Category: baby

The Nursery Part 4: The End

Remember this?  This quilt (made by my great-grandmother) was the inspiration for my bright vintage nursery.  You can see the first three installments of the nursery reveal by clicking Part 1, Part 2, or Part 3.  Why did I divide it up so much?  Because 28 pictures was far too much for one blog post.    

I created this ribbon mobile to go over the crib to keep the wee one entertained.  You can read about the creation of it here.  We got the crib on clearance at Target, and the crib sheets, Sleep Sheep, and sweet turtle blanket were shower gifts.  The curtains are also from Target, and I got the Boppy (complete with the organic cover) on clearance at Amazon.  Don’t worry, it is only staying in there temporarily.  The rugs lived in our bedroom for a while, and came from the Second Saturday Sale in Little Rock.  I’ve seen them at boutiques here in town for over $200, but I got them for $20 each.  The crib skirt is my favorite.  It was made by my grandmother for my crib 32 years ago, and is still in great shape.  It is too long, but I just folded it up under the mattress to make it work.  I should have taken a close up picture so you could see the lovely eyelet lace.      

This “bookcase” was a gold plate holder given to me by Michelle, my sister-in-law.  I spray painted it yellow to match the room, and am using it to hold some of the books we’ve received as gifts.  Below you can see the ring full of family tradition ideas that my Dallas shower guests wrote down for me.

And finally, here is Jed’s favorite part of the nursery, the Twilight Turtle.  When you turn it on it projects stars onto the ceiling using real constellations.  He likes to show it off when we bring people back to the nursery.

What is your favorite decorating item?  
What do you like to show off to visitors? 
I’m sharing this post at some great parties.
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The Nursery Part 3: More Vintage and Hand Painted Touches

Today I’m showing you another little corner of the nursery.  You can see part 1 of the nursery reveal here, and part 2 here.  I love this little corner.  We used a regular dresser that we already owned, and created a diaper station on top of it.  The changing pad is waaaay bigger than I though it would be, but I guess it is kind of important.  The little canvas basket was a shower gift, and I’m using it to hold diapers, cream, and wipes.

These paintings are my favorite part of the whole nursery.  My friend Crystal, who painted the letters and buckets, also did all three of these for me.  Bunnies and ducks have been inexplicably irresistible to me throughout the whole pregnancy.  These paintings fulfill that craving, but without looking too babyish.  I love them so much.

One of my other favorite touches is this retro fan that I found at an estate sale.  It is totally vintage, fits the color scheme, and is functional.  Isn’t it the cutest?!  
Come back tomorrow for more scenes from the nursery.  
I’m sharing this post at some fun parties.  
Check them out on my right sidebar and join in.  

The Nursery Part 2: Hand Painted Letters

Can you imagine my surprise and delight when my sweet and creative friend Crystal presented me with these hand painted letters at my Little Rock baby shower?  She matched the paint colors to the bright, vintage theme of the nursery, and attached matching ribbon for hanging.  She even gave me all the leftover ribbon.  Amazing.  Here’s one of the inspiration quilts to compare the color scheme.  

I love how each letter is unique.  I hung them above the closet to divert attention from the mirrored door and weird gold trim.  Oh, rent house weirdness…

You can see part 1 of the nursery here.  
Stay tuned for more tomorrow.  
I’m sharing these fun letters at some great parties you can find on my right sidebar.  Click away and join the fun.  

The Nursery Part 1: Bright and Vintage Inspired

I searched high and low and all over the internet for inspiration for Baby Bun’s nursery.  I picked out bedding at Babies R Us, then ditched it in favor of a set from Target.  Then I remembered my great grandmother’s quilts and decided to go in a completely different direction.

I used the colors in these quilts for inspiration, and decided to go with a brightly colored vintage theme.  One quilt hangs over a spare chair that will be replaced when we move the glider from the living room to the nursery.  The other covers the full size guest bed that lives in half the room.

We used a lot of handmade furniture that my husband crafted, including the headboard and two shelves.  One of the shelves has several cubbies that are filled with baby things stored in cute buckets painted by my friend Crystal.  

The little birdie is a tap nightlight, which will be super handy above the changing table.  In another cubby lives Paulo the Piggy Bank that I painted with some of my WyldLife girls, and one of the corsages from my baby shower.

More vintage inspired touches include a trio of mod podged doily paintings that you can read about here, and mason jars filled with brightly colored pinwheels.

Glow in the dark sheep live atop the cubby shelf, while toys and a diaper cake begin to fill the play corner.

OMGiant Belly…

Jackson enjoys the fluffy rugs that used to reside in our bedroom.  They help to mask the ugly rent house carpet.  We can’t cover up the rent house mirror doors, so I’ll use them to give you a preview of the rest of the room.  Come back this week to see the rest.

Where do you find decorating inspiration?  
I’m sharing this post at some great parties.  
Check them out on my right sidebar and join the fun.  

