4 days old

She's so cute and sweet.  And I'm so tired.

Piper Lee is coming!

At my doctor's appointment today, I had the magic number for pregnancy high blood pressure (140/90).  Everything else is fine, but with blood pressure at that level, things could go badly, so we need to be careful.  We'll be reporting to the hospital tomorrow for an induction, which means that she will be here soon.

And...that's her name.  Piper Lee.  We had a hard time deciding on a name for this little girl.  We found the name Piper in a baby name book - just like we did with Cadence.  When we chose Cadence's name, we liked the more obscure musical meaning that refers to a moment of resolution and beauty in a piece of music, and we felt like her entrance into our lives was a wonderful time of resolution and beauty.

For Piper, we've found meaning in a scripture verse: Isaiah 30:29.  Here it is in the TNIV:
And you will sing
as on the night you celebrate a holy festival;
your hearts will rejoice
as when people playing pipes go up
to the mountain of the LORD,
to the Rock of Israel.

Isaiah 30 speaks to God's justice and God's mercy.  In this verse, it speaks of joy and hope.  It's a promise of songs and music for those who may not have been enjoying those things.

2010 was a very hard year for us.  While we are so, so grateful for the wonderful place we are now, it was a tough road to get here.  Matt had to make a bold decision to leave a job without another job lined up.  We had to deal with anger over the situations and hurts that led to that decision.  We seriously considered moving across the country to Washington state.  We spent a couple months living in different places as we tried to make sure we were being financially responsible.  We left a house we loved and sweet, smart, funny friends to start over, strangely enough, in a place we'd been before. But we have this new home now, in a community we love with new friends to enjoy and the best jobs we've ever had. 

Piper is coming, and we are rejoicing!

Crafting for Baby Girl; Or, Yet Another Pillow

I can guarantee you that Matt thinks I'm a little bit crazy now.  The other day he asked me how I was feeling about the baby's room.  When I responded, "I want to make one more pillow," he just sort of looked at me.  Then I had to defend myself, "I just want it to be cute in there!"

So I made one last pillow.  I loosely followed this tutorial from The House of Smiths to make the pleated pillow cover, and pretty much followed this tutorial from cluck cluck sew to make the rosette flower.

It lives on the glider.  Under the shelves I wrote about here. 

Tomato Pie

We were given some very ripe tomatoes last week, so I made tomato pie. (Because there was a pie crust in my freezer.  And cheese in the fridge.) I did a mash-up of a recipe I pulled out of a Better Homes and Gardens mag last year and creative little daisy's recipe here.  As I said, the tomatoes were very ripe, so it was hard to get them to not be too juicy.  The crust was a bit less than crusty in spots.

More importantly, why has no one told me about this before? Or served it to me? I've been living in the southeast my entire life, people. Shouldn't I have eaten this at some point?  My feeling is, a recipe that contains pie crust, tomatoes, cheese, and mayo must be a blessing from heaven. 

No one else in this house was interested in eating it, so I got the whole thing to myself.  Yum.  (To clarify - I ate it over the course of several days, not in one sitting.)

Also, I'm now craving chicken pie.  Does anyone in High Point want to send me one?

Dry Falls

Saturday we decided to do what we assume will be our last outing as a family of three.  Remember back at the beginning of the summer when we had grand plans to go hiking and waterfall-ing?  That didn't really happen with the uncertainty about the move.  We did go on a few river outings to play in the water and to the lake on campus a couple times for events.  So Saturday we went to Dry Falls, near Highlands NC.

This was our last summer hurrah, as Matt worked all day on Sunday in the dorm. 

Excitement.

It's called Dry Falls because the trail goes underneath the falls.  Theoretically, you stay dry.

Can you see Matt and Cadie through the water droplets?  They're underneath the falls.

Then she found a puddle...

And we could barely get her to leave.

Butterfly Crayons

Someone has a birthday coming up in this house real soon and it's not the baby girl who will actually be birthed from my belly.  Cadie has been talking about how she's going to have a butterfly birthday party for months.  Realizing I will have a newborn quite literally on my hands when party day comes, I'm trying to do some planning now.  So, on Wednesday, we made butterfly crayons to give to her friends as party favors.  Super easy - peel and break crayons (we started off using the broken ones we found), arrange in molds, bake at 300-ish for 10-15 minutes-ish.

