Chocolate Peanut Butter Icebox Pie
Source: bakersroyale.com via Sarah on Pinterest
I saw this Do-si-dos chocolate peanut butter icebox pie on Pinterest recently and decided it would work perfectly for recipe club last night since the theme for the month was anything that should be served cold. The pie I ended up making was slightly different. First, I don’t have any Do-si-dos (a Girl Scout cookie) so I used more Oreos instead. I also didn’t include any coffee in the chocolate layer. The result was still quite yummy — and very rich. A small piece was enough for me, so this normal sized pie can serve a lot of people. It looked pretty too:
My pretty pie
However, the original blogger wasn’t super diligent in recording the recipe. There were several inconsistencies between the list of ingredients, the listed measurements, and the written directions. On top of that, after making the pie the way the recipe called for, I decided that the whole process could be more efficient. So with all appropriate credit to the original, I’m rewriting the recipe and posting it here in case I need it again in the future!
Fair warning: this is not a quick and easy pie. It took me about 2 hours last night to make. (And at the end, I came THIS close to knocking the whole thing off the counter. I caught it with two fingers, and the whipped cream around the edges nicely covered up my fingerprints! Whew.) Even with my edits to the instructions, I’d guess it still requires 1-1.5 hours to make. It also needs to sit in the fridge or freezer for a few hours, so make sure to account for that as well.
Oreo Chocolate Peanut Butter Ice Box Pie
Makes one 9 inch pie
Oreo Crust
- 25 Oreos
- 7 tablespoons of butter, melted
Whipped Cream:
- 2 1/2 cups cold whipping cream
- 7.5 tablespoons sugar
Mousse Layers:
- 8 ounces quality semi-sweet chocolate chips
- 2 tablespoons of cocoa powder
- 2 tablespoons butter
- 3/4 cup whipping cream
- 1 1/4 teaspoon gelatin
- 1/4 cup peanut butter, creamy
- Whipped cream (ingredients included above)
Garnish:
- 2 ounces chocolate, melted
- 1/2 cup crushed Oreos
- Whipped cream (ingredients included above)
Make Oreo crust:
- Spray springform pan with bake spray. Set aside.
- Place Oreos in a food processor and pulse until finely crushed. Alternately, place Oreos in a Ziploc bag and crush with a rolling pin.
- Add melted butter to crushed Oreos and mix to combine. Press Oreo mixture onto bottom and sides of springform pan and bake at 350 degrees F for about 12 minutes. Remove from oven and set aside on a wire rack to cool completely.
Make whipped cream:
- Place whipping cream and sugar into a bowl and beat until medium peaks form. (It helps to put the bowl and beater in the fridge to cool them down before whipping the cream.)
- Set aside ~1 cup of whipped cream for garnish at the end.
- Separate remaining whipped cream into 2 equal portions. These will be used for the chocolate mousse and peanut butter mousse.
Make chocolate mousse and peanut butter mousse:
- Place chocolate chips, cocoa powder, and butter in a sauce pan and melt. Set aside to cool.
- Pour 3/4 cup heavy cream into a small saucepan and sprinkle gelatin on top. Set aside to bloom for 2 minutes. Set saucepan over lowest heat setting. Heat and stir until gelatin is completely dissolved.
- Divide the cream/gelatin into two portions of 1/2 cup and 1/4 cup.
- Gently whisk the melted chocolate mixture into 1/2 cup of cream/gelatin. Let this mixture cool.
- Gently whisk the peanut butter into 1/4 cup of cream/gelatin. Let this mixture cool.
- When both the chocolate and peanut butter mixtures are cool:
- Place half of chocolate mixture into 1 portion of the whipped cream made earlier and gently stir to combine. Place remaining chocolate mixture into whipped cream mixture and gently stir to combine.
- Place half of peanut butter mixture into the remaining portion of the whipped cream and gently stir to combine. Place remaining peanut butter mixture into whipped cream mixture and gently stir to combine.
To assemble:
- Pour half of chocolate mousse onto Oreo crust. Sprinkle crushed Oreos on top. Pour remaining chocolate mousse.
