Take two, and call me in the mornin'

Last week I had the pleasure of sharing a momentous occasion with my extended family. It was graduation week for me from Medical School and Jaynah and I had a fantastic time hosting family and friends during the festivities.

In preparation, I was psyched that I actually had some time to get to many of those projects that the farmboy in me had been pleading me to find time for. So after some gardening, landscaping, pressure washing, painting and some carpentry work it was great to welcome everyone for a visit.

After we passed on the baseball game due to tornadoes and hail, we had a great time catching up with classmates at our graduation reception and banquet. Open bar = classmates that were only a legend showed up. Great time, food and company.

The hooding ceremony is a separate event only for the School of Medicine graduates and their families where awards voted on by the class are given to outstanding students and faculty. It is held the day before graduation and is a lot more intimate than the full graduation ceremony with the entire MCG crop of graduates from nursing, denistry, physical therapy, etc. At the hooding ceremony we receive our doctoral "hoods" which aren't really hoods but a funny looking sash time thing.

Before I left, my brother wanted to take some pictures of me. He's gotten into photography recently and has had Excalibur on loan. I really liked his idea for this shot.

Before Hooding, we had our official class picture, in front of the perfect Old Medical College which you might recognize from my previous post.

After the class picture it was time to line up in ABC order. Despite a class of 180, it took almost no time because it was easy to find our first year Gross anatomy lab groups and then get in between the groups that were at cadavers on either side of us in the lab way back in '05

My man Tim above, recently married, and bound for the Wake Forest Pediatric program and I have been through a lot since the depths of UGA biochemistry hell in the '03, physics lab, genetics, and oh yeah the entire Medical school application process, and the medical school after that. It was fantastic that we both ended up at MCG, and with the name Moore, we started out in the trenches in the anatomy lab together. Big day for both of us.

I recognized a few people on the way into the auditorium.

Mom and her boys, ready for some baby back ribs.

The Morgan Men, blue eyes for the lot of us.

Lining up before graduation with my brothers in arms. R to L : Dr. Vanags (Duke Neurology), Dr. Green (Wake Forest Radiology), Dr. Moore (Wake Forest Pediatrics)

Almost 1000 graduates, every name was called to get their diploma which was great. Medicine was last so there was lots of time to kill. I wish I'd had my Blackberry a few days sooner.

My Dad found me as we were walking in and waved, then he lost me. It was hilarious to watch him try and get the attention of a random Dental student for about 10 minutes. He took lots of pictures of this Dentist as well. Finally my brother called me, we had a chuckle and he walked across the arena and turned my Dad 45 degrees to the left. Hilarious.

Grabbing the diploma before they changed their mind. I've never been on the big screen before.

3 Generations: (c/o '84, '09, '44)

We had to repeat the cross-handed shake:

White coat ceremony 10/05

Fishing buddies.

Glowing

I love these Hambys.

Another thumbs up to my brother, Ben

All that for a piece of paper. It was worth it.

Work Hard, Play hard.

Hayes Maternity Shoot

Greetings.  

I've briefly mentioned before that one of my New Year's resolutions was to start shooting my pictures RAW and dive into post-processing.  Considering how long I've loved photography, I have no idea why it took this long.  Needless to say, like any new skill starting out was a challenge. Oh yeah, that is why it took this long; whenever I got inspiration to convert, I quickly got frustrated and immediately went back to my JPEG loving ways.

My lovely wife bought me a great RAW processing program (Adobe Lightroom) that sat almost untouched for a year.  Sorry honey, but med school might have contributed to that as well. 

So this was the year, since Jan 1 I've gradually been increasing my reliance on RAW and really delving into Lightroom.  The learning curve has been steep, but finally, I'm getting to the point where I feel comfortable, nay, enjoy working with RAW photos and finally see what all the hububb (sp?) is about.  Literally a whole new world of photography has opened up.

This new found excitement, and free time coincided well with an email I got from an old friend who lives locally in Augusta.  Coincidentally she is pregnant, and had wanted to have some pictures taken to remember this special time.  I was happy for the opportunity and we had a great time with Jennifer and Barrett shooting in downtown Augusta.

Barrett is a lifelong Augustan, and Jennifer a true Southern Belle from none other than Thomaston, GA.  We met one weekday afternoon after everyone got off work and had a beautiful Spring afternoon for Jaynah and Jennifer to compare notes on pregnancy, and Barrett and I to commisserate about how we know there is no way we, mere males, have a clue what is coming.

In front of the Old Medical College, home of MCG starting in the 1820's.

This was some type of bell tower that had once been on top of a building somewhere, but was now planted in front of a museum.

I'm a sucker for old growth trees, you can ask Jaynah.

There's a baby in there.

The Presbyterian Church has some beautiful grounds that we really enjoyed exploring.

We found this fantastic brick wall downtown right after we got some pictures with the King of Soul, James Brown (bronzed)

The Riverwalk seemed like a perfect place to end with our last bit of light.  When Andrew has to start cranking up the ISO, it is time to call it a wrap!

You can look at  the rest of the images and slideshow of these two glowing parents-to-be by clicking the link below.  

Hayes Maternity

Thank you so much, Jennifer and Barrett, for letting me be a part of this milestone.  Jaynah and I had a fantastic time.

More posts coming....I graduated, Jaynah is 38 weeks, the lost Savannah adventure, and next Tuesday we are scheduled for induction.

