25 weeks
In case you’re still looking for new posts here, there are a few over at Griggs and Woodward – including my 25 week bump (now officially a belly). See you there!
eighteen weeks down
Hello! I’m 18 weeks pregnant today, just 22 more to go. For more on how I’m feeling and our plans for Baby N, visit Griggs & Woodward.
and then we grow…
Our family is growing…
And we couldn’t be more thrilled.
While I haven’t been blogging regularly lately, I intend to as we prepare for our son or daughter to arrive. For now, the adventure continues at Griggs and Woodward… hope to see you there!
easter sunday
It’s Easter Sunday, have you heard? Just kidding, I think everyone has heard. If you celebrate I hope your day was filled with ham, strains of “Hallelujah”, and Easter egg hunts.
My most definitely was as I was greeted with a surprise from my personal Easter bunny before I was even out of bed today. My Easter “basket” was filled with new gardening gloves and beautiful pots from Anthropologie.
Once I was up and at ‘em we headed to Todd’s parents’ church where we celebrated the resurrection with a beautiful service. After we had Easter dinner at my grandparents with most of my aunts, uncles and cousins – a tradition that is ever constant and one that I love.
Despite my grandmother’s insistence that I needn’t bring anything along to dinner, I decide to make a contribution anyways. I brought along an Asparagus Gruyere Tart, a recipe from Miss Martha that I’ve been wanting to try. The recipe was simple and fast and only called for six ingredients, including salt and pepper.
If you ever need a fast appetizer, I’d recommend keeping this recipe at close reach. The ratio of effort to crowd appeal weighs heavily in your favor. For the recipe, click here.
This afternoon we did some more work on the new digs and then I played around with Polyvore a bit. I’ve been a member of the site for awhile but had never created a board before. I decided to start with my Easter outfit which is located below for your viewing pleasure. By the way, my real outfit did not feature a Chanel bag, I just couldn’t locate mine on Polyvore so I picked a similar one.
I’m at a point where I’m trying to refine and update my wardrobe. My rule as of late has been, if you don’t love it, leave it. I’m willing to spend a bit more on things that I feel great it and have cut back on buying what I call “filler pieces” – pieces that I wear once or twice then just leave in my closet. It’s an extended experiment and I think I like the preliminary results.
After my style session I staged an Easter egg hunt for my husband. I got excited and gave him his Easter gift, his first lululemon top from the showroom that just opened in town, yesterday morning. Thankfully I still had some treats left to hide around the house for him.
Happy Easter – He is Risen, indeed!
How did you celebrate Easter Sunday?
home sweet home
We really went and did it now…
Because this past year hasn’t been exciting enough, what with getting married 11 months ago and all, we decided to kick off 2012 by putting an offer in on our first house. Our offer was accepted the same day we put it in and a few months later, we are officially moved into the house.
Needless to say this is a very exciting time for us and we love our new space. Granted, it’s a work in progress, we’re only a week in, but we are loving every single minute of it.
It’s been so fun to plan the design of our new house and see how much has come together in just one short week. I’m loving the nesting phase and have spent countless hours on Pinterest looking for ideas and inspiration for everything from the office to storage space to paint colors. Thankfully my dad used to own a painting company so he’s been amazingly wonderful and has spent a few evenings here re-painting rooms to suit my fancy. Life is easy with handy men around, isn’t it?
We’re off to a great start but there is still a lot to do. You can look forward to lots of progress posts as we get settled into our nest.
Cheers to new adventures!
Where do you get your inspiration for your home decor?
happy saint nicholas day!
Last night Todd and I were playing a head-to-head round of Cranium. After I beat him fair and square we decided to just go through the “Humdinger” cards, one of us humming a song while the other person tried to guess which song the other was sure they were humming perfectly when in reality, the tune coming out of their mouth bore no resemblance to the original. But I digress.
As I was attempting to hum “The William Tell Overture” I realized that I had forgotten to do something very, very important. I said, “I have to go. Now.” and Todd, baffled, said “Where?”. We were already in pajamas, it was almost 10:00pm, he had every right to be confused. ”Secret stuff,” I told him, “You won’t even notice I’m gone.” And I left my puzzled husband behind as I rushed out the door.
