Weekend Projects

We had a busy weekend. First of all we finally got the new storm door I've wanted for about a year now! We already had a storm door (was there when we moved in) but it was older, and a bit damaged on the inside. Plus we never switched the glass out for the screen in the summer because we have two dogs and didn't want the screen ruined. Our new door is mostly glass, unlike our previous one, anddddddd....the best part is, you never have to switch out the glass and screen...why? Because the top part of the glass slides down and a screen magically rolls down. We never have to switch anything out, worry about the dogs ruining the screen, and I can finally let fresh air in through the front door. It took Bjorn and our neighbor about 5 hours to install it! And from what others have told me this is not completely unusual... we saved $97 by not having it professionally installed, but it sure made for a crabby husband!

By the way, our neighbors are AMAZING. They are always so helpful, I love our neighborhood! When we were at Home Depot Bjorn realized neither of us had measured the width of the door (they're usually always 32" or 36")...newer homes have a standard 36" but since our home is from 1973 there was a possibility it could have been 32". One quick call to one of our neighbors and he measured the door and said he'd help install it. Can't beat that!

I have a red front door fetish...I love them....well honestly I love colorful front doors in general, but red ones really speak to me. When we bought our house the door was white (and the house numbers were nailed onto the door, UM, HIDEOUS) and there were no shutters, it was so BLAND. Now it pops. :)

My first outdoor flower pot of the year...these flowers are supposed to like a cooler temperature, so hopefully they make it.


So besides some outdoor home improvement adventures and baking for Easter I also got some sewing done. I am on a sewing kick again, I will go until I burn out, give it a break, then start all up again. Now that I'm getting more uncomfortable in my pregnancy though my stamina isn't as good and I get pretty sore and tired when sewing.

Here's what I accomplished this weekend...

   First up I finished the blanket that matches Tatiana's wall art I made. There are 11 different fabrics in this blanket, and 9 of them are from the Amy Butler line called 'Love.' It's so colorful and crazy, I've been referring to it as the acid trip blanket.

I hand embroidered our daughter's name on the blanket and plan on writing a special message to her in the remaining space (once I find my fabric marker...).

"Where's Tatiana?" ...I've been asking the dogs this for quite a few weeks now, and asking them about their "little sister Tatiana." I've been saying it so much that now when I ask Vesper "Where's Tatiana!?!?" she cocks her head to the side and gets excited, even though she has no idea what I'm talking about. I thought it was cute that she just so happened to lay down with her paw right next to her little sisters name.

Next up, a taggy blanket. These are little blankets that are supposed to be a tactile and interesting thing for baby to hold onto and play with. You can buy a pattern to make one, but they are pretty simple to make without one since it's just a square...or in my case a rectangle, which is what the fabric I had left over from my blanket allowed. Bjorn's mom has made a lot of these for babies in the family, and specifically Bjorn's nephew who is now 3 1/2 still LOVES his, it's a comfort item when it's bed time. These taggy blankets are known as a "minky" in the family, because on one side we always use minky fabric (which is a super soft velvety fabric). My favorite part is picking out all the cute ribbons to use.

Girly ribbons! Hearts, Eiffel towers, owls, lots of cupcakes (of course!), "Bon Jour", "le bebe." Lots of French themed ribbons in honor of her middle name.

Minky fabric side

Flannel fabric side

      So soft and cuddly.

And last up...the fabric I picked out for Tatiana's crib skirt and a matching crib sheet. Bjorn's mom is going to sew these up and I can't wait to see the finished product. I think this fabric will go great with the cupcake art work that will hang on the wall above the crib.

Last note...baby update: Wow while writing this she has been kicking really high up, at least 3 inches above my belly button and way to my right side. It scared me at first because she's never kicked that far over and high up. *Basking in pregnancy glory* :)   ...oh and this will be a fun game for me to play. Bjorn's cousins wife is also pregnant (yay!), she is 7 weeks behind me. Her baby shower is planned for 5 days before my due date...so I will either be, a.)huge and uncomfortable, b.)giving birth, c.)have a baby with me . Can't wait to see which it will be! With my luck though I'll be one of those women who goes 2 weeks over her due date...but only time will tell!

