The Project List :: Completed Tasks

So I got done 5 out of 9 things.. not bad, right?

Putting the felt backer on for black-out purposes!

Finished!

Wish I had bought more of these to hang, but this will do!

Spray painted Sunday. So no chance of hanging it up the same day!

Glued, but not hung. I don't know where it's 'spot' is quite yet.

Hung!

I couldn't hang the small frames because I don't know where they're going yet. I found a decal set on pinterest that I think i'm going to try to paint myself onto the large wall that is currently blank. I don't want to spoil it by showing it ahead of time. :) But it's going to be awesome. I need to sketch it first on a regular sheet of paper to know I can do it on a larger wall. (If you follow me on pinterest, I pinned it.. oops!)

What else was I supposed to do? Ohh that's right, buy some fabric to make a crib skirt. Well, I didn't make it to JoAnn Fabric.. so that didn't get done. However, I think when it does get done it's going to look great. That's a project for December I think. I also didn't choose any pictures for the wall because I want to wait on that as well, especially with the new 'mural' idea.

There's plenty left to do, luckily I still have 9 weeks to accomplish these things!

The Nursery {Part 3 cont'd}

If you remember from the first "Part 3" post, this part is all about the Nursery DIY projects I'm working on.

I recently completed the mobile that we're going to hang over the changing table. I definitely cut out more flowers and butterflies then were needed but that's okay. Maybe I can use them for something else?

Basically the materials needed for this were:
Scrapbook Paper
Scissors
Embroidery Hoop
Fishing Line
Floral Wire

Though it wasn't hard to put together it was time consuming. I jabbed myself a couple of times with the needle to put the holes through the paper but it's all in the name of love.

I just hope that those colors look good against the blue walls in the nursery. It appears the colors we're going with are purple (light/dark/in between), pink (magenta, light pink, maroon) and of course most of our furniture is white, while the walls are an aqua blue. We'll see how it all turns out, fingers crossed.

The next project looks easy. I thought it was going to be easy because the directions are so simple. Well, it's not as easy as it looks folks. It's not hard, just time consuming. Probably because i'm a beginner (this makes me dread the sewing machine a little bit) But since I have to make two of them, I definitely think I can cut some time off of the project with a few short cuts.

Behold, the roman shade. The color looks lighter in the picture then it is in real life (my skills behind the camera are sub-par). There is a navy felt backer which will help create a 'black out' effect when the shades are down, which is exactly what I was going for.

I used our existing mini blinds, felt, fabric and fabritac which is probably the best invention ever if you're trying to glue fabric. The glue they say is just for fabric did not do as well as this and is getting returned! Of course there was a tape measure and scissors involved too. If you want to do something similar, i found the idea on pinterest (where else?) but it links to this blog: Little Green Notebook.

I do need to train them to go up a little bit easier, but the existing mini blinds weren't that easy to get up and down either so I don't expect it to run perfectly.

Couple more projects in the works so stay tuned!

One from every board

Since I love Pinterest so much, I thought i'd share a recent pin from every board I have on there. Enjoy ;)

Random Love- Book Holder Opener Thingy

Baby Love- Custom Birthday Onesie

Food Love- S'mores Krispie Treats

Home Love- Trash & Recycling that dumps into the garage bins

Party Love- DIY Chillers that look awesome

Art Love- Vintage Disney Poster

Kid Fun Love- How to manage glitter

Jewelry Love- DIY Necklace, so pretty

Hair Love- If only I could do this myself

Clothing Love- Cute little dress tutorial

Gift Love- 137 inexpensive homemade christmas gifts

Holiday Love- It's early but I'm doing this for Christmas

DIY Love- This is awesome and probably super easy!

Fabric Love- Deep Purple, I'm thinking crib sheets

The Nursery {Part 3}

Part 3 is all about DIY.

I will probably have multiple parts to this "Part 3" since I have a bunch of projects going and a bunch in the queue.

For now, I'll show you the one I completed this weekend.

I saw this on Pinterest and liked it. I only recently thought about adding it to the nursery.

So here's my mini tutorial if you want to create your own.

Supplies:
Canvas (mine is 12 x 12)
White paper
Wax Paper
Puffy Paint
Mod Podge (or homemade version*)

Steps:

Step 1, put your design on your piece of white paper, what you want to trace with the puffy paint. Since I liked what I saw on Pinterest, I just copied it. It may not be identical but I did the best I could free-hand.

Step 2, put the white paper under the wax paper and use the puffy paint to trace the outlines. Since i'm right handed, I went left to right to avoid smudging what I had already done. I probably didn't make as thick of a bead as I should've but it turned out fine.

Step 3, let it dry. The puffy paint said 4 hours. I just waited until the next day.

Step 4, peel it off the wax paper, carefully! Today, I spent time peeling and placing the pieces exactly where they would go but on the table just to make sure I had it down.

Step 5, apply one coat of mod podge to the canvas where you'll be sticking the puffy paint peels to.

Step 6, move each peeled piece over to the canvas, this wasn't the easiest thing but it surely wasn't difficult. Piece by piece I recreated the same design by staring at my original sketch.

