Nesting

As you all know, we couldn’t really provide a cute nursery for Monkey like we would have hoped due to our move. It would have ben impractical to paint the walls when everything would be moved out prior to his arrival. The same goes for décor. Everything would have had to been shipped. We decided to keep a minimal number of items and are happy with our choice. We’ll see how we feel once Monkey gets here, but for now, we’re good.

Monkey's "nursery"

His pack 'n play will actually be kept in our bedroom once he arrives.

We will be loading his adorable car seat into our loaner car soon. And here's to hoping he loves his bouncy seat! (We missed a photo of his swing.)

His first dresser/changing table. We managed to pick it up for $25!

L to R: wooden teething ring, wooden pacifier clip and a Longhorn pacifier from Ge (my mom)

Instead of spending time working on a nursery, though, I think my nesting instincts found other outlets in the form of food prep and crafts. Before all our household goods were sent, I spent several days cooking extra meals to freeze. In our freezer, we have:

• beef, chicken and cheese quesadillas (5 days)
• chicken enchiladas (4 days)
• Italian casserole (6 days) – this is a noodle, tomato sauce, beef and cheese casserole
• sun dried tomato, chicken and penne pasta casserole (4 days)
• pancakes (5 days)
• taco meat (5-6 days)

If you were counting, that means we have about 30 days worth of dinners in our freezer. Hooray! We only have two months until we fly home, so on average, we can eat a freezer meal every other day until we fly home. I also posted a list of easy meals on the fridge so that when we’re tired and wondering what to make for dinner, we have an easy list staring us in the face:

• French dip sandwiches
• breakfast tacos
• black bean tacos
• macaroni and cheese
• pita pizzas
• sandwiches
• out to eat (duh)

The crafting portion of my nesting has been a bit more time-consuming, and I’m still working to finish everything. I have a knitted bootie project to finish as well as a hat. I’m crossing my fingers that I get them done in time. Here are the projects that I have completed:

The blanket I made, which turned out larger than I'd planned. I love it. It's about 4'x6' or so.

This is the back. Hand stitching the binding took forever!

Burp cloths -- I made two for each fabric pattern, so there are 12 in all.

Monkey's baby hat (and the first hat I ever knit!)

I stuffed this bootie to give it shape since Monkey isn't here yet to model it for you.

The whole set!