why is it called a shower?

we had a spectacular baby shower this past weekend, filled with lots of friends and family, presents, games, and sundaes. by far my favorite part was the sundae bar (thank you em!!), which i am still enjoying the leftovers of. is there really anything better than sundae toppings? i think not. malissa did a fantastic job of planning, decorating and executing a french countryside theme complete with our favorite nicknames of the baby translated into French, french soap favors and lovely flowers. and merit received some great things....lots of clothes which she didn't necessarily need but my friends have such great taste they were definitely appreciated! afterwards everyone came back to our house for a bbq (which we are also still enjoying the leftovers from). so overall, it was a beautiful day to celebrate this new little girl who continues to do flips and cartwheels in my belly.
AND jenny brought over the curtains for her room - they are absolutely perfect! the colors go really well with the room and they block out a lot of light (as good curtains should), which is great b/c that room is so sunny.
we attempted to put together both the crib -to realize that we had no screws to put it together with- and the cosleeper - but we couldn't figure out how to attach it to the bed. so as of now the baby has nowhere to sleep. ah well, we still have a month or so.
a month!! i can't believe she'll be here in a little over a month! its almost impossible to even think about it b/c i've been concentrating so hard on my dissertation. but that too will be over soon and then i can focus all my attentions on the little blueberry. i cannot wait. i also can't wait to chill at the pool all day. and get back into prentatal yoga. and read.
i found a new blog - its interesting to read and consider what advice i might like to give my daughter. i dont really agree with everything she says (espec. the drink milk thing)...but she has some good ones and it might be nice to keep a little list going myself. any suggestions?
i also found this. ok so embroidering is for old people. i get it. make fun of me. but i love some of the designs they have. what i would do with them i don't know but some of them are really fun.
and i just finished the first season of true blood! loved it. can't wait for the second season to come out..or if anyone has it dv'rd still and doesn't mind me coming over to watch...

THIS is what i'm talking about!

http://www.usatoday.com/life/movies/news/2009-06-21-alice-in-wonderland_N.htm

i'm a little apprehensive about the new story line (alice returning to wonderland after 10 years?), but in 3-D this should be amazing!

busy little bird

i am going through major nesting i think. we decided at the last minute to have a yard sale on saturday. supreme craziness on my part -i so don't have time for this. BUT our neighborhood is hosting it so we didn't have to do any advertising - too good to pass up. we actually don't have much to sell - a TON of shoes, some clothes and bags, weird things i've found in the attic that do not belong to us (hopefully it won't piss off the attic children too much-you know the ghosties that live in the attic and play with the ben Franklin action figures that are up there? yea, them. they freak me out which is why I've never cleaned the attic before). ANYWAY. i also found some family photos that are not mine and not the people who lived here before us. creepy.
so yard sale sat. i also finally got around to cleaning out the closet in jack's room so i can move stuff out of merit's closet. that took all day. i threw out ALL of my notes from the past 5 years - why i was keeping them i don't know. i thought maybe i'll need to go back to that BICMIC exam in my future career? riight. thats what the internet is for. but now i can fit my extra clothes in that closet, and all of merit's stuff in her closet with room to spare. plus i realized i have a ton of space in our closet that i don't use. so now i do. sooo organized now!
and in case you were wondering, all of this cleaning means absolutely no writing. which on the one hand is okay b/c i'm waiting for edits from my boss, but on the other hand i could be working on a different section....oh well. it will get done. eventually.
right after i watch the third episode of true blood i got in the mail today....

she's gonna be a soccer player

so the baby is crazy moving. i'm sure she's been doing this the entire time, she's just now big enough that i REALLY feel it. like, keep me up at night feel it. its kind of the best part of this whole pregnancy thing. actually the best is realizing she already has dad's stubborn "you can't make me" attitude b/c she refuses to move when i say "jack, look! feel!".
i ordered some fabric from the far far away heather ross line that i talked about in the last post. not in exactly the colors i wanted (i really wanted the blue themed unicorns), but went with the orange. why force my love of blue on poppy? as long as its not pink - which i will force. so i got the orange theme. now i just need to quilt it together and find a good, soft pillow to cover.
katie's back in town!! yea! unfortunately for oliver that means no more mia, but fortunately for us that means far less dog hair throughout the house. and i got an awesome tea set from katie that i absolutely love as a thank you. thank you, katie. i've missed you!
i've set a time and date (and place) for my final defense...duh duh duh...... its kind of a relief to have a definite end but also a major stress to have a time limit. so unfortunately i will be writing during most of my free time. luckily, i have a lot written and a lot organized so hopefully i will pull this off. i'm a little nervous about defending and being 37 weeks pregnant but hopefully i'll get lots of sympathy. i'm not too proud to get some pregnancy sympathy, as long as i pass!
my little brother got married this weekend - the bride looked absolutely beautiful of course. and they both looked incredibly happy. highlights: alec's best man speech, mushroom shaped potatoes, my dad dancing with alec's new girlfriend, some chick's dress falling off, another chick falling on her ass with her legs straight up in the air after slipping on the beer she spilled, my mom almost leaving the bathroom with her dress tucked into her underwear. is it terrible that my highlights mostly involve others' misfortunes/embarrassments? nah. those are the funny parts! congrats andrew and em!

