Tell me baby, what's your story?

Sometime this week (cross ALL your fingers for it) my baby cousin is having a baby. She's not technically my BABY cousin...she's only 6 years younger than me...but I BABYsat her so I mean, baby.

She is smart (minus her questionable taste in music - YOU KNOW WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT, E) and funny and is definitely the cutest little pregnant woman I have ever seen. I am so stoked that she's going to have a kid, and while it won't be all sweetness and rainbows, I do know that she is going to make an amazing mother.

I threw her a baby shower in early January. She and her mom drove to Houston because I'm selfish like that a lot of her really good friends and sorority sisters live here. We had food and cake and mimosas - no shower is complete without champagne, I am convinced - and played the gross, "Guess the Baby Poop" chocolate diaper game. That game is really sick, by the way. I don't want babies, but I am so terrified that, after seeing that game played at so many showers, if I ever DO have a child, I am going to wake up to the thing crying in the middle of the night, walk to it's bedroom in a state of exhausted delerium, start changing the poopy diaper and suddenly shove my face in it, because HEY! Last time I did this it was Snickers!

If you know me, you know showers just ain't my thang (I battled with my mom about having a wedding shower...I lost), but I was SO PUMPED to throw this one for my cuz. I went all out - totally cleaned my toilets with the fancy cleaner - which also means I MADE the gift I gave her. Yeah, I KNOW. Wild.

The baby's name is Madelynn Ann, and this is what she got from her second cousin, but will definitely call me AUNT Cheryl:

That's right. I made that. Thank you, Internet, for the inspiration. I was really pleased with how it came out and E has hung it up near Maddy's crib, so that's awesome ;)

Maddy is now officially 2 days late, and E is uncomfortable and anxious and kind of pissed, but I am appluading Baby M already for blowing off the cliche of being a Valentine's Day babe. She's clearly stubborn like her momma, and if this "wait-out" is any indication of what kind of child she's going to be, I anticipate liking this little girl very, very much.