Isn’t she lovely

I had started watching NYC Prep which seems to be the no-nap curse.  It takes two to three viewings to get through it.   I was listening to Nate play in his crib while watching and the phone rang.  It was Mike, the chair was in and I could pick it up.  I wondered if I should just wait, maybe the kid will fall asleep.   The shipping place didn’t close until 9, I should wait.  I should wait because I can stare at the chair later, a nap is more important.  If he doesn’t nap the day will never end.  

You know I got him up right? 

I love it.  The End.

Trip Planning

It’s been a very popular topic in my blog circle lately.   Travel questions; Family Style.

We’ve flown with Nate several times but each time we go I’m a little worried.  He was only “this” old last time, etc.  So, we are flying to Seattle next week and while I’m more calm about it then ever I still have a few concerns.

One, he’s 22 months!  That’s 2 months shy of being TWO.  Y’all have heard of the two’s, yes?    So, I’m worried about him sitting still and quietly.  I’m worried a little about his ears and if he will sleep at all.  This is our first trip since weaning and until now I’ve always had my secret weapon at the ready.  I’m quite sure a sippy of cold milk isn’t the same.  We’ve been working hard on staying put.  I’ve not let him out to roam anywhere since the restaurant incident.  That is going just fine, so, hopefully he’ll get it.   I feel mostly prepared, I know my kid better now.  I know that a potato chip will get him to zip it much faster than an apple. I know not to bother with packing 10 books when he will just pick one and read it for an hour and then move on to  the sky magazine and safety card.  We have good equipment, the volo and the ergo- the tag team of  Oh-ho-ho not so fast!  I know what to haul with us, what to gate check.   I have a good foundation but still need help.  I’m planning on buying some new stuff but what, I do not know.

That is where  you come in.  Any advice on how to keep him occupied?   He’s super into coloring and his trains so those will be along for the ride.   What worked for your kids?  Open to anything from a dvd player to benadrly to new snacks.  Please share, so far all of the online advice I have read has been for babies, not the kid that know the limp-fish wiggle to get out of your arms.  I’ve got 5 hours in the air to fill.

A better bathroom

I’ve been slowly cooking up a plan for our bland and mostly unused bathroom.  It’s the guest/kid/cat room.   It’s full of stuff that worked in a house I lived  in 1999.  It’s past time for an update.  It all coordinates with the couches that I also want to get rid of.   I lived in this cute little Ranch back then and the bathroom was just off the main living area and it was all so cute and perfect and oh dear, matchy!  It worked for me then.   Now I want something that works for a family and also looks good. 

This is the room in its current state. Plain and nondescript.

I don’t want an in your face kid room or any type of theme.  I’m hoping for something a little more subtle but still fun.   A while back I ordered this print.

 

When I saw it I had to have it even though I had no idea what to do with it.  I didn’t care, I knew I would come up with something.   It became my starting point.  The colors turned out to be perfect, the floor has a very pale grey violet stripe and the tile in the shower matches.  

Now that I have a good plan I’ve been looking for fabric so I can embellish some store bought accessories.   So far these are my favorites but there are so many I can’t make a decision just yet.

These two.  These are my favorite but If #2 is a boy I’m not sure I want pink.

 

Or these?

 

 

 

 

 

There wont be a lot of the accent fabrics I just want to add a few strips to the shower curtain and then embellish a few towels.   It’s just for little pops on white.  

Some of my ideas have evolved a bit since I first started thinking about this. I was planning to paint the vanity black but now that I am loving gray for the kitchen I’m thinking it will look really great in the bath too. Will add some hardware and it should look like new.    I was thinking of painting the room green, now I’m not.  I need to choose the fabric and then I will pick a paint color.   I can’t wait to get this room started.   I plan to get going on it after we get back from Seattle in late August.   Stay tuned!

Daydreams

Today is one of those rare gloomy summer days.  Gray skies and lots of rain when everything looks clean and smells fresh.

I find a lot of decorating inspiration in nature.  Nate’s room colors came to me in early spring when I was noticing the clear blue sky and a gorgeous green leafy tree while sitting at a stop light.   This past weekend I saw a show where they painted kitchen cabinets gray.  A color I hadn’t previously considered.   I want a new kitchen, while this one functions well (appliances excluded) it’s dated and not really my taste.   We knew when we bought this house that we’d love to scrap it and start fresh.

