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

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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!

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!

Rock a Bye Baby

In last week's post (tackling the registry and other to dos), I mentioned the search for the perfect chair. I can not tell you how thankful we were to finally make a decision on this and get it ordered. I am sure that our mothers, were ready for us to make a decision and move on. I know for sure one of them was:). I also know that if she is going to spend as much time as she wants in this chair, with this baby, she will be happy that we got a nice comfy one.

When I tell you that we spent more time in search of this chair than we did picking out our next car, I am totally serious. Chair shopping proved to be much more challenging than expected. From what I hear, you spend a lot of time rocking the sweet little ones in these chairs, so comfort is key.

What I learned on my journey is that even the ugliest ones available are also REALLY expensive. I decided that if I was going to buy anything, I wanted to not hate it.  We had looked at this Pottery Barn chair early on but had some sticker shock. Then, like I mentioned, as we kept looking we learned all chairs are expensive, even the ugly ones. We decided on the one in the above photo that I am glamorously "modeling" for you all. It will be coming in the below color.

All I wanted was an upholstered (not wooden or leather) chair that was semi-modern with clean lines that swiveled or rocked. It didn't have to recline or have an ottoman. I wanted to be able to sit in it before buying it, which made the Little Castle chairs not an option. A lot of folks recommended these but I wasn't dropping $500 on something I couldn't see in person. I liked the way they looked but I just couldn't commit.

So, assuming that I will rock more than one baby in this chair, and that I will continue to like it when these babies are older, we went for the Pottery Barn chair. We are really grateful that our parents help us with making decisions and purchases like this. If we didn't have them, we would probably just not have anywhere to sit.

Good thing we ordered it when we did because it takes about 10 weeks before the can deliver it. By the time the nursery furniture gets here, Jeff gets the room painted (more on that) and decorated, the rug gets here (oh, yeah, another story!), the chair will be here just in time for the baby. We also saved 10% by registering for a few items at Pottery Barn.

If you are looking for a giant leather chair that looks like a 400 lb, 80 year old man would rest comfortably thru an entire Sunday of football or a wooden rocker/glider chair built for a quilting granny, you should be able to find that in a single afternoon instead of weeks of searching.

I have a whole list of stuff to tell you about, what do you want to know next? I am thinking paint samples and our (super long) process of choosing an accent wall color will make for an interesting story. Ok, maybe not super interesting but it will do.

Registry, and other works in progress.

Since we are expecting this baby to come in May, we have been super busy the last few weeks preparing for his arrival! Maybe I was kind of naive about this but I really thought that the crazy busy times, started after that baby got here. What do I know!

We are getting it done, little by little. We made the announcement to the world that we were expecting (seen here), then shared our gender reveal (here), now for the real prep work! Its kind of like planning  a wedding, except I am much more into this than I was the wedding. Maybe because, unlike the wedding, we can make decisions how we want to, and not have to tip toe around what works for everyone else, friends, family, friends of family. Nope this one is all us.

I am trying really hard to keep the habit of posting here at least once a week. There is so much I need to update you on, but I will spread it out, as to not overwhelm you as much as I have been overwhelmed the last few weeks. For now, I want to share my excitement about our upcoming shower!

My awesome girlfriends, Kristen (maid of honor from my wedding) and Julie and Casey (gender reveal party planners) are hosting this. I have no idea what they are planning but it is always awesome. Just like this shower invitation that I got in the mail this week. They know how to pick fun things that make me happy and know that I love to be surprised. How cute is this invite!

I am especially grateful to Casey for helping us with our registry and making sure we did it on time!

This guy is a handful but he is great to have around!

girls just want to have fun!

My mom and mother in law will be flying to Richmond for the shower, which will be nice. It is hard not having them be here but they do the best they can to be a part of each special thing. I would have loved for them to be here for our gender reveal party, but when Casey and Julie surprised us with having them join us via Skype that was pretty awesome too!  Totally unexpected and very special.

