Thursday, June 30, 2011

Rock-a-bye baby

*Cue violins*... My womb chair isn't going to arrive before the baby. Too bad, so sad. It was my fault for getting greedy and trading in the one that arrived well before the baby's birth for the oatmeal colored one. So I went to my nursery chair Plan B- the IKEA Poang Rocking Chair. I really liked this chair when I saw it in the store, and it's super comfortable. I like the bent birch wood and clean lines, and the fact that the slipcovers are machine washable for the projectile vomit moments in life.

I didn't want to pay $180 for a Plan B back up chair so I went trolling on Craigslist and BOOM! Found it. $70, just like new. It was even in the light gray and white slipcover (oddly named Tuna, which isn't even a Swedish word!) that I wanted, and close enough for us to drive down and pick up today. The plan is to keep it in the nursery and see if it's comfortable to nurse in and if the baby digs the rocking motion, and depending on that, replacing the horrible pink chair in our living room with the delightful womb chair I've lusted after for so long. Both will be great "lounge with the baby" chairs so I'm happy to have both.


Neat, right? It plays well with my Scandihoovian leanings. Another awesome score of the day came from Magnolia and Willow which I popped into on my daily walk (waddle).  I was looking for little side tables to have next to the changing dresser (to hold wipes and diapers so we don't have to open the drawers as we're changing the baby right on top) and the nursing chair. I've read some good advice about keeping a nursing basket close by, filled with snacks, nipple pads, a one-hand read, burp cloths etc, and I needed a small table to put that and a water carafe on. These little gold metal and glass nesting tables are perfect, and were only $15 for the set! Dealio.


I sewed that basket a while ago, not intentionally matching it to the nursery curtains, I swear.


And Elsa's pooping station. So it's weird to type this, but... I think I'm done. Oh no wait, Bird print still needs to be hung. Then we'll be done. We pick it up from the framer's on Wednesday!

Again, NOT OUR BABY.

Something about men holding babies... heart --> melt.


Look how tiny Jude's head is compared to Jeff's!!!


Jeff and baby Jude at 3 days old. So not only did Jerod and Karen suck up all the good labor luck, but they got the good baby luck too. He's a gem, quiet and perfect. I bet he doesn't even poop. Luckies!!

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

38 weeks, 4 days


I don't think my belly looks much bigger than it did at my baby shower 4 weeks ago, but my cankles do!! Helllllo swelling. Not at all nice to meet you. At least it's flip flop weather. Time is ticking down and with Jerod and Karen's new arrival, it's making everything pretty real. Which is exciting. I feel as ready as I could ever be, the nursery is pretty much done and waiting for Elsa, and my shower thank you notes are finally all written. Nothing left to do but twiddle my thumbs and analyze each weird feeling in my abdomen wondering if it's a contraction!

Sunday, June 26, 2011

Decorated!

This was the fun part of doing the nursery. Decorating! We've been collecting a few items to put up in Elsa's room for awhile, and the day finally came when it could all come together. I went on a rampage yesterday while Jeff was teaching, putting everything in frames, measuring, leveling, cutting out templates from tissue paper to mock arrange on the wall, putting Command strips on everything and then hanging them according to the instructions and then seeing them crash to the floor which could have been the baby's head and then ripping them all off and going with tried and true nails. It was an ordeal. But we really like how it turned out!


Here's her little gallery above the dresser. We have original paintings and drawings from Nathan, John, Brendan, Seth and Jeff, a few prints, and the crocheted name piece I got from etsy.


We found some of Jeff's Winnie the Pooh drawings from when he worked at Disney. I love them, and are some of the few baby-appropriate pieces he has done. Carrothead also went up. Jeff is making prints of this one and will be selling them in his website store once that's up and running. I love the pop of hot pink and black from the flamingos piece that Brendan did. We've had this one for awhile and it's lived in several places in our houses, but I like it here best.


Nathan's piece. How I love it, let me count the ways... The Rifle Paper Co. print went up too, the colors are perfect and the gold frame really classes it up the way only a gold frame can.


