hello friends! you can stop checking and being disappointed now, because our baby girl has arrived! hadley. the whole time it was her inside me. it had to be her. she is perfect and we are both doing awesome! happily starting our new life. i miss her every second she's out of my arms. studying her faces is our new favorite thing. and the way she stares us down is hilarious. we are in love. i'm going to be taking a little blog break so that i can spend every second smelling my brand new baby!
i am so happy.

thank you for all the thoughts and prayers and excitement!

sending you an ocean of love.
summer

ps. happy first father's day to grant! i've already cried about how great a dad he is. it's unbelievable.

hi friends! no baby news yet. :) thank you for all the thoughts and prayers! while we wait, have you seen brian regan? you should watch this hilarious clip. we've been spending some nights watching old favorites of him on netflix/youtube. i'm not at all a stand-up comedian type of girl, but this guy is different. seriously. last night i thought some contractions might start because my belly was shaking so much.

(sorry for the poor video quality. i couldn't find a better one for this joke.)

dear baby

today is your due date! this day has been looming in my mind for so long that it has felt almost hypothetical. like when we reached it the world might just stop. but that day is real. it's here. i woke up and ate cheerios with granola. i gave your daddy a kiss. i checked the weather and facebook. i took a shower. i'm celebrating by doing normal things. because even though it's here, you're still in there- not to put any pressure on you. i'm done counting days! i'll just be patient until you're ready. i know life must be pretty sweet, sharing chipotle burritos with me. i wouldn't want to leave either.

but just so you know, i'm ready for you. the house is clean, laundry is caught up, diapers are standing by, meals are in the freezer, and my commitments are none. all i have to do is eat and drink and sleep until you come! speaking of which, i wonder when i will get caught by you. what will i be in the middle of when you decide it's time? i'm trying to stay on top of my showering, just in case.

there are so many things i need to get down before it's too late and you're not inside me anymore. i can't imagine that right now, but i know some morning soon i will wake up and be a little freaked out that yes, the bump really is gone. (and i will be able to see your face instead!) i have loved the curve you created in my figure. i love to take extra time staring at this stomach, trying to figure out the miracle. i've loved communicating with you through the funny barrier of my skin. i love to run my fingers over the firmness and picture you waking up from my touch. i love to talk to you every morning while we lay in bed, and ask you if you'll come today?

i've loved the shiver of your stretches, the mystery appendage that pokes my left side, the pressure from your burrowing head, the throb of your tiny hiccups, the lump of your bum pushing straight out in front.. you are so amazing to feel. no one else gets to know you like this. no one else gets to have this time with you. i will savor it until the end.

it's crazy how close we are to meeting. you'd think i'd have a better idea of what you will be like on the outside, but i am stumped. completely. come show me! all i know for sure is that it's going to be miraculous. our tiny family will be three. because you're ours! our baby. 
who i get to meet any. minute. now.

i love you,
your mom

there's no point in trying figure out this week. what a strange thing it is to wait for your baby.
will it be tonight? will it be 10 days from now? i have no clue. i spend half the time being quietly ecstatic and the other half being completely oblivious; my usual coping method when something huge is on the horizon. it's a good thing i don't know the day or the hour this hugeness will arrive, because i'm not sure how i could handle it. the not knowing is where the luxury lies. i can relax because i'm not in control, and i wasn't given a schedule for this. yay.

i want to remember what i was eating/watching/feeling/doing during this little waiting game, so i'll try to record a few things here and there...



