Nursery Sneak Peak

I really should finish the nursery. But we’re waiting on a chair to come back from the upholsterer and well I just haven’t finished it yet.

Here is a sneak peak of it getting there…

 

30 weeks!!

I’m 30 years old and I’m 30 weeks today with Bear!! I cannot believe he’ll be here in 10ish weeks. Where did the time go people. Maybe I should look back at all these posts to see how many times I asked this question, because I’m sure it’s almost weekly.  I’m beyond amazed daily at what my body is doing and how its changing.  I can say that while pregnancy hasn’t been all rainbows and sunshine, I’m loving it.  I might not be singing the same tune in a couple of weeks when my body is tired and the stretch marks are finally making an appearance, but today I’m still feeling really blessed.

I was just thinking about this time last year.  We’d had our second failed IUI and were so emotionally exhausted from TTC that we planned a trip to Mexico and skipped town.  What a difference a year makes, we’re spending our money on house renovations and the baby and I don’t think I’d want to be rolling around the beach in a bikini!! 

So here I am at 30 weeks. Are you missing the bare belly posts? I can start that up again if you’re really missing them:)

 

· How far along are you? 30 weeks. People how are there only 10 weeks left until Bear arrives!? It feels like a minute ago that I was praying for the 1^st trimester to be over so that I could tell the world I was pregnant!

· Total weight gain: I don’t know. But I don’t feel like I’m gaining the way I did the past 2 months. We’ll see on Monday what my new weight is.

· How big is baby? Baby boy should be about 3.1 lbs and 17” long. He’s now close to the length he’ll be when he arrives. At this point he’ll start gaining about ½ lb a week.

· Maternity Clothes? Absolutely!

·Sleep? I’ve been sleeping a bit better, but I think that’s because I’ve been keeping so busy working on the house

·Best moment this week? The crib is up!! Here is a picture.  We still need to actually decorate the room, but I figured you’d like to see a quick snap of the room:)

·Movement? I’ve been trying to catch all the movement on video for you, but every time I point the camera in the direction of my belly, Bear stops moving.

·Food Cravings? Nothing really. I’m full as soon as I take a bite of something so that’s hindering my ability to really chow down.

·Food aversions? Nothing

·Labor Signs? Nope, but I think I am experiencing Braxton Hicks contractions. It just feels like period cramps.  I’m going to mention it to my midwife on Tuesday when I see her.

·Belly Button in or out? It’s still in!

·What I miss? Nothing people!

·What I’m looking forward to? Finishing up stuff around the house.  We’re getting closer, really! If only Ben wouldn’t have decided to tear the hall bathroom apart….

·Milestone? I don’t know. We’re 10 weeks ish away from meeting the Bear!

· Stretch Marks? My skin looks weird, but I don’t think I have any stretch marks yet.  And by wear I mean stretched out?!

I hope everyone have a good evening. I’m headed to do a guest bartender gig for the local Junior League, which I’m not super excited about. I’d rather be working on the house or sleeping!

YAY for new floors

We have the main living space in our house back. But we’re sleeping there now.

 Saturday the hardwood floors got finished and Sunday we cleaned everything and moved all our furniture out of the bedrooms and into the dining room and family room because tomorrow the new carpet goes in!! Can’t wait.

Here are several pictures. The last one is of the family room before we moved our bed in there. Its kinda hectic right now, but its fine, we’ll be back in our room tomorrow night!

 

 

 

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Our first big renovation project and the BIG 30!

Today I’m 30.  I am not scared or nervous about what this decade has in store for me, but rather excited.  We’ll welcome our first born, we’re doing our first major renovation, and I’m sure there is much much more good to come! 

I feel like in your 30’s you are really able to come into your own.  You know yourself better, you’re hopefully making more money than you did in your 20’s, and you should be more content with yourself.  I feel that the older I get and I hope it just continues.

I have fantastic family and friends and my support system is amazing.  30 will be amazing!

Here I am, 30 years old, large and in charge!! Haha

 

Now, onto the renovation stuff!

This weekend was rough.  I probably shouldn’t have done as much as I did, but you know I can’t help myself. A baby belly won’t slow me down!!

We emptied the main areas of our house of all furniture and tore out all the damn carpet. I was disgusted.  I’m so happy they’re gone. To think that our child would have been crawling on them skeeves me out.  The tile by the front door is gone, and all the carpet tack strip and nails have been removed from the subfloor.  Thank goodness we’re having someone else do the install because I was exhausted by the end of demo day.   Again, I probably shouldn’t have done as much as I did.  My older sister questioned me and asked if I was actually ripping out carpets and of course I lied because she doesn’t even like it when I go to my workout classes.

Monday we had a snow day so the house projects rolled on!  We painted all the doors in the house and I also started painting the fireplace.  The surround is done, but I couldn’t do the mantle because we have to use a deglosser on it first so that the paint will stick to the finished wood.  Very toxic, Ben is doing it while I’m at work today. So tonight I’ll put on the new door hardware (going from brass to oil rubbed bronze) and I’ll paint the mantle.  Meanwhile Ben has to work on detailing the step up from our sunken family room up onto the kitchen/dining room level.  It used to have carpet on it, but now it will look like a normal step. Why the people that built the house didn’t do this is beyond me.

And here are some pictures!!

The family room after demo (notice the fireplace)

 

The dining room after demo

 

 

The fireplace in process….after hopefully to come tomorrow

 

 

nursery planning has officially begun

I’m dreaming of a beautiful nursery!!

