bean

welcome to the world bean

This is the cutest baby EVER.

Here is the conversation that has been happening in our house ever since last weekend: "Terry, I'm an aunt!" ... "Ellen, you're already an aunt to 13 kids." ... "Oh, right, okay but still, I'M AN AUNT!"

Ashley went into labor Friday afternoon (emailed Adam to let him know she was having contractions - hilarious) and the bean was born at 6:44 Saturday morning.

Terry and I found surrogate parents and house sitters for the 6 dogs for the night and finally got in the car around 11pm to head to Cary to meet him. Picked up mom in Winston at midnight and made it to their house around 2:30, slept for a few hours and were in the drive-thru of McDonalds when we got the call that the bean had arrived!

Before going to sleep when we got to their house that night, I poked around his sweet little
nursery and took some sweet little pictures with the only light in the room being his night light. In the basket by Ashley's cozy glider are all of his stuffed animals. Hiding in among them all, poking out his little worn nose and rubbed away fur was Tigey. Tigey is Adam's stuffed animal from childhood who has been hidden, abused, slept with, hung from fans, strangled by plastic snakes, and flushed down the toilet by no other than m-e.
Do not feel bad for Tigey. Bunny has endured WAY worse, and barely lived to tell about it. But, it was so sweet to me to see this familiar face among all the new to welcome this sweet boy into the world and into his new home.

Oh, what's that, you actually want to see his face?
Okay, here he is:
Caleb Hillman Underwood
6 lb 15 ounces
19 inches
perfect

Your favorite aunt e loves you bean.
Going to take 'real' pictures of him mid-July, be on the lookout.

oh, and the other conversation in our house this week and while holding the bean: (insert blinking eye lashes longingly looking up at terry)
"I want one...."

Week in Review (the short version)

Apparently, who has time to blog when you are house-sitting 45 minutes away from where you live and running a kennel/keeping six labs on the lake?! Yes, go ahead and count them, 1..2..3..4..5..6. And dogs 1-4 are related, what fun! Here's the synopsis so far:

Here are 4 of the six (the four that are related) - kids on the left, parents on the right - watching the boys on their floats. It's the kids' birthday today (2 years old) - that means Salem's birthday, hooray!

I furminated all 6 of them, this picture does not at all do it justice -
filled up 2 plastic grocery bags
(and see that tiny pile in the bottom right, that's Salem's who gets brushed weekly,
now we know why!)

oh THIS cute boy? he's just my husband. i just love him. LOOK at his face, who couldn't love this face. He did great at wakeboarding - proud of you T!

ahhhh, summer: Pops in the Park where the symphony plays in the park for free and LOTS of peeps come and drink wine and eat yummy food. I stumbled across this cute boy while I was there. I think I like him, we kissed, we went home together, we got married. End of story.

Where am I you want to know? What are these dogs looking at you want to know? Oh, I've just been a FISH for the past week floating away in the lake, on the jet ski, totally basking in the sun. More pictures to come later, I'm behind on many adventures, but in the mean time, must go have some more!

Breaking Fast

Dear Mom (and Clissie, and Joanna, and Pam &Dale)

Second thank yous for wedding gifts and love gifts are officially in order. There were so many things we registered for when we were engaged and 'registry gun happy' that continue to sit in my cabinets, unused. I think we've used our waffle maker twice, though I'm sure we will use it more when we have kids. Our immersion blender that I was dying to have...never. Panini press that I only wanted if it was a Cuisinart...never. Yikes.

Other things though have just taken longer to use. My mom is getting ready to move to a new house next weekend and in her clean out mode (not just boxes of stuff here people) Terry and I were the blessed recipients of a grill - which we have already used MANY times. Now that I eat chicken and fish, this is much more useful! Fish is still new, mostly I've only eaten tilapia. I want to like salmon. I feel like all girls should like salmon. As Terry told me tonight, "oh yeah, it's FULL of omega 13s" (i love this boy). We had it a few weekends ago when the Bruce family was in town and I thought it was okay. In effort to master his grill skills, we decided to try it tonight as a healthy break to our fast/detox.

Wonderful Cousin Clissie gave us Cedar Planks for our wedding along with a Cedar Plank Grilling cookbook. Again, haven't used them yet, but tonight we did - and drooled over pictures of many things in the book. 'Mama Joanna' (see earlier post) brought my attention to a recipe in a Jr. League cookbook we had also gotten for our wedding from Pam & Dale, whose family I grew up celebrating holidays with. Again, sorry to say, hadn't used the cookbook yet. Mostly because I always. always. always. cook from Cooking Light, my best and annual Christmas present from mom. I ventured out tonight - strawberry salsa.

PEEPS. Maybe it was because we were breaking our fast, but I think it was just because it was amazing. All natural. All organic. Made in the kitchen over low lights, William Fitzsimmons singing in the background, Salem begging for food at my feet, a great bottle of white wine, and dancing with Terry in the kitchen while we waited for the salmon to cook.

The perfect dinner:

Go ahead and be jealous.

Thank you mom for the grill, it's amazing and we eat better because of it. Thank you Clissie for the cedar planks, they make the salmon DELICIOUS to a new salmon eater. Thank you Pam & Dale for the cookbook, I look forward to trying more recipes. Thank you Terry for loving me and cooking good food with me - especially for dancing in the kitchen with me like the movies.