Shopping and Storms

Well, Saturday turned into quite the eventful day.

We will start with the most eventful part, and work our way back. Saturday late-afternoon, bad storms and tornadoes ripped through our (normally) peaceful neck of the woods. We rode out the actual storm at my parents house in their basement. We are extremely blessed to be able to say all our family (and respective houses) are safe... but many, many people were not so lucky. Tornadoes touched down a mile or less from both our house and my parent's house. So many homes and cars were destroyed, and many lost their lives. We continue to pray for those who are trying to put their lives back together after the storms.

Here's a pretty intense time-lapse video of the storm approaching downtown Raleigh. And here are some pictures of storm damage from around the area.

The day, however, started out much more lighthearted as me, Chaddy, my mom and mother-in-law headed out to Green Pea Baby to check out some baby gear and hopefully get my registry together. For anyone in the Triangle area with-or-expecting child, PLEASE check out Green Pea Baby. They are a precious baby boutique in historic downtown Apex that actually has a wonderful website as well (for those not so lucky enough to live in my neck of the woods.)

I was spoiled (despite a busy Saturday morning of shoppers) to get the nearly undivided attention of the store owner, Krista, for about 1.5 hours as she walked me around and personally wrote down all the things I should/wanted to register for so that she could later into them into the online registry. I'd like to say that the attention was because my sis and Krista's eldest daughter are longtime friends, but I have a feeling that Krista is just as dedicated to any customer that comes through her door. She was SO thorough in her explanations that you can tell not one item is picked for her shop without painstaking examination from Krista. (Which is a big relief for this first-time mommy.)

Krista spent tons of time talking over advantages of different strollers with us, but when we got down to the Peg Perego Pliko and the Baby Jogger City Mini, we were too carried away with the lightweight and transportability of the Baby Jogger City Mini to imagine another stroller for baby J! Even Chad was in love with it.

I begged and pleaded for Chad to let me order a black one, but "Mr. Practicality" wouldn't back down on the fact he thought a black stroller would by way to hot for ol' North Carolina... despite my argument that the material is super breathable. He said breathable or not, black material absorbs heat and his little baby wasn't going to be our taking walks in the Carolina summers in a black stroller.

Chad doesn't argue with me much, so I would have felt guilty choosing the black stroller for superficial reasons (i.e. - i'm a vanilla ice cream kinda girl and I like the simplicity of black) over the health (and body temperature) of our little boy. Bah.
Anyway, we decided to register for a light green one, which is nice and neutral and should suit us just fine.

Note: I DID win the argument that I can register for the black Peg Perego Primo Viaggio SIP 30-30 --- in Nero --- by promising that I wouldn't strap our baby into this "black death-trap" and leave him out in the sun. ;)

...little victories...

(And thank you to Krista for being patient as we had this argument in front of her.)

And while I was originally going to register for a good ol' Baby Bjorn, Krista walked me through why she MUCH preferred the Ergobaby Carrier... mainly for the fact that after the baby is about 15 pounds, the Baby Bjorn is simply not comfortable for mom and dad. Chad was a trooper and tried on that Ergobaby - since I have a feeling we'll be splitting the time wearing this thing 50/50 - and even requested the fake baby doll to sit in the thing so he could get the whole experience. We both agreed Ergobaby was the way to go... and wouldn't have known a thing about it were it not for Krista.

Among tons of other "little" things, we also found our crib at Green Pea! I love the simplicity of the look with the high-quality of the furniture (and had been wanting a white crib), so this one by Million Dollar Baby was a winner.
So all in all, the shopping experience (despite completely overwhelming Chad) was a huge success for all. Except, maybe not so much for my mom's credit card who left with a big ol' shopping bag of goodies for her grandbaby James and grandbaby-to-be.

So I could go on for way too long about how fabulous Krista and Green Pea Baby are (and no, I promise I'm not a paid spokesperson), but I tried to keep it as short as possible. But - even for those who aren't in my area - let this be a reminder to please please PLEASE support your local businesses. The customer service is a million times better, their products are more carefully tested and selected, and often times the prices aren't that much more than what you'd find in your big-box chain. Yes, their selection is more limited - but that's because they've taken away the options that they find aren't up to their quality standards (which I much prefer!). I could have walked around in Babies R Us or Target (or even 'nicer' ones like Pottery Barn Kids) for HOURS and not had a fraction of the experience I had at a local shop.

So, GO LOCAL!