The Relativity of "Due-ness"

Dear Baby Girl,

You were due to arrive on this grand planet 4 days ago. Where are you? Comfy cozy inside my belly, as my little bud Aiden would say. Comfy cozy.

It's hard to describe the anticipation that comes and goes when thinking about your due date. I tried to be as non-chalant about it's inevitable passing. I started out my day with an intellectually-discussion at the Opera on TAP workshop, went to the Ballet to do some paperwork and a meeting, then off to dinner with some colleagues and one of our major donors, then lastly, the light at the end of my tunnel for July 27th (outside of you potentially arriving)--a pedicure at Salon Booth. It was worth every penny as the massage chair was the best massage chair I have EVER sat in. And my technician, Tom, when I told him I was due that day, said, "Uh uh. Not in my tub honey!" He was delightful to talk with and made my toes as pretty as can be. I'll definitely be going back to him in the future! But at the end of the day, I'm not gonna lie--there were twinges of disappointment.

So that's what I did on the day you were supposed to arrive because, well, you didn't. And so now, four days later, each day drags on a little more. Each pain and contraction I have I wonder "is this it?" And then I try and relax and remember that you'll come whenever you're ready and whenever you feel "due." Due-ness is, after all, quite relative to the wealth of factors that make one ready for labor and delivery.

Yet, as frustrated and impatient as I am to meet you, I really am proud that already you have a mind of your own. But I implore you, Baby Girl--please come sooner rather than later. It is summer after all :-)

Love,
Mama

Busy as a Bee

Been busy as a bee lately!  Growing a baby...

Week 38

Week 39

Making gifts for friends...

Making more things for baby...

• Tag Blankie

•  Pacifier clips

• Swaddling blanket

Modeled by our current baby of the house.

Working out in the garden...

The abundant amount of garlic that Jake dug up...only to have a large portion of it chomped on by Beau! But isn't it pretty?

And starting to get very impatient for Baby Girl to arrive. I'm getting so unbelievably excited to meet her, hold her, and love her at the same time that I'm becoming increasingly uncomfortable amidst the heat and humidity. I know I should take it one day at a time (and I'm trying), but the thought of having to be pregnant for another two weeks is a daunting prospect. So please--help take my mind off it! I know in my head I won't be pregnant forever, but still...the days are really long when the heat index is above 100 degrees!

Oh, and I suppose for those of you have read all the way through, wondering if there would be a clue on the name, all I will say is "High FIVE! We're almost there!"

BBQ Chicken Pizza

Oh finally! Inspiration and the time to write a non-pregnancy blog post! I hope you enjoy as much as we did!

Last night, after hemming and hawing in the car about "Eat out? Ooh, Chinese sounds so gooood! But we shouldn't spend the money. And we're having Asian tomorrow night, etc.," we finally decided to make another grill pizza. We had one on Thursday night, and while it was delicious, I was in the mood for something really savory and salty. I suggested BBQ Chicken Pizza. Jake got giddy with excitement. BBQ Chicken Pizza it was.

When we got home, Jake turned on the grill and I immediately pulled some of our cooked chicken from the freezer. Seriously, preparing meat in advance is the BEST. THING. EVER. Meals come together in no time at all! I cut up some onion, cheese, and pepperoncini fresh from the garden. Jake mixed our leftover pizza sauce with some BBQ sauce, and trust us--it doesn't take much to give it a BBQ flavor. He then mixed a bit of this with the chicken. I was skeptical of this method at first, but it really did help keep the chicken from drying out. I stretched the dough. I didn't do any fancy twirls with the dough, but I think my dad still would have been proud. Then we assembled. Here is the pizza before baking:

 Then we put it on a pizza stone that we use exclusively for the grill. If you try and use one for both your oven and your grill, your house will get smoky very quickly (trust us!). It's best, we've found, to NOT heat the pizza stone up before hand on the grill. Since the heat source is bottom heat, it has a tendency to burn very quickly before the rest of the pizza is done. And about 12-15 minutes later, here's the beauty of a pizza we turned out:

Dad, you taught me well :-)

And because we had some garden greens to use up (beet and kale), I sauteed those up with some onion, garlic, and creole seasoning for what turned out to be a delicious Southern meal--pizza style. Delicious!

All my bags are packed...

