Nursery- almost done!

So with only 5 weeks left until my official due date (which I think is probably a few days too late), my entire brain seems to be consumed with baby preparation. This is no longer keeping me up tossing and turning all night (I'm not sure I slept more than 10 hours total during the week last week), but it is keeping me busy. We moved that beautiful dresser upstairs and are finishing up the nursery. It is looking good so far. Since the kiddos are going to share a room, I've been trying to meld the boy and girl styles, but the room is kind of split down the middle at this point.

Here is the view as you first walk in the door:

As you turn to your left, you see the girl part of the room. (Mostly done except the crib mattress and potentially a rug).

As you keep turning 180 degrees, past the door where you entered, you come to the boy portion of the room.

And if you keep turning, you encounter the disaster portion:

I foresee a constant battle between Mommy and the proliferation of toys and chaos for the next 18 years or so. But I would really like to have a place for everything where it can be out of sight and then found easily again (at least once in a while). Our current "organization" for upstairs toys and books is seriously lacking at the moment. I'm thinking canvas bins and perhaps more of a book display rack rather than a book shelf. Anyone found anything that works for keeping toddler books in some sort of easily accessible, orderly fashion?

Project Dresser

You know how you behave differently around different people? Well, I have one friend in particular who brings out the very bravest in me and spurs me on to tackle projects that are really much larger than I think I can handle. So a few weeks ago when she visited and I told her that one of the things we really needed for the nursery was a white dresser, she took me shopping and picked out this from Goodwill:

Notice it is not white. She also convinced me that painting it white was a totally reasonable project and even went to the hardware store with me to get advice and to buy sand paper, primer and paint. Then her visit was over and she left. I can't say somewhere along the way (primarally during the sanding phase) I didn't regret her influence. But DH helped with the sanding. And after a coat of primer and a few coats of white paint I was feeling much better about the project (and our friendship).

I picked out some great new knobs

And now, thanks to a great friend, I have a fantastic dresser all set in the nursery!

nesting

Maybe its the end of the school year and my itching to be doing something creative and different with soon-to-be free time this summer. Or maybe it is the pregnancy, but I have been having huge nesting instincts over the past few weeks. I've really, really tried to limit myself to what my brain and free time can handle project wise right now, but with only limited success. But I have finished one project for the new little one, that I am super happy with.

There was a painting I fell in love with when I was pregnant with Jonathan, but when we found out he was a boy, it was obviously not going to work. Plus we don't really have room for Pottery Barn in our budget!

But the idea of making something similar never really left my brain and so now that we are expecting a little princess, I finished my own version that is all ready to hang above her crib!

I actually think I like mine better than the original- and at WAY under the cost of the original!!

Now its on to baby blankets, a new quilt for Jonathan, curtains for our sunroom.....

Christmas Projects

In my mind the evenings before Christmas are filled with quiet egg-nog drinking and relaxing in front of a sparkling tree. In actuality the evenings are usually filled with exhaustion and chaos, half-completed projects and a constant stress that not everything will get done perfectly. I make mental lists, but never seem to make progress in checking them off because my brain adds projects faster than I can complete them. To be clear, I love projects and crafts. The process of imagining and creating things is one of the things that makes me feel the most alive inside. However, I typically have no discernment about how many things I can take on at once. And I never give myself a break. (Perfectionism is one of the things I used to talk to my therapist about on almost every visit.) I am trying really really hard this year, however, to not beat myself up about not getting it all done and take the time to sit back and enjoy my time with Jonathan. So if you don't get our Christmas card until January, assume it is because I was taking the time to help Jonathan play with our nativity scene or enjoy the magic of Christmas lights.

That being said, I still have a list of projects to complete before Friday, and I finished the most major one today. Years ago, before there was a Jonathan on the horizon, I hand quilted stockings for Jim and myself. Back in those days I had the time to piece a complicated pattern, hand quilt it and embroider our initials. Back in those days I couldn't really imagine why I wouldn't be able to do the same if and when we were adding stockings to our mantle. This year when I realized the time commitment in making one for Jonathan, I almost threw them out bought new ones for all three of us. But I love our stockings and I love that I made them. So last week I braved the snowstorm and took Jonathan to the fabric store to pick out some new fabrics. And after spending hours in the evenings and during nap times, today I finished the final stitches!!

Who knows if I will finish knitting hats and beading necklaces and baking cookies and writing cards. But Jonathan has a stocking and a Mommy who has resolved to enjoy the magic of the season!!

sunroom update

Right before we left for our Minnesota excursion, I bought a rug from Crate and Barrel with the idea of finally toddler-proffing our sunroom so that it is usable space again. We've basically used the space for storing things out of Jonathan's way and as a "hiding" place for to-be-dealt-with-later paperwork. I needed some motivation for spending some serious time tucking away cords and breakables, sorting through piles of paper and junk. The rug seemed like a good motivation- and it was!

I loved its bright look online and even more in person, but when I laid it out, it was obvious that the rest of the room was also going to need an update. So for the past week or so I've been busy sewing new pillow shams in bright colors, consolidating Jonathan's books onto a cute rolling cart, and creating a little artwork!

