A Wintery Weekend

Fresh snow seems to make people a little giddy.  After the storm this past weekend we ended up on a walk in Central Park and it was seriously packed with people out having so much fun playing in the snow. 

We did the typical new parent thing with taking Jaime out to see the snow.  After a failed attempt to see the firecracker Chinese new year festival (omg- too crowded for me, it was insane) we stumbled upon a fantastic spot for brunch... don't you love it when that happens, when a random walk by spot ends up being the perfect spot. It was the type of spot that I am such a sucker for - big branches of cherry blossoms, subway tile, distressed wood tables, cool lights, oh yeah and good food. 

We also enjoyed the excuse of slushy, snowing streets for staying in for lazy family time hanging out, watching our baby amaze us with all of his new tricks... slow down time!

Goodbye Chicago! Hello East Coast!

After nearly ten years of calling the Windy City home, we are saying goodbye and moving east.  My husband was offered an awesome career opportunity in the NY/NJ area and we jumped at the chance to live in New York City. 

Chicago is the city where we spent our first couple of days getting to know each other after we met on my college campus when Dan was visiting a mutual friend (I was at the University of Iowa and Dan was living in Colorado).  It is where we started our careers, learned to be partners, shared challenges and successes, where we were married and spent our newlywed years, and where we welcomed our first baby.  There will always be a big huge spot in my heart for Chicago.

 

New York is going to be such an adventure.  We are currently in a temporary apartment in Jersey (about 12 miles outside of the city) while we figure out what neighborhoods might work for us and get geared up for the Manhattan apartment search.   After having such a roomy home in Chicago I am a little scared of the shoeboxes we will most likely find in a similar price point. :)

I am so very excited to experience living in New York. 

A Brunch Club Celebration for Baby

Guys, I have some the most talented and cutest women for friends.  I feel very lucky to call my brunch club girls friends... and to think, we all met through blogging!  This past weekend these girls turned our April brunch into a celebration for Baby U.  It was so sweet and I went home feeling very special indeed.

It was a community event with everyone (but me- for shame!) contributing.  I loved that as community is such an important element in life.  Did I mention these girls are talented?  Colleen was the fantastic hostess opening up her home and making a delicious brunch (totally had to have two of the yummy ham and cheese sandwiches).  Tina shared her mad paper skills by whipping up the cutest place cards and finding the perfect wrapping paper to fit in with the style I am planning for the nursery.  Natalie made these delicious pear muffins (hopefully she shares this recipe...).  Devon brought herbs (love) for favors in completely cute packaging.  Ami was the photographer taking beautiful photos for us.

{Photos taken by Ami}

See what I mean about talented?

How can you not feel warm and fuzzy when people are messaging back and forth on completely personalized gifts, running around town for the perfect paper, taking up time on their weekends to prepare a delicious meal just to celebrate your baby?  I feel lucky to have such amazing women in my life.

A beautiful weekend & goals for the week

Happy Monday! What a whirlwind of a weekend and how has February been going so fast!  This is usually such a slow time of year in my opinion but this year it has been flying by - likely due to be busy moving, counting baby growing weeks, and vacation planning.  I sometimes think that one aspect of living well means finding those beautiful moments that are in the midst of the business of day-to-day. While this was a quick weekend, it was a good one filled with moments I am grateful for...

Family time - My brother and sister-in-law were able to squeeze in a visit that was totally out of their way.  I love getting to spend time with them and wish that it could be more frequent.

Baby stuff - It is fun seeing my husband preparing for that shift to being a dad.  We went together to buy a few baby clothes this weekend.  He picked out a monkey outfit that is totally different from what I have been getting.

Couple time - We fit in a very long Sunday afternoon walk to enjoy the sunshine and burn off the pie (lemon meringue from Hoosier Mama- yum) we had with my family. It was one of those totally relaxed walks where the conversation goes on random tangents and the doggie tails were wagging with contentment.

Nesting - We made some of progress on getting our place looking like our home; seeing our photos up on the wall makes me happy.  There is still a long ways to go but small bits of progress are satisfying as is working together on little house tasks.

Goals and things I am looking forward to this week -

Blogging - Get organized and make blogging part of my routine again!  I have so much to share on here but have got to organize my thoughts so that I can be efficient with the bits of time I have available.

Working out - Running before work!  I am so excited that we now have a treadmill at home... it is going to be awesome.  And it is going to help free up some time after work which is needed.

Party - This weekend we are doing a progressive dinner with some friends - can.not.wait.  But need to figure out what to make for my course and hopefully get a little bit more crossed off the nesting list.

Photography - I need to get out and have some photography time this week.  I am not sure what the theme will be but I really need some quality time with my camera as I have been feeling pretty uninspired lately - time to break out of it.

Hope you all had a beautiful weekend and a fantastic week coming up!

15 weeks and counting

 

There's a baby on the way in our family! 

I am just over 15 weeks and feeling great.  We are extremely excited and enjoying every minute of this adventure.  Nursery plans are underway, babymoon is booked, and names are being discussed.   And we have joined team green - we are waiting until birth to find out the gender.

Maybe you noticed the lack of posting this fall?  During the first trimester I never was sick but omg was I tired.  I was falling asleep by 8pm and the last thing I could even think about doing was staring at a computer after being at work all day.  And then when I have been on the computer I have been researching baby stuff.  So there will most definitely be posts about nursery decor and such in the near future and lots of pins on pinterest about baby stuff.