All my bags are packed because baby, we are at 37 weeks. Holy moly. Full term peeps. That's what that means. Baby Girl Melbs could arrive at any time and everything would likely be okay. While you can never really know how things will ever go, there's definitely a sense of relief to know we made it this far.

Here's the belly at 25, 33, and 37 weeks in the same outfit for a little comparison:

Whoa. It's amazing what the female body can do!

I keep meaning to blog about something other than pregnancy, but have found my inspiration to be lackluster lately. So, for those tired of hearing about the impending arrival (and it's okay if you are...there are times I'm sick of talking about it, to be quite frank), here's some other things that have been going on in the Melby household:

A delicious, refreshing lunch on my half-day Friday last week. Fresh basil can make any meal go from blah to grand!

Processing the last of the peas from our garden. I think we have about 8 bags of them in the freezer, ready to go for stir frys and the like.

And our puppy. Who is the cutest puppy around :-)

Time flies...

Dear Blog,

Time flies. I'm so sorry to have neglected you recently.

In my paltry attempt to make up for my busy, whirwind life these past two weeks, here's a bit about what's been happening. I hope you enjoy the catchup!

1. 35 weeks came...

and went.

2. Last weekend was spent making freezer meals. Unfortunately, I didn't have the energy (nor free iota of time or set of hands) to document it, but here's how I helped get us stocked up for when baby arrives:

• made two fryer chickens in the crockpot--season and forget it!--that turned into 2 8X8 pans of chicken spaghetti hotdish; 4 two-cup containers of cooked, cut chicken ready for whatever stirfrys or yummy dishes we can dream up; and 3 quarts of scrumptious chicken broth.
• made one large pork roast in the crockpot--season and forget it!--that turned into 4 large containers of pulled pork for sandwiches, Thai dishes, or something equally as good.
• 7 two-cup containers of spaghetti bolognese sauce
• 6 two-cup containers of sloppy joe mix
• 2 loaves of pumpkin bread
• 1 loaf of zucchini bread
• 1 large batch of granola
• 4 pizza dough balls
• 28 breakfast burrito wraps
• 18 chorizo, bean, and rice burritos
• 2 8X8 pans of lasagna

And I think that was it. All in all, I probably spent about 11 hours over Friday, Saturday, and Sunday in the kitchen prepping, cooking, and cleaning. So not terrible. And now we've got a whole lot of food to use up once Baby Melbs arrives! A small price to pay for how useful it will be later on!

3. We received a lovely package from my mother-in-law, Mary, that contained the beautiful and gorgeous quilt she made for the crib. It matches the set that we were interested in perfectly! I couldn't believe it!

Isn't it just darling? I can't wait to wrap up Baby Girl in it and snuggle her tight as I rock her to sleep :-)

Also included in the care package (which I love to get, even at this age...I must remember to pass those onto our daughter when she's old enough to get mail!) was another quilt we can use for downstairs, some clothes, Jake's baby blankets (which almost made me cry--how sweet we get to wrap up our little girl in all that history!), and a strand of butterflies to hang, and I thought, "Hmmm...I bet this would make a great mobile for the crib!" And with a little finagling, here's what I came up with:

4. Jake and I also finished setting up the nursery--what a relief! Well, I should say ALMOST as we still have a small bookshelf to put together. But that'll be easy-peasy. So here's the snuggling corner, all set up...

...and the changing table, all ready to go. We're using disposables for the first week or so until the meconium poops have passed and because we had them to use up! Then it'll be onto the cloth diapering adventure...

...and then the crib corner. Oh wait, what do I see? Is that a letter? Yes, but it's the one I gave before--in place! The rest have been photoshopped out :-)

And because I don't want to torture my dear mother toooo much (because I know the effects of Karma), here's another letter, but where it will go, who shall know!

5. 36 weeks is here--one more week until full term! Both Jake and I are having a hard time really comprehending that Baby Melbs could arrive at any time. We're trying to savor our time together, in this state of two-person family that we're in right now, before we welcome our sweet addition and have to reconfigure how we operate and function. Which might take some time, but, as the point of this post goes--time flies! So either way--we'll survive, and hopefully well enough to savor all the moments of Baby Girl's infancy to the max!