Sorry, this is probably hard to see.

Step 7, after each piece is laid, put another coat of mod podge onto the canvas work area.

Step 8, let it dry. Test it later and if it needs another coat of mod podge, do it.

Ta dah!

This would also look cool with a different color puffy paint. I liked the white on white but it would really stand out in a different color.

*I created my own mod podge by combining one bottle of elmers glue and then filled the bottle with water, shook it and added it to the old sauce jar, then I shook that. Easy peasy. {I found the 'recipe' here}

Check it!

Ever spend 10 minutes shredding chicken that you needed for a recipe? Me too. I actually hate shredding chicken but sometimes it has to be done.

Well, thanks to Pinterest (of course) and whoever actually came up with this. I will never shred chicken by hand AGAIN!

{pin}

Did you know you can shred chicken in your stand mixer in just a couple minutes flat?

NOW YOU DO!

Halloween Fun via Pinterest

In preparation for the month of October, I thought I'd share some cool things I've seen on Pinterest lately.

The perfect party invitation! {pin}

Serve up some bevies in a pumpkin! {pin}

Be creative with those little guys! {pin}

Who doesn't love a chevron pumpkin? {pin}

Or using your favorite cookie cutters instead of making a jack-o-latern? {pin}

Or heck, a complete pumpkin fireplace setup! {pin}

Feeling crafty?

Make a wreath out of tulle {pin}

Or paint some pieces of wood {pin}

Easy peasy!

23 Week Update

Old Image Removed due to Disgust

Here we are at 23 weeks! I may or may not have photoshopped this image.. so sue me! Maybe it's this ipad camera.. yeah, let's blame the camera bc honestly, I don't see that when I look into that mirror (and by that, i mean what you would've seen, had i used the actual original image).

Anyway!! We're still feeling great!

We had a doctor's appointment on Monday and baby girl's heartrate was around 150bpm. The midwife couldn't get a super accurate reading due to a wiggling little one. Funny that her heartrate is only going up, when they told me a couple appointments ago that it would start going down. We're measuring right at 23 weeks which is good and I'm assuming my BP and other levels are doing well.

Alex had a major milestone Sunday morning, he felt her kick for the first time! We'll be working more and more on that since the more she moves around now, the more I can feel it on the outside.

Our next appointment is in another 4 weeks and we'll be doing the Glucose screening as well as a normal OB appointment.

Things are definitely feeling bigger these days. I did play volleyball last Wednesday, which left my thighs a little bit sore but felt really really good to do some sweaty exercise. I hope to continue to play for another month or so until the bump really starts getting in the way. Sleeping is a little bit harder than before but nothing too serious. And the throat burn seems to have subsided which is good.

I'm thinking about teaching myself to crochet a baby hat, which could be interesting. This is the one that I like and also this little hat/cocoon set (though that's knitted, maybe I could just use the pattern from the left hat to make a longer hat to use for a cocoon). It can't be that hard, right?? Update: I believe Charmayne will be making these for me, so no need to teach myself something new! Ha! Just kidding, I still might do it. It's nice to have a trick up your sleeve every once in a while and would come in handy for baby gifts for my friends who just had or will be having a baby soon!

{pin}

{pin}

As per last week, nothing too crazy to report. Just counting down the days until we meet our little one!

PINS

Here are a couple pins from my Random Love board. They might come in handy to those of you silly peeps who have yet to catch on to Pinterest!

Hang a picture. I plan to use this in the nursery. {pin}

Perfect for kids, am i right? {pin}

Put it in a bowl so that the sound will amplify. Genius. {pin}

Who doesn't hate when liquid spills down the side of the pan. Oh, that's right, no one. {pin}

Do you have a stripped screw? Put a rubber band over it and screw away! {pin}

Check out all my pins HERE and if they still require an invitation, you can wait for one, or leave a comment and I can send one your way for instant access!

Happy Friday!

5 Random Thoughts

We're getting closer and closer to the big reveal. I bet you're all on the edge of your seats, aren't you. HA!

I just wanted to jot down a couple random thoughts from today.

{pin}

Thought #1: I wish that I could sew my own clothing. I say this because i'm having some real trouble finding anything that I would even remotely want to purchase on any of the maternity clothing websites i've browsed (gap, old navy, motherhood, jcpenney, the expensive ones like pea in a pod, etc). Even H&M was disappointing last time I was there. Is there no where to get cute maternity clothes?? Forever21 has a line but it's way little.. by little i mean there isn't much to choose from, tanks, camis and leggings. I could live in those, sure, but they aren't quite 'work appropriate'. I have a pair of Forever stretchy jeans that still fit (and button, woo hoo high five!) so i'm thinking maybe i'll just buy normal jeans a size or so bigger so that they're slouchy and can button easily. I just don't get maternity tops. My mom commented to me a couple weeks ago (while I was wearing a normal tank with a cardigan) that they make looser fitting tops for pregnant people.. implying i should probably start wearing them. No offense to the clothing I got from my older sis (from 5 years ago!) but it's outdated and i'm not going to walk around wearing a shirt that says baby in rhinestones. I want to wear clothing like the picture above, but in adult sizes. Why do they make the cutest clothing for kids (at an awesome price by the way) and not have the same styles (albeit a little different) for adults. It's some kind of joke, isn't it? Anyway, back to sewing. Obviously, I don't know how to sew.. if i did.. i wouldn't be complaining. I mean, maybe I should just learn to sew, and then learn where to buy all the 'cool' fabric so that I can make my own cardigans and maternity tops and then i'll start a fashion line and rule the world. bahaha, just kidding. What a long thought, am i right?

