Yup. Stilllllllllllll pregnant.

How jealous are you of my super sweet Chuck Norris style? This delightful hat/facial hair is the result of a very successful Dirty Santa game a couple of nights ago.

And as you can see, the offspring is still inside my belly. I've been saying from the beginning that she would be a Christmas Eve or Christmas baby. At this point, I'm really hoping that she is. I feel like a December 26th birthday would be such a letdown; nobody is motivated to celebrate on the day after Christmas.

We had a non-stress test and ultrasound on Monday because we hit the 41 week mark. She performed like a boss. Since I really want to avoid medical induction, I got lots of tips from my doula and birth class teacher to ensure that the doctors had no reason to want to induce immediately: I soaked in the tub right before the appointment and then downed a large Nalgene of water on the way, there was plenty of amniotic fluid. Right before the non-stress test I ate a granola bar with chocolate chips in it and chugged a bottle of orange juice, she went nuts. The doctor actually called her "an overachiever."

The doctor said everything looked great, and gave us another week to try to get things started. I've been power walking, squatting, and walking up and down stairs so hard that my thighs are sore. I've calmed down on the exercise because starting labor off with sore thighs seems like a really bad idea. I made a big pot of spicy veggie chili a couple days ago, and have been adding more and more hot sauce to every bowl. I've been taking long epsom salt baths. We've been having lots of awkward giant pregnant belly sex. I've been drinking pineapple juice. I've been taking evening primrose oil via my mouth and my vag. Guess what has happened? NOTHING. No signs of labor whatsoever.

It's time to step up my game. Yesterday afternoon I went to an acupuncturist who specializes in preggos and she stuck a bunch of needles in me that should get contractions started within 24ish hours. Last night I drank castor oil. I have until Tuesday to evict this kid and I am trying my hardest to make it happen today or tomorrow.

My mom and sister are here. This video best expresses the current situation in our household. They are freaking the fuck out with excitement but NOTHING IS HAPPENING.

It's time to get this party started.

She was due yesterday. I'm still pregnant. Meh.

The due date was yesterday. No action so far. I've been walking walking and walking some more. We've been having awkward giant pregnant belly sex as much as possible. I'm about to start chugging castor oil if there is no progress soon. I just don't want the poor kid to have a Christmas birthday. She keeps dropping further and further which is resulting in nothing but an abundance of extremely unpleasant round ligament pain.

The anticipation is driving me nuts! It's like that feeling you would get when you were a kid on Christmas Eve; you are so excited to see what Santa brought, but Christmas morning seems UNBEARABLY far away. I just want to meet her and see her little face and hear her little noises and smell her baby smell!

I know that 40 weeks is just an average and that first babies have a tendency to be late... buuuuutttttt now that the magical semi-arbitrary due date has come and gone, I'm getting antsy as fuck. I JUST WANT THIS KID OUT!

So in the meantime I'm placating myself with doughnuts and Gilmore Girls and bubble baths and as many foot rubs as I can cajole out of my dear husband. The house is clean and all laundry has been done. All my Christmas shopping is completed and the gifts are wrapped. Nothing like the impending arrival of a newborn to get my ass motivated to get the Christmas shopping done ahead of time for the first time ever.

God I hope she's born soon. Everyone I know who has a birthday near Christmas abhors it. (And I've heard all about them, ever since we got pregnant and started telling people the due date I've heard alllllllllll the Christmas birthday stories, do trust.) Not to mention I absolutely cannot wait for sushi and wine. Oh man, sushi and wine, nom nom nom.

Dudes, I am super pregnant.

I am due in 10 days. WTF!?! Some new developments since I last discussed pregnancy:

I can't see my lady bits, like, at all. It's weird. Personal grooming has gone out the window. I scored a Groupon for a $25 wax job, so we'll have that issue addressed on Tuesday. I can't wait. Things are getting ridiculous down there and considering how many people are about to be staring at it, something has got to be done.

My boobs just keep growing. They grew a ton the first trimester and then pretty much plateaued, until last week. Suddenly they are significantly bigger again and let's be serious, as someone who is normally a smallish B, I'm loving it.