So, Blog, I hope that this has made you feel better about my recent two-week absence. I did miss you and hope to update you with more cheer and happenings soon.

Love,
Alyssa

The Last Getaway

The Last Getaway, the "babymoon," the "final trip you're going to have just as a couple before you get saddled down kids." We had been talking about taking this kind of trip for quite some time now, and because circumstances afforded that we could NOT just jet off to Jamaica again (dang!), we opted for another, short getaway that we both love to do: camping!

(reader's thoughts) Wait! Stop. Seriously? Alyssa, are you nuts? Aren't you, like, really pregnant right now?

Answer: why yes, yes I am really pregnant now. Here's the obligatory weekly update to prove it.


Ah! It's growing!

But camping is something that Jake and I try to do at least once a year. Now, it's only ever been once a year even though we say we're going to go more often, and I just couldn't fathom the thought of not even making it out ONCE this year. So on the first free weekend we've had in ages, I said, "Honey, let's go camping!" And so we made our reservation for a campsite at Raccoon Creek State Park, one of my all-time favorite hiking destinations (and Mom, don't worry, it's only about an hour's drive from Pittsburgh, so if I would have gone into early labor, we would have been just a short ride away!).

One of the things that Jake and I love most about camping is cooking over the campfire. We pride ourselves on cooking some pretty fabulous, scrumptious meals while we're camping (a skill taught to me by my Dad--Happy Father's Day!). So for Friday night, we had a version of "taco in a bag." For those who've ever been to a small-town fair in MN, you know exactly what I'm talking about, but it's taco fillings stuffed into a personal size bag of Doritos. Scrumdidliumptious. Only this time, I tried to be "healthy" and got the baked Doritos instead (never mind it still is laden with MSG and artificial colorings), so we ended up making giant taco salads using some frozen taco meat I had stashed in the freezer.

Taco filling turns into...

gigantic taco salads!

Then on Saturday morning--campfire coffee, fried ham and eggs, and toast. We used a half stick of butter for the meal, just to give you a gauge on how good it tasted!

And then, oh then, came the best part of this meal. The bananas I had brought with were almost all destroyed by various things being thrown on top of them. So I salvaged what I could, fried them up and put them on toast. Next best thing to fresh banana bread that I can think of. They were so sweet and caramelized!

And on Saturday evening--homemade brats, cheesy potato packets, and baked beans. Nothing more classic than that!

And for desert: a twist on the S'more using Mr. Goodbar instead of Hershey's chocolate. I think it's my new favorite thing!

Jake and I also love to go hiking. So even though I worried about sending myself into pre-term labor, I couldn't resist taking Beau out into the great outdoors, letting him offleash, and seeing the beauty of nature. Our first hike on Saturday ended up being considerably longer than either of us imagined. Close to 6 miles and 3 hours later, we finally returned to our car! Sunday morning's hike went much quicker, although in some ways it certainly wasn't easier. It started off with a huge ascent (let's just say I didn't stop sweating after that point), and then it went down into this valley with a babbling brook. It was quite serene and beautiful. Here were a few pics we captured from our hikes:

Ferns, ferns, everywhere! It makes me feel like I'm in The Land Before Time.

A random old oil barrel in a stream...

We saw these flowers everywhere! Don't know what they are, but they sure are pretty!

Happiest puppy on the block :-)

Water droplets everywhere. I bet the humidity was at least 85% the entire time we were there.

Shoo, dragonfly!

At this point, Jake goes "Geez, it sure looks like you're having fun!" I was just trying to keep the little, pesky gnats out of my eyes!

Another cool thing I personally enjoy about camping is how easy it is to set up a little make-shift "home away from home." And undeniably, it's pretty easy because I have husband who knows what he's doing in that department!

Jake tending the fire with his poking stick (insert funny comment here).

Jake with his hatchet, trying to divide some of the wood...

...and hatcheting in action!

Relaxing in the sunlight.

And laughing in the breeze :-)

Even when it means protecting me from wild animals, like this young raccoon who came wandering over to our campsite before dinner on Saturday.

Can you spot him?

There he is!

So while it wasn't a glamorous babymoon to an exotic location, we both had a wonderful time basking in each other's company without a care in the world. That being said, we're already talking about how we can bring Baby Girl camping next year. We're going to start her off young around the campfire :-)