Andrew's Completed Nursery

Andrew's Completed Nursery

Here is Andrew’s completed nursery. I am SO HAPPY with the end result. I was so nervous to do all of the sewing for the crib set, curtains, and changing pad…since my last project was a Christmas ornament that my Grandma taught me to sew…when I was 8 years old. Seriously though, I really want to get into sewing. I would love to be comfortable enough to sew Emily some super cute clothes, as well as some clothes for myself. If you want to find the links to the tutorials that I found and used for the crib set, check out my previous post: Andrew's Nursery Update.

Nursery Fabrics

Back to Andrew’s nursery. I bought a lot of the accessories from JoAnn Fabrics. The letters above the crib are all from JoAnn's. It is a mixture of wooden and cardboard letters that I painted myself to match the fabrics that I chose. I hung them all up with the 3M Command Strips so I didn't have to put a ton of holes in the wall. To guarantee that they don't fall down...I used a couple of the strips on each of the letters.  

 There really is no theme in the nursery. It is a mixture of fun ideas on each wall. I fell in love with the ABC wall which I found a picture of on pinterest. The picture that I found was attached to a link from Etsy...unfortunately the letters were way out of my price range and so I was able to copy the idea (using coupons for JoAnn's) for a fraction of the price on Etsy. There is also a slight Star Wars theme. Again, I found a picture of the crib mobile on Pinterest...and I couldn't resist! I HAD TO HAVE IT!!! The price was totally affordable and I am SO HAPPY with the finished look. Here is a link to the Etsy store: Salty and Sweet. To hang the mobile, I just bought a used crib mobile from a thrift store and then used that to hang my new mobile from Etsy.

Coolest Crib Mobile EVER!!!

For the other prints around the room, I just googled "star wars nursery prints" and I came across these ridiculously cute prints. 

C3PO Artwork

Look closely, that is not a Norman Rockwell...that is Princess Lea and Hans Solo

Hans Solo and Chewbacca

 There isn't much to say about the rest of the nursery. I'll just post the pictures...don't hesitate to leave a comment if you have any questions at all.

Andrew's Toy Shelf

Toy Shelf and Star Wars Prints above

DIY ABC Wall

Andrew's Changing Table

Fun Artwork

My Growing Pregnant Belly

12 Weeks

14 Weeks

17 Weeks

21 Weeks...IT'S A BOY!!!!

27 Weeks

27 Weeks...Goofing Off

33 Weeks

Andrew's Nursery Udpate

Emily's Nursery

When we put Emily’s nursery together, we made the “base” of the nursery very neutral so that we wouldn’t have to make a lot of changes to the room if we had a boy in the future. Emily’s nursery was cute…we painted the walls a soft sage green and then on the wall behind the crib, we painted wide stripes with the same sage green color…only it was a different finish: flat/semi-gloss. In my opinion, it was the perfect subtle touch to the nursery. The furniture was a cherry finish and the crib set was a done with gender-neutral colors: greens, creams, and brown. To add the “girly” touches, we added hints of lavender color through accessories that could easily be changed out if we had a boy in the future.

Enter Andrew…and three years later…I became bored with the nursery and wanted to change a lot more than I needed to. In order to keep Craig happy, I had to make the changes in a budget friendly way…so off to my sewing machine to dust it off. 

I found a couple of great tutorials for making a new crib set as well as a super cute contoured changing pad cover. Here are the links along with pictures of my finished projects. 

This tutorial was very easy to follow for someone who is a "beginner" sewer. I found this on the "SEW4HOME" website, which offers many step-by-step tutorials. I completed my bumpers slightly differently. Instead of sewing each individual bumper, I made one super long tube for the bumpers. As I sewed it, I inserted each bumper, and then sewed the tube more, and then inserted another bumper. Between each bumper, I sewed a seam down the middle of the tube so that it could easily bend around the corners of the crib. I was SUPER happy with the end result. As for the ties...I simple hand stitched satin ribbons between each bumper. It turned out perfectly!!!

 

As for the crib skirt, I didn't have a tutorial to follow, but I did have a couple of pictures that I wanted to model my skirt after.  This was the "look" that I was going for (minus the ruffles...after all it is for a boy's room). So, with my mother's help, we put the crib skirt together and I couldn't have been happier with the end result. We used a super big bowl to make the rounded edges in the front. Then I used a pre-made biased tape for the edges around the front, sides and back. As for the peek-a-boo portion, I used a small rope with the brown polk-a-dot fabric (the same that I used for the top of the bumpers) on the bottom.