I know what crib I’m using – this is coming from Ben’s parents

 

And then the dresser I just recently purchased…..

 

So I need to accessorize! And I need to recover that blue wing back chair you see above in the photo with the dresser.

There isn’t a ceiling light in the room so I’ve decided to get a floor lamp that can sit in between the dresser (which will double as a changing table) and the chair so I have plenty of light for changing and nursing and/or reading.  I really like the one shown below. Its traditional but the base isn’t chunky so it should fit in the space nicely.

The chair doesn’t have an ottoman so I thought it would be nice to get something to stick my feet up on or to sit on while playing on the floor with the little man.  This comes in a lot of colors but I’m thinking either this tan or possibly a dark blue. Tan would certainly fit anywhere in the house, but this room is going to need color that’s why I’m leaning in that direction.

And here are a couple of pictures of the buffalo check fabric that I want to use for the chair slipcover.  See it doesn’t have to be too country, it can look transitional!!

susie harris: buffalo gal

susie harris: buffalo gal

I think that’s it.  the sheets that I’m going to use are these from Pottery Barn Kids.

 

And the wall color in the room is already done and it’s a Benjamin Moore color – Vale Mist

Thoughts?

The nursery – phase 1

Phase 1 of the nursery was emptying it of a twin sized bed, a wall of bookshelves, and the closet. Once that was done I promptly filled it back up again.

The new dresser went in, and then I needed to move the chair in there to see how it fit.  Those two items are great right where I planned them!  The chair needs to get covered, but I know spatially it works. 

 

Then came the carpet samples, because that HAS to get done.

 

 

And now we have presents! A rocking horse, a crib mattress, and the list goes on.  Oh, and notice the 3 black trash bags? All baby boy clothes that my sister was getting rid of:)

 

This weekend I will empty the room again because all that stuff must go to get the new carpet. 

 

So we’re stuck at phase one.  Hopefully phase 2 isn’t that far behind.

The crown molding is done!!

For my birthday last year I asked my husband to install crown molding in our master bedroom.  My birthday was in March and thank goodness he got it done with one month to spare!  It looks awesome and he was even painting it when I got home from work yesterday.  AMAZING. One last thing I need to worry about doing.  The only bad thing, I realized when I was lying in bed that he painted it with flat paint instead of the semi-gloss that is on the rest of our trim….would you change it?  I  can tell, but I’m not sure anyone else would especially if they weren’t looking for it.

This is our bedroom (pre crown molding)

Here is some of the crown molding right across from our bed

And Ben pulling down the tape last night (see the crown behind his head...those angle cuts were terrible to do!)

Next house projects on my list.  I want to stain our kitchen cabinets.  I have found several tutorials on pinterest and so now I just need to decide what color stain.  Most people I’ve seen have done a java stain which is really dark and I think I’d prefer something a little lighter and more rustic, not quite so contemporary looking.  Maybe a mahogany or walnut color stain.

And I also decided yesterday that as soon as it gets warm out I’m painting our garage door black.  Again pinterest came to save the day here, I found several photos and I think the black looks nice.  Here are the photos I found and liked. here, here, and here

Just trying to keep myself busy over here…

Its the freekin weekend baby we're about to have us some fun...

You know that song right? If not google, youtube, or whatever. Its good.  Last week I received a mixed tape CD from a friend and this was the first song on the disc.  Her intent when making the CD was to put music on there that would get me pumped up and ready to party on the weekend.    As soon as I popped the CD in and heard this song I got a huge smile on my face….it’s good, right?

So first things first, I have 2 pictures of our laundry room. It’s not finished quite yet though, but the guys made great progress yesterday. they needed a finishing nail gun to put some trim up at the walls on either sides of the cabinet..but you can’t tell that’s needed from this photo anyways.  I also changed out the door knob on the cabinets.  When we got them they had Oil Rubbed Bronze knobs and I didn’t think they looked good on a blue cabinet, so I switched them out for some brushed nickel ones that are also leftover from a job we did for a client.  She had picked out new knobs, didn’t like them, and asked me to toss these away. Um no, they’re perfectly good and I knew I would be able to find a use for them at some point. 

Second, I had my bloodwork drawn this morning and it sucked going to a 7am appointment knowing what the result was going to be. 

And lastly, I’m not super fashionable, but this does not look good. she needs to hire a stylist.

They're in!!!



I can’t wait to get home and actually SEE them!

Laundry Room – Before

You can probably tell from this photo that our laundry room isn’t really a room…it’s more like a big hallway.  It wasn’t quite this boring looking but Ben cleaned everything out before I could take my before picture.   I’ve been wanting to do something in this area for a while and recently while renovating a client’s house, I had a great idea.  You see I do high end residential interior design and we take a lot of items out of our clients homes that are basically still new.  I have over the years acquired: a new bathroom vanity and top, a new Miele dishwasher, another all cherry bathroom vanity, a kitchen aid mixer, and now these cabinets!  These cabinets that came out of a client’s laundry room that they couldn’t find another use for.  They’ve been sitting in our garage for a couple of months now and since its Ben’s slow season it means things like hanging cabinets are getting done! So new cabinets and then I can accessorize it:) that will have to get done this weekend and I’m so excited. These upper cabinets are 39” tall which means a lot more storage than is currently available in our small oak cabinets.

Tomorrow I better have the end result picture to show you! ha