Since the new “nursery” is more of a playroom than an actual nursery (I’m still debating whether or not we’re buying a second crib – so far, “no” is winning) I’m way less interested in making it perfect than making it fun and functional. At the same time, I feel sort of bad that Baby Girl is going to be forced to share her space from the very beginning with an older brother so I’m putting a lot of effort money thought into special touches just for her. I mean, it’s SUPER AWESOME that we’ve already banished most of the ugly, plastic, music playing toys to the second floor, but it also means a pale pastel princess color scheme is totally out of the question. Good thing I was already into the idea of bright colors.

Instead of boring the crap out of you with hundreds of individual posts explaining every step of each project, I’m going to do them in weekly (bi-weekly? monthly? OMG it can’t be monthly because I only HAVE a month left to finish all of this DEEP BREATHS DEEEEEEEEP BREATHS) round-ups.

Project 1: Find a way to display the vintage embroidered bib my mom saved from my (her?) childhood

I *think* it’s a cow surrounded by flowers. Or maybe a vase. Or maybe I’m still high on spray adheisive.

Since the bib is sort of pastel and the room is mostly bright, I wanted a bright frame to put it in.

Green frame from Target: $6.99, tiny fabric squares: free from my swag bag at The Creative Connection, but I’ve seen them at Joann’s for a few bucks a pack

Then I used the spray adhesive to stick the little squares to a piece of off-white cardstock.

I KNOW YOU ARE SO AMAZED RIGHT NOW.

Then I put the bib on the fabric/paper and popped the whole thing in the frame.

And now I have a lovely, girly, almost-free piece of art for the new nursery

Project 2: DIY Ribbon Mobile

I did not come up with this idea, not by a long shot. A Google image search for “ribbon mobile” brings up tons and tons of slightly different versions and it’s not like you NEED instructions. But I learned a few things in my attempt so I’m going to post a tiny how-to.

I only ended up using the larger embroidery hoop and even though I did spray paint it yellow I didn’t really need to. You don’t see enough of the hoop for it to matter.

Figure out how long you want the mobile to be and cut ribbon to approximately twice that length. DON’T go out of your way to make it perfect, since the uneven lengths is what makes it sort of whimsical

I discovered that the thinner the ribbon, the easier it was to work with. I actually gave up on the wide orange kind because it kept coming unlooped. The grosgrain mid-sized ribbon also worked very well once I figured out how to tie it. I originally bought a bunch of ribbon at the fabric store but found MUCH cheaper options at Michael’s – 50 cents a spool with tons left over.

You would think randomly choosing the color order would make life easier, but instead I spent far too long worrying there was too my orange or pink in any one section

In theory, all you have to do to secure the ribbon to the hoop is hold it double, wrap the end where the ribbon is folded around the hoop, then pull the ends through until it’s tight. But with anything thicker than 1/8th inch ribbon, it’s hard to pull it tight enough to make it stay – and I was NOT looking forward to gluing each one individually. So what works is after you pull the ribbon through the loop end, take the free end and pull it through the loop again on the right side. It makes sort of a little knot without changing the way it looks too much.

Ta-da! Beautiful, one of a kind ribbon mobile for the nursery

Project 3: Chalkboard tray as door sign

I used to collect vintage trays and display them as wall art in my living room, so when I saw a chalkboard tray in the Pottery Barn catalog I thought it was a super cute idea. And one that is obviously so ridiculously easy there is no way anyone should bother to buy the one from PB for $200 (sadly, I can’t find the tray online to link to, but it was in the Thanksgiving issue.)

Supplies: totally NON-vintage tray I bought for 10 cents at church rumage sale, chalkboard spray paint, ribbon, Tacky Glue

Yeah, you don’t need a step-by-step for this.

One day, we’ll pick a %^&# name, and I’ll write that on the sign

I’m going to hang it on the door.

Now I’m going to go spray paint some more stuff in my dining room. Because I’m sure that is AWESOME for the baby.

Sorry, I know I’ve talked about names about a zillion times already, but E came home last night and declared we HAVE to know what we’re calling her before she’s born. So this is basically just me telling him what names he gets to pick from. Because we have a super nice healthy relationship where most communication is done via blog posts and text messages. We are…an American family. (TEN POINTS to the first person who names the movie! Mom, you can’t play!)

