really cooed or babbled much as a baby. She hated being on her stomach and would roll right to her back. She skipped the crawling phase and went straight to walking. She was very content just sitting and playing. She was not much of a "grabber". She learns things very fast and walked early, got her teeth early, and is now potty trained. As I said, she is our observant child and may not preform in front of people, but she is taking everything in. When she gets home she can repeat everything that happened in a class, etc. Oh, and she is still a full fledged daddy's girl. No one can even compare.
Maggie, on the other hand, has been smiling and laughing since she was a few weeks old. She "talks" all the time and makes all sorts of sounds. She loves to roll over on her stomach and play and then roll some more all over the floor. I am pretty sure Maggie will be a crawler, which Ellie did not do either. Maggie is also a grabber. If it is within a foot of her reach she will somehow maneuver to get it. She turned all the way around in her bumbo one day and to pick up a hammer! We have to keep anything she is not supposed to have very far from her so she does not get it! She is not as content as Ellie was, but she is still very patient when we have to rush Ellie to the potty or get Ellie's food, etc. Maggie loves to give hugs and cuddle. She does not, however, like to sleep! We say she is a grazer with eating and a cat napper with sleeping. Grant and I both think she is going to be our outgoing, personality plus child.
It is just so fun to see how their little personalities develop and how different they already are. I am sure there are more things we have noticed, but these are just a few. I mainly wanted to write this so that I would have record of it and remember!

The ABC's and more

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Gosh I have not updated this in awhile! We have been quite busy here in the Shanks' household! Maggie is now 6 months and Ellie is less than a month from being 2! Ask her when her birthday is and she says, "June". Maggie is rolling all over the place and that is her mode of transportation. She is also sitting up by herself and gets lots of help, whether she likes it or not, from her big sis. Ellie is talking up a storm and is so funny! She loves to sing as well. Her favorites are "Take Me Out to the Ballgame", "ABC's", "Baa Baa Blacksheep", "Jesus Loves Me", "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" to name a few. She is also potty trained and that has been wonderful to have her out of diapers. She is starting to prefer her princess panties over her Elmo panties, which is fine by me! She also is our little athlete. She loves to run and so we got her some running shoes. She tires Grant and I out running up and down the hill in front of our house!
I am going to try and catch up on pics from some of our adventures over the past few months from going to see my parents in Jackson to going to Grant's Grandmother's birthday party to other fun things we have been doing!
This is a video from last Sat after Ellie's kindermusik recital. She loves to entertain Maggie and sing to her in the car. I was able to capture some of it!

An update and video

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Ellie started Kindermusik classes back in January and is loving it! She is our serious, very observant child and will watch all the other kids in class. She is starting to do more in class, but when she comes home she will do all the songs and dances with her baby dolls. It can be so funny to watch! She has always been very observant and we are learning that because of this she does not forget a thing. This can be good and bad! She is almost totally potty trained at this point. She has a few accidents here and there, but for the most part makes it to the potty because she knows she gets a "emmie" as she calls them (we know them better as M&Ms). She is counting to three and learning her letters. It is so fun to watch her make new discoveries! Just yesterday we were going through what different names start with and later in the day when I walked into the den Maggie, who is in her boppy seat, had a big foam letter "M" on her. Ellie put it there on her own because Maggie starts with "M"! Another funny story is that she will get stuck on a song and want to hear it over and over again. There is a country song "Chicken Fried" that Grant sang to her. When we hear it on the radio she says, "Daddy". We now have it on CD and as soon as we get in the car she starts saying, "chicken, chicken!!!" After it plays she yells, "More! More!" We have heard that song more times than I can count, but it is very funny.

Maggie is a trooper and lets Ellie pile her toys on her and kiss on her and put tutus on her! She is such a good natured baby. She still has blue eyes, so we are thinking they might stay that way. She loves to "talk" and last week we were on the web cam with my parents when Maggie started "talking" up a storm. This upset my serious child and she looks at Maggie and says, "uh uh" and puts her hand over Maggie's mouth! I can see it now...Maggie is going to follow Ellie around talking her ear off and Ellie is going to be going, "BE QUIET!" Their personalities are already so different.

Snow fun!

We didn't get as much snow here in the mountains as you folks in West TN., but we have about 3-4 inches. Ellie was having a blast playing in it and eating it. Here is a short clip of her in the snow in our neighbor's yard. Maggie was asleep inside the whole time! Next year she will be able to enjoy it as well.

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In Loving Memory of Grandaddy Ellis

Wow. It has been a hard start to the year for us here. On February 1, 2009, we lost my precious Grandaddy, Dr. Bob Ellis. He had fallen in November and been in the hospital ever since. His 87 yr. old body just could not fight all the complications and we all believe that he was ready to go home to be with his Lord and the love of his life, my Mema. We were so blessed to have had him here with us for so long. He was an incredible man who lived an incredible life. He grew up in the Great Depression, went off with his father to Oklahoma and lived under a different name for several years before being returned to his mother in Memphis, fought in WWII, graduated from Ole Miss and became Registrar there during some of the most difficult days at Ole Miss, then went on to get his PhD in education from Florida State and became a professor at Ole Miss. I learned that upon his retirement he had the longest tenure of any professor. I believe that says something about him. Grandaddy was very involved in his church and literacy in Lafayette County. He was also an avid swimmer and swam up until he fell in Nov. He was also a big supporter of Ole Miss sports and attended all football games and baseball games. The baseball team will miss one of their best fans this season!

