Washington, DC

We just got home from our short trip to D.C. for the annual POW/MIA meeting. Rhett's Mom is the president of the League of Families of those missing from Vietnam (her brother is missing). We were really excited that we were able to go to support her and we had a great time too. Claire is a great traveler and loves going out and doing fun things. It was a pretty long weekend because we crammed so much travel and activites into about 48 hours but she hung in there. We did have one minor incident on our last flight home from Charlotte to B'ham. As we were oh so patiently waiting for them to refuel our aircraft (after being told to run -yeah right- to make our connection!) Rhett and I were trying to entertain Claire as our 1 hour flight was turning into a 2 hour flight. Suddenly we both look up at each other and say "what's that smell?". We look down at our precious little girl and she looks up at us and says for everyone on the small plane to hear "STINKY!!". Yes, she was referring to herself. Then the ohsofamiliar "poopey face" appears as she concentrates to finish her business and throws in a few grunts in case someone wasn't quite sure what was going on. This is not a situation that can wait so I grab my now "stinky" daughter and head up the aisle to the lavatory. The flight attendant sees me and says "you need to sit down we are about to leave" and I politely began to explain that it was in everyone's best interest that I change my child's diaper. We have flown with Claire a few times before but somehow managed to avoid the diaper-change-in-the-lavatory situation. Obviously I was about to break that tradition as I began to change my sweet baby's extremely messy leaky diaper (I won't be too descriptive but she hadn't gone in a few days - enough said). It was everywhere. All over her, the changing table and yes even the wall. In the midst of all of this she is screaming "Daaaaaaddddddy!" which is kind of funny because that is exactly what I wanted to scream too. We ended up making it back to our seats with out too much more commotion and eventually made it back to Birmingham. We are happy to be home today as we try to recover from the trip and get ready for another one this weekend. We are looking forward to going to Mac's first birthday party in Atlanta, then on to a wedding in Athens and then up to North Carolina for a few days. Whew. I need a nap already.

Summer Buzz

We've had a really busy couple of weeks around here. I taught Vacation Bible School one week and it was a doosey. I had 20 first graders to keep track of and it stretched me to my limits. God bless teachers. I don't think I have it in me. It was a fun week though. It was neat to be around kids who really understand and can learn pretty complex ideas. It was a fun age too because they weren't in that "too cool" stage and they weren't boy or girl crazy yet so they were all so sweet.
We also had to say good-bye to our dear friends, the Mareks, last week. Ironically enough they moved to Augusta where we moved from! They will be there for 3 years for fellowship. We will miss them so much. It already seems strange here without them. It seems funny to think back to when we met right after we moved here. We were just two couples - my how times have changed. We helped each other out through all the ups and downs of residency and managed to have lots of babies in the mean time! As you can see from the picture Claire is pretty upset about Cole leaving too.

Ford McKey Shirley

We are happy to announce the name of our new baby boy . . .

Ford McKey Shirley

It's exciting to have a name for the little guy and makes me even more excited about meeting him. Rhett and I see almost eye to eye on baby names which is nice. It took us about 30 seconds to name Claire. We never had a list or anything. When we found out she was a girl we both just looked at each other and said "so I guess it's Claire Louise" and that was the end of it. We held off on telling her name but decided to mix it up this time and let his name out of the bag.
The name Stafford is a family name on my side. We wanted to call him Ford so we decided to just name him Ford instead of having it as a nick name of Stafford. Rhett is big on naming them what you are going to call them so I was fine with that. McKey (pronounced Macky) is a family name on Rhett's side. It is his middle name and his Dad's middle name which is really special to Rhett. Ford will be the third generation of McKey middle named boys and the second from father to son and father to son which really means a lot to Rhett. Rhett always felt a neat connection to his Dad since they shared that middle name and now Ford will share that bond with his Dad (and Grandfather) too!
We think that Ford is a really strong name for a little boy. It passed the presidential test (Would this name sound good if he were to become President) and the ballfield test (can you hear this name being yelled from the outfield?) so we are confident that it will serve him well. We are also glad that it will be easy to pronounce and spell which is something Rhett and I will envy (he is everything from Rick to Rex and I was always "Mee-gan Swindle"). Of course having Shirley for a last name throws people off a little bit but all of us Shirleys deal with that - just ask Dr. Shirley Rhett. HA!

Last Call!

Rhett had his last Resident call this past week. We celebrated by making cupcakes as a surprise for him when he got home. It's kind of hard to believe and imagine a life without overnight call. It's something that Rhett has been doing every 4-5 nights most months of the last 3 years. We are looking forward to our "new life" as he starts his infectious disease fellowship in July. He will still have call but there aren't too many ID emergencies. The worst will be an occasional weekend that he will have to go in to round be we can handle that. Now any nights he spends away from home will be for moonlighting - which although we hate not having Daddy at home at night occasionally - at least he will be getting paid!

We went swimming the other day at the Slappey's house. We had a lot of fun in the pool and visiting with their family. Claire still really enjoys the water and is a little daredevil like her Dad. We are settling into a summer routine which is nice. We've got a lot of cleaning out and reorganizing to do before our new baby arrives this fall. We have to really maximize the space in our little house - definitely a challenge with two kids! When Claire was a baby we had all of the standard baby gear (bouncy seat, swing, playmat etc.) but none of the toys that we have now. So it will be even more crowded when we get out the baby gear again on top of the toys we have managed to acquire the last 17 months! We are trying to minimize our stuff and maximize the space we have. It's actually really good going through everything and asking "do I really need this?". You can see how easy it would be to accumulate a lot of stuff over the years if you're not careful. Rhett is currently going through several boxes of things that his parents brought after cleaning out his room at their house. I think he is enjoying his walk down memory lane but come to me and asks what he should do with his trophies from middle school. I think unless it is a Heisman or an Oscar it can go!