Keepin' it real

This is a post I've wanted to do for a long time. I think as women, and moms in particular, we tend to compare ourselves to others. I do this all the time, and it's never good for the self esteem. There is always going to be someone that does something better than I do. This was especially the case as I adjusted from working part time and having one child to staying home full time with two. Life gets crazy. Days fly by in a blur of laundry and baby care and feeding little mouths over and over. 

I feel much more comfortable now with this job life I've chosen. I've (mostly) accepted that all things cannot be as they were pre-kids. There are messes every time I turn around. I drive myself crazy picking them up. But that's just how I am. I know I function much better in neat, organized spaces. Clutter stresses me out. I'm a better mom if my house stays relatively clean. I know we all aren't wired that way, and it may appear that I have it all figured out. But let me tell ya, I never post pics on my blog of the constant messes that pop up (and sometimes stay) in my home. So that's what I'm gonna do today. I'm gonna keep it real. Because as fellow moms we should encourage, not compare. And we should be able to laugh at ourselves and embrace our quirks. Here are mine. 

This is an example of how I'm wired. I physically cannot have magnets or artwork on the fridge. It just doesn't work for me. I know to some of you that seems selfish, but it's just how I am. We painted a magnetic wall in the playroom where the boys can hang their art, so my kitchen stays clutter free. And I promise, my boys are still happy and functioning. :)

Also, my bed must be made every morning. With many pretty pillows. It just makes me happy so I do it.

And when my bed is neat, it makes the whole upstairs seem cleaner. 

 

However, I do not make Ty's bed for him. This drives me absolutely bonkers, but I just don't go in his room very often. He is technically supposed to make it, but it doesn't happen. So there ya go; a messy, not pretty, real photo.

My bathroom cannot have stuff on the counters. That's what drawers and cupboards are for. Plus, I need a peaceful escape from...

Yup. Here it is. The worst of my "real" photos. Our playroom on a very bad day. Hubby and I were just discussing this morning how awful it is right now. It stays pretty neat for a while, then somehow everything just explodes in there. So I close the door. This room is tucked in the farthest upstairs corner of our house, so it's easy to forget about the mess. Until I walk by to do laundry. Which is why I close the door. This works for maybe a week, then I can't sleep and I have to spend a morning in there putting everything back. And the cycle begins again. 

This is our 'bottom of the stairs basket'. Back before we had kids it was filled with pretty silk hydrangea and served no function. Now I can't live without it. All day long I'm picking up things that don't belong downstairs, so they go in the basket. Then it gets embarrassingly full like this, I walk past and pretend not to see it for a while, and finally cart the thing upstairs and find all kinds of stuff we were missing. 

But as long as my kitchen table is clear I can live with the stair basket. It's all about balance. ;) Or, well, keeping one's OCD habits to just a few areas. By the way, no children are allowed to sit on the red chairs. That's why we have the bench. I'm not a fan of the "ugly furniture until the kids move out" policy. Just another quirk. 

But then look at this. Hubby bought me this desk so I could close it up and make it look pretty when not in use. But even when I'm not sewing much it seems to always be in use. Do you like the linty bits all over the top? And the fabric scraps? And the unsewn coffee cozies? This is why I need a craft room. Then this mess can hide from the rest of the house. Creativity needs a little freedom... my type A, OCD-ness doesn't always carry over into my craftiness. Sometimes. But not always. 

Yikes. I still can't believe I'm posting this pic. I very well may chicken out and delete it before I publish this post. Our pen/junk drawer is usually messy. But at least my counters are not cluttered. That's the problem, I think.... all the stuff that gets left on the counter I stick in this drawer. Nail files, lipgloss, headphones, checkbook, hairbands, lotion, sunglasses....  I don't want to look at it so into the drawer it goes. I'll clean it out next week. Or the next. Weird how we have our hot spots like this. Please tell me you have them too. 

I vacuum my hardwoods four to five times a week. Mop them at least twice. Two to three loads of laundry every day, and each load is almost always folded and put away immediately. All shirts are hung up by category. Everything else gets put neatly into drawers. Myself, because if I let my five year old put it away, the drawers would be messy. Heck, if I let my husband put it away the drawers would be messy. And clothing drawers have to be neat. But this drawer. This drawer can be messy. Why is that? And my car. My car is always messy. Is it because I don't love my car? I don't love my toilets and they are always clean. 

Tell me about your OCD habits. And tell me what's messy in your house. Please.

And I hope you enjoyed seeing my messes. :)

Sewing desk

I cautiously dream of the day Beckham is old enough to sleep in a big boy bed. I'm hesitant because I remember this transition with Ty; it was frustrating at times. Also because he is my baby. And once he's a "big boy", I'm not sure that I'll be having more babies. So I cling to this time a little bit. 

