It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Baby survived the Christmas chaos at the Goodwin home in New Braunfels! It was a full house--she was surrounded by Great-Grandmother & Granddaddy; Granna & Papa; Uncle Todd; Uncle Scott, Aunt Heather, cousin Katie & cousin Skyler; and Mom, Dad & Nate! She made quite a haul, too! My mother-in-law enjoyed looking at cute, frilly baby girl clothes (she's a purple gal). Then she had fun wrapping them and addressing the pretty boxes to her top choices for Baby girl names:
*Jeanie Ranae: Baby's grandmothers (Jason's mom, my mom)
*Jewel Louise: Jason's two grandmothers
*Victoria Lynn: Lynn is my middle name
*Naomi Ruth: a cute Biblical name to match "Nathaniel"
*Callie Rae: Bill's Grandmother & 2 of Baby's great-grandpas
*Melody Faith: Jeanie's girl's name when she was expecting

Baby Girl also received a purple baby blanket that her Granna hand-crocheted and heirloom white silk booties & sandals that her Great, Great-Aunt Ree knit. The inside story is that these were actually passed down from Jason. Jeanie was SURE Jason was a girl--granted she didn't have an ultrasound, but was going off pure instinct. So sure, that she brought a purple dress to the hospital (with said baby blanket) to take "Jason" home in. How many little girls can say they inherited their purple baby layette from their Daddy?! :) (And like my Dad said, "How many Dad's would want that known?!")

I've been in intense nesting mode lately! We decided to put Baby in our "extra" room when she arrives (currently a 10'x11' area serving as a guest room with queen-size bed, craft room and extra-large storage shed!) So, the day after Christmas, Jason and I took a road trip to the IKEA north of Austin (about 90 miles) to help this plan come together. We were looking for some smart shelves to help with this transformation to nursery/craft room. The guests will have to sleep on the futon out on the landing. And this clutter I've been storing? We've been BUSY cleaning & purging! We brought several big boxes of extraneous clutter to Goodwill, several boxes to consignment, a big trash bag of garbage to the curb, etc. (This process is hard for a baby pack rat like me!)

We did find the shelves--two black and a pink shelf. Jason let me buy a PINK shelf! My grand vision is to keep the walls white, use black furniture and splashes of light pink as an accent color (crib bedding, storage boxes on the shelves, lighting, etc.) I think the look I'm going for is shabby-chic-boutique. (I made that up...I'm still not sure what the official label is.) Cute story: while we were putting together the shelves, Jason told Nate we were setting up sister's room. Nate responds, "Not sister's room, it's both our room. We going to share."

All is well with Baby--still kicking her way around my belly. As you can see from the countdown bar, I'm in double digits! Baby will be here before you know it! After our trip to Minnesota for "The Holidays: Part 2;" it's work, work, work! My ultimate goals? To finish the nursery (though we're opting to keep the bed up for a little longer so Jason will have a separate place to get a good night's sleep during his upcoming (and demanding) surgery rotation for the next three months), finish Nate's baby album (I'm half-way through), and start walking more while keeping up with my yoga routine. I think that's doable.

Well, we're leaving on a jet plane Saturday morning for a proper winter in Minnesota. Our bags our packed and we're ready to go. Unfortunately, it's an early morning--7:00 flight, 4:30 wake-up (after a night of celebration for my father-in-law's big 6-0 Birthday Bash)! Arghhh. Now? We just need to make sure the DVD player is charged up for the airplane! Enjoy!

HAPPY 2008!