I did most of the peeling and breaking of the crayons, she arranged them (with my guidance).  We have way more crayons than a household our size could ever need, and I always take them from any restaurant that gives them to us with the kids' menu.

I was inspired by this post from twelve crafts till christmas.  Plus, I remember doing something similar in muffin tins with my mom when I was kid.  I ordered a little silicone butterfly ice cube tray from Amazon about a month ago.  It was $5, I think.

We did two batches, so now we have 20 crayons to give away and we might do more, because it was fun!  In this picture, I think Cadie had already absconded with 2.

Crafting for Baby Girl: More Pillows

Earlier this week I finished two more pillows for the sofa in baby girl's room.  This is a horrible picture.  I recovered two pillows we already owned, again in a simple envelope style.  (There *may* have been a small mistake in my math and the backs *may* not be totally covered.  But you can't see that.) 

Anyway, I used a tiny white floral print from Wal-mart, then added the chocolate brown pleated band from scraps I had.  I felt like it needed more color so I hand sewed the ruffle flowers (also from scraps) and made matching brown buttons with a button kit from Wal-mart. 

By the way, I'm totally jealous of people who live where there are actual craft and fabric stores. It probably saves us money that there's not a Jo-Ann nearby, but still...

Crafting for Baby Girl - Owl Stuffie

Whoooo's come to hang out in baby sister's room?  This cute little owl!  I made it during Cadie's "naptime" yesterday when I probably should have been cleaning something.  The photo tutorial I used is here.

All materials were things I had on hand - fabric and felt scraps.  I've been wanting a few more touches of purple in the room and this little gal is bringin' it.

I'm linking up to A Glimpse Inside's Catch a Glimpse Thursday...

and Tatertots and Jello's Weekend Wrap-Up party.

Pillows for the girls!

In my effort to make something everyday until the baby comes, I've completed two pillows.  I'm also counting putting meals in the freezer as "making something" so I don't go crazy knitting and sewing and such...

This brown and pink polka dot pillow is on Cadie's bed.  It was a super easy envelope cover for a pillow we already had - I did the whole thing this morning.

This one is on the sofa in the baby's room and it definitely took more effort.  I pretty much followed the tutorial here.   It's cute, but I'm having doubts about how it looks in the room.  I may end up taking it apart, removing the ties, and putting a bird applique on the front.  We'll see...

More pillows to come soon...

Deals of the Week: Freebies!

Three freebies this week: the Mott's for tots juice box came in the mail (signed up for it through Vocalpoint), as did the oatmeal squares cereal (not sure if I signed up for it or one of our mothers), and I got a free Herbal Essences product coupon in the mail, so I got conditioner at Wal-mart.

Ribbon Mobile - Crafting for Baby Girl #2, pt. 3

Baby Sister is due on the 31st, which leaves not many days left before our lives change completely!  Matt goes back to work later this week.  And, I've decided I want to make something every day until the end of this month.  I have a list.  That may be crazy. 

Step 1 was creating this ribbon mobile that hangs over the crib.  It's cuter in real life. 

We always meant to get a mobile for Cadence and never did.  I was inspired by this ribbon chandelier.

I bought a 10 inch embroidery hoop and some ribbon, but I also used some from the box of ribbon I save from gift wrap and packaging.  Once I figured out my method of looping it around the hoop and then doing a knot it went pretty quickly.  We'll see if I can get any of the other projects I've planned done quickly at all.

P.S. We've moved the furniture around in this room like 6 times.  We're finally done.  Mainly because Matt may give up on me if I make him remove and hang shelves any more.

Scenes from the New House

laundry on the line - I can't tell you how excited both Matt and I are about line-dried clothes, sheets, and towels

a tomato!  it's getting picked tomorrow!  and destined to become part of a taco salad...

mountain view from back door

that's 7 kids on a very old swing set that we inherited with the house

sidewalk chalk time!

Baby Name Game - The END!

Our parents have guessed the name and I guess Matt's mom told his side of the family, so I better get going with this last clue for anyone still playing!  Here's the rules, if you need them again.

This one lets you pick which to answer depending on whether you know me or Matt better.  So I'm giving you two clues but you only need one letter.  If I type this correctly, you'll get the same letter for both answers.  Does that make sense?

Matt and I both have master's degrees. 
Maureen's is in: (_) _ _ _ _ _ _   _ _ _   _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _   _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Matt's is in:  _ _ _ _ _ (_)   _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _