Silas's First Thanksgiving!

First off, I really thought I would have this posted on Thanksgiving, which was yesterday, but as usual (these days) I am a little behind. To say I've had my hands full is an understatement. But better late than never.

We are in Park City, Utah visiting the grandparents for Thanksgiving. More on that later.  Before we left, I took some photos of Silas with some holiday themed decor to commemorate his first Thanksgiving. Since I insisted that Jeff buy me a new ($200 lens) for this camera that I still don't really know how to use after 4 years of owning it, I am really making an effort to put it to use. So here we go...

This is our first try. It was a nice, sunny, warm day so we took it outside. By the time I got all the gear outside, we only had a short window of opportunity for him to work it for the camera.

 Good, Lord, he is a cutie. If I do say so myself. 

Quickly, he loses steam....

This is where we lost him... And we have to take it to the house for a quick nap.

We did a 2nd round a few days later. This time we had to do it inside since the weather had started to turn a bit chilly. Here is what we came up with....

This is one of my favs, he is a happy little guy!

 Thanks for my Turkey Day shirt, Gram! Love you!

 Then Charlie wanted in on the photo shoot action!

Next up, Silas's adventures in Park City and Thanksgivukkah! A once in a lifetime event!

Since we have unplugged from Facebook, it is nice to have the time to work on organizing pictures. I'm really excited to be back to blogging. I hope you enjoy. You can subscribe to get new posts to your email ( just put in your email at the top) or bookmark the page and visit when you want a little Silas fix.

Farewell Facebook

When I hear people say this, I am always kind of shocked at first. Then a little jealous. For awhile now, it has seemed like being on Facebook was a necessary evil. Now, it just seems evil.

The last few weeks, it seems that every time I look at Facebook, it makes me really upset. So for many reasons, some listed below, I am no longer on Facebook. Well, I will be keeping my account so that I can manage my business pages and be part of private Facebook groups that I use for work.  But I will no longer have a friends list. Why?

#1. It just makes me feel bad! Every time I look at my Facebook feed, multiple people in my friends list have shared some disgusting, terrible story about child or animal abuse. Maybe I am still in a postpartum hormonal or simply sleep deprived/overly stressed state, from which I may never recover, but I just can't see that right now (or ever). If its not terrible things from the news, its something else. I hate to hear that my friends are having a difficult time with their children, spouses or parents. And while I know that people aren't (anywhere close to) 100% truthful in their posts, but I can't help but question myself when people brag about their newborn sleeping thru the night when Ive been up every 2 hours.  Or wondering why I wasn't invited to that party (that I didn't actually want to go to)? This too shall pass. Right?

#2. Are we really connected? In the early days of Facebook, it was great for business! I created a page for my business (that I will be keeping, although Im not sure it does any good) and it got me a ton of exposure. Now, it doesn't matter how much you post on your business page or how many likes you have, only a small percentage of people see your posts. Unless you pay to promote them and that doesn't even mean that they will be seen. Everyone's feed is so flooded with crap that they aren't even paying attention anymore. Time to move on.

And I can't tell you the number of friend requests I get and accept from people who I knew from high school. These people never actually talk to you. Recently I got an introduction thru Facebook to a professional contact that I had been trying to get connected with. Yay! Except she never saw the message that I sent her. Thankfully we connected via email, so all is well.

#3. The ultimate Time Waste. For the last 5 years or so, I have had Facebook and it has slowly become more consuming over that time. My husband, who lives in the corporate world and is banned from Facebook during the day, asks me why I can't just have it and not look at it. He also doesn't have a business to run. He can just have a Facebook account that he only checks monthly and not bother to look at it ever. Meanwhile, I am over here trying to keep a freelance business running and feeling like I always have to be connected. Its like a train wreck, I can't look away! Not that I want to see a train wreck...you know what I mean.