- Pour peanut butter mousse on top.
- Garnish top with more crushed Oreos and drizzled melted chocolate. Pipe whipped cream on top.
- Refrigerate or freeze icebox pie for at least 4 hours or overnight. If stored in the freezer, thaw slightly before serving.
27 Weeks
Figured it had been a while since my last work bathroom belly shot…
Size of the Baby: About 2 pounds and 14.5 inches long. She’s gaining weight way faster than she’s growing longer now. Neat.
Weight gain/loss: It’s done its now-normal crazy fluctuation this week — up 2 pounds one morning, down 3 the next day. I’ve weighed myself daily for a few years now and that’s more fluctuation than I usually see so I’m chalking it up to a pregnancy symptom of mine. Anyway, total gain is 15-16 pounds and I’m feeling pretty good about that, especially now that I am quite noticeably pregnant.
Maternity clothes: We went to Kohl’s over the weekend to get Jose some new pants, and an old co-op friend had mentioned on FB that they carry maternity clothes. They did have 4 or 5 small racks, so I tried on a dress and two shirts. I didn’t like any of them. On top of that, I ordered a couple tops from Target online and they didn’t fit at all either. There also seems to be an assumption that I want to show off large portions of my chest while pregnant. Perhaps that is true for some women, but I am not those women!
I’m starting to come to the conclusion that maternity clothes are just not built for my body type or something! Fortunately, flowy tops and empire waist dresses seem to be popular enough right now that I was able to find a dress, a work-appropriate shirt, and a good t-shirt at Kohl’s in the normal women’s section that work as maternity wear. (And I think/hope they’ll work all the way till the end.)
I could still use a few more work shirts though, or else my coworkers will just have to get used to seeing me wear the same 5 outfits every week.
Sleep: The belly feels like it has doubled in size in the last few weeks, even though rationally I know that’s not true. I started sleeping with a pillow between my knees to see if that made me more comfortable. It helps a bit I guess, but to be honest I wasn’t that uncomfortable anyway. (Jose just suggested the pillow since he’d read about it in a book.) I think it will help more as I get even bigger.
I had a couple nights of horrible sleep last week, but that can be attributed to two nights in a row of spectacular thunderstorms. Like, “thunder so loud I would swear lightning just struck my house” kind of thunderstorms. Crazy
Movement: One of the updates I read this week says the baby gets very active at 27 weeks. Um, she’s been very active for a while now! It looks like an alien is trying to get out. I read somewhere that movement decreases a little as I go forward because she’s getting big enough that there’s not much space to move around, but I have no idea if that’s true or not. Seems reasonable, but then “they” also say you should start doing kick counts around this time to make sure you notice if there is a significant decrease. Pregnancy advice is so contradictory sometimes.
Food cravings: Ugh, I can’t really think about this one now. I did the 1-hour gestational diabetes test this morning and that glucose drink is just sitting in my stomach making me feel all gross.
Tastes like super concentrated orange gatorade.
Best moment this week? I didn’t expect anything for Mother’s Day; after all, I am not a mother yet. But I have to admit that it was kind of cool to have two random strangers (one at Goodwill, one at Spring Creek BBQ) wish me Happy Mother’s Day on Sunday. (In addition to Jose, my mom, and my mother-in-law of course.) Spring Creek even gave me a free bowl of ice cream and a carnation! Woo!
What I miss: Nothing. Pregnancy continues to treat me well.
What I’m looking forward to: More work on the baby room this weekend! On Sunday I (carefully) helped Jose move the guest room furniture into the 3rd bedroom so the guest room has officially been relocated. We also bought a gallon of paint! After much debate about various shades of light blue, we finally chose one called “river mist.” (At least I think that’s the one we chose. I can’t actually remember the name of the final choice at the moment.) So hopefully there will be some painting going on this weekend, even though how much we can do will depend on whether SpaceX launches early Saturday or not, since Jose is supporting their mission.
