FINN'S NURSERY

Aside from filling the drawers and closet with tiny clothes, shoes & other necessities, Finn's room is finished! Gavin is still sleeping in here, and probably will be for the next 5-6 months, but good thing he doesn't care that is says Finnick instead of Gavin. ;) So I'll just dive right in with pictures of the finished product!

Trying to decide on paint colors...

Since this used to be Christian's room, it was A MESS! Toddlers are so destructive!!

Room prep & starting to paint.

And all finished!

The paint color is called Silver Drop by Behr.

The ginger refused to stay out of the room during pictures, but that's okay-he's cute, so I let him stay.

The 'W' pillow is handmade by a friend & her Etsy shop is called The Peachy Seam.

I found the owl Pillow at Home Goods & I made the star pillow.

The shelves are from Target, where else?! ;)

I made the mobile with an embroidery hoop, fishing lines & pom-poms, all found at JoAnn's.

So please ignore the blue area on the front of the dresser...it's where my denim jeans have worn off on the paint from diaper changes & I'm too lazy to repaint it right now. Maybe one day. ;)

The 'Finnick' wooden sign is from another Etsy shop called A Charmed Nest.

He was such a great helper. ;)

The tiered wire basket I found at Home Goods (in the kitchen section!) & I am obsessed with how much storage it gives me! So perfect for a nursery.

Gavin was mad because I kept picking up the toys as he would throw them all over the room. I was SO cramping his style.

The wooden 'baby' sign is from Hello Apparel.

The closet is ready to be filled with adorable baby stuff!

 Of course I had to have somewhere to hang my Solly Baby wrap & Tula carrier! I can't wait to break these out again.

And the final finishing touch to the room was new drawer pulls. I found the stars at Hobby Lobby and painted them black. The owls are also from Hobby Lobby & the teal pulls are from Home Goods.

And here's a little no make-up, exhausted "I worked my butt off but it's finally finished" selfie.

And that's it! I can't believe were in the final countdown to baby #3. 10 weeks to go (approximately, of course!)!

Thanks for reading!

HOME PROJECTS & SWEET BABIES

Just like this cutie's favorite game, I feel like I've been playing a little bit of hide & seek! We have been so caught up in trying to do 567 projects at home, that we haven't seen much of our friends & family...and obviously my blog is lacking as well! So here is a little catch-up with, what else, picture overload!

My 1st project was to make the back deck a little more cozy. Because Gavin is at a hard age for playing outside in the yard & the playset, it's much easier to play on the deck. A sitting place for my huge, pregnant self, a baby gate to contain the wildlings & a water table for entertainment. Sounds fabulous to me!

Speaking of outside, the boys are OBSESSED with watching Dustin mow the grass. It takes him about an hour and a half, and they watch him through the deck and house windows the entire time. 

As you might have seen in my previous blog, we got our family pictures back. I immediately ordered WAY too many hard copies from mpix.com & replaced last year's family photos in frames. I also have extra for when I get around to hanging photos in the bedroom & nursery...but that's part of the 527 project to-do list that I haven't checked off quite yet. In due time, pregnant, nesting self...

Gavin came down with a serious diaper rash, so as the doc ordered: a weekend of baking soda baths and naked babies were on the agenda. 

We also took a nice little day trip up north for my cousin's wedding...baby bump is 26 weeks here!

I've mentioned before that I have been dealing with cramps & lower back pain galore this pregnancy. I called my OB to ask her what I should do if the cramping doesn't subside with heat, rest & hydration, & she told me to head to Labor & Delivery to make sure I'm not in pre-term labor. So this is where I ended up spending an evening, with no answers as to why I'm cramping so much. I did however get to watch a Harry Potter marathon...yay for a silver lining? 

I tried to take it easy the next couple days, but after cabin fever started setting in, we headed to Home Depot to get paint for the nursery. Whew. I should have stayed home! Gavin had the fit of all fits, not once, but twice. All I could do was apologize to everyone standing in the paint department as he screamed his red-headed face off...all because Christian *gasp* touched his steering wheel. The nerve. Then the lady at the check-out gave them suckers (yay for rewarding bad behavior total stranger!), which Gavin proceeded to throw on the ground in a fit of rage...for no reason...and scream bloody murder as I attempted to wrangle him into his car seat. And once again I'll say....I'm adding another boy to this mess! 

Good thing I make 'em cute.

And then the next morning he ups the cute factor & puts on a dancing show for me. 

You win, toddler, you win.

Project #23 on our 527 to-do list is obviously to paint the nursery. We knocked it out in a couple hours, but man was that a mistake on my part! I took care of the trimwork, which meant climbing up and down on a chair throughout the whole room. Which would be enough to make a normal person a little sore the next day...add in an extra huge belly and an already aching back? I was pretty much out of commission for 3 whole days. In fact, it's been 5 days since we painted the nursery and I'm still in pain. BUT HEY, we were able to cross one more thing off the list! We still have quite a few things to do before the nursery is complete, but I can't wait to share the finished product with everyone!

Painting break...happy 27 weeks, Finn! 

