While we patiently waited for Penelope this weekend, Matt and I sprung into more nesting action to finish off a few projects that had been lingering. He put the final coat of paint on our laundry room cabinets and installed the hardware for them which means that our laundry room is officially finished.

Here are some before and afters from when we first bought the house. The projects in this room included ripping out lower cabinets and countertop, moving the extra fridge to the basement, tearing down old wallpaper, putting up new wallpaper, painting cabinets, running water and electricity for the washer and dryer, installing a new floor, installing beadboard on the walls and ceiling and putting in crown molding & chair rail.

Before:

From Daily Daguerreotype

From Daily Daguerreotype

After:

From Daily Daguerreotype

From Daily Daguerreotype

I’m so pleased with how it all turned out, which is a tribute to how good Matt is at actually creating what I have in my mind. As you know, I love doing laundry, but probably because of my adorable laundry room and its convenient location right off my kitchen. We’ve started parking our cars in the backyard now, so this is becoming our main entrance and has been really functional so far. I’m also seeing via the picture that it’s time to take out the recycling.

We also tackled a project this weekend that we had been wanting to do for years. I had inherited an old beat up bookshelf that my grandfather built years and years ago. It had been sitting in my parents basement for a while holding cans of paint, so it was in pretty rough condition. This weekend we sanded it down and put a few fresh coats of black paint on it giving it new life. Then last night Matt hauled up the boxes of books we’ve had in storage for a year now, and I organized them on the bookshelf. With my new zest for reading, we’re both tickled pink that our books are finally accessible. Although we realized we need about 2 more shelves of the same size.

From Daily Daguerreotype

Matt’s currently down in the basement putting the second coat of paint on a coffee table he built years ago, which is getting a new life in our newly finished den upstairs. The den and guest room are slowly coming together, so I’ll have pictures of those perhaps later this week if Penny Cate is still snoozin at the wheel.

Feels good to be finishing up some of these things and finally moving into our house.

I think I’ve mentioned before that Matt and I joined a CSA this year recommended by some friends. After an unfortunately soggy start due to the Nashville Flood of 2010, we started picking up our CSA boxes two weeks ago and were delighted to see a delicious assortment of seasonal produce. The first week we wound up with lettuce, broccoli, bok choy, swiss chard (my favorite!), green onions, tons of strawberries, a half dozen fresh eggs, and two huge ham steaks. This week we’ve hauled in lettuce, spinach, broccoli, more strawberries, more green onions, some fresh herbs, a half dozen fresh eggs, and some local ground beef.

I’m having so much fun making dinners out of these ingredients, and we’re starting to get into a pattern for dinners that includes huge salads and many meatless meals. I had been wanting to cut down on our meat consumption, so I’m not really buying much else other than what comes in our CSA box. One night a week we have breakfast for dinner and spend the entire meal discussing just how daggone delicious those fresh eggs really are.

I’m also trying to get into the habit of only keeping around food that we’ll eat up in that week. I used to be a person with a fully-stocked pantry at all times, but after having a conversation with my sister about keeping food costs down by only having on hand that which you would eat in a week, I’m starting to become a convert. It’s forcing us to eat what we have on hand instead of what I’m “in the mood” to cook. I’m also feel like I’m doing less cooking by making bigger batches of our meals allowing us plenty of leftovers – something I never used to do.

I will admit that I’ve started splurging on locally made bread and high-quality deli meats and cheeses for Matt’s lunches because my CSA pick-up location is a local deli. I used to just buy him whatever was on sale at the grocery store, but now he’s getting locally made roast beef at $9.99/lb. because of the sheer convenience. I’m making up for it by crafting him smaller sandwiches (sorry hun!) and filling out the rest of his lunch with things like a huge bunch of CSA strawberries. So far he doesn’t seem to mind. The roast beef is just that good.

