My friends Amy, Beth, and Meredith asked if they could throw me, or shall I say Grayson, a baby shower.  How could I refuse?  With the help of Amy and Beth’s mom, Carolyn, and my mom Becky a couples baby shower was held in our honor. Yep, that’s right my amazing hubby attended a baby shower with me.

Here are our dear friends Allie and Scott.  Scott being the sweetie that he is has agreed to take a few maternity photos for me.  Thanks bud!

Here are two more of our close friends Allie and Josh.  Yep, there’s two Allies.  Both super duper sweet and adorable.  Don’t ya think?

A few more party-goers and the soon to be Aunt Toof.  (don’t worry Toof is just a nickname)

Here I am with two other preggos.

Since it was a couple’s shower I had my better half there to help unwrap.  I just wish I could get him to help write thank you notes.

Is this what my child is going to look like?  Oh dear!

The loot.  Thank you to everyone who came and shared this special night with us.  We love you all.

This week marks the end of an era in my life.  Well, for a few years any way.  I currently work full-time at an awesome non-profit that is known all over the world for it’s work, but counting today I only have 3 days left at this wonderful establishment.  Originally, when I found out I was knocked up I thought that there was no choice in the matter.  I thought that I would pop this kid out and 3 months later I’d be back sitting in my cubicle….you know, just minus the belly.

About 1/2 way through my pregnancy, my husband surprised me and brought up the topic of me quitting and becoming a stay-at-home mom.  I was all, “wow…I can stay home and raise my baby!  Wait, do I want to quit?”  From there we started discussing all the pros and cons of going back to work, and also for staying at home.

I went back and forth for months.  I would have a bad day at work and come home ranting about how I was certain I wanted to quit, and the next I would go to a meeting that would spark my passion about my work and I came home talking about how I  wanted to stay a working woman.  I’m not going to deny it…it was one of the hardest decisions of my life.  Really.

In the end, I didn’t have any references on a good place/person to watch my child.  No joke, every single on of my friends and co-workers that had a child within the past few years has had a friend or family member watch their child if they went back to work.  I have neither.  All my family members already have jobs or just don’t live in town.

The cost of gas and the time spent driving to and from the daycare, and the cost of a good trustworthy daycare would almost defeat the point of me going back to work.  At some point I would just be making money to spend it all on daycare and gas.  What’s the point in that?

Staying at home, I think, will also provide time and energy for me to keep the house in working order.  Right now just working without a child I tend to lack in the keeping the house spic-n-span area.  With a full-time job AND a newborn….pah-lease!  My house would turn into a giant black hole of nasty.

And the best reason for me to stay home, the kicker, I would get to raise my child.  I would have the opportunity to witness 1st hand all of my child’s milestones.  Not many people now get to say that, and I am so thankful that I will have that opportunity.

I know being a stay-at-home mom isn’t for everyone, but for our family I think it’s the right decision.  At least for now.  Yes, we will be doing a bit more budgeting, but it’s so going to be worth it.  Has anyone else made this decision or at least thinking about it?  How did it go?  Was it worth it?

7/15/10 :: day 252

Yesterday I went to the doc’s for my 1st weekly exam, and didn’t leave as excited as I entered.  Even though I am not technically “full-term” I was hoping for some good news in the cervix area.  But alas….I am still carrying this little bean high and am zero centimeters dilated. I guess I should be happy that I haven’t had any problems during my pregnancy, and that my baby is happy as a clam living inside of me, but I just really want to meet him.  These last few weeks, because I can almost reach out and taste my due date, have been unbearable.  And the next 3.5 I imagine will be worse.  I think another part of me has mentally checked out of work already, and it’s torture having to sit in a cubicle all day when there are soooo many other things I need to be doing in preparation of Mr. Bean.

Last night and this morning haven’t been any better.  I awoke at 2:30am having to pee and couldn’t fall back asleep till 5:30am.  My alarm goes off at 5:50am.  JOY!

7/19/10 :: day 256

I’ve been sleeping better these days.  Well, about as well as you can sleep 9 months pregnant.

I am being blessed with some nasty gas pain or contractions this morning.  I am thinking it’s a little of both.  Oh joy!

(2:19pm)  I wouldn’t call my BH intense, but I would say that they are quite uncomfortable.  I make certain to drink plenty of water.  And thank goodness for that it has helped keep me regular.  I do not even want to think about being pregnant & backed up…if you catch my drift.  When the BH contractions come on I do my best to get up and take a stroll around the parking lot or walk to a co-worker’s desk, but that doesn’t always do away with them.  WAIT!!!  I just remembered only BH contractions go away with walking and water.  Am I in early labor????  Oh geez!  I guess I will find out on Wednesday. I’m not even going to begin to get excited about that though, because I’m sure he will tell me that nothing has changed and we are still on track for August 12th.  BOO!

7/20/10 :: day 257

(1:03pm) My stomach has the hiccups so hard core right now I kind of feel like I have the hiccups too.  Maybe he caught the hiccups I had at lunch?!?

Well we are at that point.  We are putting the final touches on Grayson’s nursery.  We originally were going to have a twin bed in the nursery since our house has only two bedrooms.  Derek and I thought that we could still use the nursery as guest room if need be, but it was decided that storage was more important than having a guest bed.  With the bed removed, we had a large space that needed to be filled.