Thought #2: We decided on nursery colors. I plan to do some posts on this including before and after and i wish i had an inspiration board to share but to be honest, i don't really know how to make those, and the inspiration is more in my brain than on an image that already exists (but check out this post or this post for some of the nursery related thoughts). Oh, you want to know the colors? How silly of me not to mention them. I can't possibly tell you the colors without revealing the gender.. so this will have to wait. I even wrote everything out and then thought, what the heck.. everyone will know if I write all this now. Sorry charlies.

Thought #3: Headed to the gym today again. Looking forward to it. Then i'm going to make dinner and probably do more laundry. I should probably mop the kitchen too.. it's a cream colored floor so it shows so much dirt so easily. But that means I have to vacuum first. We'll see if I have time for all of these things.

Thought #4: Every morning when I get in my car to go to work.. I wonder how long it's going to take to get used to driving this new car. This reminds me that I haven't taken a picture of it yet. Put that on my list of things to do this evening as well!

Thought #5: Tomorrow is Friday!!!!! Add to that the fact that I might get out at 3pm due to the holiday weekend and also we have off on Monday! I live for these work holidays even though they only come 10 times a year. That seams like a lot but it isn't.

16 weeks 3 days and Nursery Inspiration

Today is 16 weeks and 3 days into pregnancy.

Things are still going quite smoothly and I couldn't be more thankful. I've had a couple of small stretching pains but nothing other than that.

The bump is getting a bit bigger as you may have seen yesterday. Here's a picture today so you can see it went back down! :)

There really isn't much else to report at this point. Just chomping at the bit to find out if it's a boy or a girl.

Moving onto the Nursery Inspiration.

{pin}

When I saw the top image on pinterest, I really liked it. Obviously the colors will be a bit different since our room is currently aqua but I do plan to decide the other colors when we know the gender.

For a girl, I think orange, pink, purple and light yellow would be great and contrast well with the rest of the aqua room.

For a boy, I think orange, lime, teal and maybe silver would be cool looking. I'd obviously have to get some swatches together to make sure.

Then I saw the second image. Which shows exactly what I was thinking about doing. Squares are cool but diamonds are better. I would make them bigger then shown in this picture though since they'll be multiple colors.

{pin}

I still need to figure out how i'm going to get my tape that straight on a 45 degree angle and how i'm going to make sure the paint doesn't get under the tape. More googling is in order I guess.

{pin}

This is, however, why I love love love Pinterest.

And just for good measure. Here is another thing I love and plan to do in the nursery. What a great way to display books!

I could show you way more on my baby board, but if you want, just take a look for yourself. {here}

After this friday, when my sister moves out, we'll be rearranging furniture and I'll start sanding the crib pieces and the changing table to prepare to spray paint it white.

Does anyone know the rules about painting while pregnant? Obviously I want to paint a wall and spray paint some stuff, which i'll be doing outdoors when I can. But I think I might just rely on good ventilation when painting the wall. It shouldn't take too long anyway!

Nursery Inspiration {Pinterest Edition}

Lot's of nursery inspiration on Pinterest. Probably too much! The good thing is, a lot of it is DIY and easy. Without further adieu.

{1} {2} {3}
{4} {5} {6}

{8} {9}

{10}

The bedroom that will become the nursery is currently an aqua bluish color. We don't plan to repaint even if we have a girl because that's too much of a hassle, and i enjoy the blue. I've found plenty of nursery ideas that have blue walls, as you can see above. I really like the pinwheels and the mobile with the tree branch and paper butterflies. I also like the bottom image, that i forgot to put into the collage, the genius of that is.. it's made out of toilet paper rolls that are glued together! crazy, right!?

We don't have a theme that we're going with but depending on gender we'll push it a little more one way or the other. But we'll have to wait and see for that!

Guess what, tomorrow is friday! I'm pumped!

Baby Finds {Pinterest Edition}

I love this website. I peruse it all the time, and not just for baby stuff.. for everything. I can't even describe it's awesomeness with words, just go there!

{Adorable Hat}

{Adorable Hat #2}

{Cutie Booties}

{Ruffle Swimmy}

{And.. something for me}

Alex's mom wants to knit us a couple hats so I found some that I thought would be really cute. There's plenty more where that came from but those two are my current favs.

How cute are those booties? Apparently there's a diy tutorial on how to make them. I might just have to do that because they're adorbs.

Even though we don't know what we're having juust yet, i thought this swimmy was cute so I pinned it.

And then of course, I pinned a stylish nursing top. It's another diy and you just throw it on over whatever shirt you're wearing and get down to business.

Again if you want an invite to pinterest, leave a comment!