Nursery Dreaming

A week or so ago, BabyCenter sent me a pregnancy update email with the to-do list item of starting to plan the nursery.

Um, yeah.

Since we’re living in student housing and have barely enough space for the four of us as it is, the idea of a nursery makes me want to cry a little. When Squirt was born I was living in my first house – with over 2000 square feet and a nursery that I spent months planning. I painted murals on the walls including a castle tower and a large tree, along with vegetation like cattails and mushrooms, and flowers. The ceiling was blue with clouds I slaved over making just-so, the walls had metallic dragonflies in a few locations that only showed up when the light hit just right, and I even painted faux pearls with glow in the dark paint and suspended them from monofilament in one corner to mimic fireflies at dusk. There was more too… let’s just say I had a lot of fun with it. It was magical.

What I’m dealing with this time is a little bit different. With 800 square feet and two more people than before, I get to figure out how to take our “office,” aka junk room, and make it fit for human life.

Think I’m kidding?

Take a look:

I seriously feel like a hoarder.

Ugh. Not exactly a dream come true, and seeing it in pictures makes it seem even worse. 

Clearly this nursery is not going to be quite as personalized as the first one. {We ended up moving when Squirt was 4 months old and leaving that nursery was one of the most difficult material possessions I’ve ever parted with.} I don’t get to paint, we don’t have a surplus of space, and frankly we’re both in grad school – which means we certainly don’t have a surplus of money floating around. But a girl can still dream, right? 

I’ve turned to my best friend, Pinterest, for inspiration. You know what follows; a little bit of giddy excitement, followed by depression, and then a determination to make things work anyway. 

If I could, my little man would come home to something like these:

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How dreamy is that light fixture? Yum. I also love the orange and the globe.

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I just about died when I saw this one. Honestly - I love that bright green, the mobile, and that alphabet pillow is now on my wish list. Actually, I have an idea brewing because of that...

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 The neutral palette and the bright graphic mobile are so awesome. And that little owl on the dresser? So. Charming. The whole thing feels neutral, modern, and just perfect.

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This one is probably my favorite. I love the idea of focusing on adventure and I love pretty much every single thing about it, though I'm not sure the hubs would love having gold metallic polka dot pillows in his sons room. 

I know this little guy will not be coming home to a chic perfectly designed nursery, but it's so fun to look and dream. I did end up with some budget and space friendly ideas brewing though so we’ll see how it turns out! In the meantime, I’ve got a lot of sorting, donating, and Craigslisting to get done before I can even think about it. Anyone want to buy a room full of junk? 

Dear Baby

This afternoon I found myself talking to my stomach. I was alone for a few minutes and some of my worries got the better of me. I'm so very excited to bring a son into the world, but I am terrified too. I don't want to hide away from the things that worry me, since it's so much easier to face them with faith once they have been acknowledged.

• I'm worried that I am out of practice with babies. 
• I'm afraid that I don't know how to clean "boy folds"
• I'm scared that we wont be able to afford for me to stay home while he is young, and I'm also afraid that part of me does want to work. 
• I'm scared that the age gap between our children will be too great
• and that my step-daughter will feel less a part of our family once he is born. 
• I'm concerned about how to establish a solid relationship between my step-daughter and the baby, when she will have a baby sibling the same age in her other home as well. 
• I'm scared of selling things on Craigslist to make room for this little one and then later wishing I had those items back. Fortunately, stuff isn't hard to accumulate if that ever is the case. 
• I worry that I am not going to be a great support to my husband as he prepares for his comprehensive exams, and that I won't be able to keep up with things at home the way I'd like to. 
• I am scared of how much weight I've already gained when I still have half of a pregnancy to go.
• I worry that I won't be able to lose the weight I gain since I'm so much older this time around and my metabolism is quite different. 
• Then I worry that I care too much about my weight and send the wrong impression to my girls about loving yourself the way you are. 
• I'm scared of knowing what on Earth to do with a boy.
• I worry about not taking care of myself as well as I should and affecting those around me. 
• I get overwhelmed when I think of all the stuff I'll have to carry around and losing the relative ease of doing what I want when I want. 
• I'm terrified that he won't sleep as well as Squirt did and that I will feel like a failure when that happens. 
• I'm scared of colic. 
• I'm scared that a boy means ER trips are inevitable. 
• I worry that the decorations I want to hang on the wall will fall on him. 
• I am afraid to wear my favorite boots and stretch them out unrecognizably, then I'm afraid that if I don't wear them my feet will never fit them again. 
• I'm scared of the responsibility to teach him to be a gentleman, to respect others, and to have the self-control to respect boundaries. 
• Then I worry that I worry too much. 

