Zu is helping us pass the time with her melodic singing voice. Between her lovely melodies and watching the whole first season of Downton Abbey in the last two days, I have been sufficiently entertained.
Wednesday, January 23, 2013
Tuesday, January 22, 2013
Wednesday, January 16, 2013
Still waiting...
I'm 39 weeks and 5 days and still no sign of the wee one. Hopefully this will be the last pic demonstrating my girth... Note: The coffee in my hand is decaf and it was delicious :)
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
Big nursery reveal!
After many weekends of work and a big push over the past 4 days as Andy had time off over the holidays, the nursery is finally ready for it's big reveal! It's been a labor of love not only by Andy and I, but also by my dad who generously used his talents gleamed from years of house painting years ago to paint the walls, and my very talented artist mom who both painted our amazing mural and crafted the whimsical bird mobile. With creativity in mind (and frankly, out of necessity) we did many parts of this nursery on the cheap- Andy painted an old dresser; almost all books were obtained at yard sales and resale shops; the glider and ottoman were bought used off craigslist and reupholstered; the rug was bought on sale at Urban Outfitters online utilizing a coupon code; filler storage furniture is from Target and the white chair was re-purposed from Andy's single days. I still have a couple more details to fill in but in the meantime, here are some pics of our new favorite room:
I agonized over the fabric for this chair for weeks, but eventually managed to decide on this colorful, quilt-like fabric by a Japanese designer. After much searching, I found it on sale on two sites and bought what was left at each. My mom's coworker friend then used her sewing skillz to reupholster it (I originally considered doing it myself but subsequently decided I was WAY out of my league on this one). I love the way it turned out! The Rock n' Play, Mamaroo and Moses Basket will likely find homes in other areas of the house over time, but they're stored here for now.
You can see Zu's special "nursery bed" on the right side of this one. She already loves the bed and the room as a whole. We have found her hanging out there a couple of times already. Funny enough, she is the only one with a bed in this room since we don't have a crib- Sprout will be sleeping in a co-sleeper in our room for the foreseeable future (she'll be out sometime before she turns 18 I'm sure ;)).
The book nook. I originally wanted an older, used bookshelf with more character, but got tired of looking for one in our budget and picked up this storage cube at Target instead. It does the trick and actually works pretty nicely in the room with the added bonus of providing some much-needed storage space.
Beautiful artwork by Oliver and Pearl totally goes with the multi-color theme of the room! In case it's hard to see, the top picture is actually a family portrait by Oliver, complete with Sprout in my tummy and Zuzu beside Andy! I got nice frames deeply discounted at AC Moore that were discounted even further with a coupon. Love that! :)
The changing area. Here you can see much handiwork: The dresser, expertly painted complete with contrasting knobs by Andy, and truly incredible mural and bird mobile by my mom. You can also see my old bear "Cocoa Marshmallow" hanging out on the changing pad. I am looking forward to passing my childhood friend on to our Sprout.
More complete pic of this part of the mural. You can also see the Mamaroo in this pic. Andy was having a hard time picturing life without it after drooling over the one that resides with our friends Jen and Rodney and their son Rowan. So, when I found a 20% off coupon, we took the plunge. It was probably our biggest splurge.
The mobile my mom made is incredible! The hand-sewn birds hang down from a real branch with some purple bells attached. I think Sprout will love it!
Close-up of birdy flying by the tree in the background :).
So, that's our nursery. Andy, Zu and I already love hanging out there. We've taken to "story hour" in the nursery where we take turns reading books. I'm not exactly sure who we're reading to (can Sprout understand? Does Zu enjoy books? Are we reading to eachother?) but it's some good, wholesome family fun :). Hope you enjoyed the tour and looking forward to sharing the nursery with many of you in person in the future!
Happy New Year to all!
I agonized over the fabric for this chair for weeks, but eventually managed to decide on this colorful, quilt-like fabric by a Japanese designer. After much searching, I found it on sale on two sites and bought what was left at each. My mom's coworker friend then used her sewing skillz to reupholster it (I originally considered doing it myself but subsequently decided I was WAY out of my league on this one). I love the way it turned out! The Rock n' Play, Mamaroo and Moses Basket will likely find homes in other areas of the house over time, but they're stored here for now.
You can see Zu's special "nursery bed" on the right side of this one. She already loves the bed and the room as a whole. We have found her hanging out there a couple of times already. Funny enough, she is the only one with a bed in this room since we don't have a crib- Sprout will be sleeping in a co-sleeper in our room for the foreseeable future (she'll be out sometime before she turns 18 I'm sure ;)).
The book nook. I originally wanted an older, used bookshelf with more character, but got tired of looking for one in our budget and picked up this storage cube at Target instead. It does the trick and actually works pretty nicely in the room with the added bonus of providing some much-needed storage space.
We realized it would be nice to have comfortable seating for more than one adult in the room and we had this extra chair, so we made this little art corner. I have a couple more pieces of art to hang and I am planning on making a pillow for the chair out of the leftover glider upholstery fabric but haven't gotten there yet. The bin next to the chair stores our million and one baby carriers, most received as gifts or bought used.