Easter Sunday 2010

 24 weeks, 3 days

We had a busy weekend!...before I go to bed I wanted to reflect on what a great time we had with family this year on Easter Sunday.  Great conversation and great food to celebrate a wonderful holiday...plus the weather was amazing! Felt more like May then April.

I'll start with the cute stuff... a.k.a. babies and kids!

Next...the tasty stuff....this is the coconut cake I made before it had its outer layer of whipped cream and coconut.

I was a little disappointed in the taste...not my style I guess. The recipe called for amaretto liquor and I thought it was overwhelming...I don't like any taste of alcohol in my desserts.

Jello I made...I love having an opportunity to use my trifle dish!


 Other yummy things made by others...

20 pound ham from the local farmer's market.

Happy Good Friday!

I have today off from work...it's pretty awesome. I slept till 9:30 and then got up and made a real breakfast...eggs, hashbrowns, bacon and toast. There's laundry in the wash machine and the dogs are lounging with me as I blog and watch HGTV (I love you, House Hunters). Later today I'm going fabric shopping with my mother in law to pick out some fabric for a skirt for Tatiana's crib.

So...remember that greenhouse seed kit? Yeah...well...Hi, my name is Christina and I have a vegetable garden in my kitchen! Okay these plants are growing WAY too fast, how is this possible? I had to replant some of them in pots, and now our patio door in the kitchen is surrounded by plants. The funny part to me is...Bjorn didn't even say anything. I don't know if he didn't notice, or just kind of glanced at it and thought, 'well this doesn't surprise me...' I'll wait and see if the plants make it...I hope they do. If not I'll be planting more seeds in my actual outdoor garden and buying some plants from a real greenhouse...all after we get our first and last frost, so hurry up frost, stop toying with my brain! On top of this, my hyacinth on the dining room table is now in full bloom and dang that thing smells STRONG. It doesn't smell bad, but I don't enjoy the smell of it. I'm pretty sure the dining area is wondering why I'm using it as a garden and not a cozy place to have romantic dinners (because those happen so often...hah).

Now on to cute things....

Tatiana's hair bow board is filling up FAST. All thanks to Etsy, and it's endless amount of handmade creations.

Here's the newest assortment I received from Etsy seller Glamorous Boutique . I LOVE the star, it's so adorable. The dinosaur might be my second favorite. With a purchase from this seller you receive a free hair clip too! The one she sent me is the adoooorable black flower, love it.

Vesper and Tater would like to give you a sneak peak of a blanket I'm working on for my little girl, T. It matches the artwork that has her name on it. I had a lot of left over fabric, so I thought I might as well use it up!

And now I will leave you with a photo of Tater looking absolutely ferocious while him and Vesper were wrestling.

Weekly Check In......24 weeks down, 16 to go!

Maternity Clothes: Yes...and dang they are expensive! If you don't want to buy $200+ maternity jeans, don't even bother going to A Pea in the Pod. I went to the one at the Galleria on Saturday, and immediately the sales girl was all over me, asking my size and grabbing jeans. I asked her how much the jeans she grabbed were, "$220" ...WOW, really? I asked if I could try some that were a bit more affordable, so she grabs some other ones, again I ask how much they are "$110"...SERIOUSLY? Then I asked if they had anything under $100, so we head to the very back of the store where they have some between $60 - $80. She was still all over me asking what sizes I wanted, and finally I told her I just wanted to look on my own. I'm uncomfortable enough with my new size without having someone follow me around constantly asking what size I want in every pair of jeans. I then proceeded to try on about 5 pairs. It was hot in there, plus I'm pregnant so my body temp is increased anyway, and needless to say I left the store sweaty and disgusted. Any of the jeans that looked anywhere near decent were about 5 to 6 inches too long. I can't justify spending $80 unless I really like the fit. So yesterday I went back to Motherhood Maternity (not my favorite store, I don't find too many things in there cute, and anything short sleeved is pretty much cap sleeved, which does
not look good on me) and got some jeans that actually fit right for $29.98.

