G2 Nursery Reveal

It's the moment you've all I've been waiting for...

The nursery is complete with the exception of G2 sleeping soundly in the crib. Nope, she still doesn't have a name. Why is this so hard? We still have a theoretical 6 weeks to decide. Still, it's really bothering me.

If you can remember, this is what the room looked like before it became a nursery.

Now...

 

It's a bright cheery yellow with coral and teal accents. I have to confess that my inspiration for the room came from the fabric we used on the valance.

If you can't tell, it's a frog pattern. Of course, Chloe and her sister have to have a frog of some sort in each of their rooms. Mark used to think I was odd for incorporating frogs in Chloe's room. He's learned to appreciate (some of my) peculiarities.

My mom did so much to help with this nursery. She knows how to do everything and has really good ideas when it comes to DIY. She helped me create the valance, sewed the bed skirt and painted the nursery.

The bed skirt is ingenious. It was designed so that as the crib is lowered with each stage of development (laying, sitting, standing) a ruffle from the bottom can be removed and the skirt won't drag on the ground. This was huge for me since I cannot stand it when skirts touch the ground (long story).

 

These bad boys are just fabric wrapped canvas. Well, the middle one is actually paint. I'll be putting the baby's first initial on the middle one if she ever gets named. I wanted to incorporate more of the fabric into the room. Since we won't be using bumpers this time, I felt like the room looked a little stale without added pattern that comes from the bumpers.

This was fun (see above)! I really wanted to reuse all the furniture we used when Chloe was a baby. But, the crib wasn't safe so we purchased a white one. (We buy pretty inexpensive cribs.) I then decided I needed the dresser to match, so I painted the one Chloe used white. If the drawers would have been white, it would have been too much. That was when my mom suggested painting the drawers a color. I decided on two different tones of pink...both of which are in the chevron fabric from the bed skirt. I just loved how this piece turned out. I'm so glad I took the time to do this project.

I really love the way this nursery turned out. I do not think the pictures do it justice. No matter.

Here's to six more weeks. I'm praying for five. :)

Girls' Bathroom Reveal

Here is the before and after:

I know I need to iron the shower curtain. That's on my list of 'random things that need to get done that aren't urgent.' It's a loooong list;)

Eventually we will put knobs on the cabinets, purchase towels to match the rugs, and tile the floor. I would also like to get a bow holder for the bathroom. I've been meaning to get one for three years.

Overall, I'm pleased with the outcome. Now I need to go do some cleaning. If you look really closely at the pictures, you can see that I need to vacuum up some dust from mounting hardware and re-securing the toilet tank to the bowl. (It was surprise to find out that the bolts in the tank were completely rusted out. We had to go buy some new ones last minute. It was an easy fix, but a great example of how no matter how smooth you think a project will go...something is going to come up. Always expect the unexpected.)

New Home Tour: Part 3 or ~A Surprise~

This is the last of the home tour. I'll probably show before/after pictures as we do some updating on the house. Right now we don't have any work planned, but we know what our projects are for the future.

Below is Chloe's room. I decided to go with a blue since her room at our other house was pink. I needed to change it up a bit. She seems to like it. I knew I wanted polka dots, but I wasn't really sure how to accomplish the task. I've never used a stencil, but I was pretty sure it would be messy and smudge everywhere. After checking out the InterWeb, I came across this YouTube video on Polka Dot Wall Painting. It was a perfect solution. It was so easy and fast! Chloe loves it and she tries to lick the wall the dots on the wall...she seems to think it's ice cream.

As you can see, I only did one and a half walls with the dots. I didn't want the whole room to be so busy.

This is the laundry room. It's directly across from Chloe's room. I'll eventually paint and put some organizational shelving and such in here.

Now, don't judge. I was going to clean this room for pictures, but then I decided to just be honest. This is the second guest room. It's not decorated. I use it to sort and fold my laundry. I haven't bothered decorating it, because it's going to be a baby room in a few short months! That's right...

We are having baby G2 in June of 2013. We are about 14 weeks right now...starting the second trimester.

Chloe turns 3 in May and this baby will make his/her appearance shortly after her celebration. We are so excited!

Chloe is very adamant that she wants a brother. Mark is sure it's another girl. I have no idea nor do I care. I really don't. I would love to have son and think I would be sad to never have a boy. But, Chloe's so much fun that another girl would be a wonderful addition...plus I have a lot of girl clothes. We'll know more in January! 

New Home Tour: Part 2

This is probably my favorite part of our home. After living in a box for the last five years (don't get me wrong...our first home was great), this open floor plan is just what we needed. I love that I can be in the kitchen and still be a part of the family room activities.