Milestones: So here’s the thing. Various internet weekly updates have been telling me for several weeks now that the baby can now recognize my voice. It would seem that no one really knows exactly when baby starts to recognize it. So maybe it was a month ago, or maybe it’s just this week. Who knows. Other than that, she’s working on her lungs (those things take a long time too, it seems) and her immune system. AND, she’ll open her eyes for the first time which is by far the coolest thing going on this week.
As for me, I am hoping that my belly button doesn’t pop out. It seems to be getting shallower and shallower, which is kind of fascinating, but also kind of freaky. Stay in, belly button! The interwebs also say I may be feeling Braxton-Hicks contractions by now. I don’t want to jinx anything, but I don’t think I’ve felt anything like that yet. The two symptoms I do have are both minor — some nasal congestion and sensitive gums. No big deal.
Car Shopping…and Buying!
Posted by saroy in Fun Things, Weekend on May 14, 2012
Whew! Where was I? Last week went by in a flash. I was in the aforementioned training class straight from 8 to 5 every day and I’m sure you will all be happy to know that I am now properly equipped to be a leader. To make up for not being in the office at all, I had to spend a little time each night catching up on email and addressing a couple issues that popped up late in the week.
On top of that, we were unusually busy on the weeknights because we were test driving and then negotiating to buy a new car!
We’d been planning to get something in the next month or so and decided to start looking, and of course once we did that, car shopping went a lot faster than I had anticipated! We looked at a few last weekend, including the Toyota Highlander. My mom has the 2005 version, which I’ve always liked, and the 2012 edition has even more fun stuff included. In particular, we liked the way it looked, the layout of the interior, and the optional 3rd row of seats (fold down for maximum cargo space, pull up for maximum people-carrying capacity). The model we got has leather seats, a feature I’ve always deemed unnecessary, especially in the heat of Houston — but I now have to admit are comfy and will be a lot easier to clean than cloth once we are carrying a kid around. It also has a sunroof — a frill I have wanted in a car ever since riding around in my friend Cayce’s car in high school, but have never had until now!
Only 6 miles on the odometer when we drove it off the lot!
We compared it to the Ford Edge, which was nice but nowhere near as nice as the Highlander. We also compared it to the Volvo XC60, which had both advantages and drawbacks compared to the Highlander — we liked the additional Volvo safety features, but the Volvo was also more expensive by several thousand dollars. Others we looked at online but didn’t end up test driving for various reasons: Mazda CX-9, Nissan Murano, Nissan Rogue, Honda CR-V, Subaru Outback and Subaru Tribeca.
Where I parked today at work: far away from other cars!
We ended up test driving a Highlander last Saturday, and then going back on Thursday night to test drive the specific vehicle we ended up buying after it arrived from the Port of Houston earlier that day. We ended up negotiating on the final price that night, and went back on Friday afternoon to finalize the deal!
We traded Jose’s 2004 Tiburon, so the little red sportscar is no longer with us. Our next door neighbor noticed the new car on Saturday and teased Jose for getting a “daddy-mobile,” but the truth is that he was getting tired of having a low, cramped car even before we knew a baby was on the way. Still, it was his first car ever so we made sure to take a photo before we left it at the Toyota dealership for the last time.
So now we have a 2012 Highlander and a 2004 Xterra, and we expect to keep the Xterra for at least another 2-3 years. Two SUVs…well, we do live in Texas after all. At the moment, I’m driving the Highlander and Jose’s driving the Xterra. I told him repeatedly that he could drive the Highlander, since it was his car we were trading, but he kept telling me to take the new one — and I finally quit arguing! Ha.
26 Weeks
I’m in a leadership training class all week. It runs from 8-5 every day, and they even provide lunch so we have no reason to leave. This is both good and bad. The good? Free lunch! And the class is at a yacht club that is prettier than I expected. But the bad? When you’re used to sitting at your desk, working on several different things over the course of the day, chatting with your officemates, and going to a meeting or two, sitting in one room for 8-9 hours listening to people talk at you is kind of exhausting. Day 1 wasn’t bad, I feel a bit like I’m being held hostage.
Anyway. I hit 26 weeks today and am closing in fast on the 3rd trimester!
