Weekend Report--brief photo summary

[caption id="attachment_1946" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Decided to take "hanging out" to a primo level Fri night, snuggles with the fam in our hammock[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1947" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Trying a little too hard not to have 5 chins in my hammock pic[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1948" align="aligncenter" width="388"] G's side job Saturday afternoon. Just what every pregnant woman wants to see, her husband/baby daddy 65' above Young street. gulp[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1949" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Saturday night we had big plans for a fire or going out, but our friend Derek and I ended up watching a movie alone with two snoring Walsh characters as additional soundtrack[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1950" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Our girl letting her princess flag fly high. She won't pee outside in the rain. We kept carrying her to the end of the yard and she would high tail back for the door. G had to cover her with the umbrella to get her to do her business. High maintenance or what?![/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1951" align="aligncenter" width="388"] and do they ever smell sweet. G went to the store to get garlic bread to have with dinner on Sunday night. He came home with Roses which was awesome, but forgot the garlic bread.[/caption]

Other items that I don't have pictures of.  An absolutely gorgeous Bee themed baby shower for my friend Erin, the locking of my keys in the truck in Shelburne and having to wait for C.A.A (sooooo fun), psycho nesting related cleaning while G and Derek were golfing on Sunday and 481 games of fetch with B.

Past Few Weekend Reports...in photo form

[caption id="attachment_1882" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Took Gus Gus to Webers. A very important Walsh tradition that is best to start as a fetus[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1883" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Visiting G's grandma in North Bay with the fam. Showing off Gus and trying to catching up with the northern part of the family![/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1884" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Taking a break on the long weekend for a snuggle in the hammock...maybe this is why we don't get all our to dos done...we love the break part that comes along with working hard[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1885" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Mandatory Brooklyn shot. Oh my I love this wee little face[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1887" align="aligncenter" width="388"] The surprised birthday gal! Such a fun night[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1886" align="aligncenter" width="388"] One of our flower girls. It was her Mama's 30th birthday so we had a surprise dinner at Blue Mountain this past Saturday.[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1888" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Took my Grandma (aka Super Nanny) to Coffin Ridge (a local winery) as her birthday present. At 96 she claims she doesn't need "stuff" but she will never say no to being treated to some wine![/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1889" align="aligncenter" width="388"] We dragged my insanely adorable nephew along for the trip....aaand we matched so I had to get a photo[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1890" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Stopped for a break at Blue Mountain on the way back to Barrie.[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1891" align="aligncenter" width="388"] My sister in law introducing her little guy to the joys of Menchies! YUM[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1892" align="aligncenter" width="388"] This isnt a particularly lovely memory, but this happened in the past few weeks too. Poor miss B up sick all night with a GI infection and G and I sitting on the kitchen floor with her at 3am worried to bits[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1893" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Sick Brooklyn all snuggly and nappish after dealing with her tummy bug. She is all better now, but WOW we were scared[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1894" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Totally out of order, but am too lazy to fix: Mum and Brooklyn having an early morning coffee break on our deck[/caption]

The time I tried to tackle a reno all by myself

[caption id="attachment_1877" align="aligncenter" width="388"] The old bathroom--please ignore swiffer and other random items in the picture.[/caption]

When we first moved in to our home, the bathroom off the kitchen had a bi-fold door, and was this kind of blah purple colour.  The vanity was also quite tiny with no room for storage underneath.  In a house with no closets  I find it surprising that ANY design choices were undertaken in this home without "storage options" being at the top of the list.  This is primarily my bathroom as I get ready for work down here while Garret showers upstairs.  We tried to share the bathroom in the mornings but with us both leaving around the same time in the morning it just doesnt work.  I was trying to put contacts in with a steamed up mirror...makes makeup application tricky too. So I migrated to the downstairs bathroom.  The problems with this arrangement happen to be that the vanity is tiny and there is no room to store anything (as I have already just complained about)  My Mum and I were mulling around ways to make this bathroom better and we found a really awesome option at Ikea:

[caption id="attachment_1878" align="aligncenter" width="388"] fancy new sink[/caption]

We fell completely in love with this and the matching medicine cabinet and decided to have a bathroom reno party on the long weekend.  In our total naivete we thought that the only thing we would need G for would be to hang the cabinet and hook up the plumbing. Done and Done. For under $500 we could have a freshly redone bathroom/laundry room I was sold!  The furniture was picked up, Garret and I picked and paint colour and on the long weekend my Mum came down to paint.