But here is my plan:

When he can sleep well in a big boy bed, we will move him into Ty's room and they can share the bunk bed. Which I think they will love. At least for a while.  Then, I get to turn his room into my craft room!! I'll pull my big, antique scrapbooking/craft desk out of it's squishy corner of the playroom and move it in there. I need some big bookshelves, with bins and baskets and organized, gorgeous things. Maybe a big table for cutting fabric or gift wrapping. Then I can add my new sewing desk! 

Hubby bought it for me last weekend after my beloved kitty died. Got her as a kitten when I was 18. She lived to be 13 years old. I know. Not gonna dwell on it. It's already been a rough week. But it took me a while to feel like blogging again. And poor hubby felt my sadness and I know he wanted to take it away... so he did what he knew would cheer me up. He bought something for me. Something that had to do with sewing. And organization. Two of my favorite things. He really is a genius. 

Pretty! 

Excuse the annoying flash circle. Of course I waited until dark to photograph it. 

So it has this pull down front that becomes the desk, but folds up so I can hide my sewing machine and accoutrements when not it use. Looks so much cleaner than having my machine sitting out on our computer desk all the time. Still not completely ideal in the office, but it's very functional for the next year or two until I can create my own space.

Isn't it great?! It's designed to be a computer desk, but works well for my purposes. I've been working on organizing all my supplies as well... luckily our office has a walk-in closet so I have shelves and baskets in there for all my fabric. But my big problem has been my button collection. It's grown immensely thanks to my wonderful grandmas who each gave me their collections! And since I've been making so many coffee cozies with a button on each, I've been needing a good system for sorting them. 

So check back soon to see my potential solution. I'm pretty-ing it up as we speak. :)

A week of Ruby: day 8

For weeks I pondered a creative way to present all the fun gifts for Ruby to my SIL at her shower. I wanted something somewhat useful, rather than just another gift bag. But I couldn't come up with anything unique!

So there it was, the day before her shower, which also happened to be my birthday. After some shopping at Lush, we were driving home for Beckham's nap, and Mike had this sudden inspiration. 

"Don't we still have that brown storage ottoman around somewhere?"

"yeeahh...."

"let's spray paint it and recover the top, then put all the gifts inside!!"

Ahhh, my brilliant and endlessly creative hubby. Love him.

We just so happened to be within a mile or so of a huge fabric store, so we stopped. And I just so happened to stumble upon the prettiest fabric!!

I sent Mike to the hardware store while B napped for some spray paint...

then after getting home from my wonderful birthday dinner and putting the boys to bed, I got to work.

So, here is the before pic (but I had actually started priming it already- almost forgot to take the pic!)...

....and after it was mostly primed...

Here is the lid after I covered it with new fabric! This was so easy- just lots of pulling the fabric tight and a staple gun. 

And the finished product! Didn't realize how blurry this photo turned out...

But you can see it better here. Pretty, right?! It sure made a cute gift box!

It's been so much fun sharing all these projects with you, my dear 13 loyal readers! ;)

Promise to lay off the sewing posts for a while... although I have some fun stuff up my sleeve. All in good time. :)

Ten Tasks Challenge: day 10!

Well, here it is... the 10th day of this challenge. 

I did pretty good! Completed nine of my ten tasks... That darn sign was my problem. It's an overwhelming project. And I really need hubby's help with it, which pretty much means the weekend. But I will try to get on it, really soon! And I promise to post a photo of one so you can see what I'm talking about.

Here's the rundown:

1. Sign (see lame excuse above)

2. Plant lettuce- did that last week, it's looking great! And still slug-free!

3. Paint $1 garage sale bookshelf

This was coming apart in the back, dusty, and a very unattractive oak-like laminate. I nailed it back together, cleaned it off and did a somewhat lazy job painting it, then spraying with varnish.

But for $1 it looks great! And gives us more shelf space for toys and books in Beckham's closet.

4. Reorganize boy's books

Now that I have another shelf in Beckham's closet, I was finally able to sort through some of Ty's books and pull out all the baby ones that are just to young for him. 

So now Beckham has a few more books to "read", and Ty has a tiny bit more room in his shelves. 

Oh, gosh. Never mind. That still looks terrible. But it's actually better than it was! I'll keep working on it...

5. Get fabric to finish Ty's quilt

YES! Got it! And actually finished the whole thing!! I'm so happy to have that project done. 

We had a set of orange sheets for our queen bed that we never used (funny how orange seemed practical once), so I cut them up and turned them into a twin set for Ty's bed. There was enough fabric left over to use as squares in the quilt and for the little throw pillow. 

I love the guitar fabric. Perfect for my little music lover.

6. Sew coffee cozy

I love how these turned out!! And especially how easy they are!

7. Make a few batches of baby food

Done... at the last second. Just finished this up about an hour ago! And it was actually only one big batch of brown rice and veggies. But Becks is eating a lot more grown-up food these days, so we aren't needing as much puree'd food. 