1. i turned on the classic movie channel yesterday to check if i should record anything good and happened to catch the one movie that i've been dying to find! room for one more. grandma recorded this for us once when i was a little girl, and i've never been able to find it again- until yesterday. it's such a sweet film. i love when cary grant has a father role. and i always wonder if people actually laughed at these movies when they came out.
2. sunday afternoon i went into a "see it, clean it" spurt and tried to get each room in our house looking the way i wanted it to, at least at that moment. it felt great.
3. saw the new x-men movie last friday. (grant introduced me to the x-men movies. he's a fan. now i'm a fan.) matinee price + sour patch kids + good storyline = awesome time. i always like james mcavoy.
4. these are a few of my favorite things: smoothies. with pineapple! BLT. sharp cheddar cheese. chicken salad with apples and red onion. salty granola. salty homemade popcorn.
5. i'm still feeling good, pretty comfortable. it's not hard to feel normal still. (does this mean i have awhile to wait?)
6. my lips are staying constantly chapped. weird.
7. the other night we had an around-town date which included filling the car with gas and getting ice cream at the hub drive-in. grant got a heath cone, and i got cookies 'n' cream in a dish- my latest (re)discovery. we drove around the neighborhood while we devoured our treats, discussing landscaping possibilities for our front yard.
8. we're working our way through star wars. 
9. monday morning i got up and decided to make granola before i even ate any breakfast. i never put anything before breakfast. that's how compulsive monday was.
10. too bad i didn't know it was going to be 96 degrees before i had the oven on for over an hour.
10.5. needless to say, we had our first use of the a/c.
11. have you played 7 Little Words? i'm addicted to this game.
12. we listen to "somebody to love" by justin bieber whenever we get in the car these days.
13. i feel like i wander around my house lately- calm- but not necessarily getting a lot done. the computer is nice and distracting. blogging, a welcome occupation for my mind.
..so i might be back soon. :)

what will go on baby harmsie's bottom? we decided on the flip diapers. super excited!
i've heard rave reviews. i love how cool and simple they are. simple is my favorite.



also loving the chemical-free and only-buy-them-once thing, of course. but cuteness counts for something too :) just look how soft and fluffy those inserts are! and they have a disposable insert option too, very nice. they sent us 4 free packages of disposables when we ordered!

do any of you guys flip? i'd love to hear! 

when i go to the kitchen to make pancakes, i take the iPad with me. i need it because i'm trying a new recipe, obviously. probably from your blog. somehow i am always inclined to forget the pancakes i ate last time and am ready to give my heart to another. but the latest pancake trial was the 1970's pancakes from heart of light, and these will not be easy to forget. they were hearty and the right amount of fluffy. and yummy in a very wholesome, this is how a pancake should taste way.

the kind of yummy that finds you putting a pancake in the toaster at 4:00 in the afternoon for a little snack while you watch a re-run of friends. (this is why you freeze the leftover pancakes.)

rachel's hippie pancakes
lightly adapted from heart of light

2/3 cup whole wheat flour
1/3 cup unbleached all purpose flour
1/4 cup old fashioned oats
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup buttermilk + 1/4 cup milk
2 eggs
sprinkle of cinnamon

mix dry ingredients together in a medium bowl. add melted butter to bowl.* whisk eggs and milks together and pour over dry ingredients. add the honey and cinnamon. stir just until combined. cook on a large cast iron skillet at medium-low temp for a couple minutes on each side, until golden brown. stack on a cookie sheet in a 200 degree oven until ready to serve.
*i like to add the butter to the bowl beforehand instead of whisking it into the milk and eggs so that it doesn't get clumpy in the cold mixture.

enjoy! and yes, there is a bowl of syrup on my plate because i've decided that i dip my pancakes. don't mind me. i've just never bought into the syrup-soaking-in concept.

it's here. JUNE. the birth month. the one when this "imaginary" baby that i've been carrying will become real. i kept reminding myself this morning. june first. june first! each time i realize it a little excited shake runs through me. i'm ready. speaking of which, i've been getting some feedback about the post where i mentioned feeling "peaceful" as we enter the waiting period for the baby. yes, i do! and i wanted to clarify something about that.

this is not because i am naturally a super relaxed and confident person.

by nature i am pretty shaky, but the Lord has been doing an awesome work in my heart throughout this pregnancy. with the coming of a baby, i've needed His guidance on fear, strength, trust, and peace, and He has given it in abundance. if i shared all of the verses/quotes/reminders i've written down on my notecards during the past months it would be enough fill 10 blog posts, but i want to jot down at least a few things so i can remember what the Lord was teaching me before the baby came.