Progress

Above are some pictures of the nursery, which I'm gaining on little by little. I still need to organize everything since I've just thrown stuff into baskets and shelves in no logical placement, but I'll get to that soon. For now, we have all the furniture we need (except I've decided I want a toy chest to store blankets/books/toys) including the recliner Ted talked me into getting in place of a rocker or glider. I understand his argument that we'll get more use out of a recliner in years to come, and it IS pretty comfortable and it rocks very nicely :) We don't have much up on the walls, but we're saving that for after the baby is born and we can accessorize more gender-specifically.

We've had fun the past few days. For my birthday, Ted got me a gift certificate for a cooking demonstration/meal at a gourmet food store here in town. You can go online and check on which chefs will be teaching on a given night, and the menu they'll teach and prepare. The chefs are from all over Indy from different restaurants, and I picked the night with the chef from R. Bistro who prepared lamb. There were 12 of us in the class (Ted came along) and I loved how small and intimate it was, and how you could ask questions of the chef along the way. The lamb was delicious and we picked up some great cooking tips. We both agreed we'd love to do it again, so a big thanks to Teddy for such a creative gift (and a big thanks to anyone who may have steered his thinking in that direction...;)

Friday night we had a Costco date. This sometimes makes me grumpy, because Friday night is important to me: its our "date night" and I like dinner to be nice and long, since its our time to really spill all the details of our week that we forgot to mention during the busy work week. The prospect of a 5 minute meal in Costco at a plastic picnic table is not the ideal environment for this kind of conversation...but darn it, I can't help but enjoy myself every time. I always leave with at least three times more than I came for, and leave happily with my trunk full of wholesale treasures....this time it was mostly meat for our neighborhood barbeque. We had a smaller turnout this year than last year, but it was still a great time. The weather was pretty and sunny but on the chilly side (Indiana weather is the most confusing thing), and Ted grilled hamburgers and hot dogs and smoked a huge brisket for 6 hours in his special seasonings, and everyone loved it :) It's so nice to have relationships with the people on our street, because it makes it feel so much more like home. I even scored a couple of baby gifts out of it! We promised to tie either a blue or a pink balloon to the mailbox when we come home from the hospital (one lady's adorable idea), so the neighbors will know what we've had!