Creative juices are flowing

Week 26

Everyone is having a hard time believing that I haven't started the nursery yet. I'm such a planner and try to do things as far in advance as possible, so it is a little surprising even to me, that we haven't started yet. However, we decided to wait until AFTER Nick was done with school and we were back from our vacation to start working on it. I'm really glad we did because I've changed my mind a few times since I started designing things and now I feel like I'm really ready to go.

The nursery bedding came in over our vacation so as soon as we got home, I ripped it open!! I

was so excited to see it. I really like what I picked out, but I LOVE the color theme we've decided to go with. I'd had this picked out from the Land of Nod when we first got pregnant, but still kept my eyes open for other things. I came back to this one and just loved the concept. Even better, the week I ordered it, it had just gotten back in stock (after being on back order for weeks) and we got FREE SHIPPING!

Here is a picture from the website of the bedding!

Nick thought it looked a little too 'sissy' at first, but I like how it's very calming colors and it gives us lots of freedom with decorating choices. A lot of things out there for boys right now are themed, and it's mostly animals or cars. Lots of monkeys, jungle themes, etc. While some of that stuff is so cute, it just wasn't what I was wanting for our baby's room. I wanted something that was not only soothing for the baby, but something we would enjoy also.

We have just started the process of getting the nursery together (don't worry - I've started taking more pictures so we'll have the 'before and after' ones to post) and I'm so excited! My dad and step mom are coming up this weekend and we are installing a closet system with shelving to make it more functional for a baby.

We have narrowed down our paint for the walls to 2 different greens and just last night, I decided to paint the closet! Since the closet won't have doors anymore and I really have been wanting to incorporate more of the 'teal/blue' from the bedding, it came to me last night. I'm going to repaint the inside of the closet with the blue color since the walls will be green. I'm hoping it'll look as good as I'm picturing, because in my mind, it's not only a pop of color, but it should add some depth and help the closet look more put together.

That's on the agenda for tonight so hopefully it can be dry by this weekend for my Dad and Nick to build the shevles. Last night Nick and I combined our closets and dressers together for the first time since living in our house! It actually went much smoother than I imagined. We were able to easily fit things where they needed to be and we got a bunch of things to donate to Goodwill!

The baby has started moving a TON lately. It's so much fun to feel him and sometimes even see it. I'm really hoping he'll move a lot this weekend so my parents will be able to feel it. A few changes that I've noticed over vacation are I am definitely more tired. This is probably from the 'pregnancy insomnia' that has set in. Once I get to sleep, I'm ok...for awhile. One trip to the bathroom or shift in positions and I wake up and can't fall back asleep. I also wake up super early and when I'm up and moving around on weekends, I can be go go go. It's times when I stop and am sitting that I tend to get more tired. Especially sitting at my desk at work!

Bathroom visits have kicked up quite a bit. That was fun on the airplanes...LOL! My hips have started to hurt again when I sleep. I'm really thinking it's because I'm not getting to the gym and walking as much. We walked a lot on vacation which kept the pain away, but now that we are home, I've been on the go trying to work on the nursery. I hope to get back on schedule next week with at least walking at the gym. I feel like when I walk more, my hips don't hurt so that's even more motivation to get to the gym. I've started being even more vigilant about making sure I'm getting lots of protein, fruits and veggies in my diet. Not only to keep weight gain under control, but so little man gets as many vitamins and nutrients as he needs. We ate pretty badly on vacation so it's nice to be back in a routine. We also finished up our registry this weekend. Invitations for 2 of our showers went out and we wanted it done for anyone who's an earlybird shopper!

Nick has been fantastic! When we were registering this weekend, when we were looking at paint and closet options, he'd start to realize when I got easily overwhelmed and has learned to sort of talk me through it instead of trying to 'fix it'. Once he gets me talking through it, I find I start to sort of calm down and can focus more on the task at hand, rather than the finished product which gets me overwhelmed. I find myself getting more overwhelmed than normal, but he's been amazing at getting me to calm down. Last night when I made the last minute decision that we were going to paint the inside of the closet, I went in, during the KU vs. MU game and decided to start taking the current shelf and rod down myself. I got the shelf down, but got stuck on the shelf support. Instead of getting angry, which normally may have been his reaction, he was more concerned about me hurting myself. At half time, he came in and got all the rest of the stuff down so I could start taping to paint tonight! It was a small thing, but I noticed and really appreciated it because he's been so helpful.

I'll try and post pics next week of the finished closet! Next weekend the guest bedroom furniture gets moved out and hopefully soon a crib will be in. We are on the hunt for a crib because I don't think I like the one I originally picked out!