I thought I would be doing more helping in the process but "Nana" was rather emphatic about Gus being exposed to paint fumes...so she painted and I just sort of mucked around and kept her company.  The new paint colour in the bathroom looked fantastic. (but I think after 3 coats she was ready to shoot G for claiming we didnt need primer...with that gross purple we DEFINITELY needed a primer coat!)  The time came for G to install the fixtures and we ran into a mild-ish problem.  The plumbing was done in such a way that it stuck way out of the wall....and wasn't going to work with the vanity that I picked.  There was also a brief "I hate Ikea" rant provided by him in the background as well based on the weird plumbing attachments that came with the vanity.

I could make this an extremely long drawn out story, but it just gets less and less interesting...so....A friend of his from work came by Fri night and Sat morning and helped him fix the plumbing. Which ended up being a really good thing because part of it was rotting out. SO when he has been complaining that "my" reno ended up requiring him to do some emergency plumbing I have been reminding him I am actually a lifesaver.  So yeah new plumbing, and yeah new fixtures and yeah our bathroom looks awesome.

[caption id="attachment_1879" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Oh look....he loves it[/caption]

Farewell to ugly purple and ugly vanity and hello to grumpy husband!  Now that it is finished he is loving me and my design choices again but he has said that we are not allowed to have any more Ikea in our house.  I think the next project I take on (or have my Mum and I take on) will require no help from him.

He is saying that since he helped with this he should get to take one item off his "before baby comes/G wants a new TV" honey do list.  Me thinks not. Anyone care to vote?

 

 

Long weekend Run Down

[caption id="attachment_1860" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Livin' Young and Wild and Free[/caption]

As thrilling as this likely seems....the above is (what I hope) a breakdown of this upcoming long weekend.  We have been out and about the past few weekends and have more events coming in the next few weeks. As a result our wee house is feeling a bit neglected...AND my early onset nesting nestyness is freaking out.

G and I tend to have a slight time management disagreement disorder.  He feels it is entirely possible to watch 5 movies, hang out with friends, go away over night and still somehow manage to accomplish 500 home related tasks.  I have learned that this is not even close to the truth and tends to leave me just annoyed drowning in a pile of laundry and grocery bags at the end of the weekend. And so my to do lists have been coming out to help keep us focused when we try to plan home things.  I get that a long weekend is kind of a downer weekend to be stuck at home working, but if I have to deal with the pile of lumber that has been taking up half my small hallway any longer, I will lose my ever loving mind.  (ed note: it has been there since Feb when we first discussed doing built ins for our room)  

In order to make these tasks fairly weighted between the two of us I am tackling the bathroom reno with the help of my Mum and her trusty favourite paint brush.  I figure over three days we can pretty easily get all the work done (I am thinking it will just take most of one day to paint and reassemble the new vanity etc in bathroom)  I will take some before pictures of the weird purple colour and impractical vanity that was left there from previous owners...I think that this point anything will be an improvement!

Wish me luck in us accomplishing all of this..or at least luck with me keeping G focused for three whole days hahaha

Early Onset Nesting

I have been feeling rather panicked lately about all the things that need to get done around the house.  We tend to talk in circles trying to decide what should be prioritized and what we can hold off on.  In a moment of trying to feel focused yesterday I made a list and sent to Garret at work.  Perhaps was a little overwhelming?  But holy smokes October is going to be here before we know it! Plus I have a sneaking suspicion we will have an even harder time focusing on house stuff once Junior arrives.