Living the dream.

Andrew E. Morgan M.D.

36 weeks

We are closing in on 36 weeks now and the belly is growing and mostly due to the baby.  At our last check-up U/S  the little lady was nearly 5 3/4 lbs. at the 57th percentile for growth.  Yes, we are still getting growth checks, or BPP's every two weeks because of the weird insertion of the umbilical cord: velamentous insertion of the cord , but everything is still looking A OK.

Jaynah's last day of work will be May 1st, and she is truly counting down the days.  She has been an absolute trooper through this whole process, but the past week or two have really seen her excitement for a long commute and really physically demanding work diminish.  I think this is due to equal contributions of two things: 1) The end is in sight, there is a light at the end of the tunnel and 2) the third trimester is no joke, hormones, the belly, and the body's metabolism is in overdrive to fatten the baby up for delivery.  Of course, a flat tire at 6:30 in the morning last week did not help the cause.  Luckily, AAA to the rescue and she was quickly on the road after a nice patch job on the tire.

Don't feel sorry for me, I am off school, haven't started my job yet so I'm just enjoying some free time.  I feel really bad to still be in bed when my lovely 35 week pregnant wife leaves for work at 6:00 a.m. every morning.  But I've been busy with lots of things and have a lot of things left to do on my list before intern year begins.  We took Jaynah's 36 week pictures tonight:

Nickel shy of 36 weeks - 4/22/09

I apologize for the teaser last time, and I apologize for the catalog bright-light feel of these next images, but the wolves are circling, so I had to get some pictures up, and fast.  Honestly, I had to wait for Jaynah to "nest" after I finished getting all the furniture together.  This used to be our guest room and we had a lot of fun with the paint, chair rail and..., okay not so much fun with the chair rail, but we are really excited about how it turned out.  Still to come: custom artwork by Mimi Morgan aka (...she hasn't picked her grandmother name yet), as well as a glider chair and ottoman that we ordered this past weekend in Savannah.

Okay, so the crib is filled with every fluffy thing we have right now just for Jaynah's enjoyment. Fear not, everything will be taken out when it is time for baby to actually sleep. (except the tan bear on the right end, he makes sounds of the womb)

Never underestimate the complexity of the mobile.  After remodeling the kitchen, the nursery and all the furniture assembly, the freaking mobile was the thing that had me scratching my head.

View as you walk into the door. Colors: (Pink, brown, green and white)

Looking from the crib to the other corner.  The stuff stacked in the corner, don't ask, a place will be found and this is actually a huge improvement.

Chair with ottoman and side table are going to go where the little pink bounce seat is.  There is plenty of room, you'll just have to trust me.

Tall chest with "neat" pile of stuff that will find a home.  Honestly, a big thanks to everyone, we have gotten so much love and support, and gifts from all our family and friends, it has really been amazing. 

 

Low chest, aka changing table, aka "The Poop Deck"

Hit us up with some comments.

That about does it for this episode.  We're going to be scheduled for an induction at 39 weeks so that Jaynah's labor can be monitored with this crazy cord insertion. So it is looking like May 19, 20, 21st are gonna be the big days coming up.  Not sure when it is going to really hit me about what is happening.  I can only hope that when it does I'm sitting down and preferably not near my car keys and the Garmin.

Next update should be Savannah adventure pictures and/or a maternity shoot I'm doing tomorrow for some good friends here in Augusta.

Work Hard, Play Hard.

Long overdue

I was doing good there for a few minutes then kind of fell off again. Lots of photos so let's get going.

First one is 2 weeks late, we are taking the 34 week picture tonight.

Still glowing at 32 weeks:

Jaynah getting used to the video camera during our photo shoot:

Jaynah's co-workers threw her an excellent shower a few weeks ago:

The HealthSouth crew: Thanks so much

A group of old friends also threw Jaynah a shower at Callaway Gardens last weekend:

Our hosts: The Grahams

Jaynah's little bro, Chandler, watch out ladies.

The awesome Hills and my long lost Best Man, CKIII.

The tower of presents was impressive, but as Leslie's husband the engineer put it, "It isn't structurally sound..."

Can you feel the excitement? The fear is palpable.

Jaynah's cousins and their assortment of kids.

Great to see my buddy from MCG Jonas and his fia...girlfriend Heather. He's a Blue Devil now.

Great to see UGA friends Jen, Jess and Erin.

My boys:

These girls shared pacifiers I'm pretty sure.

My Dad also happened upon some tickets to this year's Masters practice round. After 4 years here, I'd driven by the National every morning but had never been inside.  My Dad had also never been while he was here so we were looking forward to it.  You aren't allowed to bring cameras in on tournament days so I was actually pumped that we were going on a practice round day.  I shot in RAW all day and have been working on the images as I've had time, really having fun with it.

Scoreboard w/ flags of all of the countries represented in this year's field.

The 10th green, a beautiful hole.

Jaynah was tiring out with all the walking so as soon as I got my Tiger fix, we headed out.

Tired, but still smiling for a portrait on the way out.  She was more excited about her "lady-fit" hat than anything I think.

More Masters pics here, link is also on the right side for future visits.

Since it has been so long I had some catching up to do, and if you have made it through this whole post, then you DESERVE something special.

How 'bout a preview:

Hope you have a great one, yard sale this weekend, should be interesting.

Work Hard, Play Hard.