My Love Story

Yesterday was the anniversary of the day Justin proposed to me. It was most definitely one of the happiest days of my life. I thought he might never propose. :) Earlier in the day he had graduated from the University of Tennessee at Martin and we were supposed to be going out to celebrate. Little did I know he had different plans. He called and asked me if I was ready. I said I was so he said he would be there in just a second. There was a knock on my door. That was strange because he usually just came on in. When I opened the door it wasn't Justin, but one of his fraternity brothers standing there in a suit holding a white rose and a card. He gave me the card which explained what was going on.

After I read the card he said, "On behalf of Justin Paschall, will you accept this rose." The slip that says Martin Church of Christ was attached to the rose to tell me where we were headed next. When I walked outside there was a HUGE limo at the end of my driveway. I about fell over. I had never ridden in one before. When I got in the driver told me there were drinks in the fridge/cooler...I don't remember which it had, and a bag of my favorite snacks from Justin. I was too excited to eat or drink anything though. I thought about calling my friend to tell her this was it. He was going to propose. But I changed my mind just in case it was just a really nice gesture.

We went to the church where another fraternity brother of his was wearing a suit and waiting with two pink roses and another card. He asked the same thing the first guy did and gave me the roses. We repeated this process all over the town of Martin. At the church the card said I was there because it was the first place he remembered seeing me. I came in late, of course. He said lots of sweet things then we headed to the next stop. We went to the KA house, the first place we actually spoke; the University Center, where we trained together to be PEP Leaders and he first let me know he liked me (he also told me he was romantic, to which he said I was skeptical, but he thought I believed now); E. W. James (a grocery store), because I am the first woman he had ever cooked for and he wanted to provide for and protect me; and his best friend Ed's house because we had become best friends. The card at Ed's said that dinner was served back at my house.

When I got there candles and rose petals covered the front porch. I walked in and saw this.

Sorry for the picture of pictures, but we don't have a scanner at the house. :) He had set up dinner in the middle of the living room. He cooked for me. As we sat down to eat he kept talking about how all his friends said he would have to come up with something REALLY good for whenever he actually decided to propose...

My heart sank.

I was still hoping he was going to propose, but was scared to get my hopes up. Neither of us really ate much. I was nervous and still excited from the "scavenger hunt" and he was nervous knowing what was coming. After we picked at desert he cleared the table out of the way and said, in very Bachelor type fashion, "I will now go get...the final rose." :) He handed me a red rose with a card attached. All the previous cards were signed, "Because I am Yours, Justin Paschall." This one had a bride and groom on the front and said "Because I am Yours." When I opened the card it said, "The honor of your presence is requested at the marriage of Micah Danielle Mullins to James Justin Paschall at a date and time yet to be determined." He asked me what it said, but I couldn't speak. He asked again and I said something like, "I don't know. Are you serious?" He got down on one knee said I was beautiful and I'm sure some other sweet things (I can't even remember and neither can he lol), and then asked if I would marry him. I said yes, of course. I ended up on my knees hugging him and kept saying, "This better not be a joke."

The first white rose symbolized our friendship. That's how we started out, just as friends. I was dating someone else when we first met. The pink roses represented the time we spent dating, and the red roses symbolized our future marriage.

He made all of the cards himself. He even put the ribbons on and sprayed them with his cologne. I think it's one of the best proposals ever. He is the sweetest and most thoughtful man ever. I am so lucky to be his wife!

I love you Justin!!!!!

Just a Little Trim...or a Big One

Today we worked all day long on the outside of our home. Can you tell a difference?

Before

After!

We cut back the MASSIVE bushes. Right now they're nothing more than sticks, but the foliage will grow in over time. They were far overdue for a trim. We also trimmed up the trees in the front. There was actually a house behind all that green!

Justin also attacked the back yard.

Before(and during a big rain, our backyard becomes a pond)

After

The back looks SO much bigger without the big tree/bush and vines.

The brush piles when we were done.