Last week we looked into refinancing just for the hell of it and in an over the phone estimate learned that our home is currently worth less than we paid for it.   It’s not really a big deal since we plan on staying for a while and eventually the economy will recover.   But, it let me know that for the time being our neighborhood cannot support a full reno.  We won’t know how long we will be in Ohio for a few more years when Mike goes up for Tenure which is also a big reason not to dive right into it.  We may live here forever or for just a few more years.  So, a face-lift will make more since.   Especially since we need new windows and eventually a new furnace and AC system, not technically a new kitchen.

In my head I now see a pale gray on the lower cabinets, a concrete countertop, a glass tile back-splash in white with white upper cabinets.  Stainless appliances and a few other spruce ups.  Lighting, sink, faucet and cabinet hardware. 

Here is my kitchen now:

Here are a few I found on flickr after coming up with the two tone idea!

This first one, I love the open shelf that runs the length of the wall, the awesome light,  direction of the hardware.

 I love the use of space with these glass topped cabinets- this is something I’d love but would not be money well spent.  I also love the pop of color from the pendant lamp.

This last one has a country feel (the island and cabinet hardware)  but I love the richness of the cabinets and the contrast of the back-splash.

I can’t say when any of this will be in the works. We still need our shower done, our master bedroom and eventually a second nursery which leads to one big boy bedroom in addition to the big stuff mentioned above. I think the jumping off point will be when one of our 17 year old appliances finally give up. I just love the process of a good daydream turned plan.

It’s the most wonderful time of the year!

It’s finally here!   Design Star, oh love it.   Summer TV is always a bore and makes me sort of long for fall about half way through the season.  The TiVois at about 23% and there’s just not much on (except NYC Prep- talk about guilty pleasure!) enter my favorite show on TV. 

The first few episodes are sort of a bummer in terms of who goes home.   You don’t get to see much of what they are good at but someone has to go and oh, you didn’t eat so see ya later!  Really, the girl who went home last night wore herself out unnecessarily and was struggling as a result.   Granted, her room was an embarrassment but argueably it would have been better if she weren’t shaking and scattered.

Last night by far my favorite room was the Dining Room!  The floor to ceiling mural was really cool.  My second fav was the Living Room, while 2 of the 3 members were aginst painting some birds pink, I loved it.  However, I’d like to see a run down of what they spend.   None of the rooms looked like they spent the budget and most were really sparse and not decorated much at all.    Even with the time constraint this is a contest, you’ve got to know how to pull off the details together.    While there is a difference between being a decorator and a designer, you really need to be both to win this. 

Are you watching?  Do you have a favorite?  After the first show I think my pick is Anthony.

There I said it.

Okay, listen and listen good.

I stopped into Starbucks this morning on the way to a hair appointment and found myself appalled.  Appalled, people!  I realize that the Suburbs of Ohio sounds gawd awful.  And, that’s fine.  I mean, what is in your head is probably pretty accurate.  Big hair, Mom jeans, crocks on grown women.   It’s bad.  This makes it hard for me, really.  Mainly because I am but a shell of my old fashionable self.  Things happen when you leave your job and stay home with a kid who leaks fluids on you and upends entire bags of goldfish in your formerly clean car.  Life, it happens.  That being said, BUCK THE STEREOTYPE.  Gah!   I’m not perfect, I wear Dansko clogs all winter long.  My sunglasses, while Coach, are 5 years old.   I could do better but damn, at least I try. 

Without further ado:  A Mean Girls  list of what not to wear. 

