Changin' Diapers.

Happy 25th Birthday to me. :)

This has been the best birthday ever.  Woke up at Bella Vie after a wonderful gift of 6 straight hours of sleep from the little one.  Had french toast, bacon (perfectly cooked - flimsy, just the way I like it!), egg, orange juice and coffee in bed with my best friend and my son.  Had a lovely herbal bath drawn for me and I soaked in the ginormous tub for a long while.  Was completely doted on and loved on by the amazing Bella Vie staff (my friends).

 

Just after the birth of my beautiful, sweet baby. 

Came home and snuggled all day with my adorable little family and fur babies too. :)

I am still just in awe of this amazingly sweet boy.  He is so precious. 

Happy Birthday to you, Ezekiel!              And Happy Birthday to Mommy.  :)

Ezekiel, one day old.  Me, one week old.

Who would have guessed that on my 25th birthday, I'd be changing my sons diapers... 

and then changing mine... :)

So thankful for these moments.

K

Welcome to this World

Welcome to this world, Ezekiel Pierce Anderson!

January 27, 2011 - 6:27 am

7 lbs 8 oz - 19 5/8 inches

 

Your mommy and daddy are so in love with you :)

Lost Generation

I love this.

40 Weeks and Still Kickin'.

Dearest Baby E,

You are 40 weeks old tomorrow.  Which means you can definitely come out any time now and make your grand debut.  I feel totally fine that you haven't come out yet.  Two weeks ago I wanted you out pretty badly.  That's because your (cute) little bunnies were shoved WAAAY up into my ribcage and yikes.  It was not a good feeling.  I couldn't get any relief from you!  And then..... you dropped. :D  And I feel awesome again!  (Thank you).  So, now I'm not near so anxious as I was before for you to come out.   Whenever you're good and ready. :)

When I was 37 weeks, daddy took me on a date for New Years Eve.  I told him I didn't want to do too much (my rib cage still hurt at this point), but he planned a surprise dinner to the conference center at Silver Falls!  He told me to get dolled up (which I did gladly because dresses are the most comfortable to wear), and he looked absolutely handsome in his slacks, dress shirt and tie!  We drove up to Silver Falls and it was like driving through Narnia - snow had fallen and the trees looked gorgeous in the moonlight.  I was excited as I saw where we were going.  You see, daddy works at the Salem Conference Center part-time and we are well aware of how fancy it is there.  Daddy wears slacks, a vest, dress shirt and tie when he works there!  We both thought we were in for a special treat.  When we arrived, we saw a few older couples walking out wearing cheesy plastic/paper New Years hats... We glanced at each other and got out of the car.  We made our way into the building and stopped in our tracks.  This conference center was NO Salem Conference Center.  It was like a lodge, which is great and all, but it was lined with cafeteria style tables and chairs, people were eating off of food trays and almost everyone in there was wearing jeans and sweatshirts.  The waitresses even had jeans and t shirts on.  One even went so far as to wear sweats.  All daddy knew about it was that it was supposed to be a very good buffet dinner and each person was $18.  Surely for $18 it had to be at least SOMEWHAT fancy...right??  Right?  (Well, one would think.  At least for this area.)  We giggled to each other and decided who cares?!  We are here to have fun, to have a date and we can just be the cute dressed up couple for the night!  The buffet food truly was incredibly delicious and totally worth the $18.  We found that the serving crew were all really friendly and chatty about our pregnancy.

 Daddy and his steak, potatoes, steamed veggies and salad

The chocolate mousse with raspberry sauce swans.  Daddy had 2 of these, plus finished 1/2 of mine.  He still will randomly tell me he wants a swan.

We were quite enjoying our dinner (even at the cafeteria table), and then came the cherry on top.  An older man and his wife were leaving the table across from us and as they were walking out, he leaned over to us and sincerely told us "I can tell that you two are a wonderful couple.  Congratulations on your baby!" and walked out.  That's the second time strangers just randomly came up to us to tell us we are a good couple.  It made my night. :)  After dinner, we went and sat on the couch by their fire for a while before we headed out back home.  Your daddy snapped a 37 week picture of me on the way out. 

