Vision for the Nursery

I have received several questions about how I am going to decorate the nursery. As you saw last week, Jeff and Janie painted a wall in the room a pale pink. That may be as decorated it gets for the next 2 months. (Being stuck in bed sucks!) It's okay though, because the baby will be sharing our room for her first 6 months (I have been asked how I made this decision- it's based on SIDS risk and the American Academy of Pediatrics recommendations).  I will just have to put the nursery together after she is born. Yes, I would prefer to have the nursery all ready when the baby comes home from the hospital, but I have to be flexible here.

My design for the nursery is completely inspired from Rachel Ashwell and her "Shabby Chic" aesthetic. I love that it's so feminine, soft, and simple- and I love the ruffles! I love the antique charm and that it's sophisticated in a way that Pottery Barn Kids is not.

Rachel Ashwell has stores in London, New York, and LA- which I am sure are a little out of my price range- but lucky for me she also has a line at Target. The Target pieces aren't quite the same as what she sells at her New York boutique, but they are still great for supplementing what I create.

We have not bought a crib yet. Don't worry, we HAVE purchased a bassinet for the baby to sleep in while she's in our room. I'm still debating between a white crib verses a dark cherry wood. Why dark cherry? Because we have a dark cherry armoire already in the bedroom. It would make it all fit together I think. If the bedding is right then I think it will still work.

These are the bumpers I purchased (above- green with pink roses. A Rachel Ashwell product). I didn't want the entire bedding set, only the bumpers, but this product is only sold as a set. So I went to Ebay and found the bumpers sold individually AND brand new. Score!

For sheets I'm buying these (also a shabby chic product from Target). What a beautiful vintage-inspired print!

This picture comes from one of Rachel Ashwell's books. I want these ruffles for the crib skirt. No stores offer anything like this, so I will be sewing them.

I'm going to sew this pillow, but with more ruffles perhaps, and place it on the glider. I'm still debating between pink and white. (These are the things I think about as I lay on the couch eating ice cream)

Lastly, on the wall I want to hang a mini quilt like this, except using fabrics in softer hues. I love the bunting!  

Writing about all this makes me want to take a trip to the fabric store right now! Ahhh to be stuck in bed.

Crochet Project

I have a new craft project to show today, and this time it doesn't involve vinyl!

I started crocheting this blanket right after we found out I was pregnant but I didn't make much progress on it until my days of laying in bed began. I got the pattern from the blog Posie Gets Cozy. If you click on the link you can see that there is supposed to be a ribbon that runs through the holes below the scallops. But buying ribbon requires leaving my bed, so no ribbon for now. I do plan to add the ribbon later, but for now I think it looks great without it. (If anyone is curious, I used Cotton Tots yarn in "county red")

I am so excited for how this turned out! I can't wait to use it on the new baby!

35 Weeks

Angela and I had grand plans for the preparations for our baby.  However, with school and work, a lot of them got shoved into the month of July when I would be off school and Angela would be done with work.  Then July came around and Angela was put on bed rest.  Needless to say we had to pare down our grand plans to necessities.  We did a lot of closet rearranging and throwing away junk we don't use or need anymore... several times I tried to use the plea "one man's trash is another man's treasure" to save some of what Angela felt was definitely junk.  But Angela countered that that adage only applies for one year.  If you haven't used it in a year, it gets tossed!  So I had to part with my prized blue towels, which had been used throughout my college career and Chile.  Angela said that the ragged edges and bleach stains were not character, but were just ugly.  Sadly my mom has also commented that she was surprised that I still had those towels. 

We really wanted to make our study into a nice baby's bedroom.  First we bought I nice white tall book shelf.  Then we replaced our huge Ikea table/desk for a smaller prettier (Angela's word not mine) desk.

But we still had some major projects left, so I enlisted some back-up to help me before I had to go back to school. Super Mom to the rescue! My mom came down and spent the whole day slaving away with me to paint the Baby's room.  I know if she wasn't there I wouldn't have been able to keep Angela from helping.

We finished, and even I think it looks great... and it's pink!  My mom said that the color made her want to eat it like cotton candy.

We had an old book shelf in the study that one of Angela's roommates had gotten from the DI, and then because it was ugly and a bit beat up she was just going throw it away.  We were... well are poor so we took it and have loved it since.  However, it was in bad need of repair and in the words of Glenda the Good from Wicked, completely Hideodus!

So I glued and nailed the parts that were broken.  Sanded it.  Drilled new holes for the shelves.  And put a whole in the back so we can put a speaker set in the top shelf.  Then with the help of my mom we painted it.

I think it looks like new! It matches the new pillows Angela made.

Finally we got a bassinet for the baby.  It has wheels and roles really easily.  So for the first little bit, we plan on keeping it in our bedroom.

It double's as a changing table too, and has all these great pockets to keep diaper changing materials.

I think the baby's room now looks a lot more like a baby's room and less like a study.

Some of the native animals in Houston pitched-in to tidy up the Nursery for the baby.

(Disclaimer: the below paragraph was written with a specific audience in mind.  If you don't get it, don't worry about it.)

You might be scratching your head at this point and saying to yourself, I recognize the sheep, owl, very fat blue bird, and pink cupcake and know they are native to Texas, but how did the Yak get to Houston?

Yes the Baby Yak is actually not native to the Houston area, and the scientists in the Hamaker branch here have been working tirelessly to find out why it has suddenly changed its habitat some 300 miles from Layton, Utah to Texas.

We have determined that it is most likely due to global warming.  We'll keep you updated on this important issue.

Another Vinyl Project

Here's another project I did before being sentenced to bed rest. It's a dry erase family planning board. I got the idea from Somewhat Simple, and bought the vinyl letters from her etsy shop. (PLEASE ignore my hair in these pictures, yuck! Remember, even before I was stuck on bed rest I still had to take it really easy and spent most of my time in a reclined position).

This project was really fun and easy. You just use a sharpie to draw your lines on the back side of the glass and then attach the letters. Then you can write with dry erase markers on the front. My old marker board that this replaced was much smaller and stained from the markers. Glass doesn't get that black buildup.

If you were wondering, I bought the frame from Michaels (when frames were 50% off and I had a "extra 20% off your total purchase" coupon too!)

The original tutorial from Somewhat Simple does not use the back piece to the frame, but I was afraid of the glass popping out so I kept the back piece and placed wrapping paper behind the glass.

Isn't the finished product so cute? I love it! It looks so much nicer than our old marker board, and it's perfect for keeping us organized.

Flour and Sugar Containers

Today is Jeff's first day back at school. Our summer vacation wasn't quite what I was expecting, but I am grateful that Jeff was able to help me adjust to staying in bed all day long. The month of July was filled with LOTS of tv shows and movies and thats about it. When you lay in bed all day there's not much to write about on a blog, so today I will have to write about something I did before I was sentenced to bed rest:

Flour and Sugar Containers

I got the idea for these from the blog House of Smiths. My sister cut out the vinyl for me using her Cricut. I love how they turned out. They look so pretty in my pantry.
I am planning on doing some more for brown sugar and rice but I need to purchase some more containers, and that would require me to drive to the store... something I'm not allowed to do. It may be a while until my bags of brown sugar have a pretty home.