Because Gestating is Not Enough...

To Do List Before #2 Arrives:

1) Play Musical Bedrooms. G's room will become the nursery. Our room will become G's room. The front guest bedroom/office will become our room. Did I mention I have to clean out all three rooms and purge all the junk? I've been chipping away at it, but I have no idea how we've accumulated so much crap in five years.

2) Decorate Said Rooms. Paint. I think that's about all I can handle. I've picked out the nursery theme after about two months of agonizing. I wanted something girly but not over the top. Mostly, I didn't want all pastel - and this is what I chose:

[Yes, it's Pottery Barn. I tried to go all indie, but PB kept pulling me back in. Don't judge.]

You see that tiny bit of aqua in the corner of the bumper? That's the wall color. I think. So yes, there's a little pink, but the red kind of toughens it up a bit. At least that's what I'm telling myself.

3) Convert the Garage into a Family Room. I'm actually laughing at myself as I type this, because I think the chances of this happening are comparable to winning the lottery. We need the space so bad. But I'm thinking this will stay firmly on the to do list.

4) Have Some Kind of Garage Sale. Or, in alternative, rent a Uhaul and make a trip to Goodwill. Or have a massive bonfire in the backyard. This last option may become more viable the more stressed and crazy I get.

5) Potty Train G. Just kidding. This is a pipe dream. I've read all the books. I've tried several methods including just putting underwear on him and watching him like a hawk. Inevitably, I turn my back for five seconds and there's an accident. Am I getting judgment? Yes. Mostly from older relatives who are like, JUST FORCE HIM. Yeah. That's a great idea. I love the idea of scarring my child for life so things can be more convenient for me. Plus? I'm guessing even if I got him 'trained' by the time baby arrives, he'll regress. So potty training goes on the back burner. I'll just keep telling myself that he won't go to Kindergarten in diapers.

6) Pick Baby's Middle Name. Okay, I don't usually put my older child's name in this blog, but I'll this one time tell you (or maybe when she's born too) baby girl's name: we're calling her Charlotte. This has been our girl name for long before G was born. So now we need a middle name. I have a few in my head, but usually my ideas are poo-pooed immediately. I'm thinking maybe I won't bring it up at all and just use the one I pick when I fill out her birth certificate info? Cunning, I know. But I'm open to suggestions. I grew up with a super vanilla middle (and, let's face it, first) name, so unusual is good. Just no crazy spellings. That drives me nuts.

7) Stock the Freezer. I did a pretty good job of preparing and freezing meals before G was born and it was a life saver. I need to do the same this time, but I need some ideas. I usually do turkey chili, spaghetti sauce and a bunch of soups. If anybody has any easily freezable recipes, sent them to me...please! I'll love you forever. Not that I don't love you already...

I know there's much more I need to tackle. Those are the biggies.

Oh. I forgot something.

8) Try Not to Lose My Mind. It might be too late...

I Can't Stop

For Valentine's Day, my very sweet husband brought me flowers. Which is a very big deal, because:

a) My husband is one of those guys who doesn't 'do' Valentines, because it is a commercial, Hallmark holiday (likely story)...

and

b) Being in the nursery business, he thinks cut flowers are a waste.

But darn it anyway - he done got me flowers!


Okay, not real flowers. They ARE fake, but they are apparently a very huge seller. And, they light up.

Here they are in the light...

And the dark...


(P.S. I'm REALLY hating my new camera, so excuse the out of focus-ness. I'm working on it).

So, two years in a row, he has come through on Valentines, being all super sweet and thoughtful.

What he didn't bargain for, I'm pretty sure, is the crazy ass redecorating bug I caught as a result of his gift.

For some reason, the colors of the flowers (red with brown stems), really spoke to me. As did the Pottery Barn catalog.


I love our new bedding SO MUCH. Of course, my bedroom looks nothing like the catalog, but it sure beats the tired old sage toile bedding we had. Which was nice, but I was freaking tired of looking at it.


Now, I'm kind of obsessing over painting. I'm thinking chair rail. Or an accent wall. I brought home a bunch of paint samples. The red and the chocolate brown were not well received. I can't bring myself to do the gold...or maybe I can...

Today, the new decor received the toddler seal of approval. He climbed right up on the bed, grabbed a book, got under the covers and pulled them up to his armpits.


He's reading The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. Such a literature fiend.

But most importantly, the bedding passed the jump test.


This was imperative.

So, that's the story of how a thoughtful little gift snowballed into a full on redecorating frenzy.

Yeah, I'm not done. I'm eying G-Rex's room and the kitchen. And the bathroom...

Progress (And the Infamous Water Table)

I am slowly but surely ticking things off of my to do list. We are having house guests from Thursday through Saturday, then a Father's Day barbecue at our house next Sunday.

Did I mention that I thought Father's Day was today until about three days ago? Suffice it to say, I felt like a moron and we shuffled and rescheduled to have the shindig on the actual day. Which is probably good, because there is no way I'd have been ready today.

What did I accomplish today?

Well. Let me tell you.

I finished re-covering my re-purposed outdoor chairs!

The chairs and table used to be our actual dining table. Yes, checkered marble on metal. Glorious. But, for outdoor, it's kind of fun and kitschy. The old chair seats were the same fabric as the back.