The reason for my abrupt escape? I had forgotten to pick up his goodies for St. Nicholas Day – a Dutch holiday that my family has always celebrated. Today is St. Nicholas Day and that means that Todd’s treats needed to be ready to be stuffed in his shoes so he could wake up knowing that “St. Nicholas” had been there. Sound familiar? St. Nicholas or Sinterklaas is the basis for our modern-day Santa Claus. There are many differences, the most obvious one being that he comes on the eve of December 6.
Anyways, I think that tradition is really important and, being that this is our first year of marriage, I want to establish traditions now so that they’ll always be a part of our history.
So, long story short (well, it has been a little long, hasn’t it?) I ran to the store and stocked up on all of the Dutch treats that I could find, snuck them back into the house and then snuck out of bed to fill Todd’s shoes and leave them outside of our bedroom door after he’d fallen asleep.
I can honestly say that this is the first time I have ever truly surprised Todd. He thought that there was some Christmas gift that had to be picked up last night, he had no idea even though I’ve bought him at least something for St. Nicholas Day every year that we’ve been together. He opened the door this morning and was so confused. He briefly thought that someone had broken into the house and left him a Heineken. Todd is virtually unsurprisable and it was such a great feeling to know he was genuinely surprised. I can’t wait to see if I can pull the same surprise off next year.
For those of you who are interested, this article about St. Nicholas is really good and gives great background on why we continue to celebrate this day and the origins of the Sinterklaas/Santa Claus connection.
Also, Todd’s shoes were filled with the following Dutch goodies: a bottle of Heineken, Droste Chocolate Pastilles, Wilhelmina Peppermint (the most amazing peppermint you will ever have) and Stroopwafels. Traditionally we’d have chocolate letters too – maybe next year, if I learn to plan ahead. Gelukkige Sinterklaas dag to you and yours!
What traditions will you/do you carry on with your family?
What cultural holidays do you celebrate?
P.S. Those wooden shoes pictured above are mine and currently being held hostage at my parents’ house. If anyone has a chance to sneak them out, let me know.
frosty (de)constructed
With Christmas coming closer, we have been in full holiday spirit. Not only have we had the tree up and fully decorated for over a week now, I’ve spent time crafting with my friend Jennie and even have one gift under the tree and a few in Todd’s stocking.
Friday night, we decided to take it up a notch and put together a short video for everyone to enjoying. We shot it in stop-motion which required a heavy dose of patience and a few glasses of wine. I hope you like it!
Season’s greetings!
Have you started your gift shopping yet?
a real break
Today was my fourth day in a row off. Four days without work. This is the most time I’ve had off since our honeymoon and it has been glorious. In addition to spending a wonderful Thanksgiving with my family, we cut down a Christmas tree, got the house decorated and relaxed our little butts off.
We planned Christmas gifts and went to a book store for a few hours. We ordered Chinese food for the first time in 2 years. We enjoyed each other’s company. We watched the yule log just because we can. I picked up a book that I had set down a month ago and started reading it again.
I love having time off.
Weekends seem to fly by and I tend to feel like I’ve wasted a lot of time over the weekend. I spend time relaxing and then, by the time I’m relaxed, I realize that there were 35 things that I wanted to accomplish over the weekend, maybe 10 of which I’ve completed. With a four day break I actually did everything I’d hoped to do. I feel productive and I feel refreshed.
It’s been a real break and I know that the time between now and my next break (Christmas) will fly because it will be full of holiday parties, time with friends, family get-togethers and holiday prep. I love this time of the year and everything that comes with it. December couldn’t be here soon enough.
My hope for this holiday season is that I can remember to take the time to really enjoy it. Spend time with family and friends and be in the moment, not just thinking ahead to the next party, meal or item on the to-do list. I want to focus on the things I love – the warmth of family, the grace of the season and the story behind it and the joy that is shared all around.
Maybe, with some effort, the whole month will feel like a long weekend.
How are you kicking off the holiday season?
Were you able to take a real Thanksgiving break?
with a grateful heart
This year for Thanksgiving we mixed things up a bit by going to celebrate at my sister’s in Chicago. We left home Wednesday after work and were there, two and a half mercifully traffic-free hours later. After getting our things settled we had a few snacks, a few glasses of wine and a lot fun playing and laughing our way through Thanksgiving trivia and a few rounds of Cranium.
In the morning we all got up and decided to get right to eating. We had a breakfast feast of pancakes, bacon and fresh fruit. A delicious way to start the day.