This part of our house is hidden in the back after you walk through the formal area. In our other house, you walked in the front door and were immediately standing in our family room. It can be a little awkward when you don't really know the person ringing the doorbell.

The only two drawbacks to an open kitchen?

1. The dishwasher is loud. If you want to talk, you have to wait until bedtime to run it.
2. The kitchen must be kept clean at all times...everybody can see the mess when your kitchen isn't hidden behind a wall.

I'm not complaining about either drawback. It doesn't bother me at all. I'm just pointing out the cons.

Below is the kitchen. When we moved in the entire house was white. I don't mean a shade of white. I mean the base color white that they use to mix another color...as white as white can get. Blinding white. So we toned everything down by painting the walls a sandy beige and the kitchen 'Chocolate Milk.' We also had the counter tops replaced. They were white Formica...we had that in the other house and so we decided we wanted to upgrade to quartz.

The view from the family room.

View from the hallway entrance. The door you see in the picture leads to the master suite.

Just another angle of the hallway entrance. I know there are a ridiculous amount of pictures of the kitchen...it's my favorite part of this house.

This is the family room. I haven't put up mini blinds yet. I'm still trying to figure out how to handle this situation. I love the natural light that flows in and this our backyard, so I'm tempted to leave it so I can have the light. It's not like we sit around naked watching television...

View of the family room fireplace.

Art niche which I'm clearly not using for 'art.'

This is the breakfast nook. It's huge for a 'nook' so now you see why we really have no use for the formal dining area. Don't mind the ugly linoleum. I'll put tile in someday, but I've discovered that linoleum is really easy to clean which comes in very handy with a messy toddler and mealtime.

View of the hallway that leads to the spare bedrooms and laundry room...which is next up on the home tour.

New Home Tour: Part 1

This is long overdue. But, I'm happy to start the tour of our new home. Below is our formal living/dining combo room. You can see the tree set up in the front window. When you turn to your right as you come in the front door, there is a double door to our office (pictures included in post).

Below is the formal dining portion of the combo room. For the immediate future it will function as a play area. We don't really have use for a formal dining area and we really could use the play room for Chloe. You can see Chloe walking through the entry way into our open kitchen/living area. You can also see that there are quite a few toys in there...

These are the double doors to the right of the front door that lead to our office area/man cave.

Office. Mark picked the desk off Craigslist. I painted the room Antique Pewter. I just love the color!

Please excuse the lack of curtains. When we moved in there were no mini blinds, so we spend quite a bit putting those up for privacy. Someday I'll get around to putting up curtains and window toppers to add warmth and personality. I honestly don't have a sense of urgency about it. We plan to be in the house for a very long time.

 

That's all for now. I'll show our living room, kitchen and breakfast nooks next. I just need to do a little de-cluttering and that's difficult while Chloe is awake.

Mommy and Daddy needed a Vacation

Two weeks ago, Mark and I were on our way to board a boat. A big boat. We took a Carnival cruise out of Galveston. We had it planned for months. We payed for the trip in full well before we put our house on the market.

As luck would have it (and I'm not complaining), our closing date was set for two days (2 DAYS) after we disembarked the ship. It wasn't as awful as we anticipated. We did lots of planning and preparing in the weeks leading up to our vacation. We also had family and friends who provided so much support during those two days.

But before I move on to talking about our new pad, I want to share our trip. We left on a Thursday sailed to Cozumel, Mexico and returned on Monday. It was four nights of relaxation and it was just what the doctor ordered for all the stress that a move entails.

There aren't many pictures because:

1. my point and shoot camera stinks
2. there wasn't really anything to photograph. we were at sea for two days with nothing in sight.

We did see a waterspout while we were sunbathing the first day. I wish I had my camera while we were out that afternoon. It was so beautiful to watch from a distance. Other than that, there wasn't much excitement which was exactly the way we wanted it. We had enough excitement going on at home.

In case you are wondering, Chloe had a mini-vacation of her own while we were gone. She staying with Shorty and Pop in Houston. In fact, she stayed with them for two extra days while we finished with closing and moving. It was sure hard for this momma to leave her behind after we returned from our cruise. More than a few tears were shed, but it was the right thing for Chloe. She got some extra loving and attention from her grandparents.



leaving Galveston. isn't it gorgeous! ha.

in Mexico at a little cantina we stumbled across.

A hood roof ornament in Mexico

 As you've probably figured out, we are officially in our new home. We closed on our old house at 9:30 the Wednesday after we returned. Then we immediately drove to another title company to close on our new home at 10:30. I had the keys to the new home by 1:30 on Wednesday.