The baby dropped overnight. Literally, I woke up Tuesday morning, looked in the mirror, and was shocked. The shape of my belly had completely changed overnight. So naturally, I immediately texted my sister a nudy pic and she confirmed that my belly did, in fact, look completely different than Thanksgiving weekend when I was prancing around naked in front of her while we marveled over my ginormous belly.

 

(Disregard the awkward angle of this picture that makes my legs look strangely short. The photographer was my husband standing in his boxers exasperatedly (spell check said it's a word!) taking a quick picture for me after I drug him out of the guest bathroom that he was in the middle of painting the most perfect shade of retro doctor office green.)

I'm dilated! Ok, so as of Thursday morning it was only half a centimeter, but hey, that's progress. The doctor was actually able to poke the top of the baby's head!

I can't sleep. I've always had insomnia issues, but it has gotten out of control over the past two weeks. I am suddenly a super duper light sleeper; as in, my dog stands by the bed and stares at me and I wake up. I am also finding myself waking up for no reason and immediately being wide as fuck awake. I don't know if it's my body preparing to care for a newborn throughout the night or just my hormones being janky, but I am not a fan, not one bit.

I have gained almost 50 pounds. I am normally a thin person (it's a combo of getting lucky in the genetic lottery + clean eating + having a very energetic German Shepherd who requires an absurd amount of speed walks). The weight gain isn't bothering me too much, except that I see it in my face big time. But it's ok because soon I'll be breastfeeding constantly, eating super clean again, and be able to walk faster than a geriatric sloth. Speaking of...

I walk slower than your grandma. If I walk fast, at all, I get Braxton Hicks contractions. Not a fan. My dog seems to be enjoying the shift to more sniffing time on the walks and significantly more dog park time, but it's driving me crazy. Plus, now that she's dropped it feels different/strange (and not in a good way) and I'm getting dangerously close to waddle status. Not cute.

And now I leave you with these delightful gems from our maternity photoshoot. The photographer is a good friend of ours, and we had fun goofing around with her and along with a ton of amazing shots, she also captured some ridiculous ones.

Caitlin Jamison Photography is amazing!

FYI: The middle one is Lee sneaking in a little bit of dinosaur. It's a thing that has been happening in our friend group since college. Basically, T-Rex impressions are hilarious when you're drunk.

All natural birth, I'm doing it. (eek!)

When I first got pregnant, I just didn't think about the whole birth thing. I mean, I knew it was going to happen eventually, I just kept putting it off as something I would think about later. Newborns seem so very teeny tiny... until you think about one exiting through your lady bits. So I chose to ignore that inevitable event for the first half of my pregnancy.

Caitlin Jamison Photography

Now that we are nearly 38 weeks, I'm thinking about it constantly, and it no longer terrifies me.  Why? Because my best coping mechanism is knowledge and I've been researching the crap out of it. I have been reading all sorts of books, articles, and blogs about birth and breastfeeding. My husband and I are taking twelve weeks of classes on The Bradley Method. I have been talking to every mother I know about their birth experiences (and wow do they vary drastically!).

So I had to make some decisions about how I want all of this to go down. I always had a feeling that I wanted to go all natural, but the more I research, the more sure I am. My approach to labor and delivery is that while yes, I will be giving birth in a hospital, it is because I want to be prepared for a worst case scenario. However, my birth will most likely be low-risk, normal, and should not require any medical intervention.  Birth is a natural event, it is not a medical emergency. My body is amazing and knows what it is doing, I just have to go with the flow (albeit a painful and exhausting flow).

We have hired a doula. I plan to labor at home for as long as possible. I do not want an IV, epidural, or any sort of drugs. I won't go into it all here because I could go on for days, but basically there is a lot of evidence that all the medical interventions now considered to a normal part of birth in American hospitals (induction, epidurals, pitocin, etc.) have a tendency to create a need for further medical intervention (and a scary high rate of cesarean sections).