Stretch Marks: Still praying it doesn't happen. Everything looks good for now...but a lot can happen in the 16 weeks left.

Sleep: Atleast 2, sometimes 3 potty breaks in the middle of the night. My whole body is achy and sore so I haven't been sleeping as well. It's now fairly warm outside too so I either sweat at night or we open a window to let cool air in, but then are constantly woken up by the dogs barking at every little noise they hear outside.

Movement: Yes, yes, and yes! A couple nights this week the kicks/punches were so intense they actually kind of scared me, but I loved it at the same time. I also felt her from the outside for the first time, which is a totally different and weird feeling.

Food Cravings/Aversions: Fruit pie...this craving needs to GO AWAY.

Gender: Pink.Pink.Pink.

Belly Button In or Out: In...and so is the belly ring.

What I Miss: Same things as last week...a nice glass of dry red wine, fitting into normal clothes and feeling cute. And a new one this week, not feeling super achy and sore all the time. Oh and being able to take ibuprofen when my back feels like it's about to go out.

What I am Looking Forward To: Easter weekend. And having tomorrow (Friday) off from work, wooohooo!

Best Moment This Week: So far...making more artwork for Tatiana's room.

1 Year Ago...

One year ago (plus a couple days) I was attending my first of two wedding showers. WOW. Never did I think, "one year from now, I will be pregnant!" ....are you kidding me!? And the even scarier part is, I never thought, "I'm going to be pregnant because I want to be!" Lets compare what pregnancy has done to me compared to one year ago...Wow I was so slim (compared to now!) and TAN. I will get there again darn it, sometime after this little baby girl has made her appearance.

Soon to be newlywed....

Pregnant newlywed!...23 weeks, 5 days pregnant.

So one year ago...Tatiana's room was our 'junk' room. Bjorn had his clothes in the closet in there, and one year ago I was putting all my wedding shower gifts in there so I could organize and put them away. Never at that time did I think there would be a crib in that room! Let alone all the other adorable things that have taken over the 'junk' room. 

So now a days everyone does the baby name over the crib thing...you know white letters, or cute painted letters hung above the crib. This past weekend we looked at a some remodeled homes on the remodelers showcase tour. These were houses that people currently lived in, and it seemed that just about every house that had a nursery had the letters above the crib... just off the top of my head I definitely remember seeing 'Oliver' and 'Charlotte'....anyway I wanted to find a different way to do this, my own way. I almost thought about not doing it at all since it's so trendy, but lets face it, I picked our daughters name and I love it. So I've been brainstorming a bit over the past couple weeks, and decided I wanted to use fabric to display Tatiana's name. One trip to the craft store, one trip to my favorite fabric store on Grand Avenue, and four hours later...

Seven Amy Butler fabrics (which the letters are on), and one Michael Miller fabric (the border). I love this line of Amy Butler fabrics, because even though they all look so different they are indeed meant to go together and they all draw in colors from one another. Even better this line of fabric is called "Love."

Now I have to share some cute photos of clothing....

I love the onesies with cute stuff on the butt. The one on the right is from our friends, John and Jaclyn.

Have I ever mentioned how much I LOVE Baby Gap? Seriously, they have the cutest baby clothes. And even more specifically, I love the clearance section at Baby Gap. I waited quite awhile for those strawberry leggings and teal blue bunny onesie to hit the clearance section!

JEANS! So cute. :) Mom and Nana have been busy shopping for little T!

When Bjorn and I went back to Illinois to help my grandparents prepare for an estate sale, I came across a sterling silver dish that was my great grandmas. It's from about 1880 - 1890. I swooned over it, not only because it's beautiful, but because my great grandma shares the exact same first and middle name as I do. I'm the 6th female in the family to have this exact name. The name goes so far back that Christina used to be 'Lady Christina' when her husband was the Earl of Stirling in Scotland. So I was absolutely head over heels when my grandma told me I could have the dish. For now it's in Tatiana's room where I think it may remain.

