Welcome to The Nest!

We spent almost the entire holiday weekend and a little bit of this past week finishing up the nursery. (Accidentally gouging a hole in the ceiling while trying to hang the mobile and then repairing said ceiling drug out the process a few days longer than planned.) We're super excited about how it turned out. Come on in and check it out!

I think I've mentioned a million times how tiny and odd this room is (6 ft x 14 ft), but I'll point it out again. The only way to get the wide shot below was by crawling inside the closet. (Camera geeks feel free to make your recommendations. We're looking to upgrade.)

The following are a few shots of the much ballyhooed Eames molded plastic rocker that we waited for all summer. I'm so happy we splurged on it. It's quite comfortable and is possibly the only rocker in existence that would fit in this room. The pillow is from Urban Outfitters and is one of the very first things I bought for the nursery because for some reason it reminds of the Madeline books.

A close up on the bookshelves. The bins don't have anything in them at the moment, but I'm sure they'll fill up with toys quickly.

The wall decals were a blast to put up. These are from the lovemaestore on etsy.

The dresser is from Ikea, but I dressed it up with new knobs from Anthroplogie. (That's the birds nest print that inspired the bird theme, btw.)

The crib bedding is a combination of Pottery Barn Kids, Dwell for Target, and Carter's. (Yes, Olive will be staring down on her while she sleeps.)

And now, my absolute favorite part of the room:

The tree decal is from Dali Decals, also on etsy. It took both of us to put it up and required a lot of intense concentration and patience. I'm proud to say there was no cursing involved.

I love how the lovemae decals and the tree decal work together. I really wasn't sure if they would when I ordered them.

Of course, it wouldn't be one of our projects if it wasn't slightly unfinished. We still want to install a new light fixture (purchased, just need to remember to call the electrician one of these days!) and I'd love to replace the blinds with shades. Unfortunately, the process of measuring for and selecting shades is completely intimidating to me, so who knows if that will ever happen. Oh, and of course, we need the baby to make it really complete. For now, we're content to wait patiently.

Hungry Howie: End of Summer Salad

A few weeks ago, a friend e-mailed to ask when I was going to post my next "Hungry Howie" post to the blog. Until she asked, it hadn't occurred to me that it had been months since I spent time in the kitchen making something worth getting excited about. When we're busy and overwhelmed, cooking is the first thing to slide. I've made many a dinner in the last few months and even tried making pancakes for the first time (I know!) one weekend, but all have been meals that I could sleep walk through. Tasty, yes, but uninspiring. I resolved to change that this past weekend.

We're very fortunate to have access to a number of great farmer's markets, so we hit our favorite this weekend and grabbed whatever looked good to us. (Including donuts from Scratch Bakery!) With the ingredients we gathered, I was able to put together this yummy end of summer salad from Sara Foster's Casual Cooking, one of my favorite, most used cookbooks. Sara Foster is one of our more famous local chefs and we're big fans of her restaurant. My adapted recipe follows.

Heirloom Tomato Salad with Purple-Hull Peas

kosher salt
fresh ground black pepper
1 cup purple-hull peas (or other fresh beans such as lady peas, black eyed peas, or even frozen green peas)
2 lbs heirloom tomatoes, sliced (or any tasty variety that you have available)
1/4 c cider vinegar
juice of 1 lemon
1/4 c extra-virgin olive oil
1 shallot, minced
1 tsp sugar
fresh basil leaves, thinly sliced

Boil peas in a salted pot of water for 8 to 10 minutes, until tender. Drain and rinse under cold water until cooled.

Combine vinegar, lemon juice, shallot and sugar in a medium bowl. Gradually whisk in olive oil until combined. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Add sliced tomatoes and peas to vinaigrette and toss lightly to combine. Sprinkle basil over salad and season with salt and pepper.

The original recipe calls for fresh lady peas, but those weren't available. It also includes a minced jalapeno in the vinaigrette, but I opted to leave that out.

Princess Olive

This is how I found Olive in bed this morning, curled up atop a pile of pillows with the covers snuggled up around her chest.

I'm pretty sure she's seconds away from complaining about an annoying pea-sized thing below the mattress that kept her awake all night long, but she knew better than to complain to a woman who has a melon-sized human in her belly keeping her awake at all hours.

In Between

We've done a ton of work on the nursery this weekend but we're not quite finished. I thought I'd post a few photos of the "in between" stage in the meantime.

The cleared out, blank slate.

The bedroom with all of the office furniture crammed in. It doesn't look too bad, but is hardly what I want it to be. Unfortunately, our bedroom is probably the last thing on the to-do list. Stay tuned for the big nursery reveal!