Welcome Jace!

Pictures are worth a thousand words, so here are three good ones from our time at the hospital.

We are all doing really well and happy to be home with my mom's company, help and excellent cooking :) We love you all so much! Thank you for your prayers and we can't wait for you all to meet him.

What are we missing?...oh, a baby!

We have a place all ready for baby Short! It came together so nicely, I had to share some of the details...

1. Before I got a sewing machine or a job, I spent a lot of my free time crocheting.  This little elephant turned out to be a keeper:) Then I got a sewing machine (!) and made curtains and a blanket with my mom when she visited in August.

2. My twinner Emily designed this sweet tryptich of "You are my sunshine".  I remember my mom singing it to us often.

3. These are just cute pictures.  The smaller one is from our 23 week ultrasound.  I love that you can see his little fingers!

4. These hot-air balloons are also a product of pre-sewing machine free time.

This is another project I'm pleased with.  When I decided to re-cover the car seat, I think I bit off WAY more than I could chew as a sewing-machine beginner, but with lots of calls to Mom, encouragement from Dane, and seam-ripping, I got it back together just right!  The cute little duck is from Mom :)

Here's what's happening outside the nursery:

• We got holes punched in our Colorado drivers' licenses this week :( Luckily, we both passed the required written test and our California ID's are on their way.
• I finally submitted my application for a teaching license and received my CSU diploma in the mail!
• Today is Dane's 10th day of work in a row.  He's been working really hard and is looking forward to a well-earned 'weekend' starting tomorrow.
• I have two piano students, both are fun to work with and are making wonderful progress.
• Dane's Sunday School class of 12-13 year-olds love him.  He sometimes gets hopeful stowaways from other age groups, but sends them back to their respective teachers.

Overall, life is good. The only thing that would make it better (we both agree) is if baby Short decided to make his birthday happen soon!  We can hardly wait.

One fish...

Last Saturday a few friends from church threw me a wonderful baby shower with the cutest Dr. Seuss-themed decorations, food and treats.  One of them even took professional-style photos of the whole thing that I wanted to share...

Like I said, everything was ADORABLE! 

The gifts were wonderful and it was great to have "girl time" with so many fun ladies!

I generally don't enjoy being in the spotlight (I honestly think I almost had a heart attack before my bridal shower!) but amazingly, this baby shower was easy and comfortable for me...because of the people.  We've only lived in Manteca for four months, but I already feel like we have a wonderful "village" of people to help us raise our little guy!
And we are so grateful.

a note from the author

I know that one of my favorite things in life is watching videos, reading about, and seeing pictures of my friends and family with their adorable kids, impressive DIY projects, adventurous trips and general thoughts on life.  On the other hand I am sometimes appalled at how poorly I keep in touch with good friends and members of my family!  So I have decided to give the blogging world a try.  I can't promise to be consistent but I think I will enjoy sharing our adventures in the far away land of California with our very favorite people.  Thanks for being one of them!

Much love,

ellen