The truth is, that right now, in my current state of affairs, I do not have the time to waste. I want to be actually connected. I want to talk to friends and family. Even if it is via email or text or the occasional phone call or FaceTime/Skype. And I just don't have the time to feel bad. Even though I have the world's  cutest baby, a very handsome husband, super successful career that I love, great family, beautiful home, my health, great friends and so much more, Facebook makes me feel crappy. It didn't use to be this way, but now that it does more harm than good, I'm no longer interested.

So, for people who want to connect with my professionally, please find me at my website, or my Facebook biz page. For family/friends, I will be telling scrapbooking our life here on this blog and still posting on Instagram. I am also toying with the idea of making a Tumblr for Silas. You know, in all my spare time:)

If you care to keep up with us, on a personal level, you can subscribe to this blog and have new posts sent right to your email.  I would love to follow your blog/Instagram/Twitter, so let me know where you are and I will keep tabs.

Mwah! Oh, and its been awhile since Ive been here so I have loads of pictures and stories to share. More soon. xoxo Emily

So this is what the fuss is all about....

Photo Card

View the entire collection of cards.

More on this later. I have a TON of stuff to share with you. For now, all I will say is having babies is not for wimps. The birthing part and the bringing them home part. Even though we are convinced we got the easier version of the hardest thing in the world (what can I say, he's perfect), this is not for the weak. Especially that 4th week, whoever would have thought that the first 3 weeks are a special kind of tough but then you get to week 4. Maybe this doesnt happen to everyone but I could have sworn that someone came and did a switch-a-roo and replaced my perfect baby with a very cute body double who insisted on crying non-stop.

I just had my very first full night of sleep and it was glorious. Thank you sweet baby Jesus for breast pumps and Daddy Duty with bottle for a few nights. Just a little bit of sleep and I am a new woman....still no time to blog yet. But I am keeping notes of funny stories to share and collecting fun pictures to go with them. Check out Silas's first Facebook photo. Of course my baby came into the world on Cinco De Mayo! It was also International Day of the Midwife, which I am sure wont be as important to him on his 21st birthday.

Photos on the birth announcement are by my wonderful friend and fabulous photographer Tiffani Sunshine Photography. She takes the most beautiful photos so you should hire her to take photos of your family! I had the hardest time deciding on which ones to choose! That is why I ended up with a card I could put 6 photos on. Not a terrible problem to have!

These balls are famous or infamous. Whatever.

So far this week, I haven't cooked anything in bulk to freeze. Last week I was really on a roll but this week, not so much. Our CSA starts this weekend so that should inspire me to get cooking again. I guess my version of nesting is cooking in bulk. Good thing we got that freezer! I totally recommend the recipes that I shared in that post too.

It only took me asking about 7 million times but I finally got the recipe for those famous balls that everyone loves so much. Normally I am a the crockpot wizard around the house but this one is all Jeff. He got this recipe from his mom and is apparently handed down from a lady named Marian Gertman, who I believe was their neighbor when Jeff was little. Is that right, MIL?
*I have just been informed that this is not the neighbor that I was thinking of. That is a famous split pea soup recipe. I have never been a big fan of the split pea soup but this is really good. Would anyone like that recipe?

If you have enjoyed these delicious meatballs and wondered how to make them yourself, so that you don't have to wait for Jeff to do it, here you go....

Marian Gertman’s Meatballs

These are delicious!!!! Key is to cook them raw in the sauce.

Meatballs cooked in sauce:

1 pound ground beef

1 egg

1/4 cup milk

1/2 cup breadcrumbs

1/2 tsp. salt

1 tsp. oregano

1 Tbl. fresh parsley

1/2 tsp.garlic powder

1/2 tsp. pepper

1/4 cup parmesan cheese

shape balls and cook in sauce for 3 hours

Any marinara sauce will do, store bought or homemade

These are great over pasta or you can make a fabulous meatball sub. I had my heart set on having the last 3 meatballs on the last sub roll for lunch yesterday and was devastated when I came home to find that the dude had taken it for himself for lunch. I went to Chipotle and inhale 3 tacos on their patio, then all was right with the world. When you make this, don't forget to invite this chick over to enjoy them with you:)

wet + dry ingredients just before baking..