Yes, darling.  I promise I'm wearing clothes under that jacket. :)  

But since you've grown more, you are making my dresses shorter and shorter!!

Since I've been sleeping on the lazy boy and napping on the futon more, Scooter has been sleeping with me more.  She loves when I sleep on the futon because she can curl up on my side and you are the perfect little "shelf" for her to sleep on!  See:

This is not a flattering picture of me, by any stretch of the imagination, but daddy thought it was precious and took this picture. :)

I got your room all put together a couple weeks ago!  It is now totally and officially ready for you!   Here is a cute picture of Scooter...she was checking out what I was doing while putting your clothes away in your armoire.  I think she is anxiously waiting for you, too. ;)

The girls are breaking in your changing table for you...

Just making sure it's soft enough for you...

Here's a [bad/blurry] picture of me at 38 weeks. 

And several of me now at 39 weeks...where you have dropped and it is quite noticeable!  I guess your bunnies are now near my belly button pushing outward, which makes me look way huge. (Thank you).

 Now you can see how low you sit!  Suck them bunnies in, child!

Thrilled to say I am 40 weeks and I can STILL fit in this pair of normal, pre-pregnancy jeans!!!

 With the help of a little elastic hair tie around the button to hold em up... :)

Does my tummy look lopsided to you?? This isn't near as drastic of a difference as it can be...This is because you are always perched on my right side. 

This is where you will sleep for the first few months of your life!  In mommy and daddy's room. :)  Isn't your cradle adorable?!  And even more special, your Grandpa Anderson put this cradle together 27 years ago for your aunt Chelsea to sleep in when she was born!  Then your daddy slept in it, your uncle Logan, and also your [slightly] older cousin Lincoln!  Now it's your turn. :)

 You remember how I said that daddy is awesome and has been so wonderful to me??  It's true!  Look at what he did for me (twice now)!  And not only that, but he did a GREAT job!  He didn't even need any polish remover to clean up any mistakes! 

I have been busily preparing for you - buying everything we'll need for you and keeping on top of house cleaning.  I also made dinners last week and we are good to go!  I have 2 bowls of chili, 2 bowls of Tex Mex bean dip/soup, 3 pans of lasagna, and 4 dishes of shepherd's pie!  I was pretty proud of myself for getting those all done. :)  

So, you see, little one.  We are ready.  For reals.  I cannot wait to hold you in my arms.  We have an awesome birth team at Bella Vie just waiting to greet you.  At my appointment this week, Patricia said that you are engaged and your head is nicely tucked to your chest!  Good work, baby!  This was one of the things I was concerned with...Pushing you out with your forehead up would surely prove to be a difficult task.  Thanks for doing what you need to do to come out...even though it's not early like I was thinking you might be.  But it's better this way.  You are just proving to us that you will fit in with our little family...by showing up late. :)   

I love you, babe!  You are so precious.  (Oh, and um...daddy keeps joking that it'd be funny if you used your fingernail to break my water...I think that wouldn't be so funny...He's already making me sleep with, drive with and sit with a waterproof pad, everywhere.  I'd really rather not make it worse by soaking it...thanks in advance!) 

Love you forever,

Your Momma K

A Whimsical Nursery for E

It's ready, finally.  (Ok, ALMOST finally...but close enough.  I have like 2 minor projects still to do, but they are no rush, thank goodness!!)  FINALLY, the cute little room is ready for it's [even cuter] occupant (whenever that occupant decides to show up, that is).

Welcome to the Baby's Room!

 

There's your general look around the room.  Now for some details and completed projects! :)

This cabinet was one of my painting projects.  It used to be a storage for towels in our bathroom at our last place, but with our teeny tiny bathroom at the new house, it really wouldn't have fit at all.  With a new paint job and new knob on the door, it matches the other furniture in the baby room and is a perfect place to store the diapers/bath stuff.  The purple bear on top is from my precious Grandma Grace.  I haven't found a very good spot for this bear yet, so for now it's just perched up there. :)  The little lion flag is from my mom, E's Grandma Miller.

