You know you're in the South when ...

you hear "Oh I Wish I Was in Dixie" on the radio, the sign on the restaurant down the street indicates that they serve gizzards, livers and fried green tomatoes ... and literally every salesperson I encountered in the past 48 hours wanted to be very sure I was going to have a happy Mother's Day. You have to love Southern hospitality!

A new kind of "Sunday blues"

I used to get the "Sunday blues" on Sunday afternoons, and often even late in the day on Saturday, with the prospect of the work week and daily grind starting up again all too soon.

Well, I'm realizing that the maternity work week is really 7 days a week, 24 hours a day (of course with obvious perks and I wouldn't trade it for anything), so the Sunday blues should be a thing of the past, right?

Wrong. I felt them coming on yesterday as the prospect of Matt returning to work set in! Ironic, since for the past six months all we wanted was for him to be able to go to work in the first place!

This was our first "normal" weekend as mom and dad, in our new place in Chattanooga, taking care of Emery, enjoying some down time, trying to unpack, etc. And he's such a huge help! I was able to go to the grocery store by myself, take a run and a longer than ordinary shower.

So I suppose I might always be dealing with the Sunday blues ... on the bright side, Emery is learning to sleep on her own and that more than compensates for any case of the Sunday blues.

Too much Food Network

You know you've been watching too much Food Network when you see Giada whip up penne with treviso and goat cheese twice in the same week. (and by the way, for any Giada fans out there, is it just me, or is she always cooking with penne, and never any other kind of pasta?)

I'm normally not much of a TV watcher, but sometimes I just need a diversion when feeding Emery ... ok, a lot of the time. :) My rotation is basically made up of Good Morning America, any show revolving around buying or selling a home on HGTV (which pretty much sums up all of their shows) and practically any cooking show on the Food Network.

Paula Dean is starting to drive me a little crazy though, despite the fact that I'm moving south and should be warming up to all things buttery, creamy, cheesy and greasy ... and Giada is too, especially with how she always has to articulate her ingredients with an Italian accent and starts every sentence with the word "now."

Today I rediscovered a cooking podcast that I don't often get a chance to listen to (Spilled Milk) and am thinking that podcasts might need to replace TV, at least for a little while.

A happy reunion

I'm trying to reassure Matt that he's not missing too much of Emery's life as he works in Chattanooga during the week and visits us on the weekends. However, a friend did jokingly point out that he missed half her life while in Chattanooga last week.

Still, I don't think he missed too much other than her putting on a few ounces and getting a little cuter with each passing day. This week her only new trick has been spitting up.

We're thrilled that we get to go down to Chattanooga with Matt next week for a visit, leaving us only one short week on our own again before we make the move!

Beds

Emery likes her day bed (and night bed for the time being) AND Mom and Dad's bed!

Emery Campbell Doescher

Born Sunday, March 21, 2010 at 11:30am.

6 pounds, 10 ounces

19 1/4 inches

She has already captured our hearts entirely! More pictures and videos of our little girl soon to come!

I can't believe it

I think between Matt and myself, we've said "I can't believe it" about 331 times in the last 24 hours, because yesterday, Matt accepted a job offer at Volkswagen that will take us to Chattanooga, TN!

Matt's been looking for a job since mid-September and in October, we began to get VW and Chattanooga on the brain. Both make sense for us in so many ways, and now that it's finally happened, we're stunned. There were days when something like this happening just felt impossible, but we kept hoping and praying for a miracle. And I took a lot of deep breaths.

Well, we got our miracle, and another miracle is (hopefully!) quickly on its way .... Baby D is due in just under a week. We can't believe it!!