Picture Post

Thursday I decided it was time to make homemade pizza... so I stopped at the store and picked up some fresh mozzarella balls, a pizza dough mix, sauce, etc... then I noticed all the pretty Easter flowers were out. I couldn't help myself so I picked up a pretty delft blue hyacinth that hadn't quite yet started to bloom. I put it in the center of our dining room table...which really, should have happened a lot sooner, because I still had a display of fall gourds in a trifle dish in the middle of the table.

Speaking of things that bloom and grow...my greenhouse seed kit has already started sprouting little seedlings! Although now I'm worried that they're going to start growing too fast and I'll have to replant them in pots in the house before they can be planted outside. Hurry up first spring frost, I want to plant my garden!

Oh yeah...so back to the pizza....mmm! Definitely use fresh mozzarella balls, it makes a HUGE difference! Just slice them up and then put them between paper towels and squeeze to get some of the excess liquid out. I also used sausage from the farmers market. I brushed the crust with olive oil, garlic, Parmesan, and some Italian seasoning and then cooked it for about 8 minutes before piling on the sauce and toppings. it may not have been super healthy, but it was made with fresh ingredients! I had some left over dough so I made some cheese bread as well.

I started my morning out with some rowdy dogs...I'm so glad they have each other to play with.

Our First Baby Girl

After graduating from college I did something I'd wanted to do for along time, and also something that my mom was not too happy about. She told me if I did this, if I got this thing, and I brought it to her house (I had just graduated from college and moved back home) I would be out of there. Well this thing I brought home turned out to be more than a thing to her, and she totally fell in love, as did Bjorn and I.

Vesper Lynd was born on July 27th, 2007. I had decided I wanted a papillon, because besides being adorable, they were a natural toy breed (not bred too become smaller and smaller like some toy breeds), intelligent, liked the outdoors, and their lineage went back as far as to Marie Antoinette owning one. Papillon means "butterfly" in french, and this breed received the name because of it's large ears, that are supposedly reminiscent of butterfly wings. They are also known as the Continental Toy Spaniel, and there's also a variation on the breed, where it's the same breed but the ears don't stand erect, and this breed variation is called Phalene (which means moth).

I got Vesper from a breeder in Wisconsin, a gruff lady who worked at the airport. Vesper was part of a litter of only 2 dogs. Her sister was already paid for, so the woman handed me Vesper. She was only 4 or so weeks old. She was nervous and I cuddled her up by my chest and she nervously kept licking me. When I first met Vesper her little ears where flopped down, which is normal for a newborn papillon. When I finally got to go back a month later to pick her up one of her ears was still flopped down and the other was standing straight up...ADORABLE. After I'd had her for about a week I went to get her out of her kennel in the morning and her other ear was standing straight up, and they never went back down again.

The first day we got Vesper I was excited, but kind of a mess. I didn't know what to do with her...then bed time came...Bjorn and I put her in her kennel and layed on my bed for a bit before he went home. Well Vesper was scared to death alone in her little kennel and barked and barked. When I left the room to take a shower and then came back she was still in her kennel barking and then when I entered the room it scared her and she started growling at me. I couldn't sleep and had to work the next day, but Bjorn didn't have to work. So he took her to his house where she kept him up most of the night. Seriously, puppies are kind of like newborns... Once I got more used to the idea of a barking puppy in a kennel she came back to my house. When it was bed time we would leave her in her kennel in the basement (because her barking was so loud and shrill), then once she managed to reduce her barking to less than an hour at bedtime she was moved to the kitchen and I would play some soft music (specifically John Mayer haha). Well to make a long story short, once she graduated from kennel sleeping (and was potty trained) she was moved to my bed and hasn't left since.

This little dog brings me so much joy...although she barks out the window like there's no tomorrow and the only way to get her to stop is to spray her with a water bottle, I love her to death. She is my little buddy...she's a perfect little lady on walks...never barking or acting out (unlike her brother, Tater, but that's a story for another day). She listens attentively when I talk to her and cocks her head to the side. She knows when she sees me with the camera that it's photo time, and she listens carefully and poses, because I've been taking pictures of her since the day I got her. Did I mention how much my mom and dad love her? Yes, the same mom that said I was going to get kicked out of the house if I brought a puppy home now sneaks over to my house while I'm at work and kidnaps my dogs for the day.