Now, as for the window in the nursery. For Emily's room we had a short valence and baby-proof blinds to block the light out. Unfortunately, due to the position of the window...when the sun would set the light would pierce through the perimeter of the window and landed directly in the crib. Craig's solution to this problem...pin up a black bed sheet. It was so ugly, but as long as it was functional, Craig didn't care.
Fixing this problem was on the top of my to-do list for updating the nursery. I saw this picture on Pinterest, however it wasn't a tutorial. I liked how the window matched the style of the window in the nursery: tall and thin. I also liked how it gathered on one side of the window in order to let some light in.

Those were the major updates to Andrew's nursery. You can see that we switched out Emily's butterfly's above the crib for letters of the alphabet. Once we finish with the decorations, I'll post pictures of the completed nursery. I can't wait for it to come together.

Potty Training...SUCCESS!!!

My first attempt at potty training Emily was when she just turned 2 years old. She had shown some interest in using the potty and so we bought the princess potty seat that sings when it gets filled. The odd thing was that her first success “filling” was with a poo-poo. We were so excited…we grabed the camera and took those embarrassing pictures that we get hold over her as ransom when she gets older.

Now, at first, we just let her sit on the potty whenever she wanted and we didn’t force her to use it at all. However, once I officially attempted to potty train, then she put up a huge fight. She wanted no part of sitting on her princess potty, on the big potty…nothing. I tried the candy method, my mom had a present wrapped and ready to bring over once she went potty in the toilet…but Emily just didn’t care. I finally threw in the towel and just figured she wasn’t ready.

Fast forward one whole year. Emily has been showing a lot more interest in potty training…I just kept pushing back the actual training because I thought it would be easier to train when I started summer vacation…and then I pushed it back more because we decided to take a vacation to San Francisco and I didn’t want to have to hunt down toilets every hour. Finally, the “right time” arrived and potty training began.

Now, you can laugh all you want…BUT…potty training TERRIFIED me!!! I was afraid of all of messes that I was going to have clean up. I am a clean freak and I so did not want stinky stains on our nice living room rug, and I just envisioned having to clean up mess after mess all over the house. So, to aid our potty training adventure, I sought out the help of Jen Lovelady and her “Pro Potty Trainer” System. Jen is an amazing mother of 4 and has an abundance of great wisdom! She gaurantees that your child will be potty trained within 3 days or your money back. That was the selling point for me. I didn’t want to deal too much with potty training past 3 days.

I bought the program (It was pretty inexpensive…I want to say about $30. I can’t tell you about the program because I don’t want to give away the tricks…just know that we were 100% happy with it and it worked 100% for us) and after the first day, I was ready to throw in the towel. Emily never once made it “in” the potty. She had an accident right NEXT to the potty, in the hallway after sitting on the potty for a good amount of time, etc. Luckily, every single accident was on the bathroom floor or on our wood floors…never on the rug! It wasn’t until it was time for bed, that first day…we put her back in a diaper to sleep in and once we finished her bedtime routine, she started to cry and cry and cry. She was saying that she had to go potty and she didn’t want to go in her diaper. I thought for sure that this was Emily’s way of trying to extend her bedtime, BUT being the nice mother that I am…I decided to let her out and try to sit on her potty chair one last time. And BEHOLD…the chair sang it’s potty tune as she WENT POTTY FOR THE FIRST TIME!!! We did a potty dance…we high fived…we were so so excited for her!!! We then called Nana and Papa to tell them the good news. It was the cutest phone call ever!!

Day #2 of potty training was practically perfect. The only accidents that we had on day #2 were when she started to go potty in her panties…but she was able to stop herself and run to the bathroom, so there was no clean up involved…just putting on new panties. That was it!!!! By the third day, she was potty trained pro. I am so proud of Emily (and so thankful I didn’t throw in the towel after the first day).

My Decision To Use Cloth Diapers

To cloth diaper or not to cloth diaper…that is the question!!! Craig and I have decided that it is best, on so many levels, for me to be a “stay-at-home-mom” for one year. So, the first fear that rips through our mind is…$$. How can I save it? How can I make it? My main course of action is to look at our budget and figure out all of the ways that we can save money, and with a baby on the way…I have to look at upcoming expenses that will be ADDED to our budget.

