Visiting my Amy...

While I was at Mom and Dad's this weekend, I tore myself out of their clutches long enough to go and visit Amy! Amy was one of my college roommates, probably my favorite, as I've mentioned before. I think we spent the most quality time together of any of my roommates, really. We roomed together during my junior year and her senior year, and it was a blast. I always had somebody to eat with in the cafeteria, which is big in my book. I got to tell her to go to bed when I woke up with her sleep walking and standing over me. =) She was there to pounce on my hand and squeal when David and I got engaged. I was there to cry with her through a breakup. Amy stood up with me at my wedding, and I prayed for a godly husband for her. I moved away, and she went to grad school in music. She's a great pianist. I think she got married about 4 years ago to my buddy, Clifton. Clifton has been driving me crazy since we met when he was 11 and I was 12, and my brother was beating him in 4-H electric presentations. He's not bitter. =) Clifton is a great, godly guy, and I'm so happy that he and Amy will be welcoming their baby girl any second now! Well, ok, maybe she's got a week or two to go, but it could be any second...

Amy and Clifton live in his grandparent's old farmhouse, which they have recently purchased. It's in the middle of nowhere. Seriously, I have to put on my brights most of the last 15 minutes there 'cause there aren't any streetlights. But it's an adorable old place. It has great windows and architectural details, and the quality of lighting that they get is really nice. I think there is just something about an old farmhouse. You really do get better lighting for some reason. Maybe they don't know how to make windows nowadays.

One of the funniest things about their house is their little bathroom. They have one, and it was added to the house by Clifton's grandfather, also known as the Man Who Thought He Could Squeeze a Bathroom Into the Place that His Broom Closet Used to Be. (They laugh about this, too, so it's ok to laugh with them.) I love their bathroom because I can wash my hands while still sitting on the toilet. It's so much more efficient that way. I hope for a big, huge garden tub and a giant bathroom for Amy one day, but what I love about her is that I know that she's ok with it if she never gets that. She's content with the house that God has given her, and she doesn't think she has to remodel everything to be happy. I love that about her, especially in the age of HGTV where nobody is happy unless their kitchen has stainless steel appliances.

Amy is such an adorable pregnant lady. She's still pretty tiny everywhere but in her stomach, and she has that pregnant appetite that I remember from my last days of pregnancy. You know, where you want to eat everything every two hours but your stomach is so tight that you're not sure if that ice cream cone will fit. I'm still nursing, so I can have ice cream with her, too. Don't try and stop me...

While I was there, I started nesting. Yeah, I know, I shouldn't be nesting, but Amy's room didn't look ready enough to my baby girl hungry eyes, and nesting just came over me. She reasoned, quite reasonably, that she has a few weeks to go, and she was still getting things in the house from baby showers. I however, was nesting... So away we went to shop for the baby's room. Cheaply. Because my friends are as cheap as I am, and Amy's staring down a bunch of new expenses with this baby and all. I was racking my brain for cheap ways to decorate with what she already had.

Her little girl's room is so cute! It has this great fireplace in it already, and I wanted to use that to some sort of effect. She needed some wall art, she said. By the time I'd left, I'd tidied up for her, since she can't bend down anymore, and I'd arranged some of her gifts on the mantel and in the baskets you see in the picture. I think she thought it looked good, at least if she didn't, she lied and said it did. =) We found a mirror in a closet that will look good over the mantel, if Clifton, the Husband Who Hates Hanging Pictures, will agree to put it up. I think she hasn't settled on that idea. But we also thought that she could put a pretty springtime wreath up there, too, as a cheap alternative.

The bottom picture is what we did with some fake flowers that we bought at A.C. Moore. At first, we thought we'd put them in a vase for decoration. But she really needed wall art more than a vase, so I had a lightening flash that maybe we could cut off the stems with a wire cutter and frame them. She already had two shadow boxes, so I cut the stem to fit, and then I cut a piece of white paper to fit, and I framed one. She said she really liked this effect, and I think she's going to do the other one the same way and hang them. Not bad for a $.75 flower...

Amy doted on Seth, and he loved it. She read him books, and she played with him, and she took pictures of him. She even got her camera out first. That's the mark of a real friend, if they take pictures of your kid as well as their own. =) We had a great time, and I hope I was a help instead of a bossy nuisance. I can't wait to get that phone call telling me that a new princess has arrived to claim her throne in your house! Love you, Amy!

*** Update: I sent this post to Amy for her approval, since I did take some pot shots at her bathroom. She informed me that she'd just eaten a plate of cookies. You go, girl!***

I think this is a sweet picture. Amy has no lap anymore, so Seth nestled in the crook of her sofa for story time. I know, I know, he's orange. I can't do anything about it. He loves carrots and sweet potatoes and baby food still.

See, isn't it just made to be a girly room? I'd love to have that fireplace in my bedroom.

Pottery Barn it ain't, but we like it. =)