My Maternity Photo Shoot – Part 1

37 Weeks 
My sweet friends Sydney and Raychel took maternity photos for me, first at the Dallas Arboretum, then with Jed at White Rock Lake and our home.  In retrospect we should have done it before I started to resemble a house, but I’m still so glad to have them.  Both ladies are super talented and teaching themselves to be photographers.  This first round is from Sydney, and are just a few of my favorites.  She edited some of them, and then I tweaked some using Picnik.      

 Looking at pictures of yourself at nine months pregnant is a bit humbling, because you really are as big as you feel.  On the other hand, I love having these pictures of our little family before we meet our Baby Bun.  We are nervous and excited and waiting patiently for our new addition.

 We tried not to be too cheesy.  I started to giggle whenever we would strike a goofy pose.  I think these all turned our really well.  The sun was SUPER bright, so there were some shadows, but these look as natural as you can look posing in a field of wildflowers with your husband.

Do you schedule family photo shoots?  

Counting Down the Days

I am so hugely pregnant right now, and the days are quickly dwindling.  We have our OB appointment today, and I’m nervous and excited about it.  We will get to see our baby for the first time since the 20 week ultrasound, and Jed is worried that we will accidentally find out the gender.  I am just stressed about getting everything done at work so that I can do nothing but adjust to motherhood during maternity leave.  I’ve made it through the first of my checklist of big events – the last Young Life club.  This Friday is the last WyldLife (middle school) event, a giant crud war.  Don’t worry, I’m not participating.  I’ll just be the MC.  Next week is  our big YL golf tournament, a couples wedding shower that we are co-hosting, and a quinceanera we’ve been invited to.  Yikes.  After that, we are good to go.  That means of course that the baby will either be a week late or come right before all the big stuff (or right in the middle).  The great news is that I’ll be done with week 37 on Saturday, so the baby will be full term with developed lungs and everything.  That is such a huge relief.  
When do you think our baby will arrive?  
Guess the date and time in the comments section.      
I’m so excited to share the my post about Jed’s Solar Powered Hanging Jars was featured by two different blogs.  
Check them out below.  
Mother Earth News

New Nostalgia

Pregnancy Update – 35 Weeks

 33 Weeks
35 Weeks
I cannot believe there are only 30 days left until our due date.  I am HUGE.  I’m still measuring 4 weeks ahead, so basically I look and feel like I should be giving birth this week.  Let me tell you, things are getting a bit uncomfortable.  Next Tuesday is our doctor’s appointment with an ultrasound where we will get to see the baby and see how big the fibroid tumor has become.  I’m nervous about that, but excited to see the baby.  I had a nightmare last night where the tumor had grown too large and forced a c-section.  Jed, on the other hand, had a great dream about us having a really cute baby boy.  Maybe I’ll have a good dream tonight.  
We are working hard to get ready for Bun’s arrival, but it is slow going because of our jobs.  Most of our stuff is still in the packages and only semi-organized.  Hopefully we can get more of it done this weekend.  Our hospital bag is mostly packed, with a list on top of all the things it is missing so we don’t forget anything.  We figured out how to install the car seat, but it took about 30 minutes and lots of help from our neighbors.  We were amazed by how tricky it was.  The entire time we were thinking, “We both have college degrees, surely we can figure this out.”  
The next things on our list are to finish decorating the nursery and wash the linens, clothes, and cloth diapers.  We are trying to figure out what exactly we need to do to prep the cloth diapers.  More on that later.  
What did you to prepare for your first baby?  
What do you wish you had done?  
What turned out to be a complete waste of time?     

A Very Festive Baby Shower

I am so blessed.  We have lived in Dallas for less than three years, and are already surrounded by an amazing community of friends.  Six of our friends recently threw one seriously festive baby shower for Baby Bun and me.  They are a creative bunch, and the shower had so many unique touches.  They handmade name tag corsages from paper and felt for everyone to wear.

The party took place at the home of our friends the Ballards.  They had only moved in one month before, and then were robbed right after buying the house.  I was pretty impressed by how moved in they were.  I have a tendency to live out of boxes for way too long.  The girls used bright, fun colors to decorate, and served a buffet of breakfast burritos.  Yum.

The tables were decorated with fresh greenery, nests of burlap and moss, and blown out brown eggs with “baby” written on them.  It was so different from the typical baby shower pink or blue, and I LOVED it.

See those brightly colored beads in the vases?  They keep plants moist without the mess of water, apparently.  Very cool, and festive.

For dessert the girls served homemade pralines and mini cupcakes in lemon and chocolate.  I tried to use restraint and failed miserably.

Each guest was asked to share a favorite family tradition to give us ideas of new traditions to start with our little family.  The girls put them all together on a metal ring and sent me home with a massive stack of ideas.

There were three round tables set up outside, and we had a beautiful Texas morning.  Each table was decorated with a straw wreath, moss, the burlap and eggs (like inside), and vases filled with individual flowers.

Inside there was a mimosa bar set up, with water and plain orange juice available as well.

I am so thankful that so many friends and family came and showered us with gifts.  We are so truly blessed.