I got inspiration for this artwork over the crib from here.  I already had the three canvases so I decided to use those.  They had old paintings I had done on them, so I just painted over them in white.  I bought the paper at JoAnns - it was a lucky find because it was the perfect green and blues!  I already had the green ribbon, so all together this project cost me less than a dollar!  Just the cost of about 5 sheets of paper. :)  

And then the "mobile"... :) It started out with me wanting to do this bird mobile.  Then I happened to find this adorable little chandelier in Salvation Army for only $1.50!!! And, the sucker that I am for chandelier's over beds, I bought it and knew it'd have to hang over E's crib. :)

This is the one that hangs above our bed:

Anyway, once I found the chandelier, my thoughts of the mobile started changing...and I kept finding the perfect pieces to make it complete.  I found the perfect sized candles ("emergency" candles) at the Dollar Tree, found the "medallion" (just a paper stick on in this case) for $2 at Aunt Bee's, and found the little birdies in the $1 bin at Michael's.  All together, this mobile cost me less than $10, which I was pretty happy about. :)  The candles, though the right height, were very squat.  So Skyler had to whittle the ends down so they would stay in their places and then we also hot glued them in so that they definitely wouldn't fall out.  I was NOT looking forward to whittling 8 candles, but Skyler jumped up and goes, "man, I would love to whittle those!"  And I placed them in his hands with glee.  Go for it, my love!  Here he is, hard at work...thoroughly enjoying himself. :)

And hanging my medallion:

He swore he was DONE drilling hooks into the ceiling after this one!  (Plaster isn't the best to drill holes into...) I assured him this was the last thing I would make him hang!! (Until I happen upon another gorgeous chandelier, that is! ;)

This is my sewing table gone changing table!  The sewing machine is tucked away in the baby's closet so I can still pull it out fairly easily. :)  Stocked on the shelves are my adorable G Diapers that I picked up and some disposable diapers too - which will definitely come in handy the first few weeks as I'm sleep deprived, I'm sure. ;) 

This is my awesome rocking horse find!!  I found this cute little guy at Salvation Army, the same time I found the chandelier, and picked it up for only $2.50!!  It looked a lot uglier and had a nasty sticky yarn mane and tail.  This is what it looked like then:

I have yet to replace the mane and tail, because I have a few ideas in my brain about those...and I want to think about them some more before I commit to one over the other. :)  But I think he already looks much cuter!!

This is the wall o' trinkety things! :) (From the top left to right) A little, adorable green clock from "grandma" Candy, a little white bird from auntie Krista, a Scentsy (baby powder) lion from dear friend Maegan, the adorable Baby E picture frame from my cousin Andrea, little red shoes that Skyler wore when he was a baby, some E's and a bird house, some little books and the Dr. Seuss ABC book Skyler gave me for Christmas 2 years ago, another birdie, a mirror and a soap.  The soap is a really cool find from St. Vinnie's in Albany.  I picked it up, gasped and immediately put it in my cart!  See it:

It says "La Belle Vie"... we are giving birth at Bella Vie!!  I just knew it had to make a presence in E's room somewhere. :)

This little lamp was a garage sale find from early last summer, and I saw the idea of using a stool as a little side table at the Blackberry Junction in North Albany (a craft/vintage decor junction).  The one I saw was actually this exact same stool, and I immediately ran over to mom to ask if dad still had this stool out in his shop.  We used to have it LONG ago in our house at the kitchen bar area but I thought I remembered seeing it just sitting out in dad's shop not too long ago.  Mom snagged it from dad's shop for me and I had Skyler sand it, putty some holes in the top and then I painted it.  Looks much lovelier now, no?  Before:

 I love it.  It's just exactly the right height and size for that small space by the rocking chair!  Which leads me to the rocking chair... This was a total score.  I found this rocking chair at a garage sale for $5 this summer!! I LOVED it immediately.  But I wasn't sure Skyler would approve because space in the baby's room was limited and I knew it would have to go in front of the closet in the room, and I knew we already had the rocker/glider out in the living room.  I stared at it and sat in it and pondered for about 10 minutes before finally deciding, "heck it's $5.  It's mine."  It had the same "s" curved legs as the rocker that we used to have when I was little - the rocker that mom used to rock us babies in.  I bought it, loaded it up in the car and THEN called Skyler to tell him that I bought the chair.  His response, "awesome! Good work, baby!" ... hm perfect.  Good reaction. :)  He loves the old wooden chair just as much as I do!  As with anything else, all it needed was a good little paint job! 