Some of the things that I keep reminding myself of:

• Women have been doing it since the beginning of time, it's only recently that women have been giving birth drugged (and holy shit the early stuff was s-c-a-r-y).
• Babies born naturally have a tendency to be more alert and responsive after birth.
• Mothers who give birth naturally have a tendency to recover faster.
• The initial breastfeeding has a tendency to be easier for babies born naturally.
• The drugs in a mother's system can inhibit the release and reception of the hormones that cause the natural "high" mothers experience immediately post-birth.

So yup, I'm doing it all naturally. And while yes, it intimidates the hell out of me, women have been doing it since the beginning of time and I can do it too. Hopefully it will all go smoothly and there will be no need for medical intervention, only monitoring. So wish me luck, because in a couple of weeks I'm going to be squeezing a tiny human out of my vag and feeling every bit of it. Gah!

Currently

Reading
The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding because the only books I have read in months are about birth or breastfeeding. Turns out, until recently I knew basically nothing about these subjects, so I'm trying to cram as much info about this stuff as possible into my overwhelmed brain before she decides to make her appearance.

Loving
That at our OB appointment on Monday the doctor had the ultrasound tech do a quick check to confirm that she is now head down (after being transverse and enthusiastically kicking the crap out of my side for over a month). The sweet ultrasound tech snuck in a few quick 3D pictures because at our previous ultrasounds the baby always had her adorable little hand firmly planted in front of her face. This time she cooperated and we got a great shot. I've looked at this picture a bajillion times since Monday, I just can't believe that I'm making that beautiful tiny human with my sweet uterus skillz!

Listening
To the wonderful peaceful silence that is our cul-de-sac in the middle of a weekday. All I hear is the rustling of the leaves in the wind and it's superb. Oh, and Dexter licking his junk... soundtrack of my life.

Thinking
About how I really wish that the people who are finishing installing our new kitchen cabinets today could give me a more specific time frame than "after lunch". I really need to run some errands but I'm just chilling here watching Dexter lick his junk instead.

Impressing
Myself with my decorating abilities. Over the years we have been very lucky to receive some excellent free furniture from various family members. I am a decorating ninja and can work almost anything into my decorating scheme if it's free. We recently received this sweet rug from my grandparents and while I would never have thought to choose that salmon color, it is totally working for me. Also, that awesome red leather chair just came to us from Lee's grandfather, and while red leather would not be my first choice, the fact that it was free makes it work just fine.

Wishing
That I weren't waiting on these cabinet installing jerkfaces because while I need to run errands, I could also convince myself very easily that a nap would be an excellent use of my time.

Wearing
Leggings, a hoodie, and Toms. My uniform these days.

Wanting
To finish up with the house. Our goal is to have everything unpacked, the kitchen cabinets and backsplash done, the sink in our master bathroom functional, and all the painting completed before the baby arrives. I have a feeling that she will be arriving fashionably late (the due date is 12/16), so I'm not stressing too hard... yet.

Needing
A massage. Pregnant chicks in their last trimester aren't kidding when they complain about the back pain. All I want to do is crack my back and then bend over and touch my toes, but there's this minor issue of a giant baby belly preventing me from any semblance of flexibility.

Admitting
That I wish people would just buy us stuff off of our registry, dammit. There is a baby shower for me this Sunday, and while I am so very very thankful for the generosity of these ladies who are giving me gifts, I HAVE A REGISTRY FOR A REASON. While I don't want to sound ungrateful, and I realize that little pink onesies are more fun to buy, there is a lot of practical stuff that we NEED. I was just looking at our registry this morning and almost nothing has been purchased. A crib mattress isn't very glamorous, but it's something that we must have whether someone else buys it for us or we buy it for ourselves. When I buy gifts for friends and I don't want it to feel impersonal, I usually buy one practical boring thing off their registry and one smaller fun thing that I know they will appreciate. 

Feeling
Incredibly nervous but super duper excited that we will be meeting our little nugget so soon! I don't have much experience caring for newborns, but I can figure it out just like every other new mother since the dawn of time, right?

PS. Feel free to steal this post prompt, I totally nabbed it from Tami.

What are your favorite Podcasts?