These are the main things I would really like to get done before Gus comes:

1. Trim on the door in downstairs bathroom


2. Paint downstairs bathroom


3. Swap out the sink downstairs bathroom


4.  Carpet the stairs


5. paint the railing and spindles (not a super priority)


6.  Backsplash in kitchen (we could just paint it before we decide to do something else...then it looks pretty and less boring)


7.  Builtins in bedroom


8. Hanging all the frames on the wall in our room


9.  Getting bathtub reglazed


10.  Fence


11. Garden maintenance


12. Powerwash/sand/paint front porch..lighting if we are feeling crazy?


13. New storm doors for kitchen door and front door


14.  Nursery will likely just involve hanging a few shelves and maybe some art over the crib? Nothing dramatic and I already like the paint colour in there. Oh and some sort of closet organization system.


15. ok I am done for now.

His response was along the lines of: "we will make a plan of attack later...when I am not at work...on a Monday morning"  Some of the heavy lifting construction jobs I will have to bow out of for now, but if we start doing some things before I am 30lbs heavier and it is 30 degrees hotter out I think we have a good chance of getting things completed.  I have roped my darling Mum into coming for a day or two next weekend to help me get the downstairs bathroom done (hurray)  I feel if we pick certain jobs and pick when we can work on them stuff will get done.  It is that whole "oh at some point we should do this" attitude that we seem to thrive on which I fear will lead to me bringing Gus home to a house that continues to look like a construction site.  Every new mothers dream, am I right?!

Weekend Report

**I meant to post this on Monday...I wrote it and saved it and didn't publish. oops ***

The weekend was really quite nice!  Garret helped some friends move, started an exciting construction project (see below) and I finally got around to starting the official name change process (only took 6 months, no big deal!), spent some quality time with the fur baby at a farm, and had a lovely lunch with some great friends!

We have tried to stop overbooking our weekends and letting some plans just fall into place.  We were both so over scheduled before that we were finding by Sunday night we were exhausted and felt like we hadn't relaxed.  Lately it has been a really good mix of getting stuff done around the house, visiting friends, and spending time together.  I know that we will still have some insanely busy weekends on the horizon, but the past few have been a lovely balance.

And now some photos of the weekend....I am thinking I should change the name of this blog to "Brooklyn's fan club" since I seem to just spam each entry with pics of our babe!

[caption id="attachment_1713" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Ending our night on Friday with some family time in bed. She loves when we let her come into our bed, she snuggles up and makes extremely unimpressed noises when we kick her out[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1714" align="aligncenter" width="388"] my copilot extraordinaire as we headed out to the farm[/caption]

While Garret helped do some moving, the girls decided to head out on a puppy play date.

[caption id="attachment_1715" align="aligncenter" width="388"] She was slightly timid at first but after a few minutes she was off like a shot.[/caption]

Please note the size difference in these dogs.  Brooklyn weighs about 18lbs, and the smallest of the farm dogs weighs 85lbs! It was SO funny to watch the four of them run around the fields.  She was having  a total blast being off leash and tearing around.  Garret and I call her the dog bullet when she runs like that.  I think we will be heading back there for some play time/energy burning off!  On the way home she was very quiet.  Curled right into a ball once we got in the car and didn't make a peep until we got home.

[caption id="attachment_1716" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Our new decorative feature[/caption]

Garret has been dying to get to this project and ended up starting it on Sunday. I made a rule that he had to finish our closet first before starting something new, and as soon as that was done he was raring to go.  A client from G's old job had left over boxes of bricks that he wasn't using so we took them.  They have been biding their time in our back shed until we were ready for a new project.  There will be some annoying cutting in to do as he gets closer to the ceiling, but the plan is to have this finished by the end of next weekend.  It's coming along really nicely and bringing some neat texture and warmth into our living room.  I can't wait to share the pictures when it is done.

I hope everyone else had a lovely weekend too!