Before:

Skyler workin hard:

(And you can see he painted the chandelier at the same time :D)

The little seat cushion I made from left over fabric when I made the curtains.  The curtains were actually 2 GINORMOUSLY large window scarfs...I was able to make each scarf into 2 floor length curtains AND still have about 4 feet of fabric left over from each one.  I lucked out with the curtains really.  I hadn't totally decided on anything for the baby room at this point and was really thinking of a white or tan carpet for the room...but of course room rugs are like $80-100 at least (yikes).  I was in Ross one day and saw the scarfs ($6.99 each and I only needed 2 scarfs for 4 window panels) and thought they were perfect, but wished they were in white...so I left them there.  Then I wandered to where they keep their room rugs and saw this blue one (5'x7') for only $40!!  It matched the scarfs perfectly, so it was decided right then...Green and blue (my fave colors anyway) would be the main room colors.  And cheap to boot for a rug AND window treatments!!  

This was another one of my painting projects - the baby armoire.  This was my sisters, my brothers and mine when we were little, then was mine again in high school, and then was both my niece and nephews.  All it needed was a new paint job and new knobs (brass flowery ones?? no thank you!)

The bird painting was a wedding present from our friend Victoria and I love it!  I love the color that it adds to the room. :) The mini bib is from my dear friend Jess and the colorful dish is from my Grandma Grace.  And of course, our smallest little family member, our pretty Beta fish Turquoise (or Turkey for short). 

And there it is.  A room all clean and decorated for E.... So little one...whenever you want to come...seriously.  We're ready for you. :)

Love, K

My Homemade Christmas

This year, after having spent the year reading several really fun blogs, I saw some really cool ideas for homemade gifts!  So, I decided to try out a few (or more than a few) for Christmas this year.  It was very fun and I *think* the recipients liked them.  However, I learned a good lesson: if you're going to do "homemade"- start early!!! ;)  My cousin and friend, Andrea, asked that I post up the homemade gifts that I tried this year...so here goes!

Homemade Hot Cocoa Mix & Marshmellows

Marshmellows from here.

Hot Cocoa Mix

8 Cups Powdered Milk

4 Cups Confectioner's Sugar

1 1/2 Cups Unsweetened Cocoa

1 Cup Non-Dairy Powdered Creamer (I used Vanilla flavored)

The marshmellows were so fun to make!  I love making things that you normally wouldn't think twice about just buying from the grocery store, but are surprisingly easy to make on your own!  Skyler (the Chemist) thought his wife was so cool for trying to make her own marshmellows and helped me with them (luckily) because they were pretty sticky and I had a hard time scraping the mixing bowl to put them in the pan!  This recipe made enough to fill 2 and 1/2 mason jars.

Barbecue Spice Rubs

I made this gift for my two brother in law's who both are grill masters. :)

The spice rub recipes came from this awesome book I got from the Library called Simply Homemade Food Gifts, which is an awesome book that I really should just buy and add to my collection!

Also from this book, I made:

Chai Tea Mix

There were several other awesome recipes in the book that I would love to try out, but didn't have the time this year.  Other recipes in the book I wanted just for myself, such as a couple syrups, scones and cookie recipes...mmm.  I'll have to re-check it out sometime after the baby comes. :)

Personalized Notes

I had to be creative with some of my gift giving for my brother and his girlfriend this year, since they are living in Texas.  I didn't want to make anything too heavy that they wouldn't be able to take back home easily.  I saw these online somewhere and thought they were so cute, so I made quick designs in Illustrator and printed them out on 5x7 blank index cards.

