It begins...

(Sorry, folks, but the spacing gets all jacked up when I add photos and I can't figure out how to fix it...)

Coleman and I try, with more and less success at times, to avoid becoming "stuff" people. We don't want our "stuff" to run our lives. He is far better at this than I am, but I'm not so shabby at it myself. This has been a particular challenge as we now face the impending necessity of having enough to care for and nurture our imminent arrival, but without going nuts and without letting all the "stuff" take over our lives.

This was put into stark relief as we registered (I stilll haven't posted on this process...sorry. I will soon), and also recently as I had my first shower.

Let me begin by saying that I was truly touched by my coworkers' thoughtfulness in planning this event, their faithfulness in attending it, and their generosity in helping us get started in this new phase of life.

However, the pile of gifts was truly overwhelming. I should have taken a picture of all these in the back of our car (I had planned on walking to the shower...very glad I drove!), but I did snap a few shots once I got them in the house and laid them all out together so that I could see who gave us what in order to write thank-you notes. As you can see, it takes up most of our (admittedly small) living room. That is Felicity in the picture, checking things out:

This is just the pile of tissue paper ALONE! (There's a better pic, but this one has Perpetua in it!)

And so it begins.

The shower was wonderful, though, and I was so thrilled that it was a co-ed, cookout thing so that I wasn't the main event and I didn't have a room full of people staring at me while I opened gifts.

Here are some of the highlights:

This is me getting my party on

This is some other folks getting their party on

This is the cake...is it not the cutest thing ever?! It's a onesie!! I was sad that they had to cut into it at all.

This is a (terrible) shot of the horrific bag Lindsey got me as a joke - she knows that pretty, pretty princess stuff makes me want to hurl. (Yes, I was a girly girl, and I'll be okay if my daughter is, too, but I want her to choose it and not have it forced on her as a social pressure. I also have issues with the glorification of the princess...what does she do exactly? Besides being pretty and being married to a prince, she rarely contributes to kingdom justice or passes better laws or anything. I just don't want my daugther to admire something or someone based solely on appearance and marital status. Sorry, getting off my soapbox now.)

Here, however, is what was in the bag - fabulous, handmade slippers from a craft merchant in Mexico, where she went over spring break. I love them!

Plenty of clothes...

Oh, this was hilarious. They are chickie pjs, but the feet are actually little chickies! Awesome!!

My incredible parents actually fed-ex'd a gift that my coworker, Judy, surprised me with on the day of the shower. This is just to show that my mother clairvoyantly (is that a word?) managed to match the wrapping paper with my outfit...exactly.

The gifts inside included some of my baby clothes, including two little dresses I wore. One of them was worn on the day I was dedicated, and they included a little picture of Mom holding me while I was wearing it that day. It was the hit of the party:

I did, however, have to explain what "baby dedication" is to all the Catholics there as we passed it around. ("Is it like baptism?")

They also bought me my super-sweet (and super-expensive) breast pump, so the parents are really going above and beyond right now. Thanks, you guys!

Okay, sorry for the long post, but I had all these pics and nothing to do with them!