And now for that amazing strawberry nut bread. This is my mom's recipe and it is amazing. Be prepared that you will pretty much immediately eat the entire loaf. This is great for breakfast. This recipe makes 2 loaves. I try to only make it when I can send one over for someone else to enjoy. I have made it for 2 friends who have had babies and it is a real big hit. I wouldn't suggest having me over if you have recently made this because I will inhale the entire thing before you can pour a cup of coffee. You have been warned. 

STRAWBERRY NUT BREAD

3 cups flour 4 eggs, beaten

1 tsp. soda 1 ¼ cups cooking oil

1 tsp. salt 2 cups frozen, sliced strawberries, thawed 

1 Tbsp. cinnamon 1 ¼ cups chopped pecans

2 cups sugar

Sift flour, soda, salt, cinnamon and sugar together in a large mixing bowl.  Combine eggs, oil, berries and pecans.  Make well in center of dry ingredients.  Add liquid mixture, stirring just enough to moisten dry ingredients.  Pour into two greased 9x5x3 inch pans.  Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour.  Remove from oven and let cool for 5 minutes before removing from pan.  

This bird is making her nest... IN BULK

From what I understand, this whole nesting thing is different for everyone. People get the urge to do all kinds of crazy things. Luckily for me, I am doing what I usually do, just in a more extreme version than ever. Think cooking, cleaning, preparing in bulk. Yep, Ive been to Costco twice this week.

Trip #1

Trip #2

In case you are new here or today is your first day (what I like to say to the dude if he is asking something utterly ridiculous), first understand that I spend a large portion of my energies cooking and cleaning up after myself (& Jasmine). The cleaning is usually just generally maintenance, cleaning up my cooking mess or organizing then reorganizing. When asked where Jeff thought I would be when I go into labor he answered, "the gym, TJ Maxx or the grocery store because that is where she is every day". I wanted to argue but sadly, it is true. He knows my every move based on the daily credit card transactions.

*Yes, I have made an arrangement with a dear friend to drag my laboring body to Nordstrom (at the very least!) instead of having my baby up in the TJ Maxx or something. 

We have both spent this entire pregnancy in prep mode. We have been reading and staying on top of what we need to do and be ready for. I am 100% aware that something will catch us off guard so make no mistake that I am not also prepared for that. Yes, I am preparing to be caught unprepared, even after all of this. Otherwise, what would we laugh about when we retell this years later?

So, since we moved into this house (that my freezer selling and above dealing making friend, who happens to be a real estate agent sold me in the fall)  and have the room for one now (and our freezer/refrigerator basically just sucks), I have been saying that I wanted a small deep freeze for the side storage room. I have kind of looked around, ok one day I saw one at Costco and that is about the extent of my "looking".  Last week I posted on Facebook that I was looking for one either new or used and one of my favorite friend/clients informed me that she had one to sell.

The next day, I set out to go check it out and it was more wonderful than I imagined. For the low price of $75, I loaded up this baby into my new mom car (then I went to brunch) and then I hauled it home where it fits perfectly in the storage room. All day (all week really) I was just bursting with happiness about my new freezer. You would have sworn I had just gotten myself a unicorn.  That's how excited I am.

Why? Mostly because, as I mentioned before, I have a super sucky freezer. One of those side by side ones that is supposed to be nice and fancy but is really pointless. But also because I am willing myself to be a breast milk producing machine. I know that breast feeding is really hard work, especially at first, and that not everyone is successful with it (so you can spare me that "lesson" if you are going to send me an email of Facebook message telling me how it really is, I don't really care for that anyway). In sticking with my obsession with being uber-prepared, I have this freezer that I am visualizing being so full of breast milk that I am basically handing it out like candy to trick or treaters or something. If my neighbors read this, I will probably not have any trick or treaters this year, but thats ok.