He has passed on to me the importance of education and doing what you love. He always supported my efforts and was also so proud of Grant for going back to PT school. He loved all of his 9 grandkids and was so good to us as well as his great grandkids. I am so glad that he got to meet Ellie, who's real name is Ellis after him, and Maggie. The women at the Methodist Church told my mom that they all referred to my Grandfather as "The Gentleman". He was that. The pastor referred to him as the "humble giant". He was that, too. He was my Grandaddy and he left a legacy for us that I hope to pass down. His life is one to be admired and celebrated. I only hope that I can make him proud and be half the person he was. We will all dearly miss him, but are also filled with joy over having him be a part of our lives.

The pictures are from this past Thanksgiving when we went to see him. What a blessing that trip was as he fell that Sun and this was the last time we got to see him. The one of him and Ellie was of him helping her put her boots on. It was so sweet.

II Timothy 4:7 says, "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith". Grandaddy did.

In Loving Memory of Pawpaw

With a heavy heart I write this entry into our blog. Last week, January 7, we lost one of the most wonderful people I will ever know. Grant's Pawpaw, Kenneth Shanks, passed away. I had the honor of knowing him for almost 5 years. I will never forget his smiles, singing, and genuine love for everyone. I thank God that I was able to stop to meet Memaw and him in Dickson on my way back from Thanksgiving so Maggie had a chance to meet her Great Pawpaw. We will all cherish this picture of Memaw and Pawpaw with her. The other picture is of Pawpaw sleeping with Ellie on her first Thanksgiving. We often get asked about Ellie's reddish hair color and where she gets it from. It was Pawpaw. He had red hair when he was a boy and was so proud that Ellie had red in her hair. She will always have a little bit of Pawpaw with her! He loved his great grandchildren dearly and there was no doubt of that. I could go on and on about how great of a man he was and how much I will miss him. Even though I was family by marriage he treated me like one of his own grandchildren so I know that they will miss him even more so. His faith is what stands out the most to all who knew him. He loved his Lord and was not ashamed to share it with anyone. One of his favorite songs was, "How Great Thou Art". I had the honor to play it for him on my keyboard as he sang along. It is a memory I will always cherish and I can still hear him singing it loud and proud. So I will end with the last verse of this hymn as I know Pawpaw's heart is filled with joy as he is with his Jesus.

"When Christ shall come with shout of acclamation And take me home, what joy shall fill my heart! Then I shall bow in humble adoration And there proclaim, my God, how great Thou art!

Then sings my soul, my Savior God to thee; How great Thou art. how great Thou art! Then sings my soul, my Savior God to thee; How great Thou art, how great Thou art!"

Christmas and the New Year

We were asked by our church, Long's Chapel UMC, to play the Holy Family in the church nativity on Christmas Eve. Maggie had the honor of playing the baby Jesus. Grant and I both had speaking lines! It was fun and will always be a memory we will cherish! We went to Grant's parents' home in Delano, TN for Christmas. Ellie decided for the second straight year that Christmas is a good time to get very sick. We went to urgent care there, but did not see improvement as the week went on. Ellie did feel okay enough to open some presents and tried her hardest to play with them. We returned a day early to take Ellie to our pediatrician and he told us that he had sent kids better off than her to the hospital. She had a mild form of pneumonia and double ear infections. He trusted us to give her the meds and breathing treatments to help her get well. She didn't eat for almost two weeks, but thanks to all the prayers and modern medicine we are happy to report she is back to running around and eating very well! She was able to enjoy watching the Cotton Bowl with me on Jan. 2. She now says "Ole Miss" and will point to my shirts and say it. She also asks to hear the "Hotty song". I do the G rated version of Hotty Toddy for her. She now knows everyone in the extended family's name and loves to talk. We love hearing what new word she will pick up on each day. She also enjoys helping to do chores and is a little OCD just like her Daddy ;)!

We are working hard on potty training and if you ask her what she gets when she goes tt on the big girl potty she will say "emmy", which means M&M's. She also knows she gets to wear her Elmo or Abby panties as well. Maggie is getting so big and is staying awake much more. We are still wondering who she is going to look like and if her blue eyes are going to stay around. She looks less and less like Ellie. We go for her 2 month checkup tomorrow.

I started back to work last Monday and Grant started his clinical in Asheville. We have Ms. Rebecca and her 2 yr. old daughter coming to our house to keep the girls. Ellie has had so much fun and adjusted well. We are so excited about the arrangement and love Ms. Rebecca. She is so good with the girls.

Pre Christmas Festivities

Before Christmas we had lots of activities going on. They had a Christmas party at Haywood Regional Medical center for all babies born in 2008. That was our first visit with Santa. We saw Santa again at our local Toy Store on Main St. Ellie likes "Ho Ho" from far away, but will not sit in his lap. We saw him again the same night on Main St for the Christmas celebration. Ellie also rode in a covered wagon pulled by horses down Main st with Daddy. Maggie and I watched. Since I was on maternity leave and Grant was out for his break we had lots of family time. Grant took Ellie to a basketball game at Western Carolina. She refers to basketball as "Daddy ball". We had our family Christmas the Sat before since we were going out of town over Christmas. Ellie opened everyone's presents for them and kept wanting more to open. She was more into the opening of presents then she was into what she got! Maggie slept through most of it, but Ellie was sure to show her what she got from ho ho. Ellie knows what belongs to each person and wants to make sure they get it. We also let Ellie paint get well cards for my Grandaddy who has been in ICU since Christmas. She painted herself as well and tried to paint Grant! She loves her baby sister and that is usually the first person she aks for when she wakes up. She still refuses to say Maggie, but only refers to her as "Baby".