27 Weeks

How far along? 27 Weeks.
Symptoms:  Tired, cranky, feeling very very pregnant this week.
Total weight gain/loss: +17 lbs.
Maternity clothes? Yup, exclusively at this point.
Sleep:  Haven't been sleeping as well this week.
Best moment this week: Have been able to see baby movements from the outside.  She is so very active, especially in the evenings.
Movement: Yup, she moves all the time.
Food cravings:  Pizza.
Gender: GIRL- Her name is Haley Miranda.
Labor Signs: none.
Belly Button in or out?  starting to go out.
What I miss:  Being able to get up out of a chair or get onto the floor without feeling so huge!
What I am looking forward to:  Thanksgiving on Thursday, my family visiting us, Black Friday shopping, and going to see Breaking Dawn part 2!

Nick's big boy room starts with Aura

I was invited to participate in the Bzz campaign for Benjamin Moore Aura.  Happily, they have provided us with a gallon of their Aura paint to review.  Benjamin Moore calls Aura "the finest paint they have ever made."  It has the following qualities:

• Never more than 2 coats in any color
• Mildew resistant
• Color Lock technology for exceptional color
• No color rub-off
• Stains wash off easily
• Easy application
• Paint and primer together
• Seamless touch-ups
• Excellent in high-traffic areas
• Long-lasting, fresh look
• Easy cleanup

Sounds great, right?  We decided that we would use our free gallon to re-do Nicks room since we are transitioning him to a big boy bed and wanted to give his room more of a big boy feel.  We chose Benjamin Moore Lucerne as our color- its a beautiful deep blue somewhere in between royal blue and navy blue.


Because its a little dark, we are also going to do a faux board and batten look using white paint and a chair rail on the bottom part of the wall to keep the room looking light and fresh.  I saw this technique on one of my favorite blogs, here.  So, we need to head back to Benjamin Moore this weekend to pick up a can of white paint as well.  Although we have not started painting yet, we have gotten a sample of Lucerne (and also a lovely lavender color for Haley's room) to test in his room and it went on beautifully.  Josh made the comment that you can really tell the difference between this paint and the stuff we have used in the past (Valspar brand which we typically get at Lowes.)

My parents are coming next week for Thanksgiving and my Dad and Josh plan to get all of the painting done then.  Can't wait to share how it looks with you all!  In the meantime, I did start a Pinterest board with some of the inspiration ideas I have for his room.  Check it out here!

Living For the Weekends!

I had a great weekend.  Sure, my kid is 2.  He has tantrums, what feels like a lot of tantrums.  But he is also a really sweet, lovable boy.  He loves giving hugs and kisses.  And high fives and fist bumps.  Its pretty cute, and kinda makes you forget all about the tantrum part.  Kinda.

Yesterday he was pretty obsessed with his little play tent.  Usually he just plays in there by himself but yesterday he wanted company, so Josh and I took turns sitting in his tent with him.  He was beyond thrilled!  I love watching him at this age.  He is learning something new every minute of the day... and we are learning too.  For example, we are learning that now that the kid understands where the snack foods are, we need to find a new place to keep them or he is going to keep wanting to eat chips for breakfast.  Mommy fail.

I have been making a real effort to try and get him to understand that there is a baby in Mommy's tummy.  So far, he doesn't get it.  He understands what babies are.  Our neighbors have one and he is very gentle with Logan... likes to kneel in front of him, whisper to him, and gently pat him.  Its adorable.  So whenever we see a baby on TV or at a store I say to him, Nick, see the baby?  Mommy has a baby in her tummy.  To which he looks at me and says "babah?"  Its a work in progress.  He has 4 more months to figure it out.

I wish that we had 3 day weekends and 4 day workweeks.  I hate that I only get 2 days a week for real quality time with my kid.  Weekdays are pretty much shot by the time I get home from work, we eat dinner, do bath, etc.  Usually only an hour our so of time for us to spend together by the time we get everything done.  Guess for now I just have to keep making the best of the weekend time I have with him!

Haley's Room

We have been working a bit on Haley's room.  The plan is to re-use the nursery furniture we got for Nicholas since he is using his toddler bed now and should be ready for a big boy bed by the time she is here.  We got him a new dresser from Ikea and moved his dresser (with the changing table) to her room.  We got a new King size bed so he will get our old Queen size bed and then the toddler bed will be converted back to a crib and moved to her room.  Quite the game of musical beds we are playing in this house!

For her decor, I wanted to do something similar to what I did for Nick- Girly but not to babyish and not any character themes.  Found this set from Target and it fit the bill.  Ironically its the same manufacturer as the set we got for Nicholas which we were really happy with.  Also, I was happy that they had this available as a Toddler bed set- comes with the comforter (which we won't use till she is in the toddler bed,) fitted sheet, flat sheet, and pillow case.   No bumpers, diaper stacker, or crib skirt.  My Mom and I are going to use the flat sheet to make a crib skirt and we wouldn't have used the bumpers or diaper stacker anyway, so we were able to save like $60 by just getting the Toddler set over the full crib set.



We are planning to paint the room light purple.... pictures of that to come soon.  We are actually going to paint Nick's room while my parents are here for Thanksgiving and then her room when they are here for Christmas.

Copied an idea I saw on Pinterest to make letters for her room that spell out her name.  I got the letters for $2.99 each at Michael's and then used scrapbook paper and modge podge to decorate them.  Will probably look for a white floating shelf to have these sit on eventually   I was pretty happy with how they turned out.


Thats it for now.  More updates to come!

26 Weeks

How far along? 26 Weeks.  Oops.  Missed a week!
Symptoms:  Feeling mostly good... just definitely feeling very pregnant these days.
Total weight gain/loss: +17 lbs.
Maternity clothes? Pretty much wearing all maternity stuff for work.  Regular yoga pants still fit.  My friend Amanda lent me some of her maternity clothes so have had some new stuff to rotate in, which has been great!
Sleep:  Sleeping very well.  I am lucky!
Best moment this week:  Coming home after a trip to Dallas for work.  Nick was very happy to see me and I have been getting lots of hugs and kisses.
Movement: Yup, she moves all the time.  Saw my stomach jumping around a bit earlier today.
Food cravings:  Nothing specific really.
Gender: GIRL- Her name is Haley Miranda.
Labor Signs: none.
Belly Button in or out?  starting to go out.
What I miss:  Being able to get up out of a chair or get onto the floor without feeling so huge!
What I am looking forward to:  Thanksgiving is the week after next... my parents and brother are coming out to visit us.  So excited!