Since I am 37 weeks pregnant as I am writing this, I am not pumping and storing yet. I have a pump but I don't know how to use it yet. What I am doing is cooking so much food for myself that you would swear that I am preparing for the zombie apocalypse, if I were planning to have the zombies over for a dinner party? In the spirit of being proactive, along with my constant fretting over what will we eat next and will we have enough for guests, I have started cooking for an army. I am freezing dinners for Jeff and I for once he goes back to work, our family is gone and people stop dropping by with casseroles. I know that I wont die if I have to eat peanut butter & jelly or cereal for weeks at a time but I would really rather not. Im quite spoiled that way.

Last week I started thinking of what kinds of delicious dinners that I would miss when I no longer have this kind of time/energy, because I will be a tending to the child. I got some great recipes from my friend Beatrix Bell, I made some of my favorites and I am requesting things this weekend from Jeff. I will include the recipes when I can but know that anything that is my usual special I probably made up, sorry!

Monday I made several pounds of meat sauce, which will be fabulous over pasta in a pinch! Tuesday I made chicken and dumplings in the crockpot and I have to tell you it was amazing! Recipe for that is here and so easy! Wednesday I made 3 turkey quinoa meat loafs, I know 3 was a little nuts but I doubled this recipe thinking it would be 2 and turns out it I had more. Thanks Bea for both of those amazing recipes. Thursday I made this chicken crockpot goodness that I make all of the time. I kind of tripled the recipe so that we would have dinner and then 2 freezer meals.

Now Jeff is making several pounds of meatballs and I am really looking forward to meatball subs. I will be taking some to our friends who just had a baby a few weeks ago, I think they will enjoy! I am also making my mom's strawberry bread recipe. It makes 2 loaves so that will be one for us and one to take to our new friends who have a new baby.

If anyone is interested, I am happy to share the recipe for both that chicken crock pot dish (it has olive and prunes in it, so think sweet/savory) and the strawberry bread. I can easily put them into a pdf to link here, I just have the written down so I won't bother doing that unless you ask. Just leave me a comment and Im happy to share.

this will soon be strawberry nut bread!

Who knows what I will be cooking next week. I haven't gotten that far yet. I will keep you posted. I want to do that whole freezer crockpot thing where you put everything that you would crockpot into a bag and freeze it so you just have to dump in the crockpot and cook. I am having trouble finding recipes I like.

Last week I made 2 trips to Costco, yes 2. I told you I was kind of out of control. Tonight I am making pulled pork (one of my favorites). I am reigning myself in a bit and only making half or a third of the 14 lb pork butt I got last night from Costco. I am convinced that I will be so damn happy that I have all this food a few months after we have this baby. Maybe people will still come hang out with us because we will still have good food, like we usually do. It will just be precooked instead of the last few years where Chef Jeff made everything cooked to order. Times they are a changing but I still plan to eat well.

If anyone has any crockpot recipes that I might like, please share!  We eat relatively healthy so think basic veggies and protein and nothing covered in Velveeta cheese, I just threw up a little when I typed that. I am also looking for more good options of things to cook in large quantities that freeze well. Any suggestions?

The details are coming together....

First came the paint, then the decal....Oh and we ordered that damn chair weeks ago....But last week it finally arrived. So here she is!

It was a relief when it arrived and I still love it. It is super comfy and looks great! Love the color. 

When my mom was here for the shower, she bought this rug. I love it! Very good purchase, it makes me very happy. Thanks to Gram and Safta for getting this nursery in order with the necessities. If it was left to me, who knows what this room would look like! Would he sleep in shoe box, or maybe an empty dresser drawer? Now that we finally have a dresser?