1. A toe ring!  I don’t care if your feet are cute or it goes with your outfit.  They are over. 
2. A sweatsuit of any kid.  If you are not warming up for a honest to goodness track meet you have no business in one!  PERIOD.  2a.  Yes, this includes air travel.  If your jeans are not comfortable to sit in that long, you need a bigger size.  IF you need a bigger size of jeans, seriously, your ass doesn’t look good enough to sport that velor in the first place.
3. A little black back pack!   These were not “cool” even when they were “in.”  They were dumb then, now you should be embarrassed. I saw two of these today.  TWO!
4. Stacked heals.  If your shoe is 2 inches thick from toe to heel- let them go.
5. Spiral Perms.
6. Tank tops:  If your tank top has a “built in bra” this is by no means a permission slip to go without one!  I don’t care if your barely filling an A cup. Or if you have fake boobs.  Wear a bra!  Always.
7. Ed Hardy.  Just.Don’t.
8. If you need hairspray, it may be time for a make under.
9. Artificial Nails: what a waste of money! Also, gross.
10. Pale is the new Tan.  Stop Tanning! 
11. Stripe Highlights.  I was a HUGE fan about 7 years ago.  That is how long it’s been since that look was in.   It’s time to tone it down. (if your highlights look like your wearing a Cat as a Hat, get a new stylist- black hair and yellow clumps are not a good look.)
12. Glitter.  
13.  Chipped nail polish. 
14. Facial Hair.  There is no need to be embarrassed by this- just get some Nair and melt it off!  A salon wax is around $15.  Pick one. 14a. groom your eyebrows.  Your brows frame your face, you can be the poster hanging with thumb tacks or the nice matted frame hanging neatly on the wall.   Do you want to look like a dorm room or a stylish house?
15. Overalls.  O.M.G. 
16. Skorts.

I’m not making any of this up, these are all things I have seen recently.  There is no excuse, you can look as cute as you can afford in Central Ohio.  There are great shops, it’s not like there are no options.  And yet, it’s a giant community of what not to wear nominees.    

 Please, add to the list if you have some of your own!

On life

Something happened this week that happens everyday in every country in the world.  When it happens to you it’s not unique, you’re not special.  That doesnt matter.  When it hits near you or god forbid, you, you’re the first to feel it, the only one who can understand.  The fact that it is common is irrelevant.

Tonight  the three of us trekked across the street to hang out with our neighbors who were in their yard.   Darci and I met about a little over a year ago.  She and her husband have a 13 month old, Camille.  Last week Darci told me she was expecting, though I’ve know for about a month.  She’s thin and tall and I’d noticed a change in wardrobe followed by a precious bumb that had recently emerged.   Last week she was 19 weeks; “I would have told you sooner but I’m a worrier.”   I told her I understood and gave a heartfelt congratulations.   She laughed about getting pregnant while breastfeeding and how the two would be 18 months apart and she “will probably die.”  We both cracked up.  Cause, yeah maybe.  

We were supposed to get together this week and go to the pool with the kids but her husband had been home Tuesday, then yesterday and again today.  She hadn’t mentioned that he was on vacation so I kept my distance while keeping an eye on the ins and outs of visitors.  Odd for the middle of the week.

When we approached the yard I saw Darci sitting on the other side of the deck, somewhat hidden.  She stayed for a good 5 minutes while we chatted and Nate and Cami went off to eat mulch.  When she came around to the side I noticed she looked like Hell, in hindsight I could have figured this out.   Her face was broken, her tummy, missing, a bandaid on her wrist from the site of an IV.   She was moving slowing and sat carefully on the grass, I plopped down next to her.   We chatted, the four of us watching our kids act crazy and it was comfortable.  

At some point I opened my damn mouth.  “Were you able to tell at the ultrasound?”   She slightly shook her head and lost it.  That was all she could do or say.  I started crying and all we could do was share a look and she told me it was “okay.”  Well that’s bull, obviously but what could she say?  I told Mike to get Nathan that we should go, she asked us to stay.   So we did.  We didn’t talk about it again, just shared glances of sorrow.  We talked about upcoming vacations and about the trials and joys of toddler-hood.   Later when Cami wandered into the neighbors yard Darci was with her and she sat at her back patio chatting with them and Mitch started tell us the details.  Things I wanted to know but knew not to ask.  They’d gone for the 20 week and the baby was gone.   She’d had other ultrasounds and heard the heartbeat and all was well until now.   I asked if she’d had a DNC, “No, she delivered yesterday.  It took 12 hours.” 