Size of the Baby: About 14 inches long and 1 2/3 pounds! It’s probably just my perception, but I feel like my belly has grown significantly in the last couple weeks so for the first time, I’m starting to believe that baby girl really is getting that big!
Weight gain/loss: I just noticed that this heading says “gain/loss.” Seriously, who has weight loss by the time they get to 26 weeks? As for me, I’m still hovering around 14 pounds total gain, according to my scale, which should mean about 17 pounds according to my doctor. I go back next week, so we’ll see what the verdict is.
Maternity clothes: For the first time, I’m starting to run out of things to say here. I’m in them now for real. Pants AND shirts. And I need a few more work-appropriate outfits. Yesterday I wore a pair of (non-maternity) pants that used to be significantly too big. I thought they were ok in the morning, but by the end of the day they were really annoying me.
Sleep: Nothing big to report here. Sleep is good. I like sleep.
Movement: Wow. If there is any correlation between movement inside and movement outside, we are going to be chasing our little girl EVERYWHERE because she loves to bump around in there. In the past couple days, I’ve felt movement in multiple places at the same time and I’ve felt pokes and bumps above my belly button, both of which are new things. Often I can sit and watch my belly move, which is both totally bizarre and pretty cool.
Food cravings: Nothing in particular this week.
Best moment this week? This isn’t really a “best” moment but it was notable and amusing. Last night Jose and I went to test drive another car after work (we did a couple test drives on Saturday too) and the car salesman said “I see you’re expecting!” It’s the first time a complete stranger has commented on the fact that I’m pregnant, so even though it was a car salesman, I must have officially surpassed the “maybe she’s just fat” stage. Yay! Haha.
Of course, then the waitress at dinner last night asked if I wanted a margarita, so I guess it’s not THAT obvious just yet.
What I miss: Running. I haven’t said this in a while but man, I miss running. Or doing anything that could actually get my heart pumping.
What I’m looking forward to: Rearranging rooms so the baby room can get started for real! I finished cleaning out the third bedroom over the weekend while Jose was catching up on work, so the final step is to move the guest bedroom furniture in there this weekend. (Well, and I also need to go to Goodwill and Half Price Books to drop off the stuff I didn’t throw away entirely.)
Milestones: Baby has eyelashes and will start opening and closing her eyes this week! That seems pretty exciting. Her hearing continues to improve as well — wonder if she enjoyed the sound effects of The Avengers on Sunday afternoon?
As for me, like I said earlier, I think my belly has really expanded in the last couple weeks. For the first time, it’s noticeable to me. If I fold my arms, I can rest them on my bump! Heh. And I notice that it’s in the way when I hug Jose, or roll from one side to the other while falling asleep, or leaning over to pick something up. It’s rather Buddha-ish.
Walking in the Air
Posted by saroy in Design & Photography, Space on May 4, 2012
Just in case you forgot how awesome space time-lapse video is, here’s a new one featuring photography from the Expedition 30 crew.
I also came across a really interesting article on Luminous Landscape (a photography website) by Alan Poindexter, a shuttle astronaut who most recently commanded STS-131 two years ago. I had assumed that the explosion in night photography from space was because either 1) recent ISS crews have been more interested in photography than previous crews or 2) NASA has just been doing a better job of making the photos and videos available to the public (for both viewing and for remixing).
It didn’t occur to me until reading this article that its the improvement in camera technology — and specifically in digital camera sensor performance in low light (high ISO) situations — that has had the biggest impact. Now that the astronauts on the ISS have cameras capable of capturing what the Earth really looks like at night, they’ve been able to come up with all sorts of inventive ways of making these time-lapse videos and capturing other amazing images.
The article is a really interesting read if you are interested in photography at all, but beware — it made me want to buy a new camera body! Mine is about 8 years old and the image quality starts to suffer at ISO 800 and higher. I would use the excuse that I need a new camera because we’re about to have a baby…except I just used that excuse two weeks ago to buy a new lens. I wonder how long (and how much money) is that excuse good for?