Except our clinically insane cats had clawed them to shreds and they were covered in cat hair.

Did I mention we left them out all winter in the rain?

I managed to salvage the foam from the seats (we haven't had rain here in weeks and I laid them it out to dry on the patio during the day. Add a staple gun and a little muscle (very little) - and my budget fabric ($4 a yard) and for under $30, I have an outdoor dining set. Score!

The next matter of business is my poor little garden. B was kind enough to install a sprinkler for me, and fertilize. The starts have been in the ground for two weeks but they're not doing so hot. B figured out the soil we had trucked in had not fully composted, so it's actually leaching nutrients from the soil and away from my poor veggies. Effing dirt.


I'm hoping for the best. My tomatoes are in pots and are doing very well. Whew. But B thinks that next year, once the soil is all happy, my garden will be much more productive. Fingers crossed!

And, for those of you who have been following my water table saga, I bring to you, without further ado, the toy itself (and my spastic dogs who make it into EVERY FREAKING PHOTO I TAKE).


G is pretty taken with the little squirty animals.

He is especially concerned about making sure they all make it into their cave.

Walrus and whale are safely tucked into their home, ready for night-night.

The Neighbors, They're Talking...

As much as it pains me to admit this, we are THAT house on our street.

That house. You know, the one where the neighbors shake their heads as they pass by. Why don't they DO something about their lawn? They really should take down that old fence! Why in God's name do they have that Bronco on blocks in their driveway (no really. we do.).

And I was brought up better than that. I really, REALLY was.

We're like Hal and Lois on Malcolm in the Middle. All the neighbors around us talk to each other and seem to be friends. They probably have cookouts when we're out of town. No one talks to us.

Until this week.

Suddenly, neighbors s are stopping to talk to B as he's working in the yard. Now that we're fixing up our lawn THEY LIKE US!

Sure, it's taken us a while to get around to it. WE HAD A BABY FOR *&@'s SAKE.

This is our front yard about three weeks ago, all the nasty sod pulled up. Did you know they grow sod in netting? And when you try to pull up the sod and netting, it rips up into a cajillion little horrid pieces? It's does and it sucks.

And if you're wondering, the guy across the street has someone else take care of his lawn. Cheater.



Here's our yard a few days ago after B's birthday gift was delivered. Fifteen yards of dirt - erm, I mean - soil. He wanted DIRT for his birthday. Now that is dedication!



Today, my parents visited and we got all that loverly soil spread around, and in the next few days B will till and we'll spread grass seed.

And then, we will have the VERY BESTEST FRONT YARD IN THE WHOLE BLOCK. And they will all worship and adore us.

Or maybe just talk to us?

There is still the issue of the Bronco (I told you I wasn't kidding). But if it's still here come summer, I'm totally making it into a planter.

My Toy Story

When G was around 6 months old, I felt bad because he only had 2 or 3 toys so I went to Babies R Us and picked up a few more.

Well, those 'few more' have spawned, and now we have this:



The toybox has vomited. (And our cat, Boris, is striking quite the pose).

This doesn't even account for all the toys. I packed up a boxful a few days ago and put it in a closet. So they'll be 'new' to G in a few months time.

I was looking at the toys today and realized most of them are from my mother, G's Gigi. She is the queen of consignment stores - so I don't feel AS guilty as she's not spending all her money on new toys.

Seriously, it's getting ridiculous. This morning, I stepped on the Little People's Noah's Ark, my foot slid across the wood floor, and I ended up in the splits.

Which is NOT good as I haven't been able to do the splits since I was 18.

B has instituted a new rule - if Gigi brings new stuff for G, she must also take back an equal amount. So far, this hasn't happened.

Looking at all the hard work we - er, I mean B - did on the living room, it's sad that our new interior decorator is Fisher Price.

I need a piece of furniture for this area. This makes me swoon. Sigh. But cash flow is an issue these days, so I'm keeping my eyes on the CL. That would be Craigslist.

Anybody have any creative solutions they've used to tame the toy takeover?

There is a Couch in My Kitchen.

While we were on vacation a little over a week ago, we had our hardwood floors refinished. It seemed like a good idea to go ahead and paint our living room and redo the trim while we were at it.

Now, we've been home a week and our house still looks like WWIII (as my mom would say). There is a couch (and a chair) in my kitchen that I have to crawl over to get to the fridge. Our table is outside. Our office/extra bedroom is so full of junk that it is a hazard to navigate. And our living room is a cornucopia of plastic, painters tape and dust.

This could very well be what pushes me over the edge.

I have never wanted to organize so badly. But, it is pointless, because I will come home from work tomorrow and all my work will be for naught. I have decided that once all the dust has settled (literally and figuratively) I will be having a massive yard sale to get rid of all our excess stuff. I say stuff, cause it's not necessarily junk, but it's not useful to us at this point in our lives. I mean, who really needs a boxful of VHS tapes when you haven't had a VCR in 5 years? Hoarding runs in my family and I need to watch myself...it's a sickness...really!

Hopefully this will all be over soon and we'll have a beautiful, freshly painted living room, kitchen and hallway. The other rooms can definitely wait. Until then I'll be cursing at the sofa blocking the fridge and the ever present coating of sanding dust on every stable surface...x*&@#%!