Hello...is this thing on?

Hello dear friends and internet strangers!

I am back after an almost 5 year hiatus. I cannot promise anything by means of regularity in posting here so try not to get your hopes up. I realized recently how much I have missed writing. I could write for myself but that seems dull so here I am, at the keyboard with a few precious moments to myself and I am stumped by what to write. What was it that seemed so important I needed to share? My Swiss cheese brain has failed me yet again. In all honesty I thought my brain would not remember the password to login to my dusty old blog, but my fingers did not fail me this time like my brain sometimes does.

Since I cannot for the life of me remember what topics I thought of to write last night I will tell you my New Years Goals for 2020. Hello new decade.

1. Floss my teeth.
2. Read before bed
3. Walk 1 mile outside everyday
4. Have 1 hour tech free while at home
5. Do something creative

I have a checklist in the bathroom, and being the type of person who likes to check things off I have been sticking to these goals fairly well. Thus far my teeth have been flossed and feet have walked a mile everyday this year. Thirty whole days! The feat seems both small and large simultaneously. 

Sometimes I feel like I cheat the creative goal by knitting two stitches before going to bed.

I've been having good luck with books lately so it is not a struggle to read before bed, if anything the struggle is to go to bed at an appropriate time and resist the temptation to read the next chapter.

This does not feel like anything eyeopening or thought provoking for my first post in five years. I will try to keep this up, as I really do miss the act of writing my thoughts. Not only that but I really like looking back at my posts from the past and being reminded of projects or fun activities we did.

Cheers to 2020!

Lauren

Sprout's Colors Book

I had seen a few fabric color books on Pinterest so when April Vacation hit I pushed aside all of the other more important sewing projects (diaper bag, maternity sewing projects that will fit me now..) and started sewing something that the baby won't need for a while but I felt I like I really wanted to do.

Jaimie helped me fill in some color holes, since I had very little black and orange fabric. The actual sewing of the colored pages didn't take too long. I tried to be crazy but it turned out to have a lot of straight lines. Crazy quilting just isn't my thing. The white pages with the color name were made using wonder under to adhere the fabric letter and then embroidery floss to write the rest of the word. embroidering words is so hard because you feel like you're spelling the word wrong even if it's an easy word you obviously know how to spell. Staring at it for so long makes your brain do funny things. I did almost all of the embroidering while watching Silicon Valley with Charlie. That show is funny.

Each page had a layer of white flannel between to make it softer and hide the seams from the colors pages.

I made it too many pages to be able to sew through all of them at once, even with the walking foot. Too much flannel!This meant I had to kind of wing the binding aspect and hand sew a lot of them together, then hand sew the blue part around the edge to cover the mess of thread and fabric.

I can't wait to read it to Sprout, and for Sprout to drool all over it and throw it around with his or her chubby hands. Eeek! I think that feeling of excitement is why I wanted/needed to finish this project before other more "pressing" sewing projects.

I do have more projects to share, just very little energy to take the photos needed to post, but lots of energy to go outside and enjoy the lovely weather we've been having. I'll get to it.

Lauren

In Case You Haven't Cried Your Eyes Out Already Today

You're welcome.

Lauren 

Two Years of Homeownership

Today marks two years since we "bought" (signed a loan for 30 years) our house. Sometimes it feels like we've lived here forever and other times like we just moved in. Either way it still feels very much like home. About once a week I will say to myself, or to Charlie, or Penny and Blaze, "I just love this house." I really do. I love driving home and pulling into the driveway, seeing Charlie cooking dinner inside or the pellet stove glow on the walls. Watching the dogs little heads in the windows (because they're standing with their front paws on the windowsills I spent hours painting!) I love having a garage, even when I forget to open the garage door while exiting and crack two of the four windows. I like that everything we need is in the house, and that it is almost exactly the way we want it to look. I love how I look around and it feels like us and shows all of the hard work we've put into it. Mostly though I love who I share the house with and who will be joining us to live here. I'm excited for this house to have a baby live in it, and a toddler, and a kid. I'm happy for all the house has taught us so far and excited for all we still have to learn.

Man that got sappy quick. In order to keep you from crying here's a list of my favorite projects to date, and I am using "favorite" loosely here since actually doing some of these projects was not really fun, but the end result is awesome.

1. My sewing room. When I think about what it used to look like I am blown away by how much paint, click flooring, elbow grease, a new desk and a few curse words can get you.
2. The downstairs paint job. Again, paint can take you a long way.
3. The outdoor shower. I love this addition and can't wait til it's actually warm enough to use it again. I think everyone should have an outdoor shower.
4. Painting the outside. OMG did that take forever but was so worth it.
5. My plants. The indoor plants are doing great. I even divided several recently since they were doing so well. Only problem is I am running out of places to put them. The outdoor plants are a bit more fickle but I am learning.