I know and I’m sure they do too that these things happen.  “These things.”  Can you be more trite?   Even so it is what it is.  I let him do the talking so that’s all I know today but if they don’t already know they will learn that something went wrong and the baby wouldn’t have had a normal life.   But you know what, that’s what “we” say and “we” know.    And what the hell do we know?  I don’t know a damn thing other than an great family had their hearts ripped out of their chest, that life sucks and it’s not fair.  No matter that everything happens for a reason.  I imagine they’d like to flip the universe off and beg for their baby back.  The one they got to see and hold and learn the gender after it had died, after a Mother was induced and had to deliver a baby that she would never hear cry.  The one they had to say goodbye to 5 months before it’s scheduled birthday.

I know miscarriage is common, three of my six sisters have had one, my Mother had 4 one of which was Heidi’s twin.   There could be more to come.   Just because it happens doesn’t make it less gut wrenching. 

I know that tonight there are mixed feelings of blessings and of loss.   Tonight they will kiss their perfect, healthy one year old good night and then a Mother will go to bed, rest her hand on her empty womb and die a little more inside. 

Life, often the cycle is all wrong.

My heart breaks for her and her family.  I wish there was something I could do other than hold her hand and offer to walk her dog or watch her girl.   I wish.

Sew Cute!

Tomorrow is Miss Emelia Clare’s 3rd birthday.  So far this child has received shoes from me for every birthday.  This year I was inspired to do something a little more personal than shoes.

So, I made her a present and since shes already opened it do you wanna see? 

And the finished product.

 I was hoping that it would be good enough to give to her, not something embarrassing.  Carrie said to go slow, rip seams, and you want people to ask where you bought it not, who made it. I swear I went slow and I did rip seams that weren’t good and well, it’s border line embarrassing in person and the question it will beg is who made it but, I did it!  My first project.  Hopefully E won’t care, and hopefully it will hold up.  I’ve already dreamt that it fell apart.

- After seeing it she told me, “My pillow has beautiful owl’s on it!”  And in that second it was all worth it.

Lately you…

 

 

1. Can’t wait to greet the dog every morning.  We run to the kitchen to let him out, you greet him excitedly with a “Hi!”  And you can’t wait to get your hands on him.  You two interact all day long. 

2. Are officially obsessed with music,  more specifically our i pods.  You cannot function without music.  You dance with your left elbow and wrist, as if you’re making armpit farts.  We are waiting for the rest of your body to join in.

3. Would live off of fruit if we’d let you.  You yell “MM!” when something tastes good. 

4.  Call all birds  “goose.”

5. Hold on to me in the shopping cart, resting your head on my chest, arms wrapped all the way around my waist.  I say ” I love you, baby.”  You yell, “Yes!”  

6. Ask to go to the pool every day.  You fetch the pool bag from the laundry room and bring it to me with a question mark on your face.  

7. Love Nemo and Yo, Gabba Gabba.  I didn’t think I’d be the kind of Mom to plop her kid in front of the TV but in order to get a shower a little Nemo goes a long way.

8. If Dad is home you’d rather he read to you than me.  Fine by me, kid.  I’ve already read “if you give a mouse a cookie”  48 times today.

9.  Only want to play with toys which have dead batteries.  Life is so hard!

10. Don’t fall as much as you used to, but when you do you really make it count.

11. Love to wear shoes.  If you’re barefoot you will bring us a pair and ask “sooes?”

12. Stick your tongue out when you’re concentrating.  Just like your dad does.

13. You are prefect, and happy and kind.  You say Please and Thank you  (peas & shanks) you have no fear and love life in general. 

14.  Remind us to enjoy life, too.

15.  Shanks!

 

*idea from Ali Edwards’ post today w/ the same title.

Score

I got the chair I asked for!   I’m not sure I’m cool enough to own mid century furniture, but maybe I am.   It’s not here yet, I have to wait a few more weeks for delivery but just knowing that it is mine will hold me over for a while.  I chose it for the living room and picked white so it can move around as our needs change or when we move one day.  This is going to be something we have forever.  I love it! I’ll share photos of it when it arrives.   I think I will look younger than 32 sitting in it, and possibly 10 lbs thinner.  You never know.