Two years ago, I had one of the most amazing student teachers with me from PLU. She has blessed me in so many ways (more than she will ever know) one of which was introducing me to the “ease” of cloth diapers. She has a sister who uses cloth diapers full time (you can find her AMAZING blog at: www.thatmamagretchen.com) and so she would share with me how great and easy they are. When I found out we were pregnant…I was so intrigued to look further into the cloth diapering system. Does it really save you money? It seems so disgusting!!! How easy could it really be?

I did a lot of research, read a TON of reviews, and talked to a handful of friends who were already cloth diapering their little ones. Personally, I know that money wasn’t my ultimate priority for the simple fact that it is a nice lump sum up front to cloth diaper and if I didn’t think I would actually keep it up…it would be a huge waste of time and money. Now, cloth diapers have come a long way from the time my mom cloth diapered me! Cloth diapers, first of all, are SUPER CUTE…cute colors, and cute fabrics. (Yes, that’s important to me!!!). In all of the reviews that I read, it seems that most all “first-timers” had the same fears as I do/did about cloth diapering and they were ALL relieved of their fears and weren’t thinking twice about turning back to disposables. Everyone that I have talked to said that it is super easy, not as gross as you think it might be, and a huge money saver…all of my requirements in order to commit to this new lifestyle.

So…with research out of the way…it’s time to commit and start making some purchases. If I start looking for diapers early, then I have time to be patient and wait for sales. I also looked a lot on craigslist, and found a lot of great deals for diapers that have been barely used, if at all. From the reviews that I read, I felt that I would be most happy with the bumGenius 4.0, and the Flips diapers. Honestly though, I’m not 100% sure about the pocket system (bumGenius) but it has the best reviews by far…so clearly there is something about it that everyone loves, and since I haven’t a clue about cloth diapering, I’m going to put a lot of trust into these reviews. Now, as for the Flips diapers, I love the idea of using inserts in the diaper and when they get wet…I don’t have change the entire diaper, just the insert. I am thinking that these will be the diapers that I will use when I go out of the house, that way I don’t have to pack my diaper bag with a handful of cloth diapers…just my Flips inserts.

Now, remember, I haven’t used these, and so my thoughts are just that…thoughts. Who knows what my opinion will be once I start using them.

So, to start my cloth diaper stash…I really don’t want to have to do laundry everyday. I would love to be able to stretch it to every 2-3 days if I could. With that said, they say that a newborn needs to get changed an average of 10 times a day. So I found a GREAT deal on bumGenius 4.0’s on craigslist. A mother was trying a few different brands, bought stashes of each brand, and favored one brand over the other…so she sold all 12 of her bumGemius 4.0’s, along with the two inserts that came with them, at a great used price…even though a handful of them were never truly used. As for my Flips stash, cottonbabies.com was having an amazing sale on those (buy 2 get 1 free) so I bought a handful of those as well. Then I have some randomly purchased diapers (staying with the two brands that I have previously purchased…I just like some of the fancy fabric options), and inserts (I bought about 10 used Flip inserts from craigslist, and then a two different brands of organic inserts from cottonbabies.com). So my final stash is as follows:

13 - bumGenius 4.0

     13 - 4.0 Newborn Inserts

     13 - 4.0 Regular Inserts

11 - Flips

     19 - Flip Inserts

     6 - Flip Organic Inserts 

     6- Econobum Inserts

1- Mustache Pocket Diaper (Gift from Etsy)

1- Bummis Bio Soft Liners (100)BiodegradableInserts

In addition to the "diapers", I also have 2 "Planet Wise" diaper pail liners. I just bought a regular trash can from Target with a lid that flips up by pushing a button. When it's laundry day, the liner goes in the washing machine along with all the diapers, so I don't have to reach in and handle all of the dirty diapers.  The last thing to get me started...are the "Planet Wise" wet bags. I purchased three bags to rotate in my diaper bag: 2 mediums and 1 small.

There you have it...we shall see how this all works out once baby Andrew arrives. I so hope it is as easy and basic as everyone says it is. I have a lot of convincing to do for my husband to be sold on this...because Lord knows I will never hear the end of it from him if he doesn't have a change of heart once we start putting all of this into practice.