I haven't worked since we left Nashville in August, so I've had a ridiculous amount of time on my hands lately. Thank god for podcasts. I listen to them with my cats all day long while I paint, unpack, and decorate the house. I listen to them in the car. I listen to them while I fall asleep at night and while I lie awake at night (thanks, insomnia).

These are my current favorites:

Serial is a spinoff of This American Life (another one of my favorites). It explores the true story of a murder committed in Baltimore in 1999 over an entire season of episodes. I am 100% sucked in and it's painful to wait an entire week for each new episode. I just want to know who did it already, dammit!

I recently discovered Stuff You Missed in History Class and have been loving it. I am a total history nerd, so this is right up my alley. I will admit, some of the topics can be a bit... dry. So I just scroll though the list and look for topics that I might find interesting.

 

The Savage Lovecast is awesome. It is hosted by Dan Savage, a relationship and sex advice columnist. If you are easily offended by... well.. anything, then this is not the podcast for you. My sex and kink knowledge base has expanded significantly since I began listening to his podcast. Now I can't help but wonder what kind of weird shit people I know are into because ohmygod... I can't even... you just have to listen. Your mind will be blown, TRUST ME.

Radiolab has been a favorite of mine for years. It is just two dudes exploring topics and concepts that they find interesting. I don't know what else to say. Just give it a listen, you won't be disappointed.

Do you have a favorite podcast? I would love some recommendations!

I built furniture. I am amazing.

I am a champion. Bold statement, I know. But seriously, I put together an entire IKEA dresser all by myself with minimal swearing in one afternoon. The adventure began with the dresser in the form of three very heavy boxes.

(The lighting for the above picture was terrible, but I knew my husband would not be amused in the least if I made him stop priming the kitchen walls to come move the boxes to the other side of the room just so I could take a pretty picture. Thank goodness Eloise volunteered to do a sassy pose for me.)

My mother-in-law, almost sister-in-law (Lee's brother is getting married Saturday!), and I went to IKEA Friday and returned with treasures including a dresser for the nursery.

People aren't lying when they say that IKEA furniture construction is no joke. The instructions have no words and the pieces are not labeled. What. The. Fuck!?!

Thank goodness I am a genius and showed all those random pieces of wood and small metal bits who was boss. The level of triumph I am currently feeling is akin to if I had cut down the tree myself and built this bad boy from scratch.

I BUILT FURNITURE. I AM AMAZING.

However, this is currently the only piece of furniture in the nursery. I might need to work on that...

PS. Isn't the wall color fabulous? It's called creamy cucumber and I am LOVING it.

Please keep your opinions on my belly size to yourself, jerkface.

I am tall (5'10") and, until about six months ago, thin. I feel like my belly is quite large and continues to grow larger with each passing day (and Cook-Out milkshake). Apparently the rest of the world does not.

I am so over the constant "I can't believe you are so far along!" and "But you're so small!" A while ago I read a post (I wish I remembered where) on how a pregnant woman's belly will never be the right size, people will constantly tell a pregnant woman that her belly is either too big or too small, or both. SO TRUE.

People, please keep your opinions on my belly size to yourself. I actually find it sort of offensive when people tell me that my belly is small. I realize that many of them intend it to be a compliment since our culture is so fucked up and obsessed with weight that people think that telling a PREGNANT woman that her belly is small is a good thing

What these people don't know, is that we have a marginal cord insertion, which means that the umbilical cord is attached to the side of the placenta instead of the center, which in some cases can lead to undernourishment. We've been monitoring her growth and I am happy to report that as of last week, she is roughly four pounds which is perfectly average for 32 weeks! But my baby being too small is still a sensitive subject for me.

So please, tell a pregnant woman that she is beautiful, she is glowing, or even that her tits look fantastic, but keep your opinions on her belly size to yourself. She gives zero shits about your arbitrary opinion on the size of her baby belly, I promise.

Fun fact: your belly size (from the pubic bone to the top of the uterus when lying down)  should roughly equal the number of weeks that you are pregnant. For example, the fact that I am 32 weeks pregnant and my belly measures 32 centimeters means that I am actually textbook average. Booyah!