January Cure Day 1: Make a list of projects

*I should make a side note that since we are still experiencing some construction related insanity upstairs I think that focusing on the main floor for now would make the biggest impact. Although once the closets are finished boy howdy am I going to nerd out with some serious organization. #nerdalert

Entryway: fix light--new fixture? Fix hole in ceiling,
Dining Room: touch up paint behind the hung mirror, remove the full length mirror, paint the trim on doorway heading into living room, organize and purge items in the buffet.
Living Room: Go through DVDs donate the unwanted ones, finish painting the spaces that were patched, clear off all random paper from the tray on the ottoman
Kitchen: fix hole in ceiling, organize drawers and cupboards, finally choose a backsplash, hang a small shelf over the stove, throw out expired condiments in the fridge, make a list of the food we have in the freezer
Backroom: Make a pile for the outreach and garbage, put hooks up to hang skis, snowshoes etc, make a list of the food we have in the deep freeze
Basement: Hang a corkboard over my craft table, get G to go through his tools, organize my scrapbooking stuff, organize the file cabinet so it can actually be used

"Santa" (cough, Mum, cough) put a really cool note pad in our stocking this year. It has a shopping list on one side and a daily breakdown on the other. It is meant to be used as a weekly meal planning tool, but I think I am going to also use it as an organizational guide. G and I tend to get rather squirrelly when our place is a mess and I want to strive for more zen in 2013.

3 months old today

Happy 3 month birthday to our sweet Brooklyn/Turd Ferguson.  Even when you are peeing on the floor or trying to eat our shoes we still love you and wouldn't trade you in..  Thanks for becoming part of the Walsh family and for teaching us (mostly your Dad) patience, floor cleanliness and the general joy of snorty grunty snuggles. Love you fuzz bum!

And now photos of our sweet fur baby

[caption id="attachment_1165" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Being Ghetto fabulous in your winter jacket[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1168" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Navigating through the streets of Meaford[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1167" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Helping me write wedding thank yous. Signing her approval with a nose print[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1169" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Napping...this is when we can relax[/caption]

Neither of us have really had a dog before so this is a wee bit of a learning curve, but we are really enjoying it.  We have turned into those people who take 5000 iPhone photos of her doing cute things, laugh at her when she snores and makes funny noises and fight over who gets to snuggle with her when she is calm and wanting to cuddle up.  We are loving that she always wants to be near one of us, but we are wondering how cute it will be when she is double her size and still insisting on eating her toys in our lap.

 

 

A Christmas Tree in Review

One of our family traditions since before I can remember is getting a new Christmas tree ornament each Christmas. My brothers and I each had a series that we collected and we would always get that one and often others each year.  My Mum would diligently pack each ornament away at the end of December into 3 separate tubs one for each kid.  This year as we set up our first tree my Mum came over with my tub of ornaments.  Garret was completely shocked that the entire tub was mine.  (personally I just think he is jealous that he doesn't have a pile of his own ornaments...maybe I should get him some this year?)

Since I have 32 years of collecting ornaments under my belt I have to say that I have amassed quite the collection. I didn't want to overwhelm our tree so I just picked a few to see the light of day this year. (also part of the decision making process is we only had a few ornament hangers and I couldn't be bothered buying more. I am becoming a cheapskate in my old age I guess)

[caption id="attachment_1153" align="aligncenter" width="388"] My maid of honour got me this as a Christmas present this year. I bought ornaments for her two girls so she bought us one for our fur baby[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1154" align="aligncenter" width="388"] This has been my favourite ornament forever. It says 1980 on the door so that is a fave for quite a while. You can see a little chipmunk inside setting up his own tree. LOVE IT![/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1155" align="aligncenter" width="388"] This is an ornament that my Nana Shaw(who died before I was born) made for my Dad. I thought it was so super special when I was a kid and I loved that my Mum gave it to me. It says "Love Mom 1977" on the back.[/caption]

 