I can't help it. I'm human, and it seems we all strive to feel like we're in control. Being a parent is a stark reminder that I cannot control anything, I can merely hope to influence things for the better. 

To be fair, all my worry is countered by an equally strong list of things that excite me and make me anxious for the little guy to make his appearance. I can't wait to build model rockets and attend little league games. I'm so excited for my husband to have a son to share his crazy sports-fanatic nature with, and for my nephew to finally have a boy cousin. I'm excited to see my girls love and snuggle with him, and I am so excited to watch another little person grow. I can't wait to finally set up the crib and start to make the "office" (aka junk room) into a place where a little one can start out in life. 

The frustrations of being huge (yes, already, though I know it will get much worse), and the many ailments that accompany pregnancy are temporary even when they don't feel that way. It will all work out in the end. I'm sure I'm no different from other expecting parents. The conclusion I've reached by thinking through all this today is that it's ok. I am allowed to freak out and worry about silly things and stress about issues that don't exist yet, because I am a mother and I love this little baby already. It's all a sign that I care, and that will trump it all. 

Oh, how things change.

Last I blogged, I mentioned that I had been battling the emotions of infertility. In a strange twist of fate, it was the very next day that I found out that I am pregnant. There is no way to describe the shock and disbelief of those first couple weeks. I literally took 14 pregnancy tests in four days because I was in such disbelief. Soon after, the fatigue hit. I spent my days sleeping way more than normal and trying not to feel too ill at the smell of cooking food. Now, I can happily say that the first three months are done and I'm getting some energy back, not to mention more able to eat. I still cry at the drop of a hat, but that's not too far different from my normal self anyway.

Needless to say, life is crazy. We've told our kids and families, and now I find myself all consumed with thoughts of how to take our little blended family into yours-mine-and-ours state as smoothly as possible. There are definitely some bumps ahead, but I think we will figure it out. I'd like to return to creativity now that I'm able to stay awake for the majority of the day. I've been back in the kitchen and it feels so good!

Enjoy your summer, I'm hoping to be back, but I know better than to make promises. :)
See you soon!

Fourth of July Door

So, my front door has been naked since Valentine's Day. It's been really weird, actually, and almost every time I come in or out I say something along the lines of "Self, it's about time you get on that." So today I got on that.

Spring decor is not usually my favorite so now that it's close enough to Summer that I can just jump straight into Fourth of July that's what I did. I liked the simplicity of last years door, so I took that idea and tweaked it a little. I decided to use a yarn wrapped oval wreath that I made last summer (and can't find any photos of the process). It was the foundation of my favorite (and easiest) wreath to date:

It's simply a pool noodle, taped like mad so it wouldn't come apart, and stuffed into a rectangular rubbermaid tub for a week or so while we went on vacation. I just did that to keep it from coming untaped, the squared oval shape just happened to be a major bonus! I really didn't think it would stay, but here it is a year later and it's still oval.

I grabbed the flags from last year, the yarn wrapped wreath, and went to town.

I know it's popular to use the pool noodles for wreaths, and rightly so since it's so affordable, but my favorite thing about them has nothing to do with cost. I have learned that I can decorate a foam noodle wreath by sticking things together with straight pins! They stay really well and are perfectly removable - which means I can stretch that $1 pool noodle a million ways and redo the wreath anytime I want without having to peel a bunch of hot glue off stuff.

Now, necessity is the mother of invention as they say and my ribbon stash is incredibly low. Since I'm refusing to buy anything else (I am already a hoarder after all) I decided to use my last scrap of burlap to hang the wreath with. It wasn't long enough so I stitched two pieces together with buttons using a gold metallic thread to add a little som'n and make it long enough to hang.

Only I didn't love it hanging that way because it put the buttons in the middle where they just looked ridiculous. I wrapped the end of the burlap around the top of the wreath, then using my favorite sneaky straight pin trick tucked some cream tulle under the overlap and pinned it tight. Now it hangs from a strip of burlap off the front of the wreath and a strip of tulle off the back.

And... finished. I think. I can't say how I feel about it. It's ok, but I may have preferred the square frame of last year. No biggie - when it comes down I can just unpin everything and make it into something I love more.

What do you think? Do you prefer the rectangle frame from last year or the oval wreath from this year? At least my dark, miserable apartment door is properly dressed now and can welcome guests with a bit more flair.