I love my perfectly average baby belly. Suck it haters.

We are moved in! ...kinda

Well, we are living in the new house...sort of. Our bedroom is the only room that is fully functional at the moment. We've been staying here since Saturday, camping out in the bedroom when we aren't getting stuff done.

Allow me to give you the grand tour (let's call these the "before" pictures)....

Living room:

Dining room:

Study:

Kitchen:

Looking spiffy, eh? NOT.

We had family and friends help us move in and paint on Sunday. I've been attempting to finish up some of the painting since then, but I have chronic tendonitis in my right arm and shoulder that has been exacerbated by the pregnancy soooooo... I am a delicate creature at the moment. It sucks donkey dick. I am going insane being here all day with so much that needs to be done but not much I can do on my own. I can't do much painting at a time, I can't carry boxes up from the basement, and my husband has been working late (not by choice) every day this week. It's an issue. Luckily he will be home all weekend and we are going to try to get as much done as possible! I NEED ROOMS. Even if we just get the living room put together, I will feel so fancy being able to sit on my own couch again!

We are having an island built for the kitchen and new granite counter tops have been selected. I can't wait to see my new kitchen come together!

Let's talk about choosing paint colors.

IT'S SO HARD! At our previous house, I tried to push myself out of my blue/green comfort zone and chose a yellow for our foyer... which we both hated. So this time around I'm just going with my gut and choosing colors that speak to me... which are teal/turquoise blues with a bit of green.

In other news, I retrieved our kitties from my parents' house on Wednesday! I have missed them so much and it makes me indescribably happy to wake up in the morning to find them both purring furiously next to us on the bed.

These two are champions. I have had them since 2008 when they were babies and have lost count of how many times they have moved with me. They did some serious exploring Wednesday evening, but by the next morning they were back to devoting as much time as possible to their napping. Lazy bitches.

And that's all for now folks, hopefully I will have some real rooms to show sometime next week. For the sake of my sanity, let's hope I do.

In one week I will no longer be living with my in-laws! YESSS!!!

Guessssssssssss what you chicken butts?!?!? We close on our new house TOMORROW! Super pumped about this. We are moving all of our furniture on Sunday and plan to start living in it Sunday night.

Here are some of the reasons I am extra excited to not be living in my in-laws' basement any longer:

Pantsless/braless midnight snacks. At the moment, if/when I am hungry in the middle of the night, I have to get completely dressed to go upstairs to the kitchen. His parents stay up super late and it is never safe to assume that I will not encounter them, no matter the hour. I cannot wait to be able to wander down to the kitchen sans pants and bra for snacks no matter what time of the day it is. Hell, I plan to spend an entire day without pants or a bra on just because I can!

No more awkward chitchat. His parents are very sweet and I do really like them... BUT sometimes I want to be able to walk through the house without having to stop for a five minute conversation every time I run into one of them. He is retired and she works from home, so at least one of them is ALWAYS at the house.

Doin' it without constantly listening for my in-laws. His mom's office space (she works part-time from home) is directly outside our bedroom door, so there is always the danger that she will wander down to her office late-night because she just remembered such and such that she needs to take care of asap. Nothing like the sound of your mother-in-law's footsteps to kill the mood IMMEDIATELY.

Guilt-free sleeping in. I just want to be able to sleep as late as I want, ok!?! I am naturally a night owl and found that after I stopped working, I quickly reverted back to my late nights/late mornings schedule. Add the fact that my insomnia has returned full force the past several weeks (and I'm steering clear of my sleeping pills while I'm pregnant and breastfeeding), and some days I just want to sleep until lunchtime. I. Can't. Wait! As I get into my third trimester I am finding that I need more and more sleep, and I can't wait to do it in our own bed in a quite house while spooning my cats. Speaking of...

Our creatures. Our kitties and puppy have spent the majority of the past two months at my parents' farm and I am so excited to see their adorable faces on a daily basis again!


Lee was out of town the past week for work, so I spent it at the farm with my parents. I was able to spend lots of time chillaxing with my parents, and even got to visit my 90 year old grandfather who is over the moon excited about his impending great-grandfatherhood.