Jeff ordered 2 covers for the changing table and they arrived a few days ago. This one is my favorite, the other one has a monkey on it. They are both super soft. It must be nice to be a baby and get to lay on soft stuff all of the time. 

This is the original inspiration piece that the nursery was built around. I got these hooks from Urban Outfitters, maybe before I was pregnant. I am just not sure exactly where I want to hang them. Jeff is driving me slightly insane to make a decision so he can get them hung but I'm not ready to commit so we wait. 

This weekend Jeff prepared our cloth diapers. This was a bit of a process that requires its own full post so thats coming soon. Last weekend he washed all of the baby's clothes and hung them up in the closet in order of size. I believe it is all coming together. 

This is the 36 week. I start going to the doctor weekly now, so Im guessing we will start getting progress reports on how close we are getting. This week we need to get the car seat installed and pack that hospital bag. 

I will be doing a cast of my belly too, that will be a whole thing and I can't wait to see the final product.  Im working on making a video for the post on the amazing baby shower that our friends gave us. Ah, what a blessing.

Hot Date on Friday Night

Things have changed for us in the past few years. The days of walking from our funky little Spanish Town houses to the bar or the parade route or Happy's Running Club seem to be memories from a distant past.

No complaints, we've had some time to transition. Planning the wedding was big undertaking, then we became homeowners. Now we are in the final days of it just being the two of us (plus Jasmine & Charlie), before the little one makes his appearance.

Maybe I'm just naive, but I thought we were supposed to be just chilling right now and the real work was going to start when he gets here. Every weekend we attack our never ending to do list. It feels good to be making progress but it seems like once we do one big project (like painting or decorating), then there is just another one around the corner.

This weekend, our goal is to get the must haves. You know, those things (like a car seat and a stroller) that we need to bring him home. So tonight, we tackled Babies R Us. We were there for less than an hour and I managed to get $800 of "necessities" and go to the bathroom 3 times. Good thing that Jeff had his clip board to keep us organized and the muscles to carry the goods to the car. My man has the muscles and the brains!

Since it was in the same parking lot, we popped into Kroger for a few items. 

The honeydew is for the fruit of the week, 35 week pic, to be taken tomorrow. I ran out of raspberry leaf tea (which I call vagina tea), our midwives recommended that I have 3 cups a day starting a few weeks ago. Since it comes 16-20 bags to a box, I am going thru it like crazy. The pomegranate soda was just an impulse buy at the register. Of course, Mr. Safety Inspector, only approved the purchase once he confirmed that it was caffeine free. 

Tomorrow is my last wedding before the baby. Then Sunday we head over to get the must haves from Franklin Goose.  Our other 2 registries, besides Franklin Goose and Babies R Us, were at Amazon and Pottery Barn Kids. Between these 4, we should be able to get everything we need. Right?

For now, I will have some tea...

Accessorizing the Signature Color

First, let me say that I acknowledge that I am slipping on my weekly updates. You know I do not care for excuses, especially of the "I don't have time" variety. However, since the last update we have managed to celebrate our 2 year wedding anniversary (go us!), have both of our mothers in town, have the best baby shower ever (thanks Kristen, Julie and Casey), celebrate my mothers birthday and Passover. Immediately following all of that, I survived 3 commercial photo shoot days. I'm "off" today, getting ready for one more tomorrow.

The follow up to the last post (where Jeff painted the nursery) is that we added a fabulous decal the accent wall. White birch trees with blue birds and a fun orange owl! I love it so much, I sit in there for a few minutes each day and admire it.

This was SO easy. I was a little worried that I had chosen a project that was a little more work than what we are capable of DIY-ing at the moment, but it was surprising simple. We got it out of the package and up on the wall in about 3 hours.

Now, we took our time, to make sure that we still loved each other throughout the process. We even took a snack break and got everything cleaned up. I have been telling people that we are total pros at this and can come over and decal a wall for you anytime. Im confident that we could get the next one up in less than 2 hours! With this chick's excellent supervising skills and the dude's flawless execution, we are pretty much masters. Just saying.

