Nursery Inspirations

Working on the nursery has proven to be a fun yet stressful experience. We have family coming in to town in early March and we would like to have as much done as possible before then. Also, after talking to my good friend that is 36 weeks pregnant, she suggested doing as MUCH work now as possible. She warned me that once you get to the third trimester energy levels plummet so I want to use all this energy I have right now!

We bought paint yesterday, an exciting step. We decided to forgo the typical pink walls and do something a little different -Blue! The color is actually a light aqua blue and is beeeeautiful. Another important part of our nursery is a painting done by my very good family friend, Teresa. She painted my mom the most beautiful painting and after my mom passed away Teresa made sure I got it. It is definitely the inspiration for our room. I love it so much!

I found this picture of a little girl's room on Pinterest and knew right away this is what I wanted. The color of the walls, the pretty colors, simple and modern. We do not plan on doing the tree, but have not ruled out something fun to do on the walls.

*Now my biggest challenge is finding those curtains... I LOVE THEM!

The next picture I found is from Pottery Barn Kids. Once again, love the wall color, and I love the bedding set. It is SO expensive though. I have thought about just purchasing the dust ruffle and bumper pad though, making it more affordable. The polka dot sheet is my least favorite part of the set.

PB Kids:

After seeing the awesome PBK bedset I actually found this picture on Pinterst used in a real space. I loved the blue walls in contrast with the brown chair so much that we actually got one! (a brown chair that is). We ordered the most amazing rocker/glider/recliner from Buy Buy Baby. It is a Best Chairs brand, made in Indiana, and something that will last a lifetime. Hopefully I wont have to spend too many nights in it, but it does lay all the way out in case I need to sleep in the nursery!

With all of the exciting changes, it is still hard to imagine what the room will actually look like, considering THIS is the current condition:

All prepped and ready for paint...

I will have to say, at least all of the bulky furniture is out and the walls aren't puke green any more. A step in the right direction! The painting should be done tonight, and hopefully we get furniture soon... fingers crossed!


Last but not least, a picture of what 22 weeks is looking like for me :)

Counting My Blessings

As we started the overwhelming task of doing an inventory of everything we need for the baby I began to feel some anxiety. Between figuring out what we "need", the stress of taking so much time off from work this summer, getting the house together and the multiple $dollar$ signs I saw flashing before my eyes through out this, I really had to take a step back and put everything in to perspective. After doing so I felt so extremely blessed and a sense of peace washed over me. It's something I don't do often enough, but I wanted to take the time to count (a few) of my blessings...

-I am so thankful for my husband. I truly believe God hand picked Kyle and I specifically to be husband and wife. We are best friends and he is my encourager, supporter, and mate. I feel so blessed to be so HAPPY every day I wake up next to him!

-I am thankful for my job. I knew in high school that I wanted to be a nurse and achieved that goal as soon as I could. I was blessed with an amazing job, experiences and memorable patient relationships. I was admitted in to a super competitive Nurse Practitioner program as soon as I could and have so many more opportunities in the future as a nurse.

-I am thankful for my church. I am surrounded by a strong body of believers who Kyle and I share life on life with. They are our friends and supporters.

-I am thankful for the wisdom my mother gave me. There is not a day that goes by I don't think about my mom. Whether it is a song that I hear on the radio or something that makes me laugh, I still feel the urge to pick up the phone and call her to tell her about my day. She was the most beautiful, strong, smart woman I ever knew. I was so blessed to be her daughter and I can't wait to tell my daughter about how amazing her grandmother was.

-I am thankful for this next step in our lives. As intimidating as bringing a child in to this world is, I feel blessed that God has chosen us to be parents to his baby girl at this time. I can't wait to be fun loving parents!

-Most of all I feel so blessed to have such a strong relationship with Jesus. I love my discipleship groups I have every Monday night and bible study with girlfriends every Wednesday night. I love learning more about my Creator and becoming a better woman of faith. I love the freedom I have in Christ to be me, have fun, and enjoy my life. For this reason I am TRULY BLESSED!

