featured.

I'm so excited! Tennyson's Nursery was featured by another design blog. Fun fun fun! The name of the blog is Opal Never Shouts. You can go here to read what they had to say. Happy weekend everyone!

I can't believe that my favorite part of the nursery is actually here.

UPDATES:

* Kort is talking too much in class and getting into trouble for it...I'm tempted to be frustrated, but honestly, I'm even more tempted to be grateful that we made it a whole week before his "overly-social-behavioral-problems" started... with my energy level and current emotional state, I'm inclined to take what I can get! He also lost his Spiderman lunch box today. All I have to say to that is...well...bygones.

* Nursing is still really hurting on the right side, but at least it's manageable. The left side feels FINE now. How cool is that?

*Tentens is sleeping for a FIVE hour block now from 1:00 a.m. to 6:00 a.m.! Yay! I LOVE it! (Needless to say.) It is so great. We had a little hiccup on Sunday night where I only got an hour and a half the. whole. night. But, MERCIFULLY, he went right back to sleeping a five hour block. I feel like that amount of sleep is allowing me to operate sanely throughout the day.

*Tentens has TOTALLY grown out of his newborn stuff. I can't believe he is growing so fast! It's a great reminder to cherish every moment I have with Tiny-Tentens...because this stage is so, so terribly fleeting.

*Tennyson cried a little bit here and there during his first week of life, and now, he cries pretty much not at all. He puts out a few whimpers and cries when he's ready to eat, but that's the extent of it and I am SO grateful for that! We didn't think there was any chance of getting another baby who was as sweet and easy going as Kort was (and we had prepared ourselves for that) but, lo and behold, he is awesome! Yay for that.

* I have the best husband in the world. I don't know how women who have total turds for husbands do this. I guess they are just a lot cooler and stronger than I am... He is my rock, and the cutest dad ever. Tens is a huge fan, and so am I.

*Hot, hot, hot, H.O.T. and long, long, long, L.O.N.G showers are my very best friends.

*I haven't gotten dressed or "ready for the day" for 4 days straight now. I don't "do" anything other than nurse, rest, change a diaper, rest, nurse, load the dishwasher, take a nap, change a diaper, nurse, repeat... Sometimes this makes me feel guilty and like I am not contributing anything to our family...and like I am lazy. Then, I have to remind myself that I am single-handedly keeping a person alive every day. A p.e.r.s.o.n.(and a really, really cute one at that.) And that is enough for me. I may have to remind myself of this fact a lot, but it really IS significant when I stop to think about it.

Baby Bob's Nursery is being featured!

The lovely Nicole at Chic and Cheap Nursery has decided to make Baby Bob's nursery the "Nursery of the Week" on her awesome website! Yaaay! Be sure to go over there and leave some love! ALSO - if you click over there, you get to find out what Baby Bob's real name is going to be! Fancy that. ;)

(Lemme know what you think of the name...but only if it's nice. I am an overly-emotional, solid 40 weeks prego after all! You can be mean later...)

The nursery is finished!

I can hardly believe it, but it's really true. The nursery is finished! Let's pretend like someone actually cared enough (or that this nursery was actually chic/cutting-edge enough) for them to interview me about it mmmkay? It would go something like this:

So tell us, Lola, what kind of "feel" were you going for here?
Great question, imaginary home-decor blog interviewer! I wanted this nursery to look and feel as clean and fresh as possible. I hate clutter, and therefore wanted decorations to be sparse. I also wanted every piece of furniture included in the room to be functional. (You guys really like it when people use the word functional in their design strategy breakdowns, yes? Well, there it is. I wanted the room to be functional. Functional, functional, functional with a capital "F" baby!)

I love the wall color, what hue is that?
It's actually "ColorPlace" paint from good ol' Walmart. The color is called "Wading Pool." I picked ColorPlace paint because (as everyone in "the biz" already knows) it is the very highest standard of quality in the design world... okay, actually it's because it's costs $13.88 a gallon. That's one third the cost of Home Depot's "Behr" brand... (which, is probably leaps and bounds "better than" the cheap stuff, but to tell you the truth, I don't think my walls could tell the difference...) so um, money talked. I wanted the blue to be bright and fun and to somewhat resemble a refreshing swimming pool. I LOVE the robin's egg and turquoise trends that are popping up everywhere lately, and I LOVE the result!

Where did you get that cute orange pillow?
It was $4.99 at Target.

Where did you get those DARLING dog silhouette paintings?

I made them. I bought 2 "3 packs" of 16x20 canvases at Robert's Crafts with a 40% off coupon. So, it cost right around $20 for 6 canvases (I have two left over for projects I have planned for Kortland's room) I painted 3 white and 1 black and then googled "free dog silhouette clip art" and found the one you see here. This little pup looks just like our dog Bella. I thought that would be fitting for the baby's room since Bella WORSHIPS Kortland and will no doubt worship Baby Bob as well. I printed out 4 silhouettes on photopaper, painted them black or white, glued them to the canvases and sprayed the junk out of them with a protective glaze by "folkart" ($3.75 for a large can at Robert's) I LOVE the look of unframed canvas, so we hung them "as is" and I am really happy with them!!!