Since I am a little behind, I hadn't done it yet, BUT I did take a ton of photos with the intention of creating a step by step video of how to to put up a decal. This would be super helpful, if you ever wanted to do it. If no one is interested, Im probably not going to take the time to do that just yet. BUT, if you are, leave a comment and I will get it up ASAP.

The how to video won't take me long to get up, but I should probably tell you all about the amazing baby shower that we had last weekend. And I have a few thank you notes to get out to the wonderful people who shared that day with us.

Living in Color

You remember how long it took us to pick out that chair? Well, lets just say, it took longer than deciding on my new car, which I got last week. More on that later.....

The nursery is slowly but surely coming together. The chair should be delivered in April, just in time for the baby to arrive in beginning to mid May. I moved what was my office, for the first few months we were in this house, to a new room that is much better suited as a study. I should do a little post on how its coming together too. I will add that to my list.

Before the furniture was delivered, in the middle of a random snow day, Jeff got the room painted. Choosing the paint color was a process, just like the chair. 

First we went to Lowe's or Home Depot (I cant remember, we are at both like every other day) and got some swatches. I taped them to the wall and checked in to see how I felt about them over the next few days. I would take a look in the early morning, mid day and evening, to see how they looked in different lighting.  After a few days, I narrowed it down to these 4.

Since we knew we wanted to add a decal mural, we figured it was best to pick that out first and that would help make the decision. Since we decided on a nature/woodsy kind of thing, we picked the green. 

Once we decided on the color, which only took a week!, this dude started painting! He did a great job and got it finished before the furniture was delivered. 

While I love the gold/yellow and feel like it is such a happy color, I felt green was best for the wall.  I added my splash of yellow with the rug!

And here is what it looks like pre-mural, with the furniture. Next post will be putting up the decals, which turned out GREAT! And just in time, I really wanted it to be up before our moms come to visit and before our baby shower next weekend. I am so excited I can hardly stand it!

Mirror turned Chalkboard

This was my Thanksgiving project. Long overdue to get done and long overdue to share. My bad. Most of what we have to share is baby G related (like registering and getting this damn chair ordered), so I thought I would break it up a bit.

You know that I am passionate about upcycling, repurposing or whatever you want to call refusing to throw stuff away. That is how this DIY headboard came to pass and so many other projects.

The backstory on this mirror goes like this....I bought these 2 mirrors for like $35 off Craigslist for my small studio space that I rented in Dallas (circa 2009). When I went to pick them up, the girl nonchalantly mentions that they have these obnoxious giant nails thru the wood framing all the way around. Since I was already there and I needed a mirror, I just took the damn thing.

Now these have been wrapped up in packing paper for 2+ years and schlepped from Dallas to our first house in Richmond and now here. Just like the wood in our shed that became the DIY headboard, I swore to the Dude that I would figure out some amazing and fabulously creative way to use them. It took me some time, but now that we are in our new house it came to me.

I decided to turn the smaller of the two mirrors into a chalkboard to hang in the dining room. After I hammered out the giant nails that were in the frame (I've got a pic of that from the 2nd mirror project that we did today), I taped off the edges and spray painted the chalkboard paint directly onto the mirror.

It was so easy! I did take a few coats. I think I did it 3 times, just make sure it was even. I let it dry about a half hour each time in between. 

 Each week, we have been taking my pregnancy progress photo and writing the number of weeks on the chalkboard. It also is a fun place to write our menu when we have people over for dinner. I am sure we will use it for all sorts of stuff!

We have been tracking the baby's progress with his size corresponding to fruits and veggies. I couldnt find a rutabaga that week:)

If you are a Pinterest person, I added this to my DIY decor Pinterest board. Its here if you want to  repin and save it for a future project.

See, told you so! Never doubt my creative vision. Today we put the 2nd mirror into action. It looks amazing, more to come on that.