Once we decided on storage over sleep space, I knew exactly what type of storage I wanted.  Big white wooden cube shelving.  The owner of The Modern Baby Company recently posted pics of the nursery she designed for her daughter.  I drew tons inspiration from her design.

The hunt for white wooden cube shelving commenced.  Here is what I was looking for…

(photo credit belongs to The Modern Baby Company)

However, Memphis ain’t got no freakin’ IKEA, and all the other stores I tried just didn’t have what I was looking for.   Since Ikea doesn’t ship many of their items I would have to DRIVE to the nearst Ikea to purchase this bad boy.  6 hours to Atlanta sounded like too much work and waaay too much gas money for one bookshelf.

So after many long weeks of searching I decided that maybe i needed to give up on that dream and find another piece of furniture that would both provide storage and match the MOD style of Grayson’s room.

Enter the chest of drawers from Target.

I am now thrilled that we decided to go with this piece of furniture, because I now have so much extra storage space that I am only able to fill up 1/2 of this bad boy.  Room to grow…that’s always nice.

So, this past Saturday was spent building the dresser…

…and hanging curtains.

As a gift, my mother-in-law offered to make curtains for the nursery.  So, off to the fabric store we went.  Unfortunately, they just didn’t have what we were looking for, so off to Target we went!

Target had just what we were looking for.  Doesn’t it always?  If I could marry Target I would.  We would make beautiful children together.  Mind out of the gutter Jennifer.

Where was I?

Curtains.  We found just the curtains we were looking for at Target and the rods at Bed Bath & Beyond.  So, another project that was going on Saturday was Derek hanging curtain rods and my sweet, sweet mother-in-law parked in front of the sewing machine.

We are getting close to D-day people.  Three weeks left!  Gotta get on the ball.  I hope to be totally finished with the nursery withing the next week.  Just a few picture frames left to hang on the wall.  I’m working on the art right now in Photoshop.

Keep tuned for more status updates.

On Sunday, following the shower some of my friends threw the day before, our church threw a shower for Mr. Bean (a.k.a. – Grayson).  It was a blast, but that thing wore my butt out.

I made my nephew JD, he was my helper that day, feel how soft the blanket was.  He agreed…mucho soft-o.

JD bought this book for his cousin using his Christmas money.  How sweet is this kid?  I mean, seriously!

There were so many wonderful ladies at the shower.  I really should say people at the shower, because Mark the man that married Derek and me popped in with his wife Stephanie for a few.

Grayson got a tiny t-shirt showing his support for his uncle Davis (yes, that is where his middle name comes from) who plays on the Bartlett High baseball team.  Second base…in case you were wondering.  BTW…a scout was checking him out the other day.  Go Davis!

I just want to give a huge thanks to Katie, my bother’s girlfriend, for being the gift tracker.  My baby sister was in Ireland during the shower (I’m so J) so Katie stepped in and wrote down all 5 bazillion gifts I opened that day.

Thanks to all the lovely ladies that threw the shower.  It was wonderful, and the food and punch were so yummy.

Check out all that we were blessed with.  It took forever to go through, wash, and put away.

My friends Sarah, Rachael, Cari-Beth, and Ashley threw me a baby shower a few weeks back.  I know, I know…I’m behind on posting about my showers.  I apologize.  So here we go.

Sarah made the most adorable name banner for Grayson.  What talent.  She is awesome at throwing parties/showers.

She also made these adorable hangings of my belly shots that show my growth throughout the weeks of my pregnancy.  They hung just about the refreshment table.

They ladies made an amazing coffee and ice cream punch (decaff) especially for me.  I love this stuff.  It taste just like a Starbucks frappachino.

Meet Sophie,  my future daughter-in-law.  Just kidding.

Sophie is my friend and neighbor Betsy’s little girl.  Derek and Betsy grew up together and have been great friends since the 4th grade.  Now Betsy and her husband Jonathan live just down the block from us ,and have a daughter that was born in January.  We like to joke that Sophie and Grayson will one day fall in love and get married.  Wouldn’t that be nice?  To know the girl your son marries since the day she was born.

Sophie got all dressed up for the shower.  Just look at those flowers on her shoes.  The girl really knows how to win a boy’s momma over.

Not only was Sarah the hostess, but she played double duty that day writing down all the gift for me.  My baby sissy was in Ireland at the time.  Yeah….like I felt bad for her.

Here I am with all the lovely ladies that helped host the shower.  Thanks girls!

Sarah made me a mommy-to-be pin to wear during the shower that consisted of a cute green ribbon and pacifier.  Every time I got near Sophie she tried to put the pacifier in her mouth.  So funny.

See that adorable owl I’m holding?  Sarah knew what my little man’s bedding looked like, and said she went on a mission to find the perfect owl to go in his room.  I think she nailed it.  She found this adorable handmade owl at the Carrot Fever Etsy shop.  The second I walked in the door I noticed the owl just chilling on top of the gift pile and I melted.  I love this sweet little guy so much.

Here’s the loot.  Thank you so much to everyone that was able to attend the shower.  We love you all and are so blessed to have you in our lives.