My sweet mama came into town for the shower, and Betsy (one of the hostesses) made her a special corsage with her grandma name (Dede).  My sister in law came up with Dede as an easy name for my niece to call her, as her non-grandma names are Deborah and Debbie.

Here are four of the six hostesses: Morgan, Whitney, Allison, and Betsy (Asia and Ellen are not shown).  I’m the rotund one in the middle, of course.  I am so thankful to these girls for throwing an amazing shower for me and going to the trouble to get seriously creative.  I felt really special.  I showed you a bit of my Arkansas shower earlier, and I promise to show more of that one soon.  Some amazing friends from work threw me a lunch shower as well, but I’ve got to get the photos from one of them.  Once again, we feel so incredibly blessed.  

So, in keeping with the shower idea… 
What is your favorite family tradition?  
I’m sharing this festive baby shower post over at some great parties.  Check them out on my right sidebar and join the fun.  

A Ribbon Mobile for Baby’s Nursery

We are hard at work on Baby Bun’s nursery, and my favorite part is the decorating.  I saw a ribbon mobile I love at Pottery Barn, but it was almost $70.  I decided I could make one pretty easily for a lot less.  I piled up the coupons and went to Hobby Lobby.  Ribbon was half off.  Score!  I bought ten different colors of ribbon and a wire wreath frame.  I already had paint for the frame and craft glue.  The wreath was that floral dark green, so I painted it light aqua.  The aqua repeats itself throughout the nursery, as do most of the other colors.  As you can see we did not stick solely to the traditional gender neutral colors of green and yellow.  I can’t wait to show you all of the nursery when we get done.  

 At first I cut the ribbon into strips, but they were way too long.  I wanted to make sure the baby couldn’t grab it even when he/she is able to stand in the crib.  I cut each piece in half and it was perfect.  Check out the massive pile of ribbon.

I glued strips around the inside ring first. I folded each strip over and putt a dot of craft glue on it, then held it in place for a few seconds.  This was effective but a bit messy.  I think you could double the length and knot it in half for a glueless mobile.  After the inside ring, I decided to skip the two middle rings and go straight to the outside ring.  I glued the ribbon around that ring, and love the way it looks.  Then I measured from the hook (centered above the crib) to see how far I wanted the mobile to hang.  I divided that measurement in half and then added 2 inches for a little give and the knots.  I tied each of those ribbons to the middle ring with a knot and then hung the mobile from the hook.  I love how some of the ribbon is starting to curl.

 Here is Baby Bun’s view.  Fun, right?  
I hope he or she will love it.  

 I think it is simple, yet bright and fun.  Below you’ll find a little sneak peek into the nursery.  Jackson is mystified by all the goings on back there.  As you can see we have rugs in place (that used to be in our bedroom) over the weird rent house carpet.  There is only so much you can do in a rent house, but I hope to do all that I can to make it lovely.  The fabric hanging over the crib is an eyelet crib skirt made for my bassinet (32 years ago)  by my sweet grandmother.  She died 6 years ago, so I love that I have a piece that she made in the nursery.  Hopefully we will get it in place soon.  One step at a time.  

What is your craft project of the moment? 
I’m linking to some great craft parties.  Check them out on my right sidebar and find some inspiration for your own projects, or join in.  

Glen Rose Getaway – Dining at Sunset Ridge Bed and Breakfast

On our baby moon getaway in Glen Rose, Texas, we found a really special bed and breakfast inn.  Jed searched long and hard online to find a place that fit our needs and our style.  Sunset Ridge is in our price range and is far more modern than many B & Bs.  I’ll post pics of the place later on, and tell you all about it.  The photo above is the view from our private patio during sunset.  As you can see, the name Sunset Ridge is a perfect fit.  Besides the obvious breakfast part of the B & B, Sunset Ridge offers a four course dinner for an extra fee.  The couple who runs the place gives a few options to choose from, and let me tell you, we chose wisely.  

 We started with homemade Parmesan Black Pepper Crackers and Herb Dip.  We had already dipped into it by the time I thought to take a picture.  The dip and crackers were savory and light, a great starter.  The lighting was also very “romantic”, making it difficult to get a great photo.  Oh well.  You get the idea.

 The second course was a Poached Pear and Blue Cheese Salad.  We were a little nervous about that combination, but it was delicious.

For the entree, we each had a Filet of Beef with Roasted Asparargus and Roasted Fingerling Potatoes.  Jed described the steak as the best he had ever had.  That, my friends, is a great compliment.  We got the recipe before we left, believe me.

 See the above photo for evidence of the deliciousness of our entree.  Amazing.

We shared a huge piece of Double Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Dipped Strawberries for dessert.  It was awesome, and we were fully stuffed after indulging in a fantastic four course dinner.  One of the best things about it was that we only had to walk across the veranda to our room after dinner.  Come back later this week for more about our Glen Rose getaway.

Have you stayed in an awesome Bed and Breakfast Inn?  Tell me about it.  

Spring Fling Day 2 Giveaways:
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