Beautiful artwork by Oliver and Pearl totally goes with the multi-color theme of the room! In case it's hard to see, the top picture is actually a family portrait by Oliver, complete with Sprout in my tummy and Zuzu beside Andy! I got nice frames deeply discounted at AC Moore that were discounted even further with a coupon. Love that! :)
The changing area. Here you can see much handiwork: The dresser, expertly painted complete with contrasting knobs by Andy, and truly incredible mural and bird mobile by my mom. You can also see my old bear "Cocoa Marshmallow" hanging out on the changing pad. I am looking forward to passing my childhood friend on to our Sprout.
More complete pic of this part of the mural. You can also see the Mamaroo in this pic. Andy was having a hard time picturing life without it after drooling over the one that resides with our friends Jen and Rodney and their son Rowan. So, when I found a 20% off coupon, we took the plunge. It was probably our biggest splurge.
The mobile my mom made is incredible! The hand-sewn birds hang down from a real branch with some purple bells attached. I think Sprout will love it!
Close-up of birdy flying by the tree in the background :).
So, that's our nursery. Andy, Zu and I already love hanging out there. We've taken to "story hour" in the nursery where we take turns reading books. I'm not exactly sure who we're reading to (can Sprout understand? Does Zu enjoy books? Are we reading to eachother?) but it's some good, wholesome family fun :). Hope you enjoyed the tour and looking forward to sharing the nursery with many of you in person in the future!
Happy New Year to all!
Tuesday, December 18, 2012
As promised...
Our 2012 F-S family Christmas tree pic!
I'm 35 and a 1/2 weeks pregnant and feeling every day of it, but immensely grateful :). Happy holidays from us and ours to you and yours!
I'm 35 and a 1/2 weeks pregnant and feeling every day of it, but immensely grateful :). Happy holidays from us and ours to you and yours!
Friday, December 14, 2012
Christmas tree shopping
Andy and I went Christmas tree shopping last weekend. Usually we head out to Honeypot Hill Orchard in Stow where you get to choose a tree as Christmas music is piped in while sipping free hot apple cider, followed by roasting marshmallows over an open fire and a visit to goats, pigs, chickens and bunnies. This year we had so much Sprout-preparing to do that we decided to just go to Allandale Farm down the road instead of making the hour drive each way to Stow. Allandale is a very nice farm, coined "the oldest working farm in Boston" (although technically I think it's now in Brookline) and to be fair, they did have an open fire and a pair of oxen, but no marshmallows, free cider or music. Alas...
We went to Allandale one other year for our tree and for some reason decided to buy a white pine that reminded us of "Cousin It." That will go down as the worst tree we have or will ever bring into our home. It didn't smell like a Christmas tree, the wispy needles didn't hold ornaments... It just sucked. The only redeeming value was that it very light- Andy was a fan of that feature :). This year we steered away from the pines (and felt badly for the families that looked at them and thought "this could be a fun new type of tree!") and after much perusing, got a good old-fashioned balsam fir. We haven't yet taken our annual F-S family Christmas tree photo (I'll post it when we do) but here are a few of us shopping:
The last shot shows Andy holding our tree. We knew it was a good one because when he picked it up, a woman walked by and said "what a beautiful tree!" and I subsequently saw multiple families eying our tree to see if we would leave it behind so they could scoop it up. No such luck suckers! :) It's funny how Christmas tree shopping can make me feel so competitive... The tree is now up and decorated in our living room and looks beautiful, unlike our dearly departed Cousin It tree. May you all learn a lesson today- white pines are interesting to look at, but you're in for a world of disappointment if you try to make one your Christmas tree.
In other news, I'm 35 weeks pregnant today and still doing well! Sleep (or lack thereof) is probably my biggest problem currently, but what can you do. Hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday season!
We went to Allandale one other year for our tree and for some reason decided to buy a white pine that reminded us of "Cousin It." That will go down as the worst tree we have or will ever bring into our home. It didn't smell like a Christmas tree, the wispy needles didn't hold ornaments... It just sucked. The only redeeming value was that it very light- Andy was a fan of that feature :). This year we steered away from the pines (and felt badly for the families that looked at them and thought "this could be a fun new type of tree!") and after much perusing, got a good old-fashioned balsam fir. We haven't yet taken our annual F-S family Christmas tree photo (I'll post it when we do) but here are a few of us shopping:
The last shot shows Andy holding our tree. We knew it was a good one because when he picked it up, a woman walked by and said "what a beautiful tree!" and I subsequently saw multiple families eying our tree to see if we would leave it behind so they could scoop it up. No such luck suckers! :) It's funny how Christmas tree shopping can make me feel so competitive... The tree is now up and decorated in our living room and looks beautiful, unlike our dearly departed Cousin It tree. May you all learn a lesson today- white pines are interesting to look at, but you're in for a world of disappointment if you try to make one your Christmas tree.
In other news, I'm 35 weeks pregnant today and still doing well! Sleep (or lack thereof) is probably my biggest problem currently, but what can you do. Hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday season!