We are soooo tired but it's worth it because we got a lot done. I wonder if we'll be able to move in the morning. We are both already sore.

Starting this project has also shown us that we have AWESOME neighbors! The other day I had cut a couple of the bushes back with a hand saw and was getting ready to start some more when our neighbor across the street came over and offered to bring his chain saw and help me out. We didn't get them done, but we got pretty far before it ran out of gas. This same neighbor had already come over and cut down a dead tree for us.

Justin bought us an electric chain saw last night so we finished cutting the bushes with it today. When we started dragging them to the curb a teenage boy that lives next door came out and asked if we wanted some help. I said, "SURE!" He was actually jogging to get the brush and then carrying it to the curb. We got done A LOT faster with his help.

Later a couple that lives down the road stopped and offered to loan us their pressure washer to get the green mildew off our bricks where the bushes were. They and the first neighbor mentioned both told us you can spray a bleach water mix on it then spray it off. They also mentioned that they noticed all the work we'd been doing. Our neighbors have been so helpful and nice. I love our neighbors!

We worked hard all day and are so tired, but there's just something good about hard work. It's great to see the pay off. It makes me feel proud. Not that I'd want to do that kind of hard manual work every day, but occasionally it's nice. :)

Our Easter

I hope you all had a happy Easter! We had a great day filled with candy, eggs, and family!

First, we got our day started with Reagan's goodies left by the bunny. She was pretty excited. :)

We had 150 people at worship Sunday morning! Lots of family in visiting with various members. We also had some visitors, Jeremy and Blythe! If you don't know, they are friends of ours from Demopolis. They came in to Memphis to go to a concert the night before and then stayed at our house Saturday night and went to worship with us Sunday morning. It was so good to see them. We miss our Demopolis friends soooooo much!

After worship we jumped in the car and headed to Grandmommy and Grandaddy's (my grandparents) house. We had lunch with the great grandparents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins and then celebrated the April birthdays. There are 6!

And, as you can see, they don't all behave for pictures. My grandmother said no one else is allowed to marry anyone born in April since we already have so many April bdays. :)

Then the main event, at least as far as the kids were concerned. The Easter egg hunt! Of course my mother had given Reagan a special egg hunting outfit with bunnies on it. And I put bunny ears on her so she will look back at pictures and say, "MOOOOooooom!"

It was her first time hunting eggs but she had lots of fun. She also had helpful uncles and a cousin who would carry eggs in their pockets and drop them near her so she could get some eggs. There was some fierce competition from her older fellow hunters. :) Some of the eggs had ants on or near them. She wouldn't touch them until we got them off or moved the egg away from them. Haha.

We had a great Easter! I hope you did too!

Happy to Me

This weekend was also a weekend of birthdays. While in Smyrna we also celebrated my grandfather's 75th birthday. He's a big golfer if you can't tell from the cake. :) Reagan and Annabelle got to help him blow out the candles.

Saturday we went to cousin Drake's 7th birthday party. They had a swimming party at an indoor pool at one of the hotels.

Reagan had a big time. She loved her cupcake with green icing. It even turned her teeth green.

Reagan LOVES to swim! She had so much fun swimming with Daddy and Drake!

With all of this singing "Happy Birthday" Reagan learned something new.

She's so cute. She just randomly starts singing it now. :) I love her.

Opening Day!

On March 31st we did something that had my husband acting like a giddy little boy. We went to Opening Day for the Cardinals in St. Louis. If you know him you know how big of a deal this was for him. He loves the St. Louis Cardinals. As I mentioned before, one of the elders here at Ripley bought us tickets and reserved us a hotel room. We were so surprised and excited. It was a lot of fun to be there for opening day. It was crazy to see so many people there. I think there were over 46,ooo people there that day. Crazy. It was an awesome experience!

Me and my hunny at the game.

One of the greatest baseball players of all time, Stan Musial. Before the game they have hall-of-famers and all the coaches and players ride around the field.