After a bit of digesting and relaxing, I decided to get to work prepping some appetizers and then Thanksgiving dinner.
The most festive appetizer award went to the cranberry brie bites that I made. I saw them on Pinterest (anyone else as obsessed as I am?) a few weeks ago and could not wait to make them. They turned out almost as beautiful as the pictures, a delicious little mouthful and so simple to make.
Another great appetizer we had was a caramelized pear and goat cheese crostini with a touch of honey and goat cheese – a recipe that my sister found and I would definitely make again.
Of course we had traditional Thanksgiving fare as well. Turkey breast, green beans almondine, white rolls (tradition – I love my one (or two) white roll(s) per year), mashed potatoes and stuffing muffins – all delicious and so comforting.
Of course it wouldn’t have been Thanksgiving without pie. We finished our meal with both apple and chocolate peppermint mousse pie with a little ice cream on the side for good measure.
Tasty doesn’t have to be pretty, right?
Of course, Thanksgiving wouldn’t mean a thing without so many things to be thankful for. I am so thankful for a family to share meals with, the amazing blessings of the last year including marrying my best friend, a home to keep us warm as the winter draws near, a job – even though it’s a desk job, my “new” family who has been so welcoming, friends who are always there to help celebrate life’s joys with and the list goes on an on. Thanksgiving marks the beginning of the holiday season and I am looking forward to it with a grateful heart.
What is your favorite holiday tradition?
Which foods are a must-eat at your Thanksgiving meal?
P.S. If the holidays are a stressful time for you, remember…
(Printable available here.)
happy hallo-weekend!
What is this? A new post? I bet you thought those didn’t exist at Pomelo Sunshine anymore. I promise, they do!
As much as I love blogging and keeping up with the blogger community, I think it’s important to engage in real life as much as possible and not feel obligated to post if there are other things going on that are more important. Also, I sit in front of a computer at work for 8 hours every day and there are days when I don’t get up at all so sometimes, coming home and staring at a computer screen and typing up a blog post just isn’t that appealing. A balanced life is important and I want to live that so, for now, my plan is to update the blog when I feel like it, when it feels right.
But you didn’t ask where I’ve been, did you?
Let’s move on to more interesting things.
We have been busy, busy enjoying the fall season. The weather here has been hit or miss and we even had a week of 80 degree temperatures a few weeks ago – craziness here in Michigan. It’s definitely full-on fall now and I even had to scrape frost off of my car the other morning. Bring it on, frost, I’m not afraid of you. Winter is still weeks away.
Of course Halloween is tomorrow and I am prepared with a bucket full of candy that I’ve been willing myself not to eat before at least a few trick-or-treaters stop by the house. We also have an expertly carved pumpkin to light the way. Todd and I decided to just carve one pumpkin in a team effort this year which we did with a group of friends after visiting a haunted corn maze.
Our pumpkins turned out pretty spooky indeed.
Ours is in the middle. Check your windows for peeping pumpkins tomorrow night.
We’ll be attending a Halloween/birthday party next weekend but we didn’t do much that was Halloween-y this weekend EXCEPT run a Halloween 5K. In costume.
It was probably the most fun I’ve ever had while exercising. There were close to 1,000 participants and at least half were in costume. It was so fun to run next to penguins, witches, the Three Amigos and princesses.
We dressed up as a couple of garden gnomes.
I made our hats and Todd’s beard and I was quite proud of how the costumes turned out. The kids cheering along the way seemed to really enjoy our costumes and we got a kick out of their reactions when we’d wave at them. One little girl saw Todd and said to her mom, “Look! It’s Santa Claus!”. Priceless. I also liked the guys who yelled, “Expedia dot com!” as we passed. It was a great event and we had a lot of fun. I hope to participate again next year.
After the race I met up with mom and we spent some quality time shopping and lunching which is always a great way to spend a Saturday afternoon. When I got home Todd and I did some relaxing and then, after dinner, went to share a few drinks with a co-worker who is leaving to take a new position (hope you made it to Philly safely, Ajdin!) and then went home and watched a scary movie. We have Netflix and settled on Trick ‘R Treat.
We rated it 1 star. Ha. Oh well, it still made for an entertaining evening. Maybe scary movies just aren’t really our thing.
Enjoy your day tomorrow, Happy Halloween!
How did you celebrate this weekend?
Are you going to or did you dress up? As what?