Last weekend was the best little music festival around aka Shakori Hills. I got to spend Saturday enjoying it with my family and Sunday with some good friends. I hadn't been able to go since we moved to Nashville, so it was great to be back. I just had to document Baby Girl's first Shakori:

We will be 31 weeks tomorrow. Eek! I can't believe that I am so far along. When did this happen?!?

Plaid scarves, tiny frogs, and grilled cheese...

I realize that I am being rather cliche by even mentioning this in blogland right now, as it seems to be the topic of the week, but I AM SO EXCITED ABOUT FALL. It is seriously my favorite season. Scarves and boots and layers and warm drinks and crispy evenings and blanket cuddles. I am loving it! And here are five other things that I am loving right now:

New scarves. I am a bit scarf obsessed anyways, and now that I'm trying to make my small closet of maternity clothes as versatile as possible, I've given myself permission to buy a few new ones. It's totally legit since they'll still be my size in four months, right?

That's some straight up fashion blogger shit, right there. You almost can't tell that I'm wearing pajamas and no makeup, right?

Tomato soup and grilled cheese. It is overcast and nippy today, how could I not?

Sir Poindexter is here! While we've been dwelling in my in-laws' basement, Dexter has been living it up on my parents' farm. That is, until he somehow managed to get a nasty cut on his back. The vet stitched him up and put in a drain, which means no running around balls to the wall crazy on the farm for a bit. So he's here in the basement, spending the days chillaxing with me and ensuring that I get up off my increasingly large lazy pregnant ass for long walks on a daily basis.

He has been obsessed with hunting the tiny frogs that dwell on the banks of my inlaws' lake.

 Despite how hard he stalks them, he hasn't managed to get one yet.

Crockpots. First of all, it is fall which automatically means crockpot time, duh. Second, I love making a ton of food at once and then having lots of leftovers in the fridge. Since I am eating constantly, I love having a healthy, hearty snack readily available at all times. I made this chicken, sweet potato, and kale soup last night and it is most definitely a keeper. I doubled the sweet potato and kale to stretch it a little further.

I have leftovers for days, and that means I am one happy lazy cook.

Birth classes. We start birth classes tomorrow. I signed up for a twelve week series of classes on The Bradley Method. They are all about natural labor and birth as well as breastfeeding, postpartum care, caring for a newborn, and more. Hopefully this will make me a bit more confident about the whole baby exiting through my lady bits situation...

The end.

Don't be jealous of my sweet 80s maternity flannel.

I have a new favorite maternity shirt. My mom "borrowed" it from my dad's closet when she was pregnant with me and proceeded to wear it throughout all three of her pregnancies. She loved it so much that it was still lurking in the back of her closet last week (her youngest baby is now 22). I adore it. It is super comfy, perfectly long, and I'm loving the bitchin' purple/turquoise combo.

I am now in my third trimester. Whaaaaaaaaaat? It's time to start seriously thinking about how this human is going to exit my womb...yikes.

As I mentioned previously, I greatly appreciate all the bloggers who share about their pregnancies. I have always been intrigued by pregnancy and babies, and always enjoy leaning as much as I can. So here are some more of my experiences as of 27 weeks into this, that some pregnant ladies may not be sharing with you during casual conversation:

I can see the bottom of my belly button. I have a pretty average innie (I guess?), and have never really been able to see the very very bottom where all the skin gathers. It is now stretched wide open and I'm not gonna lie, it's slightly disconcerting.

Boob veins.  Before I spent a glorious long weekend at the beach earlier this month, I was looking quite pale, per usual, and had all these huge crazy blue veins suddenly appear all over my chest and boobs. My body is preparing to sustain a human life, NBD.

Dark nipples. And on the topic of my newly large(ish) breasticles, my nipples have completely changed colors. Whoa.

Pantyliners are a must. A friend had warned me about the need for pantyliners during pregnancy, especially towards the end. Yup, she wasn't lying. About week 25 I discovered that little joy.