Karen and Kim put out these little blank cards at the baby shower for people to write us awesome things for the baby. We got a few awesome ones with drawings from our artist friends, and I think this one from Seth and Mandy was my favorite. Seth drew an amazing Siamese cat with a rattle and says "We hope the baby doesn't barf as much as the cat". ME TOO.


This cat print came from our family friends, the Folkmans, who we stayed with in Grimstad, Norway. I love it. So haunting but sweet, just like black cats.


My Aminal came!! Aminals crack me up. They're made from kids drawings of animals, and are all organic and made fairly etc etc which is icing on the cake. I really wanted Ceeta but Liun was available on Amazon and I had a gift card so we went with him. He's still pretty great. I made the pink floral pillow and the Ugly Doll was a gift from Jeff years ago.


This is one of my favorite photographs ever. I saw it randomly in a Real Simple magazine one day, clipped it, and Jan blew it up and printed it out for me. I love her little dress and the boy's outfit too, and it's just such a great moment of kids acting weird snapshot in time. I wish I knew who took it and what the story was.


Tory the Giraffe finally came in the mail! Plaid Pigeon got blown up all over the blogs so they were swamped with orders and it took five weeks to arrive, but at least it came before the baby!


I was debating for awhile what we should do above the crib until I saw these Sharon Montrose animal photographs. They are so beautiful, but so very expensive. I knew I couldn't afford them, and wanted at least one big one or several small ones, so I pouted for a few days and then realized I had something similar already in the house. I had this book called Animal House which is full of amazing animals photographed against really rad wallpapers, by photographer Catherine Ledner. I pulled out 10 of them, trimmed them to 8x10, and they're perfect!


These are the ones the Command strips failed so miserably at. I would like to avoid them peeling off the wall and dinging the baby in her soft skull so that plan was quickly abandoned.


They look neat though, right? Perfect and colorful, fun, and again with those classy gold frames. A note on the frames, btw: They are from Frames, USA which I highly recommend. I bought 17 frames from them, two in custom sizes (for the crocheted Elsa and the kids dancing photograph), they are solid wood and made in the USA, and were delivered within 2.5 weeks of ordering for a grand total of $140 with shipping. SO much cheaper than anywhere else, and I looked. They are the gold economy frames (which I found from the Lay Baby Lay blog) and I'm really pleased with them. You kind of have to buy in bulk there ($50 minimum order, $15 surcharge if you spend under $100) but in a case like this, it was perfect.


My favorites are between the sloth and the llamas.



And the last piece of decoration, a wood tray to encase the changing pad, because I'm crazy obsessive and it was bothering me how the changing pad cover kind of pulled up at the bottom and looked messy. I just bought a few pieces of precut wood at Home Depot, measured and had Jeff cut them to size, nailed them, and painted the simple box a light pink. It looks finished now and only cost about $20 in materials. They actually sell these things, and have the nerve to charge between $100-300 for them!


And in case you're wondering... we're framing Jeff's bird tree print to go above the changing table, rounding out the artwork in the baby's room. I can't wait to see it up. That and the womb chair really are the last things we need. Well, the baby too I guess.

THIS IS NOT MY BABY.

Despite what housekeeping at our office seems to think (Jerod and I share an office and they see all our baby stuff lying around and assume we're married and having the same baby), this precious little thing was brought into the world yesterday by our dear friends Karen and Jerod. Jude Atticus Rasmussen! Such a great name. He is destined for greatness. 

I feel a mixture of elation (bestie friends having their first baby!), reassurance (Karen had a great and relatively fast labor and delivery from what I can tell of the bits and pieces we got via text yesterday), and holy-crap-I'm-next. My dad texted me back saying "One down, one to go" and I stopped and I think all the blood ran out of my swollen body. Mother-f.... what did I get myself into? But then you see cutie-batooty pictures like this and you get all excited again. :)


CONGRATULATIONS JEROD AND KAREN!! WE CAN'T WAIT TO MEET YOU JUDE!

