Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Before & After - Income Suite Bedroom & Bathroom

As mentioned in my previous post, we have finally completed the bedroom (minus carpet installation) and bathroom of Operation Income Suite.

We started gutting the income suite in April of 2012.  We were a little a lot more delayed than we expected due to unforeseen electrical problems, i.e. we had to completely rewire the basement and main floor, and not to mention all that baby raising we were doing.

But here it is all nice and pretty...

The Bedroom

All that's left is the finishing touches...
 carpet, closet doors and baseboard.
Paint Colour:  Benjamin Moore - Woodlawn Blue

"Man Cellar" with the shelves removed and a coat of masonry paint.

The Bathroom

The bathroom is our first 100% completed project.
I will probably add a few manly accents at some point.
I'm super jealous of this space.
Paint Colour:  Olympic - Quaking Grass















Tuesday, January 29, 2013

New Playroom & Reclaimed Sanity

     This past weekend we worked our butts off to put the finishing touches on the bedroom and bathroom of Operation Income Suite.  We have officially reclaimed our entire main floor and we're starting to feel more like a family of three.  As much as we love Grandpa, we've been missing the perks of having our own home.  We forgot how much we really enjoy being able to walk around in our underwear, and I specifically love not having to close the bathroom door when I'm in there, although, the hubs isn't a huge fan.  For the first time since we bought our house, we have privacy and peace and quiet.  It's so so so nice.  I've been jumping for joy all week.

     We transformed the "dining room", or the room my Dad was occupying, into a much needed playroom for C.  It's a safe place for her to explore, and practice crawling and standing.  With C being extra curious and mobile lately, the room also doubles as a baby jail so that I can do really important things, like catch up on my missed episodes of Girls.

This is what we were working with before...
C looks contained in this pic showing how her playstuff took over our living room.
That probably lasted 3 minutes max before I was chasing her and pulling her away from the coffee table.

This is our living room now...
This will be the next room to get a makeover, but at least for now we have a place to hang out that's not cluttered with baby crap.

This is C's new playroom...
We ripped out the disgusting carpet, just like we did in the updated office.
Reading nook... what a fun word!
I scored this awesome baby gate off Kijiji for $25.
Sorry C, but the bathroom and stairs are off limits.











Sunday, January 20, 2013

Pregnancy Test & That's How I Feel About That

It was Negative. But what the hell 15 day late period?!
We even sat down and had the what if talk and everything before I took the test and the hubs reassured me that it would be okay if we were expecting again and that everything would work out.  We made it work the first time with little to no planning right?

I was a little bummed with the results, so I guess that says something about what I want next.  However, we decided we're not quite ready for baby #2, but we sure did entertain the idea.

I put a temporary (approximately 4 hour) hold on my craft room plans and day dreamed about a second nursery instead.

We talked about having kids close together but 17 months apart is a little too close for comfort. We'd need two cribs and I really didn't want to kill C's time in the spotlight so soon.  I just never imagined it happening that way.  Then again, I never imagined having a baby and owning a home at 24.

Next, I thought about how badly I'd like to be an avid beach participant this summer and being overweight, bitchy, and chasing after a one year old isn't exactly the image I had in mind.

Then I remembered this letter that I wrote to myself after giving birth, in case baby fever struck again.

In the end we left it at this...

We're not trying but we're not not trying, we'll just wait and see what fate has in store for us.






Friday, January 18, 2013

Amber Teething Necklace for the Win!

     C's been having a super hard time with her teeth.  My once happy, smiley, sleeps-through-the-night, baby now cries all day and refuses to nap or fall asleep for the night.  That's what we've been dealing with the past few weeks, until a genius mom instagrammed a life saving pic of her handsom man wearing an amber teething necklace.

     I rushed out, tracked one down, and strung it around C's neck, and I shit you not, within 30 minutes my baby was back to her awesome self.  I did a whole bunch of research on them and obviously everyone is entitled to their own opinion.  I just wanted to be in the know before I tried it... and... HOLY MIRACLE BEADS!

Healing Amber
Here's how it went down...