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Works in progress
Last weekend Andy and I were busy at work once again making preparations. I have been stressing about getting an old dresser to use as a changing table and finally found one on Craigslist this weekend. The gentleman who was selling it agreed to deliver it within an hour and finally, one big piece of furniture was crossed off the list! But, not so fast... I really wanted a white dresser and this one was polished wood. Andy seemed excited about the possibility of painting furniture and went to work researching the best way to do it. When the dresser arrived, it looked like this:
Andy assembled the needed supplies and went to work. We decided to use the leftover semi-gloss white paint that my mom had used to paint the birch trees with a few weeks ago. Very frugal! :)
First, Andy removed the drawers and lightly sanded the dresser down so the paint would stick. You get a nice sneak peak at the nursery mural in the background in this one!
He then applied a first coat of paint, all the while with a smile on this face. :) Unfortunately, this is where the progress ended as we got to the end of the weekend and there is somehow some brown streaking coming through the paint on the top of the dresser... We still have to figure out how to address that one... In any case, I'm sure it's going to turn out great!
Meanwhile, I've been working on my quilt since October. It is also still a work in progress, but below I've included a few pics along the way. First, I ironed out all 12 "fat quarters" I picked out for the project:
Then I cut the each quarter into ten 4.5" squares per using a template (this was more than I needed but it took me a while to decide how big I wanted this quilt to be).
I assembled all my materials and my much-neglected Pfaff sewing machine (that I got for my birthday from Andy years ago and has been intimidating me from the back room ever since) on the dining room table, which became "project central." Nice to finally put some mileage on that baby!
I sewed the squares into 10 rows of 8, and then sewed those rows together to make the finished quilt top.
I knew I would be stuck here if I didn't get this done in time for my Aunt Anne's visit for Thanksgiving as I had no idea how to finish the quilt and she is a quilter extraordinaire! I've made only one other quilt in my life and Anne helped me back that one as well. So, I busted my hump to get the top finished by Thanksgiving. With a lot of help from Anne, my mom and lovely future sister-in-law Kelly, we got the quilt all pinned up and ready for finishing!
I spent the weekend working hard to finish sewing the backing onto the quilt but I still have a good bit left to do. It is slow-going, fairly tedious work but I'm actually enjoying it. I had Andy take some pics of me working on it this weekend but I can't in good conscience post any of them as I look, well, not-so-fabulous (understatement of the year here). Instead, I'll include a pic of me from Thanksgiving that hopefully won't make small children run away in horror:
So, nothing is finished, but we continue to work hard to get all our DIY projects done. This gets harder as I get more and more tired- week 32 (that started at Thanksgiving) was the onset of my 3rd trimester fatigue and boy, am I fatigable! Other than the fatigue, various aches and pains and insomnia (a lot of qualifiers here...), we are doing well. Sprout was HEAD DOWN (yay!) at our last ultrasound a week or so ago and growing like gangbusters, thankfully. Hope everyone is enjoying a wonderful holiday season!
 | ||
| Please excuse the mess in the background- part of the purpose of getting this darn dresser is having somewhere to put all Sprout's stuff! |
First, Andy removed the drawers and lightly sanded the dresser down so the paint would stick. You get a nice sneak peak at the nursery mural in the background in this one!
He then applied a first coat of paint, all the while with a smile on this face. :) Unfortunately, this is where the progress ended as we got to the end of the weekend and there is somehow some brown streaking coming through the paint on the top of the dresser... We still have to figure out how to address that one... In any case, I'm sure it's going to turn out great!
Meanwhile, I've been working on my quilt since October. It is also still a work in progress, but below I've included a few pics along the way. First, I ironed out all 12 "fat quarters" I picked out for the project:
 |
I assembled all my materials and my much-neglected Pfaff sewing machine (that I got for my birthday from Andy years ago and has been intimidating me from the back room ever since) on the dining room table, which became "project central." Nice to finally put some mileage on that baby!
I sewed the squares into 10 rows of 8, and then sewed those rows together to make the finished quilt top.
I knew I would be stuck here if I didn't get this done in time for my Aunt Anne's visit for Thanksgiving as I had no idea how to finish the quilt and she is a quilter extraordinaire! I've made only one other quilt in my life and Anne helped me back that one as well. So, I busted my hump to get the top finished by Thanksgiving. With a lot of help from Anne, my mom and lovely future sister-in-law Kelly, we got the quilt all pinned up and ready for finishing!
 | ||
| Andy and Zuzu were hard at work here... ;) |
So, nothing is finished, but we continue to work hard to get all our DIY projects done. This gets harder as I get more and more tired- week 32 (that started at Thanksgiving) was the onset of my 3rd trimester fatigue and boy, am I fatigable! Other than the fatigue, various aches and pains and insomnia (a lot of qualifiers here...), we are doing well. Sprout was HEAD DOWN (yay!) at our last ultrasound a week or so ago and growing like gangbusters, thankfully. Hope everyone is enjoying a wonderful holiday season!
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