Showing posts with label New House Becomes Home. Show all posts
Showing posts with label New House Becomes Home. Show all posts

02 April 2015

March 2015 Recap

I'll be honest, March can be summed up with two words: too busy. I'm actually pretty surprised that I have so many pictures because I felt like so much of the month was spent with our heads down, going from one thing to the next. 

We started the month with a hike on this beautiful day. 

When things get too busy, this girl's sass kicks it up a notch. 

We checked out the zoo with Misha and Miss E on a sunny Friday. 

This guy soaked up the zoo until just a few minutes before we needed to leave. 

So much fun eating in March.

But it's not so fun getting an allergic reaction. This was just the beginning.

We love our yard and "special park."







There's always a story to be told, a song to sing, or a why question to ask.

It's a privilege to end my days this way.

Both kiddos ended up with ear infections. E showed us by having massively disrupted sleep while M had an afternoon of fever and lethargy. I enjoyed the cuddles while it lasted.

A couple hours and an episode of Daniel Tiger later, and she was doing this. 

This guy has started going after toys and sitting well in the last week or two.

I finally hung up these photos. Recognize that girl on the left?

Looks like Madeleine's and Cooper's little siblings are going to be buddies just like they are.

I leave you with Elliott's version of one of my favorite YouTube videos* of all time:

Hopefully April will leave us a little more time to slow down.

*Sad post script to the video.

31 December 2014

Christmas Squared: A Modern Christmas Log Cabin Quilt

A month or two ago, I decided that I wanted to make a Christmas quilt to kick off my goal of making one seasonal quilt per year. I thought it would be fun to have a special throw to get out just for the month of December each year, a comfy place for us to curl up and establish some great memories. 

I settled on a pretty simple design that would allow me to use strip piecing. I tried to choose fabric that would be timeless and grow with us as a family. Every quilt that I make teaches me a lesson, and this one taught me to follow my fabric instincts. I'm so glad that I did! 

The size of the quilt is a fair bit larger than intended. I wanted a generous throw size and ended up with one that is longer and just slightly narrower than a standard twin bed quilt. (It's pictured resting on a queen bed.) This is about twice as big as any other quilt I've made to date. About a week before I started, I got a new sewing machine (merry Christmas to me!), and there is no way that I could have done it without my new machine's 11-inch neck! 

Enough quilting mumbo-jumbo - here are some photos: 






The quilting on this beast is rather simple and quite imperfect. As I was quilting, I debated whether I should go back and fix the mistakes to make it a little closer to perfect, but I decided against it. Here's the thing: like a piece of writing, a quilt should be tailored to its audience and purpose. This is meant to be a background for family memories, not a show piece. I'm currently in the season of my life where perfection is a thing of the past and good enough is the motto of the year decade. Hopefully I'll one day treasure those untouched mistakes as I curl up in the quilt while I wait for our teenagers to come home or wait for the grandkids to arrive.

For now, I'll treasure being able to lay down our first year of memories with this quilt.



And with that, goodbye 2014

24 December 2014

Few Festive Decorations

I enjoy decorating our home for Christmas and - at the risk of sounding like my mother - it seems a shame that not many people get to see it in person. To counter that, I'm sharing a bit of my decorations here.

Last year, I went a bit overboard. Our 2014 decorations are a mix of old and new with nothing too complicated. I tried to keep it simple and limit the stress associated with creating, displaying, and tearing down decorations while still bringing a bit of holiday cheer to our home. 

Our tree is up in the formal livingroom again. It's smaller than last year (and definitely not as nice of a noble fir as we've had in the past), but we managed to fill the entire tree with just lights, an extended felt ball garland, and sentimental ornaments. No filler bulbs this year! 


Christmas trees are often a topic of discussion amongst parents of toddlers. Our rule is that anything that can be reached can be touched...with one finger. Madeleine has responded well to this (this year) because it doesn't feel so off-limits and, therefore, attractive, and she is still able to indulge her curiosity (mostly) without damaging things. I also strategically decorated the tree so that ornaments on the lower half of the tree are unbreakable, fixable, or replaceable. 


Even this guy loves to look at the lights and grab at ornaments. He doesn't seem to mind that the crazy thing is drying out at record speed. 

Our formal livingroom mantel is bright and cheerful without a lot of effort. I wanted to highlight the new piece of art (depicting the location of our wedding) but still make it feel like Christmas. I think that the new felt ball tree, our stockings, and those gorgeous Glassybabies (in new fern, happiness, dolphin, and crayola) do just that! 


I added letters to our stockings this year (inspired by this). I don't love the scale, but they'll be fine placeholders until I find the perfect font and size. And, yes, our initials spell out a word. It wasn't intentional, but we're embracing it! 


In the livingroom where we spend a lot of our time, I've dialed things back quite a bit. This year, I'm displaying a few ornaments on this awesome driftwood tree my mom and stepdad made for me, and I've reused an older bunting (tutorial here).