[caption id="attachment_1156" align="aligncenter" width="388"] This one is new this year as well! My MIL found it in her travels and it reminded her of Brooklyn. Note the cute little tutu![/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1157" align="aligncenter" width="388"] From my Mum last Christmas...first year in our new home![/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1158" align="aligncenter" width="388"] This one my friend Lauren made me in 1991! This made it on also by default for coming with it's own ribbon[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1159" align="aligncenter" width="388"] First Christmas together! My friend Erin M got me into the s'mores decorations a few years ago...how cute are they?[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1160" align="aligncenter" width="388"] This guy is from a few years ago[/caption]

The series that I collected are called Mary's Angels I adore them but can see why Garret might not want a tree chock full o' angels.  So they will stay in the Christmas tub for this year.

I do love it when I see the gorgeous themed trees that people do each year, but I am not sure if I will ever be able to bring myself to do that.  One of my favourite Christmas memories is when we would set up our tree. My brothers and I would pull out each ornament and reminisce about them and funny other stories of Christmas past.  This is definitely a tradition I would love to keep up with our future Walsh offspring.

 

 

 

 

 

The Scary One

I didn't want to write about this when it was happening, because I didn't know the outcome.  Now that it is more sunshine and roses as opposed to doom and gloom so I can discuss. Thurs and Fri Brooklyn was clearly not feeling very well.  We spoke with various other puppy loving friends and they said her upset tummy was likely due to stress or a change in food.  Saturday morning it became very clear that we should probably take her to the vet. G and I both thought that we had just given her too many treats in our quest to get her to sit, so when the Vet came back with a more serious diagnosis I think we were both very shocked.  B had Parvovirus which can be a really serious puppy killing type of illness.  We had to admit her and the vet was honest about her chances...he said he really couldn't say.  There seems to be an outbreak in Barrie lately and some dogs make it and others don't.  Naturally I cried the entire time and felt like a total jack-hole by the time we left.  We both tried to be really positive about it but we were both pretty scared.  Garret joked that he was going to get a vasectomy because if he was this sad about our puppy he didnt think he could handle having kids.  We had to clean the house like crazy and throw out all her blankets and soft toys...so instead of Saturday being a joyous home renovatey day it ended up being me crying over a tub of bleach as I cleaned the kitchen floors kind of day.

Obviously the little Turd-meister really snuggled her way into our family and our hearts quickly.  Yesterday the clinic called and said that she was doing awesome, her temperature was down and she was eating and drinking and keeping it all down.  I picked her up last night and it was SO AWESOME to bring her home.  We had a serious Walsh family snuggle session with her on the couch once G got home as well. She was being extra turdy though so I am not sure if she just forgot her manners in the 2 days she was away, or she was just angry that we seemed to leave her behind to get poked and prodded!  But honestly we didn't care at all because we were just so glad she was home.

[caption id="attachment_1125" align="aligncenter" width="388"] sharpening her teeth[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1126" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Christmas is cancelled because of MY vet bill?![/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1127" align="aligncenter" width="388"] After getting some energy out she crawled into my lap for a snuggle. I took her off to get up and she just walked in a small circle and got in my lap again. After a near death experience a gal's just gota snuggle[/caption]

 

 

 

Closet-ish things

I am realizing in my haste to post every day I am failing to take good pictures or truly edit some of my posts---note to self: better planning would make for a more successful NaBloPoMo...there is always next year.  I always have my iPhone on me, and during our renovations our Nikon has run out of batteries and I put the charger somewhere safe, where I wouldn't forget where it is.  So obviously I have no freaking clue where it is. And so you are treated to blurry camera phone pictures of the newest exciting developments in Walsh life....Yesterday my husband (yup still cant stop saying that without smiling) finished building me a closet. Granted it's the guest room closet, but it is AMAZING regardless.  Current plan is to store perhaps some out of season clothes as well as bedding and other random goodies in here for now.  Garret has an annoying/endearing (?) habit of hanging up ALL 500 (conservative guess) of his T-shirts so perhaps this can be his dedicated T-shirt hanging closet?  We shall see, as for now it is a catchall everything closet as we havent finished the hall closet or our bedroom closet.