One of my big concerns was that the CSA would require so much prep work that I’d be overwhelmed when Penny arrives. But I’m finding that’s not the case. Everything requires a little extra washing, but is so tasty and fresh served cold or quickly cooked that I’m spending less time cooking and more time sitting at the kitchen table reveling in my meal. So far the portion we signed up for hasn’t been unmanageable, and I’m hopeful that we’ll be able to continue managing it after our daughter comes along.

Tonight’s dinner is super simple. I’m making a huge CSA salad to go with red beans and rice. Tomorrow night we’re having a veggie stir-fry to go with leftover fried rice made with local eggs. On Saturday night, we’ll grill up our local ground beef in some tasty burgers with homemade sweet potato fries and… you guessed it… a big ole salad.

It’s probably not too late for you to join a local CSA. Some just give you produce, others have meat and dairy items as well. Check out localharvest.org for more information.

I’m headed out of town this weekend for a ladies weekend in Easternish Tennessee, which is going to be fun fun fun. On the docket is food, more food, some movies, some reading, some exploring, and food. Last night I folded myself up like a pretzel to give myself a pedicure… THAT is how serious I’m taking this weekend.

As I prepare to drive out of town, we’re having a delicious Tennessee thunderstorm. When I moved here last year I was blown away by the thunder and lighting, and every time it rains like this I’m tempted to break out 1980s Eric Clapton and dance around until the power goes out. Don’t ask. I just love it that much.

While I hunker down for girl time in the rain this weekend, Matt will be busy working on the second floor and told me that he intends to have it basically finished by the time I get home. “Basically finished” means all the painting except the trim. I won’t hold him to it, in case he decides to spend all day tomorrow in front of the TV watching scary movies about space exploration that I would never put up with. But the thought of coming home to a completed upstairs makes this pregnant woman ready and willing to head straight into labor and delivery.

I hope you have a glorious weekend that involves either chocolate or space exploration – whichever is more your gig.

As I mentioned earlier, my mom is coming out to visit next Monday and is staying for a week. We’ve had this on the calendar for a few months now, and the anticipation is totally killing me. I always look forward to visits from my parents, but this visit is different for a few reasons.

See, I’ve been pregnant for nine out of the past twelve months. Matt and I moved to Nashville just 15 days shy of a year ago, unpacked boxes in our temporary apartment, hung our pajamas together, and took that life changing pregnancy test. Two months of my first pregnancy went by, and then my mom flew out to be with me during the hardest week of my life. Her visit last July changed everything about our relationship. Up until then, she was my mom, and I loved her. But when she came out to Tennessee to help me through my miscarriage, suddenly her MOMHOOD struck me like never before. All those years of hearing her tell me to “drive safely!” while I rolled my eyes came flooding back, and suddenly I realized A) what it feels like to be a mother, B) how the last thing a mother ever wants is for her child to hurt, and C) what it’s like for a mother to lose a child you loved more than life itself. My mom now totally made sense.

I’m not sure she realizes it, but since then I’ve opened up to her in ways I never had before. I’ve told her things I haven’t told anyone else (other than Matt – sorry, Mom, but you would want me to be honest with my husband, I’m sure). I’ve gone to her to cry instead of the people I might have otherwise gone to. In the past year, I have finally taken advantage of her motherhood the way she had offered it to me for years.

People often ask me if it’s hard living far from family, and the biggest thing I miss is that I would have loved to share the past seven months of this pregnancy with my mom… in person. Because I’ve realized just how much I need her to mother me… at age 27. I’ve realized how much I want to be a mom just like her. And a mother-in-law just like her. And a grandmother just like her. I want to be like my mom.

So she’s coming out next Monday, and for a full week we’ll be able to live out pregnancy together the way that I’ve wanted to for the nine months of this past year that I was pregnant. We’ll shop and clean and daydream about Penny together. She’ll give me tips and advice, and bemoan raising daughters, and I’ll likely cry a lot when I voice my fears and concerns to her. And I will so enjoy just soaking up her motherhood. It will be such a great time of bonding, but it will also be a time of closure and healing. Last time she came alone to visit us, she was here to mother me in a dark place. And this time, she’s here to celebrate with me.

