Wedding Shower of Firsts

So have I mentioned that my baby sister is getting married? Yep, its true. It is hard to believe that she is really all grown up but we couldn't be more excited for the couple-to-be.

In their honor, we hosted a bridal shower last weekend complete with:


a mini candy station

a tree of well wishes

along with tons of creative gifts to help the couple celebrate their many upcoming "firsts." Here she is opening her first junk drawer. I mean, how can you start your marriage without post its, tape, pens and a box of Trojans? Aren't my sisters-in-law the cutest?

Unfortunately, we were too busy running around organizing food, chatting with old friends and trying to get the fiance video interview to play to get better photos of us sisters enjoying ourselves.


Note to self: Snap more exciting pics once everyone (including Alyssa!) is in town for the wedding next week.

Dear Crew,
You are just a little over two months old and every day you fill my life with more joy than I ever knew was possible. Every coo, smile and clasp of your little fingers hits me to my core. There are moments when I just look at you, lift my hand to my heart, pat twice and say "Pitter Pat." My heart is not quite sure what to do with all this new found love.

I love getting to watch your growing little leg rolls, facial expressions and sounds as you begin to discover your little voice.

I am so excited for everything to come.

Thanks for being my new little bud.

Love,

Mom

One Month In

Crew's First Month (and glowing accomplishments) In Review:

-Meeting the Families
-Nursing (pretty) well
-Hanging in his Boppy
-Perching on Daddy's shoulder
-Sleeping in the Pack N Play
-Demanding his pacifier
-Immediately spitting it out
-Pooping
-Smirking and smiling during his BMs

The past month has flown by and I can hardly believe how much Crew is growing. I am also surprised at how much I have enjoyed getting to spend almost every minute with this lil guy. I feel like I have a new little buddy for all my daily activities and revel in each of his milestones and changes. What a whirlwind of events, emotions and learning moments for both Cole and I.

Not surprisingly, I am now convinced the motherhood will be the hardest and most rewarding venture of my life. I am so grateful for the privilege to be Crew's mother.

The Prince's Pad

One of the funnest parts of being pregnant was planning Crew's nursery. I had hours of fun pouring over blogs, magazines and Web sites dreaming about what colors he might like, theme vs. no theme, how to get furniture I liked without paying an arm and a leg, and so much more.

Because I had so much fun, this may be the longest home improvement post I have ever written. If you don't need the play by play, see the two collages below. If you want the nitty gritty, keep reading.

and


Hope you enjoy; this is our favorite room yet!

Just three months ago, our designated baby room looked a little like this:

and this


Amidst months of home renovations, this room became the perfect "catch all" for Christmas decorations, out-of-season clothing and home decor that still needed to be unpacked and put on display.

Once we cleared out all of the bins and such, we got to work prepping the ceilings and walls for some much needed color. This included patching the walls and removing literally 10 ceiling hooks like these:

While we appreciated a good hook as much as the next guy, our most recent theory is that the room served as a green house of hanging plants for some previous owner.

Once the walls and ceiling had been prepped and primed, it came time to choose the wall color.

Knowing that we wanted fun colors and visual interest, our weekend of paint sampling resulted in the following finalists:

It was a tight race between the green and dark blue but we played it a little bit safe with the wall color knowing that there were a lot of colors and patterns to follow. Because of the bold nature of the blue, we used it as an accent wall and finished off the other three walls in a cream that had just a hint of blue added.

Uninspired by any of the bedding I could afford, I took my mom up on an offer to help me with a bumper pad and crib skirt. I planned to round out the bedding with a homemade quilt by yours truly. After weeks of combing local fabric stores, I fell head over heels in love with this collection by local designer Riley Blake:



With our basic inspiration in line, it was time to tackle our storage issues. The closets of a 1960's split level leave much to be desired. The addition of a baby didn't change the fact that Cole would continue to need the baby room closet for his clothes.

Thanks to the "Billy" closets at Ikea and a little brainstorming by Cole, we were able to come up with a storage solution that gave us bukoos of storage, cute shelves for decorating and a kind of swanky built in storage look.



Cole started with two six foot bookshelves and mounted them to the wall. He then added the half sized shelves in front of the original bookshelves and bracketed them to each other. We finished each new storage unit off with doors and beautiful pulls from Anthropologie.

Butting the two shelves together gave us a really deep space for drawer length containers that now hold Crew's clothes, accessories, bath necessities and everything else he needs.

With the storage dilemma solved we added the recliner and changing station.


The recliner was a no-brainer once we realized that we would end up paying the same amount for a quality wood glider as we would a gliding recliner. Plus, the cheap-os in us love the idea that when we no longer need the chair for rocking little ones to sleep, it is neutral enough that we can use it in another room of the house.

Normally I think changing tables are just another piece of expensive furniture for new parents to buy. However, since we plan to try reusable diapers (once Crew is big enough to fit into them) I figured it would be a good investment to have a designated station for all the diapering "stuff."

The matching changing table for our amazing find of a crib was going to set us back a whopping $450, so we opted for a similar styled table with a dramatically smaller price tag (gotta love online shopping).

Favorite finishing touches like the letters

these curtains

and stocking the shelves


proved to be the perfect projects for Stacy (Cole's mom) and I as we patiently waited for the lil man to make his appearance.

Of course lengthy descriptions aside, this finishing touch was the only thing I needed to make the nursery complete.


We just love this guy!

"New Mommy" State of Mind

What a blur the last two weeks have been at the Lansford house!

We welcomed our first baby, are conquering nursing one feeding at a time, hosted the Bukey's for Dad birthday dinner, celebrated a too-low-key birthday for Cole, survived three doctor's appointments and even managed a few afternoon trips to run errands with the family. With all the help from family and friends I have been surprised and maybe a little overly confident about my recovery.

(i.e) Last night we made a diaper run to the local Walmart. We walked in, bought the diapers and walked right back out. Conversation consisted of mindless chatter about how surprised we are at the number of newborn diapers Crew goes through each day.

As we approached the car, Cole grabbed the carrier and I dutifully pushed the cart to the cart holder, while thinking about just how well we have our roles down. We drive home.

As we pull into the driveway I turn around to grab the diapers and take them inside, when I realize they are nowhere to be found. (86 pack of newborn diapers gone=26 dollar loss)

Cole looks at me incredulously and says, "Did you not grab the diapers out of the cart?"

We raced back to the store and with a little luck (I mean, it is Walmart), our diapers were sitting right in the cart where I left them.

Breathing a huge sign of relief, we finally let ourselves have a good laugh on the way home.

...Although a little crazy and sleep deprived, this new mommy will get it eventually.