Home Improvement List
Posted by saroy in House & Home on May 3, 2012
Current junk room/future guest room on the left; current guest room/future baby room on the right
Now that we’re back from vacation, I’m starting to think more seriously about the baby room. I think I’ve already mentioned that the first step is actually to clean our our “junk room” — i.e. the room that has no purpose other than to store random items. That will become the guest room, and our current guest room will become the baby room! I never gave any thought to just using the junk room as the baby room because it’s small, oddly shaped, and only has one window that faces our fence and neighbor’s house. It’s the least desirable bedroom by far, so it just makes sense for it to become the guest room since that will be the least-used room in the house.
Anyway, thinking about the baby room makes me think about all sorts of other improvements I’d like to make to our house! We have no actual plans to do a lot of these things before the baby arrives (although the things I do hope to accomplish are in bold), but it’s always nice to dream! Here’s the list that’s been evolving since we moved in almost 3 years ago, in no particular order:
- Furnish and decorate the nursery
- Turn the 3rd bedroom into a nice, comfy guest room
- Replace the carpet in the family room with wood or laminate flooring
- Get a rug for the dining room
- Build an over-the-machines counter in our laundry room (a la Young House Love)
- Repaint all the trim and doors (everything is currently off-white, and I’d rather it was white, and yes I know this is a huge and TEDIOUS task so it will probably never happen!)
- Build some sort of craft table for the bonus room (a la Someday Crafts)
- Finish installing the cabinet hardware in our kitchen (there are about 6 drawers I never finished last year)
- Revamp/reorganize the kitchen cabinets and pantry to better fit how we actually use the kitchen (everything is still where it was when we moved in)
- Get a new light fixture to replace the “boob light” in the bonus room
- Paint the master bedroom
- Paint the study
- Decide what to do with the wall o’ windows in the family room (cornices, curtains, etc?)
- “Frame” the huge wall mirror in the master bathroom (a la something like this) — or remove it entirely and replace with 2 smaller mirrors
- Same as above with the mirror in the guest bathroom
- Make some large DIY art for above the bed in the master bedroom
- Clean out one side of the garage so we can park the TBD new car in there
- Install tree spotlights outside (we have them already; they go with the flower bed lighting we did two summers ago)
- Replace the front porch can light with a pretty pendant of some kind (which I thought of after coming across the Can Converter)
- Redo the front flower beds (I plan to hire someone to do this for me)
- Build a bed around the crape myrtle, oleander, and hibiscus that are planted along the fence in the backyard
- Get gutters installed on the back of the house
- Buy a grill (especially since we have a gift card from my parents specifically for this!)
25 Weeks
24 weeks, 3 days along the road to Hana, Maui!
Size of the Baby: About 13-14 inches long (the size of an eggplant) and 1.5 pounds. I love how quickly she is growing now! Hard to remember that at our first ultrasound in December, she was only the size of a sesame seed.
Weight gain/loss: I can hardly believe it, but I didn’t gain even a pound in Hawaii despite eating PLENTY of tasty food. So overall gain still stands at ~14 pounds. I’m hungry more often, but I also feel full more quickly, so overall I guess I’m eating about the same number of calories that I did before.
Maternity clothes: I stopped by the maternity store at the mall on Friday afternoon before we left on vacation since I had a coupon and they were having a sale. Score! I got 2 pairs of maternity jeans (I only really need one pair, but they were buy one, get one free) and 4 tops (2 for work, 2 casual) for about $100. Not bad at all. So I’m doing pretty well in the clothing department at the moment. The only real issue is that a lot of my normal t-shirts aren’t quite long enough anymore. (And by that I mean that while they’re still long enough to cover my belly, they’re not quite long enough to cover the oh-so-attractive elastic waistband on my pants.)
Sleep: I slept a lot on vacation, but I also woke up a lot. I’m not sure if it’s pregnancy or just that I was in an unfamiliar hotel bed. I officially can’t sleep on my stomach anymore — no matter how I try to arrange myself, it feels too weird. I’m most comfortable on my back, actually. I know you’re not supposed to spend extended periods of time flat on your back, but I figure if I start cutting off circulation then I’d feel that somehow, so I don’t worry about it too much.