i'm so crafty i make PEOPLE

so i didn't get to the pool this weekend. it kept looking like rain... BUT i got so much done around the house! with a huge help from jack - the lawn got mowed (thank god), pictures got hung and rehung, and copious amounts of baby laundry was done and separated by age and put away. i thought i had mostly newborn clothes. it turns out i have newborn, 3-6, 6-12, 12-18. this chick is set! especially with my mom and i continuing to buy her clothes and me registering for some very cute organic stuff from Alchemy (we just can't help ourselves). and diapers. diapers are washed and ready to go. this laundry literally took me two entire days. it was ridiculous! but now its done, we can see the floor to the baby room and hopefully now the crib will get built and pictures will get hung in there. slowly this room will be ready for baby.
i'm starting to get the itch for vacation. this happens at least once a year and its happening now - the need to be somewhere that is not here for a week or two. i'm thinking beachy, but i really want to go somewhere foreign like...greece. or ireland. i'd be happy with ireland. but we're saving for south africa so no trips this year.
i think i'm beginning some serious nesting. i just want to craft and organize. and drink coffee. weird i don't really like coffee.
i saw this:
from heather ross and immediately wanted to make a baby blanket/quilt out of it in this style:
but after my laundry i realized this kid needs absolutely no more baby blankets (except for maybe a really soft bamboo one from dreamsacks) so then i saw this: (everything is off of soulemama) cute pillow and thought - that would be way better. (i realize this is actually a dog bed, but you get the idea). so ahem jenny - need your help!
and guess which of these ribbons i'm dying to have: (actually i love them all) from retrosaria thank god i'm having a girl.

may's already over?

i can't even believe it's already the end of may! in april i really thought i'd be finishing up last minute things for work, done writing, working on final edits. instead, i'm in the middle of experiments (although if they work will be final experiments - but that a big if), have taken on a completely different project with a high school student and am almost where i was with writing in april! talk about major stress.
thank goodness the pool opens this weekend - it may mean i spend less time in the lab, but i can def get writing done there,which is a great excuse. lets hope that bathing suit i bought a couple of weeks ago still fits, i feel as though i've expanded quite a bit since then.
we're still trying to get the lawn/gardens in order, but so far everything is at least in the ground where it should be. just some mulching. oh and a mowing of the jungle we call a backyard (not even kidding).
the nursery is begging me to organize, do laundry, put clothes away, hang pictures, put crib together. as my mom has instructed - it must be done before the end of june b/c we'll be having everyone over for a dad's baby shower/bbq and everyone will want to see it. mom's baby shower is earlier in the day, complete with sundae bar!
speaking of organizing the nursery, i still have that ugly chair that must be reupholstered. its about the same shape and size as the Ektorp chair from ikea. i found a website that sells slip covers for those chairs and i am so tempted to buy one!
they have a bunch of different prints and even send as many swatches as you want for free! but then i'm thinking, i could just cover it with a pretty quilt or blanket and tada! free upholstering! we'll see.....
and now that it is warm in the evenings...i WILL be walking!!! so anyone who wants a walking buddy please see me. byrd park? maymont?

stroller search continues...

i finally got to work on my baby registry. although we've been given more clothes than i know what to do with - plus three bouncy seats, an infant car seat, a crib (soon to be two - one for my mom's house),a co-sleeper, two playmats, a jumper that fits in the doorway (i'm reminded of axel's hellacious jumping and how scared i was he was going to bounce himself right out of the door and have visions of merit doing the same). of course i still needed to register for some stuff. unfort. most things i need are kind of expensive - stroller, high chair, car seat, pump (def need one of these - working mom and all), bottle steamer/sterilizer. thanks to kate i made my way through babies r us with good suggestions - especially when it came to the stroller. the two of us could not fold the stroller i thought i wanted to save our lives. we actually ended up leaving it in a half-folded mess on the floor. lesson one: make sure you can easily fold a stroller AND that it will fit in the back of your honda - with room to spare (which that one did neither). ok. so i found a much cheaper one, that is light and folds easily into basically nothing. score. i still need to take jack b/c he's decided he wants a three wheeled one so he can go off-roading with it or something. something about big sturdy durable tires. whatever. at least i've gotten most of the registry taken care of. one less thing to do.
the major thing on my mind is thesis writing/finishing. as you can tell, i'm completely procrastinating by just posting this. but i woke up in a sweat last nite that i would never finish this thing, so i hope thats going to kick my butt a little to get going. i spent the three hours that lost was on working on figures last nite. and i still feel totally behind. but i'm really not! ah, i just need to sit down for an ENTIRE day and work on it. and yet, there always seems to be something better to do...funny how that works.
speaking of lost and procrastinating - i've spent the majority of today reading various posts about the season finale. all i can say is 1) i hope juliette stays in that hole. hate her! 2)WTF?! 3)locke?! wtf again. EW has some interesting theories. i'm glad other people think about this so i don't have to. i would say the last 20 minutes or so were fantastic. espec. when Juliette got sucked down the hole....did i mention i hate her and her stupid pouty face?