After thinking about these blessings (plus many more) I began to look at preparing for baby a little differently. Although it is easy to do so, I am going to do my best to not get too wrapped up in all of the "stuff" (like having the best stroller, curbs, bottles, etc).

Have you counted your blessings lately?

Halfway point- 20 weeks!

I can't believe it! This week marks week TWENTY. When did that happen, and will the next 20 weeks go this fast?? Every day that passes the pregnancy seems more real and real, and between the growing belly, changes to the house, etc, the Regals are officially getting ready for this baby girl.

This week I had my "big" 20 week ultrasound. They did an anatomy screen, starting at the head, and worked their way down all the way to the toes. My favorite part was when the ultrasound tech looked at her mouth she pointed out that the baby was swallowing, then when she got to her belly and the baby's stomach was full of fluid, and when she listened to the heart beat we could tell that the baby was hiccuping -ADORABLE.

We also found out that Baby Girl is measuring on the bigger side. Her head measured 21wks5dys and her belly 21wks2dys. I asked the ultrasound tech what that meant, and she said - looks like you have a chubby baby! Which I am totally fine with :) As long as she is healthy!

We finished moving out all of the furniture in the nursery and sold our fireplace too! It is officially a blank canvas to work with now. This weekend Kyle and I are going to go to look at furniture, supplies, etc to get an idea of pricing and what we like. It's crazy to think we will start registering soon! My first shower is in the beginning of March... I can't wait!!

I heard that once you hit week 20 you kind of "pop" out... and that is exactly what happened. I was so lucky to have a generous friend/previous coworker that let me borrow a huge bin of super cute maternity clothes. Until now I have just been making my current clothes work, but they are definitely starting to get a little uncomfortable! Another "first" this week was when a patient's father of mine looked at me, down at my belly, and asked, "is this your first?" I was kind of surprised, because I feel like I am not showing that much in scrubs yet, but apparently I am. I proudly said "Yes!" and thought, gee I hope I don't get that question asked AFTER maternity leave :-/

20 weeks

Nesting

The nesting process has officially begun! Because we live in a 2 bedroom townhouse, we have to do a lot of rearranging before we can start working on the baby's nursery. The first step is cleaning out our extra room in our finished basement (which is home to 2 desks, a sewing machine, old text books, blankets, laundry... basically anything that we don't know what to do with we put in there!). Once that is done we can move the furniture that is upstairs in our guest room down there to make it a livable suite for company. This is important to us as we know family will be wanting to come and stay once the baby is born. When that is done we can work on the nursery which will need painted, crown molding fixed, and then filled with all our goodies we get!

This week Kyle took a day off work to help me start the adventure. Thank goodness he did, because there is NO WAY I could have done it with out him. We had a "giveaway pile", a "sell" pile, a "recycle" pile" and lastly, my favorite, the "TRASH" pile. If it was up to me I would seriously just throw everything away. I feel like since I don't even remember what half the stuff is down there, who cares if I ever see it again? We ended up posting Kyle's old computer desk and chair as well as an Amish fireplace on Craigslist. What is an Amish fireplace and why do we have one, you ask? Good question! The previous owners sold this house to us with "2 fireplaces" which is quite hilarious considering one of them plugs in. It is actually kind of awesome, heats instantly, but it is currently in the nursery and we need room for other stuff!

If we had a bigger house I would consider keeping this beaut:

The only thing left now once those items are sold is to get the queen size bed that is in the guest room downstairs. One task I know I can't help with it. I am not on a lifting restriction but I do know my limits and taking a bed down 2 flights of stairs to the basement is just something I don't want to try. -And good thing I didn't! Because I am SO SORE today for all of yesterday's hard work! My back is the worst. I guess it is just not used to supporting the weight up front... Oh the joys of pregnancy :)

Once the bed is moved we will get to painting, and I am really excited about where we are going for the design of the nursery! More to come on that :)