Definitely one of these:
Caroline
Corinne
Louisa
Merin/Marin
Eloise

Probably not but still in my brain and you never know what I’ll do after labor and/or possible middle names:
Piper
Persephone (Penny)
Violet
Layla
Hazel
Claire
Mae
Natalie (if she’s born on Christmas)(Because it means “born on Christmas”)

And per Swistle’s suggestion on my first baby name post, if she’s born on Christmas Eve I’m totally using Eve as a middle name. I would use it as a first name but it’s WAAAY too close to “Evan”.

(I put Persephone on the list after I heard it somewhere months ago and totally forgot about it until I was re-reading the draft of this post. I sort of love it an abnormal amount, despite the fact that I simply cannot imagine calling my relatives and announcing “We named her Persephone!!”)

I was going to spend today being obscenely lazy, maybe writing a few long rambling blog posts, maybe taking Little Evan down to the Aquarium, maybe getting a Starbucks, maybe lying on the couch eating bonbons – you know, basically living the stay-at-home-mom life my husband THINKS I live every day.

Instead I woke up at 7 am with my heart pounding and dozens of to-do lists racing through my head. The reality of being 10 weeks away from a newborn hit me like a ton of bricks and suddenly the dog hair under the couch and the dishes in the sink seemed like national tragedies instead of just the life I’ve been comfortably living. Oh no, the guest towels haven’t been bleached! The Christmas wrapping paper isn’t organized! The paint cans in the basement aren’t sorted by color!! HOW CAN I BRING A LIFE INTO THAT KIND OF WORLD!?!?!!

My goal for today is to cross enough crazy off my brand new nesting to-do list that I still have time for a Starbucks. And maaaaaybe a quick trip down to the baby store in Mystic that sells UppaBaby strollers.

Because I simply CANNOT have a baby until I have a double stroller. Preferably a ridiculously overpriced one.

Is there anything better than Ikea?

This is just the tip of the giant Swedish iceberg

I bought a yard of Ikea fabric while in Minneapolis to use as “inspiration” for the new nursery/playroom but I’m already changing my mind about it. It’s very…yellow. And the green is sort of a split-pea-avocado shade that may be too modern for me. It does have adorable birds and a fantastic amount of orange so I’m hesitant to trash it, but it may end up as a single throw pillow instead of the main color scheme.

I’m sort of shocked at my total NON-desire to do Baby Sandy’s nursery in pink and purple and crystals and ruffles and flowers. I want primary colors and clean lines and shapes and animals and have no plans to paint the almost-white walls and beige-yellow moldings. (And not just because I hate painting, especially trim.) My taste in nursery decor has pulled a total 180 in the past year and a half. Maybe I’ve been looking at too many nursery tours on Ohdeedoh. Or spending too much time stalking Morgan at The 818.

For example, if I had had a girl the first time I think I would have gone TOTALLY overboard with the nursery theme.

Like this. Only PINKER. With a giant chandelier.

Or this one. Only SPARKLIER.

OR THIS ONE. Which I will admit is pretty cool. Really cool. I kind of want to go to there.

I think it’s good I came to my senses for Baby #2, don’t you? (My husband may have just pulled a muscle from nodding too hard.)

So here’s my question: BESIDES Ikea, where should I be shopping for nursery stuff? Pottery Barn Kids is…boring. I get the CB2 catalog but none of it is very baby-friendly. Same with West Elm (and holy over-priced end tables Batman!) Should I just start stalking Craigslist with a passion?

P.S. So we actually WENT to Ikea Sunday and I bought…none of the above. I did buy this:

EDLAND dresser

It is MUCH paler gray in person and will match both the yellow & beige walls & carpet and that fabric I’m growing to like more and more every time I look at it. Plus, it’s huge. I’m going to put it in Baby Evan’s room for now (to solve our current NO DRESSER problem) and move it into the new nursery once we get our renovations done.

I also bought the easel I’ve seen approximately fourteen different people blog about this month, with a chalkboard on one side and a white board on the other PLUS  giant roll of paper you can pull over it for crayons. Baby Evan is a little young for it still (did you know chalk will write on almost any surface, including your own face? BABY EVAN DOES) but I mentioned it at least forty times as we walked through the store and E wanted me to shut the hell up likes buying me things I want.

Next time, I’m going to mention the moose rocker.