This post was prompted by some photos I accidentally came across this morning of Vesper as a puppy. She is now 2 years and 8 months old. Her third birthday will be 5 days after my due date with Tatiana.

Our little girl as a mischievous puppy.

Our perfect little lady all grown up!

Pregnancy Progress....23 Weeks

Pregnancy progress! We've got  23 weeks down (as of tomorrow), and 17 weeks to go.

Maternity Clothes: Yes...but actually I found some regular clothes that are great for maternity at H&M today
Stretch Marks: Nope...praying it doesn't happen, but not feeling totally optimistic!
Sleep: Atleast 2, sometimes 3 potty breaks in the middle of the night
Movement: Busy baby this week...well she's probably always been busy, but I am feeling her consistently disco dancing in my belly, and did I mention I  LOOOVE it. :)
Food Cravings/Aversions: Icees....and as of lastnight, water with lemon and cucumber slices
Gender: Pink.Pink.Pink.
Belly Button In or Out: In...and so is my belly ring...hmmm should probably take that out soon.
What I Miss: A nice glass of dry red wine, fitting into normal clothes and feeling cute.
What I am Looking Forward To: The weekend...lots of fun stuff coming up.
Best Moment This Week: So far...Getting a hair cut for the first time in 23 weeks/5 months (I found out I was pregnant a couple days after my last haircut). My head felt 10lbs lighter...I have really thick hair so if I don't get it thinned out and trimmed it gets to be too much.

So how funny is this...23 weeks ago when I was getting my hair cut I was talking to my hair stylist about how I had just had a miscarriage about 2 weeks previous and how we were really hoping to get pregnant again soon. So she was telling me how she was ready to have her second baby soon. So last night I go in and she walks out from behind the counter, and bam, she's pregnant too! We are about 2 weeks apart... so last time we chatted I was actually pregnant and didn't know it yet, and she was 2 weeks away from being pregnant. There are so many pregnant ladies all around! :)

Time to start getting the garden ready...

Last night I put my greenhouse seeding kit into business.

Here's what I planted:
Beefsteak Tomato
Best Boy Tomato
Zucchini
Carrots
Green Beans
Pepper
Lettuce
Radishes
Sweet Pea Flowers
Cosmos Flowers

I'm really really really hoping this turns out successful, because I would love to start my garden this year from little plants that I started from seed, as opposed to buying tomato plants and what not. I used organic seeding mix and organic plant food (which contains pasteurized poultry manure, mmm!...wait does that mean that the chickens were organic and they ate organic food...thus making their manure organic?...), but more than half of my seeds were not organic. I also have a whole lot of onion bulbs to plant (I had a lot of success with them last year, and still have frozen chopped up green and white onion in my freezer that I use), and I plan on planting yukon gold potatoes after the organic potatoes I bought at Whole Foods start growing those ugly little sprouts. I will also most likely buy basil and cilantro plants from the same vendor I got them from last year at the farmers market. I love when I'm cooking and I can just run out to my garden and pluck some basil leaves or a bit of fresh cilantro. I froze my basil at the end of the season last year...I just coated it lightly in olive oil, and now if I want a more fresh version of basil (as opposed to dried) I just grab some out of the freezer. It's nice, I throw it in spaghetti sauce, white sauce, beef stew, etc...

I've got the seed kit near a window and resting on top of a heating pad kept on low. Anyone have any seeding kit or gardening tips for me? I'm a little concerned about tending to the garden once I'm in my third trimester of the pregnancy. Weeding and what not is an exhausting task in the heat when not pregnant, so I can only imagine the joys it will bring while 8 to 9 months pregnant.

Ready to go.

All done.

"What's this?...I think I smell pasteurized poultry manure...hmmm..."

"Maybe I should just give it a little lick...tastes like dirt..."

"I will bask in the evening sun while Vesper eats dirt..."