Movement: Jose and I might be taking a little TOO much pleasure in harassing our baby. He likes to talk to her and try to wake her up, and I usually resort to poking my belly until she starts reacting. (Sorry, kid.)
One of the funniest moments in the last week was one evening in Hawaii when we were back in our hotel room relaxing. We had just shared a big ol’ Hawaiian shave ice and the syrup was REALLY sweet. Must’ve been the sugar, because baby was going CRAZY in there. At one point, Jose was talking to her and she kicked right where his face was touching my stomach. So basically she kicked him in the face. Ha!
Food cravings: Mmm, shave ice. I want some more. I searched for “shave ice Houston” and found this place in Kemah and League City (in retrospect, I have seen their little shack on 518 before but never stopped) but I can’t tell if they are open. I hope they are!
Best moment this week? Driving to the top of a volcano. Snorkeling in Hawaii and seeing 3 HUGE sea turtles. Driving the scenic road to Hana. Visiting a lavender farm and a goat dairy. Yeah, it was a pretty awesome week. Not awesome: coming back to “real life.”
What I miss: Nothing. You will all be happy to know that I satisfied my goat cheese craving last week after finding out that the Surfing Goat Dairy on Maui does pasteurize their milk. It was delicious and I was only sad that I couldn’t bring any home since we had no way to keep it cold.
What I’m looking forward to: Car shopping this weekend! Yep, we’ll be getting a new vehicle sometime in the next few months to replace Jose’s Hyundai Tiburon. Both of our cars are 8 years old, so this summer was already seeming like a good time to preemptively replace one of them — and on top of that, neither one of us is really interested in trying to wrangle a baby into and out of the back seat of a low, 2-door sports car. We don’t have any super solid ideas of what we want — we’re not even sure whether we want an SUV/crossover or a sedan — so we may end up doing a lot of test driving.
Milestones: Baby’s hair (if she has any) has color! I am VERY curious to know what she’ll look like since Jose has the typical Hispanic brown eyes and black hair, but I’ve got blue/hazel eyes and brown/dirty blond hair. I was born with hair, but Jose was a bald little baby. Guess we’ll have to wait and see.
On the negative side, I experienced my first bout of (mild) swelling in my feet and ankles on the flight back from Hawaii, despite wearing my compression leggings again. Since I had no issues on the way over, I’m guessing it was just caused by dehydration and extreme lack of movement on the return leg — we took a red eye, so I slept basically the whole flight, didn’t drink much water, and only got up once. My feet returned to normal a few hours after we got home and have been fine since. I don’t anticipate flying anywhere else before baby arrives, so I’m going to be optimistic and hope that’s the one and only time my feet will swell.
Skeeters
Posted by saroy in Fun Things on April 30, 2012
I’m back! Physically, anyway — mentally I’m still on vacation. Maui was awesome, as expected, and I’ll have photos to share soon. In the meantime, Jose and I hit the ground running upon our return! We got back on Saturday afternoon and tried to catch up on our sleep, but yesterday we headed over to Sugar Land to see a minor league baseball game with Debbie and friends to celebrate her birthday.
I didn’t even know we had another baseball team in this area, but it turns out that’s because they are brand new — yesterday was their 4th game ever! They are the Sugar Land Skeeters, and they belong to the Atlantic League of Professional Baseball (i.e. they are not affiliated with MLB). They also have a brand spankin’ new ~7000 person stadium called Constellation Field. Parking was free, and tickets were cheap! We paid $9 each for “grass land” seats in the outfield, and it turned out that there’s one bench that runs along the front of that section so we actually ended up sitting there, right in front of the Skeeters bullpen. (You can see Debbie, Jason, Steve, Jen, and the kids in the picture on the lower right.) “Real” seats are $12.
The only negative I can think of is that concession prices were on par with MLB — but since the tickets and parking are so much cheaper, I didn’t really mind. The stadium is outside, obviously, so I imagine it will probably be pretty darn hot in a month or so, but yesterday it was quite pleasant outside in the shade.
24 Weeks
Size of the Baby: About a foot long and up 4-6 ounces since last week. It’s still hard to believe there’s a baby that big in there, despite the growing evidence (i.e. belly).