I love the finished product!! It is light and cheerful and great for cuddling with a toddler and a good book! And such a good feeling to have that room back in use!

picture perfect

I got my latest issue of Better Homes & Gardens in the mail on Friday. And it was covered in all of these notices that this is my final issue- special bright red plastic wrap, a card stock cover, several page inserts, and a no-postage-necessary reply envelope.

I am in a quandary about what to do. On one hand I love getting every issue of BHG in the mail. Magazines in the mailbox have the power to make my day great (I think it is something about the shine of the pages). I love paging through it and looking at the beautiful homes and decorating ideas. I love reading about recipes and I love looking at green yards. The problem is that I don't stop with just looking. There is this seductive path my brain takes at some point with almost every issue. I start off thinking "Oh, what a fun idea". This thought is immediately followed by "I could do that; it would be great in the ____ room". I earmark the page and then this idea starts to simmer on the back shelf in my mind. At first I am planning how such and such idea could fit into what we have, and what I like, and what would work for us, but then things become more sinister. A piece of my brain starts to ask myself why I haven't already finished this project and remind myself of what a mess our house is and how this project would fix that and make me happy. It keeps pointing to the dishes in the sink and telling me that painting the walls in the family room would make me into the sort of person who doesn't have dirty dishes in the sink- ever. And then this rogue part of my brain starts to call me names like "lazy", "unorganized", "unstylish", "slovenly", "boring", etc etc.

So I'm trying to decide whether it is worth it. I love projects- when I can get them done. I love ideas- when I deal with them in a healthy, reasonable way. I love shiny pages and beautiful pictures. I somehow, though, need to remind myself that no one's house actually looks like the pictures unless BHG is coming over to do a photo-shoot. Everyone has a junk drawer and dust bunnies and dirty laundry. I am not a failure as a human being when my house isn't ready for a photo-shoot at all times. The question is whether I can remember all of that next month when the shiny pages arrive in the mail enticing me with their call that "Heavenly Emu" colored paint on my walls will fix all of life's difficulties.

self sufficiency

I firmly believe that I should be able to do anything and everything. And that if I can do something, I should. Asking for help is not something I do. This especially applies to things I might consider paying someone else to do and leads me to feel guilty whenever I pay someone to change the oil in my car, put new gutters on my house, do any sort of yard work, paint my fingernails, cook food for me, etc. I'm working on the idea that while I might be physically able to something does not mean that I should. This is a new idea for me and one I'm only starting to believe. The fact that my time is so increasingly limited is forcing me to make some of choices. For example, I could vaccuum or I could spend time playing with Jonathan- not a difficult choice. But lately it has come to my attention that no one around here is doing any house cleaning. And so, after working through some significant feelings of shame and inadequacy, we have decided to pay someone to come and clean our house twice a month. Some days this decision leaves me with this amazingly light and ecstatic feeling freedom and joy. On other days (today) my pride sneaks out and causes me to take on projects like pulling the oven out from the wall and undertaking a massive effort to scrub it and the floor behind it clean- just to prove that I am not a slob.

guest room quilt

I finally finished the quilt I started planning last spring! Next for this room is some new curtains and possibly a fun colored paint!

our hovel

We have this amazing contractor friend, Philip, who has done some work on our house. He is truly wonderful- does great work, on time, is super friendly and reliable and just wonderful. For example Jim mentioned to him today that we were noticing a mildew smell coming out of our vents. And within 3 hours Philip was at our door to check it out. Amazing. Wonderful. But now as he is leaving, I feel like a total wreck.

First of all, I was still in my pajamas and in the middle of nursing Jonathan when he came to the door. So I'm already feeling self-conscious. But then we go around back to get to the crawlspace and of course to get through the halfway painted fence we go through the gate that is held shut with a bungee cord because I haven't fixed the latch that broke last winter. And of course after the crawlspace, he wants to check out the actual smell coming from the vents- one of which is under our front windows that leaked about 2 years ago messing up the plaster and paint in a big area between the windows and floor. The leak has been fixed, but since the area is behind the sofa the wall itself hasn't been fixed. It looks terrible. But of course he wants to pull the sofa out so he can smell that vent. After checking it all out, I show him out through the front door where the storm door came off of its hinges and blew into the front railing the week we moved in (4 years ago) knocking the railing off and into the garden. Neither have been fixed.

As he is leaving, he asks if we've decided yet on what kind of new gutters we want (he gave us some quotes a few months ago). Except that isn't what he says. What he says is "Have you guys decided about taking down that rooftop garden yet?" Referencing, of course, the multitude of plants that sprouted and are now well established residents of our current gutters. Honestly one of them is over 2 feet tall.

In general I don't think of our home as being in such disrepair. But when I start putting all of that stuff together... I'm sure Philip thinks that I am a total wreck. It is like having Martha Stewart come over for dinner and serving take-out chinease. That is certainly how I feel as I watch his pickup truck pull away from our dirty little hovel. None of these things would take much effort to fix- 15 minutes with the power drill and the latch to the gate would be good as new. 45 minutes, a bit of drywall mud, and a can of Kilz would take care of most of the problem with the water damaged plaster. 2 hours and the fence would be all the same color. But none of them are done. I am, after all, the queen of half-finished projects. The problem is that once I can see the end of a project, my brain starts planning the next one and that is so much more exciting than finishing the last details of the current one. FOCUS, woman, FOCUS!!