I stole the Santa photo idea from a friend. Each year, we'll get to look back at the previous years' visits to Santa while adding a new one to the mix. It's a little hard for me to believe that this is already our third Christmas with kiddos!


For the shelves, I pulled out some old favorites, including my Joy to the World. This will always be special to me because I made it shortly after I found out I was pregnant with Madeleine, while George was out snowboarding and I had an afternoon alone with my thoughts. 


Even though Christmas is just one day, I enjoy our special decorations all month long. Hopefully you've enjoyed seeing them, too! 

08 August 2014

Gender Neutral Nursery Reveal

Happy Friday! 

I have a little treat for you: photos of our completed nursery! Remember the preview, nearly five months ago? I've already shown you a lot of the individual projects, but let's have a look at how it all came together.  


You've already seen the mobile and the crib skirt and sheets, but this is where the magic is going to happen. Do you hear that, Baby Boy? You're going to be a great sleeper, just like your big sister.

The camera in the corner is a webcam. We're using the same model we have for Madeleine, and we securely link it to a free app on our phones, which is only viewable in our home.

The blue bear was a gift from a friend, and I'm so excited that he'll have his own bear after seeing how much Madeleine adores her Gund.


Right next to the crib is the chair we moved in from Madeleine's nursery. We want Madeleine to move to a new bed on her own timing, so we opted to only minimally reuse key items. This chair is amazing for nursing, soothing, and occasionally catching some ZZZZs with a newborn (it glides, swivels, and reclines), and now Miss M has a lower chair that is better suited for her reading. Happiness all around. I can hardly wait to curl up in the chair with Baby Boy and his houndstooth quilt


A couple of weeks ago, I strategically planned for Madeleine to paint in the colors of the nursery. She loves painting and enthusiastically complied with my wishes. 


Then, I surprised her by displaying a few of the pieces in the nursery. She is incredibly proud of her art work and points it out every time we go in the room. Turns out, it goes really well with the inspiration art piece and the bunting I whipped up.


Remember those built-in shelves and bench? This is how they turned out. We have plenty of space to store things as our needs change, and it's been fun to have a place to display things after a shelf-free nursery. 



The green light on the bottom shelf was made by George and should be a nice way to get a bit of light at night without turning on the overhead lights.


This is the fingerprint guestbook that the ladies made for me at my baby brunch. It's flanked by a kiwi that I convinced Madeleine to hand down and an owl door stop that I painted.


This silver dollar is one of the most special parts of the nursery. It has a long and meaningful history with George's father's family with roots here in Seattle. For the past four years, I've been waiting to find the right place to display it, and I think this is just right. It's "mounted" using museum wax to a piece of the fabric used for the window cushion.


I sewed the cushion for the window seat from an outdoor fabric meant to be fade- and stain-resistant, so I hope that it's true to its promises. Making my own piping and sewing on such a large scale were definitely some new challenges for me, but I really enjoyed watching this piece come together. It's not quite as tight fitting as I might like, but I'll take it!


On the other side of the room is the changing station and dresser. 


In the frame at the left, I've displayed two Hawaiian postcards. We found out that a new member would be joining our family on the morning we returned from our trip to Maui, so I thought it was fitting to include a little Aloha in the room.

We'll eventually be adding a diaper pail to this space, but it's currently backordered.


Of course, I took advantage of an excuse to make another divided basket. I'm pleased with how this one turned out, and I discovered that the "scraps" from making crib sheets are the perfect size for the interior lining. Score!

And, yes, that is an industrial container of hand sanitizer. We are ready!



Behind the door, at kiddo height, we hung these three lil' owls. 


The first thing you pass upon entering and last thing you see when leaving is another special part of the nursery. This horseshoe came from my grandparents' farm, and it still has remnants of dirt caked in the shoe. 


Phew. You made it through the tour!

Details:

Ceiling Paint: Misty Gray (2124-60)
Trim and Cabinet Paint: Super White (PM-1)
Crib and Dresser: Pali Lucca Collection
Sheets: Homemade using this tutorial
Crib Skirt: Homemade
Mobile: Homemade
Chair: Best Chairs Tryp
Quilt: Homemade using this pattern
Brown Picture Frames: Aaron Brothers
ABC Print: Children Inspire Design
Bunting: Homemade with Joel Dewberry Modern Meadow fabric
Beaver Tote: 3 Sprouts
Clear Globe with air plant: World Market
Owl Bookend and Decoration: World Market (actually a doorstop)
Grey Felt Bin: Target (a long time ago)
Jacks: World Market
Cushion Fabric: Sunbrella Spectrum Mist
Olympic Peaks Art: Metsker Maps at Pike Place Market
Changing Pad: Keekaroo Peanut Changing Pad in Sable
Wipe Holder: OXO Perfect Pull in Aqua
Laundry Basket: Target
Owls: World Market

And now...time for the favorite part game. What's your favorite element? For me, it's a toss-up between the mobile and Madeleine's art.

(Psst - In case you're wondering, this is the nursery we prepared for Madeleine's arrival.)