Gavin was super confused to wake up from his nap & see this room in shambles. Since we weren't quite finished, he hung out in the crib with snacks, juice & toys and distracted entertained us with his awesome dance movies.

On Sunday, we took a break to attend church & the baptism of our niece & nephews....and obviously to do a little rough-housing. ;)

And while I was out of painting & comfy clothes, I had to capture the 27 week bump. Last week in the 2nd trimester!

Another project on our list was to make a headboard for our new King size bed! Dustin's work has started carrying mattresses, so of course we took full advantage. We got an adjustable base with massage...I feel like a total spoiled brat sleeping on this bed. But then I remind myself that we've had the same bed for I don't even know how many years and even that was a hand-me-down, so we've never actually had a nice bed! That seems to be the theme with the bedroom actually...all of our furniture is so old and worn, and all of the decor is just leftover decor that doesn't go in the rest of the house. One of these days, hopefully sooner than later, we'll update the rest our bedroom!

We made our previous headboard, so we pretty much knew what we were doing. We ran into a few problems here & there, the main one being that we bought the wrong type of fabric. It has no stretch to it what-so-ever, so the tufted look isn't as great as it could be, but we put a lot of hard work into it, and I'm not going to complain!

Plus we had an adorable helper. ;)

And the finished product! Most of the bedding came from Bed, Bath & Beyond. Throw pillows I either had or bought from Kohl's. I need new lamps & nightstands...and to get the wrinkles out of this darned goosedown comforter...anyone have any ideas on an easy way to do that?

But here it is, something else we can finally cross of the never-ending project list!

Thanks for reading! 

Hopefully I'll do a better job at keeping everyone updated on what's been going on around here...our next couple weeks include refinishing 2 tables & mayyyyybe finishing the nursery?! Oh, and our 5th wedding anniversary, my glucose test, my 10 year high school reunion, Father's Day, a best friend's wedding, planning a trip to Texas & Vegas...the list goes on & on!

GOOD-BYE NURSERY, HELLO BOYS' ROOM

We finally finished making over the nursery into a shared room for Christian & Gavin! It took about 2 weeks, but I'm so happy with the results! Since Gavin isn't quite ready to transition to a big boy bed, he is still sleeping in the crib in what will be little Finnick's nursery. Christian is beyond excited about his new bunk bed, and keeps asking when Gavin can sleep in there, too. Finn will be sleeping in our bedroom until at least 4 months old, so we have a little while before we have to transition Gavin...which is good, because I'm SO not ready for that yet! I'm not sure when we'll start on the nursery, because I'm "nested out" for now! 

The boys' room was a lot of work...more than I had originally anticipated. I decided I wanted to do a board & batton look in the room, which meant putting up a chair rail, vertical trim & painting the lower half of the wall. The whole idea behind this is that the higher gloss paint on the bottom half will be much easier to clean up with dirty, grimy boy hands living in there. 

Dustin hung the chair rail & trim and I caulked & painted...teamwork at it's best! This actually would have been a super easy project, except that we ran into a paint color problem. The trim in the entire house is antique white, which I've never been completely in love with. So I just assumed that I could paint that antique white on the bottom of the chair rail and all would look fine. Unfortunately, I started painting, stepped back, and realized it looked awful. All of the furniture is bright white. The blinds are bright white. The antique white looked horrible. So we had two choices...tear down the chair rail and trim & leave the walls plain, or repaint all of the trim, doors & baseboards in the bedroom a bright white. 

Well as you can imagine, once I get my mind set on something, I do NOT want to go back...so off to Home Depot I went to purchase a bright white paint. Painting baseboards and doors is NOT fun. I was pretty much cussing and grumbling the entire time. However, I am so pleased with the results and very happy we decided to go that route. Of course, now I want all the rest of the trim in the house bright white, but that's a HUGE project that we will never, ever do. So I can just enjoy the one room of pretty white trim. 

So enough chit-chat...onto the photos!

Here is a before...

Gavin was quite the helper. ;)

Hanging chair rail & vertical trim.

 We got the bunk bed put together just in time for Christian's birthday. We don't have a second mattress yet for Gavin, and we're really in no hurry either!

And the finished product!

Here is a complete before & after...Gavin's nursery & now a shared boy's room.

I love these leaning shelf towers! I got them on sale at Target and I think they're perfect storage. Plus I put them together all by myself. ;)

Another before & after.

This table we got from IKEA and I just put a coat of stain on it.

And last but not least, the closet! Having 2 boys move into 1 room means I need a lot of storage, so we got this awesome shelving unit from IKEA and attached clothing rods to it...lots of storage & looks good, too!

Funny little story though, Dustin installed the shelf in the middle of the closet while the laundry basket was still in the closet. And the first day I went to do laundry...well, the basket is now a permanent fixture in the closet, because it doesn't fit in between the shelf and the closet door! And it's a metal basket, so it won't bend. We cracked up laughing when we realized what he did. 

But that's it! The boy's are loving the new room and so far, no accidents from bunk bed. Knock on wood. Now that I say that, Christian is sure to fall out tonight. :)

Thanks for reading!