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i guess what matters is that it makes her happy

why can't babies like simple, modern, minimalist toys? why is it that they instantly gravitate towards the ugliest, gaudiest, loudest heaps of plastic that can be found? i had this romantic notion that i would only buy my baby natural, organic or hand-made things. i pictured wooden blocks, softies, hand-knit dolls from peru, organic teethers and beautifully crafty finds from etsy. sigh... i did NOT imagine that my living room would be overtaken by this monstrosity (aka the fisher price rainforest jumperoo):

the cutest little owls

i've been working hard on bean's room. a lot of the big things are done/chosen but i'm still fine tuning the details that will bring it all together. i just want it to be perfect for her so it's taking some time to find the right pieces. for the past couple weeks i've been scouring the internet in search of the perfect artwork. i wanted something colorful, whimsical and girly. here are the prints that i finally decided on:

 

i absolutely love them! i bought them from a very talented artist at yumiyumi.etsy.com (btw, i am obssessed with etsy lately). and the best part is that she is local - and by local i mean she lives just a few blocks from me. i hadn't actually realized that when i ordered them from her, but she emailed me and asked if i wanted to meet at the coffee shop to pick up the prints. a nice bonus to be able to support a fellow grandview resident.

i will post pics of the nursery once it's completed. still need to find a rug, lighting and a couple wall decor items.

bedding... check. crib... check.

bean has become quite the active little girl in the past couple weeks. the kicks, punches and squirms are pretty constant now. so much so that the movement keeps me awake at night at times. but it's nice because now chad gets to feel her more consistently also. the other night he had his ear against my belly and she kicked him really hard in the head, which got him all excited about her playing soccer some day. i think it has finally hit us that this is an actual human being growing inside of me. it just seems so much more real now.

and this real person is going to have some pretty big needs! we joke that she will have to sleep in the bottom drawer of our dresser. or even worse - henry's old crate. it's seriously time to get our butts in gear.

we are slowly making some progress. as i mentioned in my previous post, we've picked out bedding. we've also made a decision on the crib. and have chosen a color scheme for the room. people typically associate blue with boy, but i've taken on the challenge of making blue girly/feminine.

crib bedding - motif by dwell studio

crib - park lane by baby mod

color & design inspiration

o christmas tree! how are thy leaves so verdant!

our xmas tree two years ago

our xmas tree last year

our xmas tree this year!

alpha dog

there's nothing like assuming hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt (in the form of a mortgage) to make you feel poor. except maybe that burning desire to spend tens of thousands more (that you don't have) in attempt to make it feel like home. furniture, accessories, paint, tools, appliances... it all adds up very quickly. we've now come to a point where some serious prioritizing is required to figure out how to allocate those last precious dollars. but evidently, what is a "priority" to one person, is nothing short of trivial to another.

me - i feel that we need this:

landscaping

chad feels that we really need this:

30-in Apple Cinema HD Display

henry feels that we need this:

fence

the dog won. they are coming to build him a $4000 fence in two weeks.

hate is a very strong word

i recently started watching "sex and the city" in syndication. i didn't get to see the last few seasons when they originally aired because there was a phase in my life where i was too cheap to shell out the $20/mo for hbo. (ironically, it was also during said phase that i had no problem putting down $200 for a pair of jeans or $500 for a pair of shoes, but would eat cherrios for dinner to save money). but anyways, the point is that i missed out on the whole carrie and aidan saga, and am now just catching up on it.

in the episode that i watched last night, carrie is reluctantly visiting aidan at his "rustic" country cabin. i knew there was going to be trouble as soon as i saw her get out of his pick-up truck wearing a halter dress and stilettos. no surprise that miss city girl is miserable out there in bfe, and the entire situation comes to a head when she gets frightened by a squirrel in the window and drops a hot pan on her leg. she just starts freaking out, and when aidan tries to lovingly console her, she just loses it. "i hate that squirrel! and and... i hate this stove! (kicking the stove) and i hate this fridge (hitting the fridge) .... and... i HATE this house!!!" overreact much? and i'm thinking to myself... omg. she's nuts. what a fucking biii... wha? what did she say? hello deja vu. have i seen this episode before?

OMG! that's ME. just this past weekend, i said (screamed, ranted, wailed are all probably more accurate) those exact same words - i HATE this house - during my own melodramatic meltdown, in conjunction with my own kicking and hitting of inanimate objects.

we bought and moved into a house a little over three months ago. and very often, when i look around at our half-assed attempts at making it feel like home, i really do feel like i hate it. we are having the most difficult time furnishing and decorating it. frankly, i am about ready to give up and resign to living out of boxes for the rest of my life.

the moment that really set me off was when chad and i finally admitted to each other that we didn't like the brand new living room furniture that we had just purchased. chad, who is maybe a little more laid back than i am by nature, shrugged his shoulders and said, "so we made an expensive mistake. let's just buy new furniture." my response to that? i started bawling like a baby. no way. to me that seemed like a reckless, irresponsible waste of money, and somehow i felt like it was a blow to my ego that i couldn't get it right the first time. after all, i pride myself on having good taste. and then, he continues on to say that maybe we should hire an interior decorator. to which i responded, "why would i want to pay someone to decorate this shithole?" right. did i mention i was being melodramatic? in retrospect, that really was a ridiculous statement. i can laugh about it now, but let me tell you, my friends, i found nothing funny about it at the time. and chad, he certainly wasn't laughing either...