All of this to say, I love my mom. And yet again in my life, God has shown me that I will face tough stuff ahead, but there is so much to celebrate. New life, green grass, faithful friends, a man I admire, creme brulee, a puppy romping in her backyard, and fresh beginnings. And the best daggone mom in the world.

I’ve broken many of the rules of pregnancy in that I’ve indulged in the occasional salami sandwich, regularly forgotten to take my prenatal vitamins and have sipped on four glasses of wine with a few glurbs of Matt’s beer to boot. All in all, I’ve tried to be pretty good, but the fact of the matter is that by nature I’m a rule breaker. There are few rules that I believe really matter in life, and the rest I feel can be bent a little bit.

Despite my penchant for living on the other side of the law, I have held firm against my biggest desire – Wellfleet oysters on the half shell. Luckily I live in TENNESSEE and am not faced with this temptation on a daily basis. But this past weekend while in DC we went out to a yummy seafood place in Old Town Alexandria with my lovely cousin and her husband. And what should Matt order? Oysters on the half shell. Because deep inside his puritanical spirit enjoys snickering while I am forced to OBEY.

I have never wanted to dive into something face first more than I wanted to dive into his plate. Thank the good Lord in heaven that the conversation was so interesting I was distracted from his plate long enough for them to be slurped up swiftly behind my back.

While I have vigilantly given up raw seafood while pregnant, you better believe I won’t let breastfeeding stop me. And as soon as that baby girl pops out of me you know I’m going to be demanding that Matt provide me with a dozen Welfleet oysters on the half shell. In Tennessee. In June. Which doesn’t have an R.

I consider that ample payback for the twinkle I saw in his eye the ONE night he ate oysters while I was pregnant. What goes around comes around, boy!

Over the past… eh… week and a half, life has been spinning at an absurdly fast rate of speed. Suddenly all of these carseats started arriving at the front door, which made it absolutely necessary for me to remove them from their boxes, inspect all of their moving pieces, read all of the installation instructions (holy cow!) and proceed to vacuum, detail and wash both of our cars.

It was bittersweet cleaning out our Volvo wagon, because I knew I was ultimately cleaning it out to be replaced. The little guy has been everything we could have wanted for carting around drywall and a muddy dog over the past few years, but has now gotten to a place where it needs major repairs – repairs that are significantly more expensive than the car is worth. As of December it won’t pass inspection without those repairs, so we’re planning on replacing it, perhaps with an Outback, perhaps with something else.

We’ve put 85,000 miles on our already well-loved wagon in almost five years, which is crazy considering it was my car and I took public transportation to work for 2 of those years and was at home for another year. Matt’s jobs have always required an outrageous amount of driving, so we’ve had to face the fact that we will inevitably replace cars sooner than the average American family. It’s a bummer on the wallet, but has gotten us pretty adept at car shopping over the past few years.

This Saturday we had an appointment to test drive an Outback and a Forester; the former we decided was the car for us. We’re wagon people. We like having a five-seater with lots of storage capacity and good gas mileage. We like a car that drives well in the snow, not that that matters so much anymore. We like a car that you can put a muddy dog in and not think twice about.

But I didn’t like how the smug salesman was unwilling to negotiate down to the price I wanted. So today I called down to a competing dealership to see what the Polish salesguy could do for me. After I played a Chris Matthews-worthy version of hardball, he made me some good promises that the car we’d be special ordering would come in right at the price we are willing to pay.

I like the Polish people. They make great sausages. And sweet sugary baked goods.

I’ll hear back from my friend later this week, and I hope he has good news for me. Yeah, I want a new Outback, but more than anything I’m just gnawing at the bit with an insatiable desire to install this adorable new carseat!

Until then, I can bide my time re-reading the owner’s manual.