Justin's favorite newer player John Jay

Albert Pujols battin

g. I don't know if you can tell, but he's doing his signature sticking the tongue out. :)

The team and coaches. The guys in the red blazers to the left are the hall-of-famers.

My March Madness

Ok, so it's been a while and a lot of "madness" has been going on. I'm sorry. Please forgive me. :) I'll give you a few short posts to update on all that the Paschall's have been up to.

Towards the end of March I got a text that my lovely cousin Erin was in TN! I've talked about her before, but if you don't know, we were born 10 days apart and did a lot of growing up together. She now lives in NYC so we don't get to see each other much. Now that we are back in TN we get to see her when she does pop in. We went over to our grandparents' house so we could hang out for a little while. Reagan loves her as all children do. She's a nanny so she's great with kids. :)

It was sooooo good to see her! I'm hoping Justin and I can get up to NYC for a visit in the next couple of years.

While basketball fans look forward all year to March Madness I look forward to this even more. The last week of March we went to the Memphis School of Preaching Lectureship. We look forward to this week so much! It's such and uplifting week. We get the opportunity to listen to great men preaching the gospel and I love getting to be in the ladies' sessions. We always get our batteries recharged. I think most people don't realize that preachers need to be recharged just as much as the rest of us. They spend all of their time speaking and rarely get to be spoken to. MSOP has such wonderful speakers who are great students of the God's word. In fact, you can listen to the lectures if you are interested. The Online Academy of Biblical Studies has all of the men's lectures. I wish they had the women's as well so I could listen to them again and again. Justin actually got to speak at the youth day they have the Saturday before the lectures begin. The audio from it is on there too. He was awesome, of course. He's my favorite preacher. :)

It's also a great week because we get to see all of our friends that were at the school the same time we were, see other friends, and get to make new ones. It's always a blessing to be around people who are like-minded. They also have classes for children 5 and under so that mom's can actually sit and listen to a sermon for a change. Reagan had lots of fun hanging out with her future best friend and/or husband Benjamin. :)

When we took her to class we showed her that he was there and she said, "BEN!!!!" She adores him and I was so glad she had a friend in her class.

If Ben doesn't work out or she's into slightly younger men, there's always Brody! She loves him too, as you can see. :)

She also got to hang out with and meet new friends. She absolutely fell in love with Kenadie.

The great thing about this is that she only lives 30 minutes away so we will have to schedule some play dates!

I already miss my friends and wish we had more excuses to get together more often!

Another bonus to the lectureship is that many bookstores set up and sell books. I bought several books! I'll cover more of them as I go through them, but the one I am currently reading is "Loving Your Husband" by Patsy Loden. I've just started the study but it's been great so far. There is a lot of scripture and it's actually a workbook. You answer questions as you go, memorize verses, and there is even homework. I'm really looking forward to really getting into this study.

I always take away a lot from the lectureship, but this year I really got motivated to make some changes I've been needing to make for a while. It will take some time and a lot of effort, but what good things don't? Pray for me as I am working to be a better wife, mother, and Christian. I can always use it!

My Little Impressionist

Reagan LOVES to ca-ca. That's color for all of you non-Reaganese speaking folk.

Once she discovered real markers she's not into the color wonder so much anymore.

She's very picky about the colors she wants. You must give her choices and if you don't have anything she wants she'll say, "Noooo," and wait for you to bring her more.

I think she is an art prodigy. Just check out this picture she drew for me!

Doesn't it look like a flower?! It reminds me of the Impressionist paintings.

I think she's going to be in museums one day. ;)

A Whole YEAR older!

Guess who's back. Back again.
Well, back for today at least. I'll try to do a couple of updates later about our trip and everything. But today is all about this little lady.

It's Reagan's FIRST BIRTHDAY! I really and truly cannot believe that my little baby girl is now a crazy, busy, solid food eating, whole milk drinking toddler! We'll get to all that in a minute. I really can't believe that it has been a year since she was born. I'm so glad the nights of getting no sleep are long gone! When I go back and look at all the monthly posts it's crazy.

