nursery alphabet

A-Z
Originally uploaded by girlwithgreencard and fabric!

For the so far still bare nursery walls: hodgepodge alphabet.
I stole the idea from a nursery tour on apartment therapy's nursery site and then got to work.
The letters came from different craft stores (the larger the store, the better the selection of different font types, materials, and sizes). Some of them are simply painted (like the P), others are mod-podged with papers (tissue paper works best, but I also used pretty sturdy scrapbooking paper). A few are painted on little canvases, others are covered in buttons (because we all know I love buttons). I covered some with fabric, others with paper (though watch out - I glued the letter to the paper and then cut around it with the exacto; you have to choose the right letters for that - nothing with tons of tiny corners!), but my favorite is the V - it's decoupaged with little pieces of fabric.
After I had collected my letters, it took me about two days to decorate all of them. It was a great distraction from the "when will I finally go into labor" thoughts I kept having. :)

ETA: Look! The ABC is featured on Rookie moms!

she's back!

I got to pick up my sewing machine from the shop this morning - no new parts needed and only a "minor repair," which made it much less expensive than it could have been.
Next project: Two more burp cloths and a manly sling for papa to carry baby. Let's see if I can get the sling done by father's day!

good news, bad news

ring sling
Originally uploaded by girlwithgreencard and fabric!

Good news:
The ring sling has been completed! I used Amy Butler fabric (bought on Etsy) and this pattern. The rings are from slingrings.com. I had some minor issues with the smaller pleating, but overall, this was an easy-peasy project, which made it ever so much more fun to work on.

I got inspired looking at chickpea sewing's sidebar and promptly followed two of her super-easy tutorials. Voila: two cloth diapers turned burp cloths and a reversible bib to go with either of them.
(I slightly altered the bib pattern: instead of cotton fabric and terry cloth, I used cotton quilt batting and two layers of cotton fabric, making the whole shebang reversible. Also, I had bought flat diapers, not prefolded ones, so I had to add the folding, which wasn't all that tricky. Next time, I'll buy the prefold diapers for this project because the seams of the diapers weren't all that straight, which made the folding look sort of messy.)

Bad news:
Right after finishing these projects, MY SEWING MACHINE BROKE. I took it to the shop, where they told me that it would take up to a week and a half to fix, and that they would probably need to order a part, which puts the repair cost in the $200 range. *sigh* I was pretty literally distraught for the rest of the day - those lovely pregnant hormones make "dealing with stuff" NOT EASY.
Now I will most likely have a baby before I'll have my machine back. Which? *sigh* but also YAY! BABY!

snoozing bear

snoozing bear
Originally uploaded by girlwithgreencard and fabric!

I'm on maternity leave and loving every minute of it!
Today, I made my own sling using this super-easy pattern.
Next up is the same thing with a manly pattern - for daddy.

French seam and pocket

I wasn't going to be like this...

It's happened. I've started to overdo it, I think. To wit:

I've begun stenciling little insects onto the nursery walls.
Also, we used the same stencils at the babyshower, when my guests were forced to (in lieu of party games, because YUCK!) design onesies. So, technically, I've not only "gone cutesy," no, I'm also well into the territory of "extreme matchiness," both of which are things I wanted to avoid.
And you know what? I don't care. I like the bumblebee!
More photos when the rest of the vermin is done. :)

I eat, I sleep, I kea

Before:

After clearing out the mess and all of the furniture, we visited my "happy place":

Then, we spent each evening for a week with those hexagonal tool thingies:

Yesterday, The Husband worked in the yard all morning, and I crawled around on the floor building the dresser. Then, I hemmed the curtains and vacuumed all the wood shavings off the floor before we headed to IKEA yet again to exchange the wrong part that had come with the bed and get the extra screw that had been missing from the dresser package and to exchange the lampshade that was (in my opinion) a slightly wrong color. And now, it looks like this:

We still need to procure two twin mattresses - IKEA was sold out of all except their really expensive options (big mattress sale). And of course, they won't have them back in stock until APRIL. And I want my sister to sleep on that bed in MARCH. So here's the other side of the room, with the naked bed:

Currently on the bed: My collection of fabrics that match the curtains for pillows, a quilt for the guest bed, and perhaps a wall hanging. I have my work cut out for me!
Now, you probably say that babies are supposed to sleep in cribs. And that we have no changing table. And to that, I would reply that we're getting a used bassinet from a friend as well as a co-sleeper, and Junebug will be sleeping in our room. Meanwhile, Junebug's room will be the guestroom for all the visitors scheduled to come this year (yay!). And the changing table? We'll have to see. My tendency right now is to change baby's diaper on the bed or floor.
But there you have it. A baby room!

I lost 65 pounds today!

The New Year's Bug finally got through to me after we consolidated rooms to turn the "office" into a "nursery." I sorted through every. single. file in The Ugliest Filing Cabinet Of The World and threw out all those vastly important mortgage statements from 2001 and the W-2s from 1999. I also got rid of all the "permission to register" forms I amassed going to College(s) and my tests and term papers. It was incredibly freeing! 65 pounds of useless paper!!!
And the best part? The Ugliest Filing Cabinet is now NOT cluttering up my sewing room. It lives in the garage (until I can convince The Husband that we might as well throw it out).

finished project

I finally made a pillow case for my enormous pregnant-lady body pillow. I was pretty sloppy and fast, but it turned out great. I'll be snuggly tonight! :)

drumroll! (updated)

Some days, I really struggle to explain stuff. For example, we're studying geology in science right now. Well, how do we know what we know about the core and the mantle of the earth? The idea that there's a ball of iron in the center of the planet is rather hard to grasp.

This afternoon, something else rather abstract became a whole lot more real (though just for me, not for my class).
First, why don't you look at a picture:

It's true. I'm 11w1d today. Wheeee!

This afternoon, we went and listened to the baby's heartbeat for the first time. Just like good 21st-century parents with more gadgets than we know what to do with, we recorded it.

It starts out with me fibbing about taking my vitamins (eeevil! - the vitamins, not me) and my doctor suggesting I keep them with my hair brush to avoid "forgetting" them. Then you hear the little heart gallop pretty well for a bit, until The Husband interrupts, then there's more static, then more heartbeat.

Click here to get your own player.



Settle in, you guys. I have 6 more days of first trimester, and I intend to use that time to get all the suppressed b*tching for the last 2 months off my (recently much enlarged) chest.
But through the nauseous misery that has taken over my life, I am thrilled.