Projects I still want to complete:

1. New front steps. I'd love two solid granite steps at the front, and would so love if the "shade loving" plants I added to the front of the house would grow and look like they do in magazines.
2. Floating shelves in the living room, so that the book shelf that holds two books and 10 plants won't tip over on Sprout once he or she starts crawling. I realize this isn't a project that needs to get done now, but I sure does feel like I need to do it now.
3. Make a path to the outdoor shower and bury the gutter pipe so it stops flooding the patio. Wouldn't it be lovely if soft moss would grow and line the path to the outdoor shower? Instead it's muddy and rocky, not exactly what you want to walk through to get back into the house after a relaxing shower.
4. Make the grass grow! I have put little to no effort into this project with the exception of raking one million acorns off the lawn, but I look at the grass and really wish it would be nice and green, not brown and mostly dirt. Then I think "first world problem" and get over myself.
5. Fix the garage door I destroyed.

Lauren

Divided Baskets for Babies

My friend from high school is having a baby 3 weeks before me! It was so exciting when we both found out the other was pregnant. I thought I was going to fall over from excitement.

Her shower was last weekend and I made a divided basket for her and filled it with things I think she would need for her bundle of joy, but really what the heck do I know? She's very into researching things so I have basically been buying/registering for the things she does. She researched car seats for days and I just took her word for it and asked my mom for the exact same one. One review said a mother was driving with her baby and the car rolled over three times and the baby didn't have a scratch on him. Sold! How'd I get so off topic? The basket was really easy to make once you cut out all the dang pieces. So much interfacing! Cutting the pieces out is my least favorite part of sewing, especially now that my belly gets in the way when I need to work on the floor with bigger pieces of fabric.

It was so cute I decided to make one for myself...I mean Sprout.

Of course it's made of elephant fabric. I sure hope Sprout likes elephants because this room is quickly filling up with them, much like the rest of the house. I am not sure what will go inside of the basket just yet. I'm sure I'll find a use. Until then it's pretty cute huh? And Just a sampling of the elephant collection in this room. 

Here we are at her shower. She's having a girl and carrying much lower than I am. Old wives tails might imply that mens Sprout is a boy. More people have predicted that as well. Who knows though? Guess we'll find out in July. I just want Sprout to have 10 fingers and 10 toes, and preferably weigh less than 10 pounds, but if I had to chose I'd pick the first two requests over the last.

Lauren

As Of Lately: April

It's been a long time since I posted last. Whenever that happens I feel like it's harder to get back into posting since there is a lot to post about, a quick picture and word dump seemed like the best way to get back into it. I say "get back into it" but have very few ideas for future posts; we'll see what happens.

Lately I've been....

Slowly putting together Sprout's room. Not knowing the sex is fun (really, I swear I love not knowing) but it makes picking out decor 10 times harder "is it too boyish/girly?" is our new favorite phrase around here. On the (very) plus side it has kept me from buying tons of outfits, decor, sheets, quilts, etc. 

Anxious about all of the stinking leaves and sticks that emerged from under the snow! I'm only anxious because bending over is getting to be more of a challenge, raking takes me 3 times as long as it used to, and Charlie is too busy coaching to help me. When will all these leaves get raked?!? 

Thinking about how lame it sounds to be "anxious" about leaves. Can "nesting" urges happen outside the four walls of your home?

Making plans for a garden. Half of me knows I am crazy for thinking this is realistic to take care of a baby and a garden all summer. The other half keeps saying "You'll be home all summer! You can do it." And the positive iota in me keeps saying "You're garden was an epic fail last year, so you've really got no where to go but up.....or fail again which wouldn't be so bad either, just try." 

Sewing baby things. Mostly for other people. Baby fever for sure, but I am enjoying it. It's fun to have friends who are pregnant too. 

Reading every night.

Proud of all the progress I've made in my goal tracker. I was floored to find out that I read and flossed everyday in March! *Pats self on back* April has been going well in those two areas as well.

Finishing "Me Before You" and feeling like a heartless human because I didn't cry, or even think about crying. This is especially disheartening since I cry every time I see this commercial. I think the underlying problem was that I didn't really like the book. 

Going on long walks in the woods and saying baby names out loud into the forest. Still not totally set on names. It's very hard picking the name a person will have forever. I've also come to realize (but should have known all along) that I over think things far too much. I could go on for 30 minutes about all the things I consider when contemplating names, but I'll spare you. My dream is that when the baby comes the name will be obvious. "Name yourself kid!" If worse comes to worse we could be the hippy family who names their kid Sprout.

Attempting to make the perfect Rice Krispie treats and failing miserably. How can three ingredients be so hard to mix? They keep coming out way too hard, like break a filling, cut the roof of your mouth hard. I'd ask for suggestions, but really I just want someone (you) to make me a pan (or 7) and deliver them to my house.

Watching Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt on Netflix. I'm not sure I 100% like it though. Some parts are really funny, but sometimes the main character annoys me. All (3) of the other shows we watched are over for the season.

Trying to figure out what the big fuss about "Wolf Hall" is. I know very little about that period of time, so I think my ignorance makes me not enjoy the show as much as the people I know who are super excited about it.

Loving feeling Sprout move. I am *this* close to being able to distinguish which body part is kicking/punching me. I keep waiting for the time to come when I get annoyed by the 3 am dance party that wakes me up every morning, but it hasn't. Turns out 3 am is a great time to think about how nice it will be when Sprout gets here, and how cool it is that my body is able to grow another human. It boggles my mind every time I think about it, even after 28 weeks.

Wishing it was April Vacation already.

Enjoying the (hopefully) last few fires in the pellet stove for the year. Come on warm weather!

Lauren