Bare Feet on the Dashboard

18
May
2011

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.

17
May
2011

The Nursery Part 2: Hand Painted Letters

categories: baby, crafts, decorating, handmade

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.

16
May
2011

The Nursery Part 1: Bright and Vintage Inspired

categories: baby, crafts, decorating, handmade

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.

15
May
2011

Verse of the Week – Nehemiah 1:11

categories: jesus

“O Lord, let your ear be attentive to the prayer of this your servant and to the prayer of your servants who delight in revering your name. Give your servant success today by granting him favor in the presence of this man.” Nehemiah 1:11

I am reading through Nehemiah right now (random, I know), and this verse came along as I was preparing for our big fundraising golf tournament. I prayed this verse over and over, asking the Lord for favor as we presented the ministry of Young Life to a lot of new faces. Sometimes it is hard to ask for favor from the Lord, because we feel we don’t deserve it or that it is wrong to ask. I think He wants to us to ask, and longs for us to seek out His blessing. Have you asked the Lord for favor in any situations lately?

09
May
2011

My Maternity Photo Shoot – Part 1

categories: baby, pregnancy

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?

03
May
2011

Counting Down the Days

categories: baby, pregnancy

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

28
Apr
2011

Pregnancy Update – 35 Weeks

categories: baby, pregnancy

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?

27
Apr
2011

A Very Festive Baby Shower

categories: baby, crafts, handmade

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.

26
Apr
2011

Heavenly Day – Our 3rd Anniversary

categories: family, marriage, weddings

Three years ago today, I married Jed in a picturesque field in the mountains of Weaverville, North Carolina. I cannot believe it has been three years already. Now we have made a new home in Dallas, though we still miss the mountains and our wonderful friends there. We have a baby due in a few weeks and will soon be a family of three (plus one wiener dog). We have learned so much about loving each other well, compromise, selfishness and selflessness, getting on the same page about money, serving in ministry together, and being each other’s biggest fan. I’m praying for 67 more years of wedded bliss and life together. Thank you, Jed, for loving me so well and being everything I could ever want or need in a husband. You will be an amazing daddy to our little Bun. I hope we get to dance to our wedding song today.

“Heavenly Day” by Patty Griffin

Oh heavenly day, all the clouds blew away

Got no trouble today with anyone

The smile on your face I live only to see

It’s enough for me, baby, it’s enough for me

Oh, heavenly day, heavenly day, heavenly day

Tomorrow may rain with sorrow

Here’s a little time we can borrow

Forget all our troubles in these moments so few

All we’ve got right now, the only thing that

All we really have to do

Is have ourselves a heavenly day

Lay here and watch the trees sway

Oh, can’t see no other way, no way, no way

Heavenly day, heavenly day, heavenly day

No one at my shoulder bringing me fears

Got no clouds up above me bringing me tears

Got nothing to tell you, I’ve got nothing much to say

Only I’m glad to be here with you

On this heavenly, heavenly, heavenly, heavenly

Heavenly day, all the trouble’s gone away

Oh, for a while anyway, for a while anyway

Heavenly day, heavenly day, heavenly day

25
Apr
2011

Happy Easter!

categories: family, holiday, jesus

Here we are, giant belly and uncooperative wiener dog included. We hope that you and yours had a wonderful day celebrating our risen Lord.

Therefore He is able to save completely those who come to God through Him, because He always lives to intercede for them.

-Hebrews 7:25