And what about the sunburst mirror?
I really wanted a fun, modern feel in the nursery, and sunburst mirrors are both of those things. I also thought the baby would enjoy staring at it after waking up from his naps. The cost of a sunburst mirror online or in stores was the equivalent of what we spent on our entire nursery, so buying one outright wasn't an option. I found great diy instructions for one here at apartment therapy. And so I made it! It cost $11 total. Score!

Where did you get your curtains?

I got them at IKEA for $17 a set. I can't stand regular closet doors, so I always get two sets of curtains. One set for the window and one for the closet. These ones are actually shower curtains, but I loved the look of the rings at the top better than anything they had in the "actual curtains" department. They were a steal of a deal, but I wouldn't recommend them for two reasons.
1. They come REALLY long and un-hemmed so you have to measure, cut, and hem them yourself. Too much work. (Boo to that.)
and 2. The fabric is SUPER wrinkly and hard to iron. I ironed these babies for over two hours and they still don't look as nice as I'd like them to. I love how they look in the room, and loved the price tag even more, but consider yourself warned, they are a BEAST to get prepped.

I love the rocking chair, where did you get it?

I bought it at a yard sale for $2 over 6 years ago! Every time we have moved, the hubs has looked at me like, "Seriously...for reals?" when I insisted that it move with us from place to place, but I just loved it, and I couldn't get over what an exciting deal it was. It's like a trophy to me. It was a cute, vintage cream color, but that wouldn't match the rest of the nursery, so I sprayed it bright white. Did you know you can get cans of "ColorPlace" spray paint at Walmart for just .92 cents a can? Yay! This took two cans. The pillow was made with fabric from IKEA (oh, their fabric is simply glorious... glorious I tell you!!! I felt like a kid in a candy store.) It was $7 a yard. Insane.

And I see you are a fan of vinyl lettering.
No. I actually sort of hate it. (No offense or anything ya'll) I can't believe I used it in my little dude's nursery, but when I read that quote (at yes, Robert's Crafts again) I literally laughed out loud. (If you saw Kortland's bath water every night, you would understand why.) Truer words were never spoken, I swear! It HAD to be a part of our nursery. At this point in the process, it was way easier to just buy the existing medium rather than come up with and paint/print/make a sign with the quote on my own. I was tired ya'll. (And seriously, I LOVE how it turned out...so I guess I'm something of a vinyl lettering convert!)

Well, Lola thank you so much for giving us a peek into your nursery. I have to say, it is simply divine with capital D!
No, Thank YOU made-up (aka non-existent, imaginary, not real) home-decor-blog-interviewer! The pleasure was all mine for sure!

Um, pretty sure ya'll should best leave me some love on this one! I'm just sayin'...my heart and soul went into this sucker...are you really going to be so cruel as to NOT leave some comment love when a swollen pregnant girl's heart and soul is on the line? I think not ;) Love you!

So, finishing mah baybuh's nursery is what I did all day, what did you do? The girls at CG want to know! Link up and tell us mmmkay?!

sneak peak.

the nursery is painted!! (scream with me now - ahhhhhhhhh! woo-hoo! yaaaaay!)

the hubs is an absolute s.a.i.n.t. (a SAINT i tell ya)

do you know what i did? i picked the color, had him paint the entire first coat (while i was at the zoo with kort) and when i came home, do you want to know what i said? well, it was something along the lines of:

"oh no...i think i hate it...i've made a huge mistake... possibly the biggest little mistake of my life, wait, let me go look at it again...uh oh, I really don't think i like it... wait, maybe it's not so bad, let me go look at it again...oh geez...yep, totally hate it. hate it!"

so the hubs (being the amazing person that i love) said.

"that's okay, it can be like a primer coat."

then he drove to the store, bought the new paint color i selected, and repainted all over again.
no eye rolling coupled with numerous "i can't believe you's"
no sighs and grunts as he made his way out the door...
just a man of brawn and action.
bless that man of mine.

do you want to know who else is a saint? my dear, dear friend natasha who offered to come help me prep the room and start painting earlier last week, and was totally the CATALYST that got things moving in the right direction. do you want to know who else is a saint? our friend ben who helped the hubs paint while i was at the zoo.

we have such great friends...

everyone is excited. (especially the bub-meister...if you couldn't tell...)

i can't wait to show you the finished product! i will probably be m.i.a. a lil' bit throughout this week while i paint furniture, craft, recruit my mother in law to sew the crib bedding, and generally go nuts (in a good way) getting this little labor of love pulled together.

my back is in horrific amounts of pain,
my feet, ankles, and fingers have decided to get puffy
(which is freaking me out and making me feel panicky and claustrophobic)
and mr. baby bob is wiggling and jiggling and making all of us smile.

...and my nursery is painted!!!!!
(wait, i already said that, didn't i? yeah, well, it's sort of a big deal around here.)
i have a baby in my belly,
and he is healthy,
and wiggly,
and probably a lil' bit sassy just like his big brother,
and we are making a nursery for him.
and life is just really, really good.
the end.