     I put the necklace on C at around 5:30pm (usually her fussiest time of the day).  Plus we were at Lowe's buying really exciting things for the house, like new doorknobs.  No distracting devices (ie. soothers, teethers, my scarf) were needed once that necklace was nestled under her chin.  She sat in the cart, like a big girl, for an entire hour and occupied herself while we shopped.

Weird right?...I didn't think this mystery necklace would take effect so quickly and I wasn't about to question it either.
This place is great! Can we come here every day?! ...yes, unfortunately we can.
     That night, I took the necklace off her during bathtime, and we decided to wrap it around her ankle for the first night just to be safe.  She had a hard time getting to sleep that night.  We think she was uncomfortable with the weird, hard thing digging into her ankle, so we took it off.

     The next day, the necklace went back on and she wore it for both of her 90 minute long naps. (Win!)  We decided to put her to bed for the night with the necklace on.  After countless google searches, and reading that most moms leave the necklace on 24/7, we tucked the necklace underneath her undershirt and sleeper, and checked on her every hour or so just to be safe.
Looking quite hipster these days.
She slept great!!! I mean perfect, like she used to.  From 7pm to 4am, when she woke for a quick bottle, and fell right back to sleep until 8am.  
Relief at last!
  C hasn't been fussy or whiney during the day, she occupies herself during play time, and she goes down at night without acetaminophen or ibuprofen.  This thing is AMAZING!!.  I kind of want an adult size one for myself.  I feel like I say that about most of her things... how sweet would a jumbo size bumbo chair or jolly jumper be? Like really...
Just doin' my thang.
But honestly, thank god for moms who share awesome information, and amber teething necklaces.
Halleluja Amen


Monday, January 14, 2013

Updated Office on a Budget

     It was a typical Monday evening when I convinced the hubs to rip out the carpet in our main floor office. We had planned on chucking that hideous carpet since the day we decided on the house. I'm not sure exactly why we kept it for as long as we did. I guess we wanted to torture our eyeballs for a little longer.

Ew
     We tore that horrible mess up and kicked it to the curb, literally. That night, I jumped (on the newish looking hardwood) for joy. Actually, it created a spiral of weeklong renovations and upgrades that eventually made for a pretty exhausting weekend "off".

     After ripping out the hideous wallpaper, slapping a coat of paint on the walls and rearranging some furniture we're left with a mostly finished product that we love.
C loves it too!
I big time approve of the organized closet, which was beginning to make my right eye twitch.

Office To Do List:

Rip out hideous carpet
Tear down disgusting wallpaper
Prime & paint
Hang pictures
Tear out shelf in closet
Clean up & paint window sill
Print calendar
Thrift a home for printer
Buy desk lamps
Buy reading wall lamp & install
Install floating shelves & wood letters
Spray paint chalkboard paint accents

Okay, so there's still lots to do.  
I don't think we'll ever be able to look around and say 'we're done'.
Thank god (or whoever created it) for wine.






Wednesday, January 2, 2013

Teething Toys & Chilly Chewies

Teething is the most fun!... said no mom ever. 


     C's teeth started bothering her at around 3 months old and it's been downhill ever since, with no teeth in sight. To make matters worse, her first teeth, once they do cut trough will be her lateral incisors. Basically, the sharpest, spikiest and most painful teeth to cut first. Awesome.


     Although I hate to admit it, we've had no choice but to give C a dose of Tylenol or Advil every once in a while, if she absolutely cannot sleep despite our efforts. Our doc advised against homeopathic meds for several reason and I'm still not sure how we feel about them ourselves.

   
 The drugs help, obviously I limit the dosage and frequency, and we use them as our last resort.


These are the chew toys that have helped us survive the past few months:

1. Nuby Bug A Loop Teether
2. Bright Starts Clack and Slide Activity Ball
3. Bright Starts Take & Teeth Clover
4. Sassy Teething Feeder
5. Nuby Coolbite Teether

I've been looking in to teething tablets. Hopefully I'll finish up my research today and make a choice about whether to use them or not. 
Have any of you had experiences with them?