Saturday, June 25, 2011

An art-filled Saturday

I'm so excited our frames for the nursery came yesterday! That means art and pictures are finally going up on the walls today. It's my project for the day and I'll post pictures when I'm done! One of Elsa's paintings is the one our friend Nathan did for her, after I may have hinted of my love of Siamese cats. Here's another sketch he did of one. Love it. Beards, not as much.

Monday, June 20, 2011

I really really love this.


I want it bad but we've been picking up a lot of art lately. This one is just so rad though. So torn!!

As seen on Door Sixteen, print by Jen Ray.

Friday, June 17, 2011

Soobee!

How did I not know our sweet friend Sue Blanchard had an etsy shop of awesomeness?? Under a rock I was. These two crack me up, I love them:



And these are a few of my favorites from her website:



On the chance that you might be reading this Soobee, I hope we get to see you on Sunday! We're going to the flea market so call if you're still going!

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

She'll have something to sleep on now!

The crib mattress came! Now the moms can stop worrying about our jokingly ascetic crib set-up we had going on for awhile. This baby is plush. Yet super firm which apparently is very important if you want your newborn to not die of SIDS. Memory foam toppers + Liv = a good night of sleep. Memory foam toppers + newborn baby = death. At least that's what my books say. So firm we went. And organic, because I believe in that stuff. We bought the Naturepedic Organic crib mattress because of all the 5 star reviews, and I'm happy with it so far. It fits the Sniglar snugly, and is water(pee)proof so that's great.


And yay! The sheets I sewed for it fit! I'm good at measurements. The mattress looks like it's up super high though. I know newborns can't stand up and jump out of the crib, but does this look normal? Should she be that close to the top of the rails? And is sleepy sound machine sheep okay where he is, or should he be moved down to underneath the level of the mattress? These are things they don't cover in my books.


See how much better the shelf looks in black? Everything pops off of it more now, and it coordinates with the dresser. Too many furniture finishes and colors going on before. Speaking of too much, I realize the shelf has a lot going on with it. Things will be edited down once I have more room to play with stuff.


I ordered all of the frames for the artwork that will soon be going up on the walls, and I can't wait to get them. I'm really excited about what we chose to hang up on the walls so far. She's going to have lots of fun stuff to look at.

Mmm gelato... *drool*


Gelato is my new thing apparently. We went and got gelato with Jana and Matt the other day and now it's hard for me to think about anything that isn't gelato. Is that weird? I got pink grapefruit with them, and today when Jeff and I were up in LA, I got organic apricot and cantaloupe. It was deelish. Jeff got merlot and oatmeal, both also quite good. What technically is different between gelato and ice cream? Can I make gelato in my Cuisinart ice cream maker? I want to try.

Jeff is fancy now and always orders an espresso with dessert or after a meal. Lah-tee-dah.

Happy Anniversary hubby!

Three years!! It does and doesn't feel like we've been married three years, in all the best possible ways. I love you babies.

These are some of my favorite wedding memories, it's nice to remember that special day.














And our wedding/honeymoon Super 8 movie that Pete made for us. Stupid YouTube won't let the music play, such a shame, it adds so much.

Sunday, June 12, 2011

Pinterested? Why yes, yes I am.

Okay, sucked in. YET AGAIN. First it was Blogger, then Facebook, then Tweeter, and now... Pinterest. It's pretty genius, and addictive. The internets has SO much beauty and so many cool things that I would never get to see without its existence, and Pinterest helps me to "pin" them all to my inspiration boards so I don't forget about them. You can follow my pins by going here I think: http://pinterest.com/livmcmillan/

Here's a screen snapshot of what my pins look like:


Fun, right?? I'm already obsessed with Lydia's and Joy's pins. Great style, ladies. This is going to come in handy when I'm on maternity leave and have NOTHING to do.

Friday, June 10, 2011

Warby Parker Sunglasses!

I love my Warby Parkers, and I just saw on the For Me, For You blog that they're coming out with a sunglasses collection! They look awesome too. I want the first pair:




And in case you can't read that fine print from my screen snapshots, Warby's are awesome because they're $95, come with Rx lenses, have free try-ons and returns, AND they give away a pair of glasses to someone in need when you purchase a pair. Everyone's a winner.