Something I never anticipated was how much more complicated a move is when you are selling AND buying a house. This is the first time we've had to make such coordinated move. Last time, we had a few weeks to move out of our apartment and into the home we purchased after our wedding. This time, in order to avoid living at a friend's house or in a hotel for a few days, we had to be very strategic about closing dates and times. Thankfully, our real estate agent was amazing and coordinated everything perfectly. We literally loaded up the moving van on Tuesday night (with the help of some awesome friends), slept on the floor of our bedroom with two pillows and one blanket, woke up and went to signing, and then unloaded the van at the new house on Wednesday. Whew, I get tired just thinking about those two days. It was a lot. It was totally worth it!

I'll post pictures of the new house soon.

Nothing

Things are still bananas around here. We had an offer on the house. It is NOT sold. It's a looong story and one I don't want to revisit, so I'm not going to write about it today.

While you wait for a legitimate update to this blog, I give you this:

 

 

 

 

The Big Bed Switch

On Chloe's 2nd birthday, we made the switch from crib to full-size bed. We chose to skip over the toddler bed because we already had a full-size mattress. I wasn't too concerned about the switch, but I did worry a little that she might take advantage of her crib-less freedom.

all stretched out on her full size bed

The only indication she gave of missing her crib was when she walked into the room while we were taking it apart. She looked at Mark and said, "Oh no. Where bed go? It broken." She was more concerned about finder her Minnie Mouse that usually resides in her crib. Lucky for her it was resting on her toy box. :)

That night we put her to bed using our same routine. Only one change was made...Mark and I were in her bed with her for story time. We left the room with her awake after singing the Alphabet song, saying prayers and giving kisses. I expected her to try and get up at least a few times, but she fell asleep as quickly and easily as she always does.

In the mornings, she stays in her bed until I come get her. I don't think this will last. I suspect she will quickly learn that she can get up without my help. We do have a baby gate up so she is quarantined in her own area of the house. I do this because we have a staircase and I don't want her going downstairs by herself.

The second and third nights/mornings have gone just as easily as the first. The only 'issue' (if you even want to call it an issue) has been nap time. She does try and get up a few times. I simply go to the door and tell her to lie down. She does and she's quickly asleep.

I'm glad this switch has gone so well. At about 36" (3 feet) tall, Chloe was getting too big for her crib!

On decorating the room: We decided not to paint or change much other than the furniture. I officially passed down my great grandmother's furniture that had been given to me by my mom. I wanted the bed spread to be antique looking like the furniture and I couldn't really find anything. Luckily, my mom mentioned that she had a yellow lace bedspread that was sewn for her by the same great grandmother. So Chloe is using it.

we have a bed rail. i took it down for picture purposes.

look at all those books! it makes me so happy.

toy corner

I still have a few things to finish in the room. I want to hang some more stuff on the walls, particularly over her headboard. I also need to switch her bookshelf out with the one that matches her furniture. But, you get the just of her 'newish' room.

Kitchen Chaos

I just wanted you all to see how I run my kitchen. I found this humorous. I'm not sure if my kitchen looks like this when I cook because (a) I have no idea what I'm doing or(b) it's the nature of cooking.

I do clean as I go or this would look much worse. It is complete chaos in my kitchen when I'm behind the stove.

Laundry Today or Naked Tomorrow

Ok. You caught me. I stole that from a picture on Pinterest. But then again, almost everything on Pinterest is stolen borrowed from a more creative mind.

The purpose of the title is to reveal our...BRAND...NEW...LAUNDRY ROOM!

Before, our washer and dryer sat in a cove in our garage. Not a huge problem, but we couldn't leave clothes in the laundry room to air dry. They would smell like gasoline if we did. It also meant our washer and dryer always had a layer of dirt and dust on it. Don't even get me started on the bugs. I was always checking for bugs (specifically, prehistoric-size tree roaches...a common problem here) before walking out there.

We were lucky because somebody had already hung a door in the cove for easier access to the washer and dryer. That meant we only had to add a wall and do some minor electrical work in order make an indoor laundry room!

Please excuse the poor picture quality. I used my iPhone to take these.

before. standing in the garage looking into the cove.

Mark and I had stained the concrete a few weeks earlier.
It was cheaper and easier than tile.

Shorty and Pop framing the wall and running wire for an outlet.

Pop and I. We had to tape and floating the wall.
I didn't do much, but I'm good at folding the tape. :)
And never underestimate the value of a good project supervisor.

Finished.
Love the yellow walls!

New cabinets look much nicer than the warped shelves from before.

 I can't wait to hang some shelves in between the two cabinets. We will also do a touch of decorating in there. Not many people will ever see this room, but it's now one of my favorites! I love being able to do laundry INSIDE the house!

Thank you so much, Shorty and Pop! We really appreciate you taking two weekends out of your busy schedule to help us with this project. Chloe will be paying you with cuddles a long time for this one!