[caption id="attachment_1113" align="aligncenter" width="388"] In real life it is more exciting and not remotely yellow[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1114" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Please note the additional shelves for more storage....oooh baby...SO exciting[/caption]

 

 

Young House Super Love

The thing about reading someone's blog is that you start to feel like you know them.  It is different than the familiarity you might feel with an actor or someone else, because you get to know bloggers on a different level.  You read about their lives, their families etc, and over time you develop what is obviously a one-sided relationship.  Meeting John and Sherry last night was really awesome, yet also kind of strange that someone you feel close with doesn't know you exist!  It was really neat to get to West Elm and see the ton of people lined up through the store who all obviously feel the same way about these two people.  It was funny overhearing all the conversations while we were in line about how long people had been reading Young House Love and how they all were excited too.  My friends Meagan and Harrison and I went and met up with some super nice people in line...thankfully because we were there for three hours!  I thought that the rain would keep more people away...but alas others were just as excited to come out.  We did some people watching, window shopping at West Elm and good conversation made the line go faster.

[gallery]

Pensive nephew

I can't get over how cute this little guy is! This is how he likes to sleep...makes me think he is pondering the universe while waiting for his next meal. I got to have some serious snuggle time with him on Tuesday night which was awesome. It is just so lovely to have another baby in our lives to love on and practice with. And G loves it because he thinks it will give him more of a reprieve ;)

Boo!

October FLEW by!  (really interesting sentence to lead with huh?)  But really, I can't believe we are at this point in the year already, it will be Christmas soon...scary stuff!  I think because we were so focused on September 22nd for such a long time, it seems foreign to now be looking ahead to other exciting events. (of which I am thinking we have lots!)

Last night we did not do a big night of reno work.  It was Halloween so we had to go celebrate with the cute little ones in our lives.

[caption id="attachment_993" align="aligncenter" width="388"] This one didn't quite make it out Trick or Treating[/caption]

We made it out with a really scary lion for a few houses and even in the rain it was so much fun

[caption id="attachment_994" align="aligncenter" width="388"] I think the umbrella was her favourite part![/caption]

I couldn't manage to get a picture of the front of her outfit, but believe me she was the cutest lion out there.  I haven't been trick or treating in about 15 + years so it was really fun to remember the excitement of the night!  Molly was the most polite trick or treater too, telling the other little girls that they looked "beeeeeeeeuuuutiful" and always saying thank you. She was NOT liking the "scary boys" in the Scream masks but other than that I think she had a great night.  Her Daddy stole her chips, Uncle Garret was stealing some chocolates and Auntie Julia was delighted to find a small package of Nibs...it's surprising that she made it home with any loot.

Our next stop was to visit Elliott and Ashley and their little monkey:

[caption id="attachment_995" align="aligncenter" width="388"] All tuckered out on his first Halloween[/caption]

We had some snuggles and took some photos and G found a new snuggle buddy... (I think I'm being replaced)

 

[caption id="attachment_996" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Buster had no interest in getting out of there![/caption]

When we got home G did the first coat on our bedroom. We weren't too sure about the colour but once it was done we were really happy with it

[caption id="attachment_997" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Me: "Hey babe are those your good jeans"? G: "umm hey look over there "...trails off and quickly changes the subject. This is an ongoing discussion as he has about 40 work outfits, and yet every time he is doing something I catch him in nice clothes! Oh well at least it looks nice in photos :)[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_998" align="aligncenter" width="388"] finished walls and one really dusty set of blinds![/caption]

I really need to learn how to take more colour true photos of things like this so I can show off what colour things really are.

He has worked so hard over the past few weeks and I just can't believe the difference in our home  Last night was our last couch sleepover as tonight after he paints the trim the bed is moving back in! To finish this project we still have to figure out the built ins to go over our bed, and rework the closet, but once the bed is in we can get dressers back and start purging and cleaning and organizing (my favourite fall project)