Here she is with her giraffe at the hospital, at six months and at one year. I can't believe how much she's grown!

She is getting so big and turning into this little person. She doesn't seem like a baby anymore. She's seems like a little tiny grown up. I know she's not nearly grown. She's just so much more grown up than when she came into our lives. It's so funny to sit and watch her try to figure stuff out. She is so busy. I can't keep up with her! I never know where she is because she's constantly moving. She is now officially off baby food. She either eats what we're eating (cut into little pieces) or eats a gerber toddler meal. She's also drinking whole milk now. While we were on our trip she stopped nursing so when we got home we gave the whole milk a try. She wasn't too sure about it the first two times but the third time she drank the whole cup and now drinks one at every meal.

She's starting to talk more and more. She can say hi and bye and waves at everyone she sees. When Justin comes home she screams "dada" and squeals because she gets so excited. Sometimes she'll say bible and she says duck. Sometimes it's directed at her rubber ducky in the tub and sometimes it's just random. She also randomly says yuck. :) She likes to watch me play super mario bros. When I die she'll go, "OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooooooooo." lol She's starting to say uh-oh as well.

She's so sweet. She will run (well, kind of run) up to us and hug our legs or pat us on the arm when we're holding her. She hugs her animals and baby doll.

I know I'm forgetting stuff but it's getting late so my mind is not working too quickly. I wanted to take her down to the river today to take pictures but it stormed off and on all day. But we were able to sneak out in the back yard between storms. Here's what you really want anyway. :)

A few from her party. (if you want more look on facebook)

Her monthly update pictures from the past year.

I Have Nothing Cute to Say...It's Too Late at Night.

Well, I said Reagan had been teething pretty easily with these two teeth and now I regret it. She has had a horrible day. She was crying and cranky for most of it. I put her to bed early and used the time to make some more bows for her.

I know the navy may seem random, but it was made for a specific outfit. :)

In one of her non-crying moments she was playing in her room and when I went to check on her she was doing this.

I guess she's gonna start climbing everything. Uh-oh. She also likes to step up on the side of her activity jumper.

Day 21 of 30 days of music is a song you listen to when you're happy. I don't necessarily listen to this everytime I feel happy or only when I feel happy, but I think it's a happy song. How can you not smile when listening to it?

Another Month Older:11 Months

Reagan is 11 months old today! Wow. In just 3 weeks we will be having her first birthday party! That’s just crazy.

She is getting really good at mimicking words. She never gets them quite right, but she will try to repeat things we say. A frequent one is thank you. She also says something every time we say amen at the end of a prayer. While Justin was gone I said I love you and she parroted it back at me! I’ve not been able to get her to do it again though. Lots of times she will try to say the last word you say. She knows who mama and dada are and when we tell her no no she will shake her head and say, “nananananananana.” She’s so cute.

While Mom was here she got her some Nike tennis shoes. They’re so cute! She’s not real great in walking in them yet, but she’s getting better.

Her walking is getting better and better. She’s getting a lot faster and is using walking as her main mode of getting around. She still crawls some, but usually she walks. Here she is showing off how good she’s getting.

She has mastered the art of pouting.

She loves her bath time!

I love how she looks like she's up to something in that picture! :)

She’s growing up so fast, but she’s still tiny. Today her 9 month jeans were falling off while she was walking around the house. She’s eating like crazy though so maybe some growth is coming soon. She now thinks she needs to eat whatever is on your plate. Even if it’s something she can’t chew. She has eaten mashed potatoes, fries, green beans, and bananas. She gets about half a banana every night and loves it. Here’s a video of her eating green beans today.

Reagan had a great time playing with the zinnias today.

She was pulling the petals off one at a time.

I now have all the parts of Reagan’s outfit for the party! I had shown you the tutu and head band, but now I have some leggings and the embroidered t-shirt. The shirt came in today and it is sooo cute! I can't wait to see her in this outfit and take pictures of her in it! She's going to be the cutest little birthday girl in the world!