Registering kind of snuck up on us, I didn't realize it would be so intense! And such a time consuming process. Of course, I do have the world's most thorough researcher for a husband. He has read this book, cover to cover and refers to it as his bible!
 
Seriously, if you or someone you know (who likes to make ultra informed decisions on everything) is having a baby, get this book. Jeff has read it cover to cover and it has all the safety information and the best place to buy everything.


It really helped us when registering. We are registered at a few places (see below for details). Babies R Us is a big box store that has a lot of stuff and is easy to order from so we went there. I added Amazon.com at the last minute, because it was suggested to me by previous new mamas who said having gift cards to Amazon was great to be able to order things yourself and have them show up to your door. I also registered for like 5 things at Pottery Barn because it saved us 10% on this chair. More on this agonizing chair decision and how we spent more time chair shopping than shopping for a car.

The place that I am most excited about registering was a small local store, Franklin Goose. They have very unique, environmentally friendly products. You can order online, which is great for our out of town friends and family. The staff is SO helpful and knowledgeable on the 2 things that are really important to us, cloth diapering and making your own food.

We went to a diapering class there that was SO helpful and we are ready for the challenge, yes, I know you think we are nuts. No, we don't care what you think, we are doing it anyway. Unless you think we are awesome, in that case, we agree. I don't know why I am surprised when people say super negative things about something I am excited about, but that somehow 30+ years into this life, it still kind of gets to me.

Because so many of our friends and family are out of town and won't be able to join us for the shower, we wanted to include registry information here, if you wanted that.  I added the links so you can go straight there, some of them were not easy to find! Anyone who sends anything before the March 23 shower, I am saving your gifts to open then so it can be like you were here in spirit.
Babies R Us
Amazon
Franklin Goose 
Pottery Barn

Things coming soon:
The Chair Shopping Adventures
More details on the Gender Reveal Party
Weekly Pregnancy Photos Journal
Letters to the Baby
Hiring a Doula
Why Cloth Diapers?
On a Mission for the Perfect Chair
Nursery Decor

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Gender Reveal

So last week we had a gender reveal party to find out the sex of our baby. This was by far, the best way for us to find out. You know that I LOVE a party, especially with surprises and lots of hype. Our fabulous friends, Casey and Julie, really went way above and beyond to make this incredibly special for us. We will never forget it. Thank you so much to everyone who gave a little something to make this so amazing for us.

Oh, in case you somehow missed it....we are having a baby. I have posted this video on Twitter and Facebook about a million times but I will go ahead and put it here in case you want to watch it again.

We got some great photos and videos that I need to edit so that they are manageable enough to share, so those are going to be added soon, I promise. For now, I did get this video up so that we could announce the big news and share how we found out what we would be expecting in May.

I will be adding more, like our letters to each other and the baby and Aunt Casey's poem that she wrote for us and the baby. Just like her, it is hysterical, very sweet and really fun. We also played a lot of fun games. Casey and Julie surprised us by having our moms join the party via Skype. Wow, technology is so cool. This was great because they got to be a part of the last game we played (that I won!) and they got to see us open the box and find out with us.

Having an incredibly talented photographer as a friend is a wonderful gift. Here are a few of my favorites that my friend Julie took for us that night.

"the" revealing photo

Everyone had to wait for the video to hear the news, but I did make 1 exception to that rule.  

I think she is saying "Please tell me this is not true!"

Happy mom and dad!

This is, by far, my favorite photo!

Wait, no, its this one!

I think this is a printable. 

Team blue for the win.

One of our best surprises for the night.

Team pink, sad to have lost the game but still excited to welcome baby boy.

Little Spencer, says "Don't be sad, little boys are lots of fun!"

I write to the baby every week, this is the last letter before we know the sex.

Always festive. The details are important. 

Future big brother!

More videos and and photos to come! Are you liking the personal blog updates? I am shooting for once a week! Lets hope I can keep it up!