Peppermint Sugar Hand Scrub

From here. Except instead of lemon, I used Peppermint Essential Oil (just a few drops).  It smelled wonderful!  I'm going to have to make some for myself soon. :) I got the 4 pack of small spoons from TJ Maxx for $3.99.  Overall probably cost $2 - $3 for each scrub.  Not bad :)


Seasonal Word Blocks

These blocks are SO cool!!  I saw this blog early last year and wanted to make some for myself, but just haven't yet gotten around to it.  I thought this would be a good lightweight gift for my brother's girlfriend!  Even though they are wood, they are surprisingly lightweight and I'd be surprised if all seven blocks together weighed more than a pound.  I found the blocks at Craft Warehouse here in Salem.  Some day this year, I'll make some for myself too.  Just makes sense - I HATE getting out, decorating and then putting away season decor.  The only exception I make is for Christmas...and it's minimal.  So, to have one "decor" that works for many seasons just makes sense for me. :)


Sweater Scarf

From here.  Unfortunately, this is NOT the scarf I made - I forgot to take a pic of the one I made!!  The one I did was out of a brown sweater and I used large wooden buttons for it.  I will also be making one of these for myself. :) Too cute!


Crayon Roll Carrying Case

I made this for my 3 year old nephew this year, after seeing it here.  I gave him a some craft gifts (new coloring book and fuzzy coloring poster, etc) so I thought this would go along with the "craft" themed gift. :)  This was surprisingly easy to make and I actually did it at about 4 am on Christmas Eve morning when I woke up and couldn't fall back asleep.  (Thanks baby E!)


Monogrammed Luggage Tag

Don't pay too close attention to my terrible stitching...this was also made at 4 am and I had the worst time trying to go around the curvy letter in my sleepy nature.... :)

We gave my brother a new carry on luggage this year, so I thought this new monogrammed luggage tag from here was appropriate!  Aside from my personal issues with the J, this was very easy to sew together! 


Homemade Irish Cream Liquor

Also forgot to take a picture, so photo is from here, where I also got the recipe!

This recipe made so much!!  I got different bottles than shown and made one for each brother in law (I think they were about 16 oz.).  I had enough left over just from one batch to completely fill up a Nalgene bottle which now remains in our fridge.  Skyler didn't complain.... :) 


Fabric Covered Thumbtacks

These are so cute and I thought would be great little stocking stuffers. :)  I made some for my mom, sister, soon to be sister in law (Shannon) and my friend Jen.  Super quick and easy too.  I'm going to make some for the corkboard I have in the living room in the toile fabric that I made my mom's out of.

Lavender/Rose Flax Seed Warming Bags

I had made one of these warming bags for my sister in law earlier in the year so I decided to make them for my sister, mom and Shannon also. :) I tried to be all cute and add a few buttons to them, and as soon as I stitched them all on, Skyler comes home and goes, "I'm not sure that the buttons will be ok in the microwave...but they are super cute with them on though!" (Yeah, my husband called my craft "super cute"!) So I tested one in the microwave (I originally thought they'd be ok because you microwave other plastics...) but after 30 seconds I pulled it out and realized that this was DEF not ok.  They were all soft and rubbery...so after they cooled I pulled them all off. *sigh* :)


Cup Cozies

 I had seen this tutorial long ago, but forgot about it until my friend Jess started making some cup cozies for her coworkers!  I found these "not a paper cup" cups and thought it'd be a nice gift together. :)  You know, cuz I'm earthy like that.  Then I packaged them up with a few of the instant coffee packs.


Husband Wallet

Finally, a little simple homemade gift for Skyler.  I saw this quite a while ago and didn't save the link so I have no idea who's idea it was...I did the "12 Dayt's of Christmas" - one date for each month of 2011.  Especially with the baby coming, I wanted to make sure we planned dates and special outings (some including and some excluding the baby).  I made a "wallet" out of cardstock paper and I just stitched the sides together, and made the "money" date coupons on Word, printed and cut them out.  Skyler has this nicely tucked away in his nightstand now. :)

And that, (I THINK) are all the homemade gifts I did this year.  All the ones I can remember anyway. :)  I can't wait for next year - it will be so fun making gifts for our baby! I already have a few ideas... :)

Did you make homemade gifts this year??  If you did, let me see!!!!

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Love, K