Swollen feet. So my body is doing this new cool thing where if I am on my feet continually for more than an hour or two, they swell. A lot. To the point where I have to cram them into my Tom's like sausage into a casing. My ankles always join the party too, mmmmm... cankles.

Doin' it. While my libido has definitely increased, so has my sensitivity and my girth. It's a delicate balance and while it is still quite enjoyable, I sure am looking forward to someday doin' it sans giant belly containing our kicking offspring.

In some ways, I can't believe I only have three months left! In three short months we will suddenly find ourselves with a newborn that is completely and 100% our responsibility. Eek! But at the same time, I also can't believe I have three months still to go, my belly is starting to be a real nuisance and her kicks already seem so strong. She nailed me in the top of my bladder a couple days ago and I nearly wet myself. True story.

A New Abode

We found a house! And we're feeling really good about it, it's ridiculous how perfectly perfect it is. The lot is over half an acre. It's in a neighborhood in a great school zone, but tucked back into a cul-de-sac and woods so it feels private. There's a large backyard for Sir Poindexter and future tiny humans to enjoy.

It's two stories plus a finished basement. The entire main floor is hardwood. It used to be a four bedroom until some genius turned the smallest bedroom into a gigantic walk-in closet off the master. 

It's pretty much move-in ready and since the price was right, we're going to be able to redo the kitchen immediately!

I am embarrassingly over-excited about designing my own kitchen. First, that ugly ass wallpaper has got to go. We're going to paint the walls a light turquoise/teal, replace the counter tops with a light gray granite, install a white subway tile back splash, replace the hardware, and replace the grimy old white appliances with sparkly stainless steel ones! I AM SO EXCITED. Ya'll, I have been watching an absurd amount of HGTV recently and am feeling super inspired. Do you want to see an inspiration picture (aka the same picture from my last post)? Of course you do.

via

I can't wait for my shiny new kitchen. Ohmygoodness.

Fingers and toes crossed that all goes well with the inspection and homeboy buying our house in Nashville doesn't bail like a dick. I'm looking forward to having a couple of months to get settled into our new space before baby girl arrives.

Five things that are making me happy on this lovely Friday.

We got an offer on our house in Nashville last night! Nothing is guaranteed at this point, but it is a good sign regardless.


These boots arrived in the mail yesterday. Thank you for the birthday money, Nana dearest!

They are going to work well with the fall/winter look I am sure I will be rocking 97% of time until the baby arrives: large top, leggings, and scarf. Maternity wear is so damn comfortable, I love it.


Joanna Gaines, the co-host of the HGTV show Fixer Upper, is my new spirit animal. I have been watching an ungodly amount of HGTV with my mother-in-law over the past few weeks, and I am OBSESSED with this chick's style.

She does a sort of farm chic look, which I normally do not like, but she pulls it off like a boss.

White, gray, blue, and hardwood. My decorating mantra. I'm crossing my fingers for exposed beams in our next house SO HARD.

I'm promising myself that we're going to get as much work done as possible in our new house before the baby arrives, because I know that once she arrives all decorating will come to a screeching halt for awhile. (Hoping so hard that we are in a new house before she arrives! I love my inlaws, but don't want to bring my newborn home to their basement.)

But seriously, I'm loving every single house that she decorates. And she manages to juggle mothering four little kids. And her outfits are always on point.


This vegetable noodler (that's what I call it anyways) that my mother-in-law gave me for my birthday. I made zucchini noodles with shrimp and tomatoes tossed in pesto the other night and it was amazeballs. I want to try beets next. I'm about to noodle every vegetable in the kitchen, for serious.


My baby bump. I love love my baby belly, and good thing, because it is growing crazy fast.

Birthday Baby Bump

I turned 28 on Wednesday. And while 28 is a bit intimidating as I can no longer claim to be in my mid-twenties, I am happy with where I am right now. I am married to my best friend, back in North Carolina surrounded by friends and family, and creating my new favorite human with my magical baby making belly.

My standard birthday dinner is sushi and martinis, but considering both are off limits at the moment, we did fondue instead. It was delicious and super fun. We did the full on four course meal: cheese, salad, oil, and chocolate. Nom nom nom.

