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?

 

 

It's a....

Baby...ha, we didn't find out. But here is your first glance of our sweet babe Gus:

[caption id="attachment_1873" align="aligncenter" width="388"] And for inquiring minds: That is a leg thankyouverymuch[/caption]

It was  unbelievable to finally get to see what this little one looks like. When we had our earlier ultrasound it looked like a sea monkey. Still exciting but very less babyish.

This time the technician was laughing and asking me if I could feel "all that movement" I said only a little bit, and she turned the screen towards me so I could see the wiggling pile of baby that is Gus.  She said that the baby was having a dance party in there (clearly my child!) After she did all the measurements she called Garret in to have a look.  It was really awesome to see his face as he saw our baby.  It was an emotional moment for us and I think really drove it home that we are having a BABY.  Also reassuring that I am not just getting fat and emotional for no apparent reason! haha

Of course we think that Gus is perfect looking with a beautiful nose and lips, we are so happy the profile picture turned out so well!  Watching the babe flip around and stretch in there was just the neatest thing--I could have watched for hours.  I love that we now have an idea of a face to put to this little thing boogieing around inside me all the time.  It is magical and yet oh so strange to love something so much that you can't quite comprehend even exists.

8 months down

8 months down and we are:

• Slowly working our way through our to do list (I think because I told G we could look at getting a new TV when it was done...I have never seen him this motivated!)


• Worrying about our sick pup...thankfully she seems to be on the mend, but wooo what a scare the other night


• Nesting (ok this is pretty much just me, but G is dealing with the fallout...lucky guy)


• Organizing our living space as much as possible. This may fall under "nesting" but we are really working to find a place for everything and remember when done with said thing to put it back in that place


• Preparing for our labour and delivery course next weekend.  G is working on being mentally prepared to watch a birth and learn "all the gross stuff" that will be happening.  Poor guy is in for quite a shock


• Waiting for Gus' kicks and moves to be felt from the outside.  I LOVE that I am feeling the starts of kicks and moves, but I cant wait for G and others to be able to feel from the outside


• Expanding around the middle (mostly just me)  this also leads to:


• Realizing  that this is actually happening


• Spending some time outdoors...loving the summer weather that is coming (finally)

The one with the hungry pregnant lady

Yesterday at work we had a baby shower for another colleague. There was cake. I may or may not have been looking forward to said cake all week.  The morning seemed to drag on to infinity (before the shower at 11) This was me:

[caption id="attachment_1866" align="aligncenter" width="388"] Preach Stanley[/caption]

I just realized that once Gus comes I will have no excuse for being a sweets spaz. This saddens me. boo.

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