8. Update Beckham's baby book/ work on scrapbook

SO relieved to have this done/started! I have the baby book completely up to date, which I have been putting off for way too long. And I finished ten (yes TEN!) pages in his scrapbook!! That's a ton! It occurred to me the other day that I had Ty's entire first year documented in two scrapbooks by his first birthday party. We brought them to display. So... I was having a lot of guilt that I'd barely started Beckham's and his first birthday party is in a month and a half! I still have a long way to go on this, but just having started makes it easier to keep progressing. 

9. Clean cushions on patio furniture

Yeah... this didn't go so well. We tried a borax/dish detergent/water mixture on them, and I don't really think it made much difference. Thanks to some great comments on my last post, I now have a few other options to try!

10. Come up with a system for Ty's chores

I'm so excited about this! I put it off until literally this morning! And look how cute it turned out!

It's an old cookie sheet! I just cut a piece of scrapbook paper to fit and decorated it a bit, then added Ty's daily and weekly chores. We are going to hang it somewhere, then he can use the magnets (which I need to make cuter) to mark off his chores as they are completed. 

Thanks to The Shabby Chic Cottage for hosting this challenge that really helped motivate me! 

Ten Tasks in Ten Days Challenge

I'm hoping this is the motivation I need to accomplish a few nagging tasks that I've been putting off. Gina at The Shabby Chic Cottage is hosting this challenge: I will be finding ten tasks to tackle and listing them on my sidebar, starting tomorrow. At five days, participants will link up on her blog to show our progess, and again at ten days to show off our completed tasks!

Check back tomorrow to see my list... I'll be updating over the next ten days with my progress so please hold me accountable!

Nursing cover and baby frame

Today I am very excited to announce......



I finally have my VERY OWN sewing machine!!!
How have I lived this long without one?!

Thanks to my grandma, who bought a new sewing machine and decided to buy one for my mom as well.
And thanks to my mom, who decided to give me hers!
Any projects I've ever done have been either sewn by hand, or by spending hours at my parents' house, borrowing my mom's machine. But this is so great; now I can sew at night when the boys go to bed!

I've been caught up in a happy little sewing frenzy. I don't think my husband is all that happy about it. I've made 2 trips to Craft Warehouse and one trip to Joanne Fabric. I've cut up Minkee fleece in our living room leaving fuzzies absolutely everywhere. I've spent the last several evenings glued to my new toy and basically ignored him. But look what I made!

Can you tell what it is? It's hard to photograph, but it's a nursing cover! I have one already, which I love and use all the time, but I've been wanting another one for when mine is in the wash. I just happened to have some leftover fabric from when I sewed our Christmas stockings (at my mom's-- with her help), but it's not really a Christmas-y fabric.... so it made a perfect nursing cover! The boning for the top and the D-rings for the neck strap cost about $3 total! Plus I added a little pocket for Beckham's pacifier.

I've been working on a couple other projects as well; we'll see how they turn out! Check back soon!


One other thing I am super excited to share....
My friend made me this gorgeous frame for Beckham's room!

Didn't it turn out great?
We did his footprints today. Here's my advice: Don't try to footprint a 9-month-old baby.
I really meant to order this and footprint him when he was much smaller, but months got away from me, so here are his giant footprints that were almost impossible to get!
But I'm so thrilled with how it turned out, and it looks so cute in his room. Thanks a ton, Mel!
Click here for her Etsy store.

My home-improvement wish list

The main reasons, and there are several, that I'm often running on very little sleep are as follows:

1. A very loud frog has recently relocated to the green space behind our house. I can hear him all hours of the night, with windows closed, all the way upstairs in our master bedroom.

2. My husband snores. A lot. Also very loudly.

3. No brainer here; I have a baby. He still gets up to nurse. I know, I should work on phasing out these feedings, but every time we start making progress he comes down with an awful cold or ear infection and I feel too bad leaving him to cry.

4. Our 4-year-old comes into our bed way too often. And it's a queen-size. Gets a little squishy. I sometimes go sleep in his bed and we did not splurge on the expensive mattress. Rookie mistake.

That being said, last night I found myself 'Sleepless' for an entirely different reason; one I imagine is very common among us women, moms in particular. My to-do list played endlessly, over and over and over in my mind. Not my mundane daily to-do's; I am actually ahead of the game this week and caught up on chores. This was that big list of wishes-- if only I had the money and time, here's what I would do.

Our laundry room is in desperate need of a makeover. I really hate the wire shelves; they look messy, stuff falls through the cracks, things don't stand up right on them. Drives me nuts. But my perfectionist husband wants nice wood cabinets, the kind you would put in a kitchen or bathroom. Of course, I love that idea, it would look great. But it's very low on the budget priority list. I'd settle happily for inexpensive white laminate cabinets!