Weight gain/loss: Don’t know this week! No scales available. At my doctor’s appointment last Wednesday, they weighed me at the same weight I’d been 3 weeks earlier.
Maternity clothes: I successfully turned a cheap t-shirt into a ruched tee, and that was a fun project. Also, I did wear my so-sexy compression leggings on the plane and in the end, they weren’t a big deal. I think pre-wearing them at home a couple times stretched them out just enough. And weirdly, I do think they helped me not feel quite so spent after a long flight — I can see why runners are into compression gear.
Sleep: Nothing really of note here this week.
Movement: I feel her daily, and it’s cool to feel — and SEE, when she’s feeling particularly energetic. Jose feels her on a regular basis too, and sometimes I think she’s actually responding to him when he talks at my belly. It definitely doesn’t feel like muscle twitches anymore. It feels like something poking me or tickling me from the inside.
Food cravings: Hawaiian shave (not shaved) ice. OMG so good. Why has no one opened a shave ice place in Clear Lake? If all those yogurt shops can stay in business, certainly there’s room for a shave ice place.
Best moment this week? Being on vacation. Duh.
What I miss: Goat cheese. All the menus here feature items with goat cheese, and there is a place called the Surfin’ Goat Dairy. I can’t take it anymore — I’m calling them to ask if it’s pasteurized. Yes, I will be that crazy pregnant lady if it means I can eat some goat cheese.
What I’m looking forward to: The rest of vacation!
Milestones: Baby would have a very good chance of survival if she was born today. She can hear loud noises outside the womb. She looks like a full term baby, minus the fat — which she will now start gaining. Go baby girl, go!
As for me, I realized that at most, we have 16-17 weeks to go until we become a family of three. And we basically haven’t done anything to prepare yet. Eek! This week we are doing a downright awesome job of savoring life as a couple. When we get back home, it’ll be time to get to work I guess!
DIY Ruched Tee
So if you’ve been reading my weekly updates, you’ll know that my luck in finding maternity clothes so far has been very hit-or-miss. It hasn’t worried me much up to this point, but with the belly beginning to expand more noticeably, I’m going to need SOMETHING to wear. I’ve pinned several ideas on Pinterest and ordered a couple patterns to try, but as a first attempt I decided to go for a ruched t-shirt a la this pin:
Source: bowlofcherrys.blogspot.com via Sarah on Pinterest
It looked easy enough, so I bought a $10 plus size 1 (i.e. 2 sizes larger than the size L I’d normally get) t-shirt from Target and got to work. I quickly realized that the one thing the tutorial didn’t mention — and that I couldn’t immediately find in any other tutorial — was exactly how to lay out the elastic on top of the side seam.
First attempt. This is NOT how you want to do it!
On my first attempt, I laid it out sort of like the photo above. In other words, I had the seam spread open and ran the elastic more or less along it. I’m not sure why I didn’t do a better job of thinking it through, because this turned out ALL KINDS OF WRONG. I mean, it did produce ruching, but it wasn’t neat and clean and of course you could see all the stitching on the outside of the t-shirt. A humble reminder that I am still quite new to this sewing thing!
So I tediously ripped out both seams and tried again. This time I thought it through a bit better and realized I should probably fold the shirt so that the seam stood out, and sew the elastic directly down the seam. That way you wouldn’t be able to see the stiching from the outside!
So…as you can imagine, this produces much better results! (And for what it’s worth, I checked out the seam of a ruched shirt at the maternity store in the mall this afternoon and hey, lookee there, they did it just like this!) I felt pretty stupid not to have realized this earlier.
Yay! Much better results, as you can see.
Here’s a very awkward photo of the final product. (I just realized there is a lovely hint of toilet in the background since I took the photo in our upstairs bathroom. Sorry!) Overall I was pretty happy and it only cost $10 for the entire project since I already had some leftover elastic and blue thread. I’m not exactly saving oodles of money because there are plenty of cheap ruched maternity shirts out there — but it definitely gives me additional options if I find a cute non-maternity t-shirt and want to wear it without it looking like a tent.
Yay for sewing!
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