I'll be 24 weeks tomorrow and feeling quite pregnant. I swear, my belly gets bigger every day. My app says that my uterus is now the size of a soccer ball (it starts out the size of a large lemon). My constant state of being is either hungry, sleepy, or both. I often have to get back up out of bed to make myself a second dinner because I will suddenly be absolutely starving and breakfast is just too far away.

I'm feeling her little kicks every day. Lee felt her kick for the first time a couple nights ago, which was cool. It's a strange feeling, knowing that it's a tiny human inside my belly that's squirming all around and kicking me from the inside out. With every kick, I get more and more excited to meet her, this tiny human that is going to change me and my life forever.

Only 113(ish) more days until she arrives! It seems so soon and yet so far away. We have a lot to do before then like sell our Nashville house, buy a house here, move out of my in-laws' basement, and acquire all the many many things that it apparently takes to successfully care for a newborn. Seriously guys, ohmygod. My sister-in-law (aka mother of two wee ones) took me to Babies"R"Us to help me register for baby crap and whoa. I don't know how the human race survived with women having babies in caves for so long as apparently newborns and toddlers require approximately 734 various plastic items to survive in the world. It's bonkers.

Living in the Parents' Basement

We survived made the big move on Sunday and are now residing in my in-laws' basement. Our house is on the market and the first showing was today.

The move was bittersweet, it was the first house we ever owned. It was also the first place we lived together as "real" adults. Previously we were in the same small town where we both did our undergrad, he was in grad school and I was working full time. It never felt like we were official adults. We were still renting, partying constantly, and living like college students.

After we moved to Nashville for his job, we bought our first home, adopted Sir Poindexter, launched our careers, and found out that we are going to be parents. I came to know inch, every nook and cranny of that house. I could walk through it confidently at night with no lights on (and pray I didn't step on a painful dog toy). It was starting to really feel like ours, and I could picture us raising our babies there.

But here we are, starting over again. On the hunt for a new house that we can be settled into before the baby comes in December. Trying to decide whether to prioritize vintage charm and location or square footage and a backyard. It's a daunting, yet exciting task for sure.

We spent our Saturday watching HGTV, house hunting online, and playing countless rounds of Settlers of Catan. Marvelously relaxing.

We found out what the baby has in its pants!

We had our anatomy ultrasound on Monday, which included the baby's pants parts! So Tuesday, I announced the pregnancy/gender on Facebook:

*I don't share our last name on the blog because A) the internet is full of creepers and B) I don't want my blog to pop up in search results when someone (for example, a potential employer) searches my name.

Since we're planning on several kids (threeish), neither of us had our heart set on a certain gender. We are so excited to be having a baby girl! I had a feeling it was a girl. Whenever I dream about the baby, she's always a toddler, about a year and a half old, and always in pigtails and always absolutely adorable. Early in the pregnancy, I found myself using the pronouns "she" and "her" when I wasn't thinking and slipped up. I was right!

Knowing that's its a girl and seeing her squirm all around on the ultrasound just made me want to meet her so badly! I can't believe we have to wait 19.5 more weeks, gah! I know it will fly by though. And despite the below picture, we have high hopes that she will be super cute.

As of 5:00 today, I will be unemployed!

Guess who's excited that today is her last day of work!

I was recently promoted in May. While the increase in dollars was worth it, the new position was not as challenging or mentally stimulating as I had hoped. So I'm not terribly distraught to have an excuse to move on...


But I will super duper miss some of the friends I've made there. My best work friend's birthday is Saturday, so she will be arriving to work this morning to find this on her desk:

 

Not bad, eh? I'm rather proud of myself. Note that the card is completely glitter, the extreme sparkle-tastic nature of it is not fully represented in this picture. The awesome balloons are attached to a very easy to care for houseplant for her new house. She says that she loves plants, but can't keep them alive. I've had one of these for years and it is still going strong. (It's a Nephthytis, in case you give a shit.)

We're seeing as many friends as possible over the weekend, then spending next week packing and cleaning furiously. We are moving August 3rd and nothing is in boxes yet, gah!