I am embarrassed to admit that this swatch of pink has been painted for a year and a half. I am also embarrassed to admit that it is in my laundry room. When we (happily) found out Beckham was a boy, I decided I needed something feminine in this house of boys. The laundry room is the only place that is mine and mine alone! Honestly, not my favorite room, but it's mine. And I wanted it to be pretty. I got the cute pink garbage can above, I hung my 'Le Boot' picture, and I painted this pink square to see if I liked it. Which I did. And still do. And yet it's still a tiny square. Goal for the summer: 

Buy gallon of Miller Divine Berries and Beans, and get to painting. 

Another shameful admission of mine: We moved into this house before we were even pregnant with Beckham, but we decorated his nursery and still to this day have done almost nothing with Ty's room. Bad, bad mommy. Honestly, we just struggled with inspiration. His fav color at the time was orange, so we got this cool chair which I really like. And he really, really loves music, so we wanted to do a rockstar room, but the orange is hard to work with. I've been looking on Etsy for some cool fabric so I can sew him a coverlet, and I found some that I think will work. We have a bit of a vision finally, so I hope to be posting 'Ty's Room Makeover' soon!

Second goal for the summer: paint, fabric and accessories for Ty's room.

I know my kitchen doesn't look too bad, and there isn't a whole lot I want to change. But we bought this house short-sale because the builder went bankrupt (as so many have done lately). Great deal for us, but you can tell where he started running out of money because he did some cheap finishes that drive me crazy. I really don't like the countertops. Or the short little backsplash. 

And it has always bugged me that the lower cabinets don't fill this space.

Or this one. 

Two strange, empty walls. Like he decided to save money by cutting out a few cabinets. I've always wanted to track down the company that made these and order two lower ones when we finally decide to redo the counters. I think it would be a relatively inexpensive fix, would look so much nicer, and give me more cabinet and counter space! Definitely a long-term goal, but it runs around my mind nonetheless. 

I have this really cool antique craft/scrapbook desk, which has a rolltop. But the rolltop is broken. I love the idea of getting deep into in a craft project and being able to leave out my mess and just close the top so it looks neat! I've tried fixing the thing myself but it seems almost impossible. I think we need to find some sort of wood expert who could repair it for us.

I also have this secret hope that when Beckham gets a little older, we could buy bunk beds for the boys and they could share a room. Then instead of having a "craft corner" in the playroom, I could have my very own craft ROOM!!! This idea absolutely thrills me. Literally keeps me up at night. I could have a sewing table. And a gift wrap table. With wooden dowels to hold all my wrapping paper and ribbons. And floor-to-ceiling shelves, filled with gorgeous, crafty things. In little glass jars, with labels. And PINK walls!

Oh, the possibilities.....

Really cool wall art

My great friend, Mel, makes the coolest, most unique frames. Kind of like a floating scrapbook page. She has an Etsy shop, SmileMakerMemories, where you can order a pre-made frame or have her custom design one for you. The art is sandwiched between two pieces of glass so your wall color shows through. Here are a couple of my favorites:

Sooo cute for a little boy's room! Or girl! Lovin' the zoo animals!

This is actually one I ordered for my cousin's little baby girl... how sweet are those tiny footprints?!

I just think this one is so cool. It's painted with chalkboard paint; wouldn't it make a great little bulletin for your grocery or things-to-do list? So much prettier than a dry erase board. 

This one gets ordered by a lot of military families;  the red stripes are actually ribbon. Sooo pretty, and a really cool keepsake. 

Playroom Fun!

Our playroom desperately needed a makeover. I suppose playrooms, by definition, should be full of toys and messes, and ours certainly was. Still is. But it was so uninviting that I never wanted to play in there with Ty. So we decided it needed a few little fixes. We managed to find an inexpensive couch so I would have a comfy place to nurse Beckham; we painted the walls a really fun, wild green; got rid of some of the toys; and then the fun began. I've always liked the idea of chalkboard paint, but hated the idea of my messy four-year-old running rampant with chalk. I saw in a magazine not long ago a playroom with a magnet wall and loved the idea! So we went on a search for magnetic paint. Home Depot carried it, but in a spray can, which seemed a bit messy for me.... So we checked Fred Meyer, who had the paint-on kind. It's basically a dark gray primer that you can paint any color over. We masked a large (8'x3') rectangle and painted 2 coats of the primer, then covered it in an even wilder green. Now Ty has a huge surface to play with his magnets, practice spelling, reading, and math. Plus it really livens up the wall!
I also bought some cheap, white shelves at Ikea and painted them red for some great contrast against the green walls. Then the boys finger-painted 4 canvases to display on the shelves. Well, Ty finger painted 3 canvases and I smeared Beckham's fingers through some red paint on the fourth. What a mess! But so much fun, Ty is so proud, and they look so cute in the playroom!