The Nursery

We (I) had a bit of a phobia when it came to decorating the nursery.  Following our losses, I was nervous about anything representing the pregnancy to be so permanent in our house.  We also have only 2 bedrooms, and we host a lot of guests, so the room had to also serve as a guest room.  Therefore we (I) didn't want anything too "babyish" or "girly".  The room we ended up with is (I think) none of those things, and I'm pretty pleased with it overall.

BEFORE

This is the before picture.  Bry finding out the baby's gender.  The bed was arranged in the middle with the cedar chest at foot of the bed.  The bedding is from Ikea - can't find the name of the pattern for the duvet anymore.

Because we live in an apartment we weren't able to paint at all, which I think made us be a little more creative in including colors.

AFTER

This is the after photo when I finally got around to taking a few photos.  Now I'll go into some details about the items in the room.  Note that the only NEW furniture is the CRIB and the CHAIR. (The bookshelf and table just weren't visible in the before photo.)

1. CRIB

Made by our Brother-in-Law, Brandon Filzen of  

Filzen Custom Hardwoods, LLC.

The beautiful craftsmanship is evident in every part of this lovely crib.  At some point I hope to do a post on the crib building process - Brandon has given me all the photos.  He did such a lovely job - basically I found a crib that I liked, gave him a photo and he did the rest.  I will point out that the crib is solid Black Walnut and my favorite feature is the drawer storage underneath the crib.  It is a convertible crib as well to grow with Hannah.

The giraffe is a Susan B. Anderson pattern that I knitted (and finished!) before Hannah was born.

Amazing crib.  Special Uncle.

2. GUEST BED

-Again, the bedding is from Ikea.  

-The throw pillows are covers that I bought in Philippines.  

-The right side lamp is from Target, I spray painted it the teal color.  The shade is also from Target. 

 -The Globe I bought at Goodwill - it too, got the spray painting treatment.  The fun part is that it still shows the USSR and the colors on the map part match the teal perfectly.  

-The left side lamp is also purchased from Goodwill but was originally teal so no painting required.

-Guest book is from Germany and not enough people write in it when they stay here!

-Elephant picture - bought from Etsy.com Zeppi Prints. Found the frames at JoAnn Fabrics. Thought about mounting it to canvases but opted not to potentially wreck the prints.

3. Bookshelf

 This bookshelf has a TON of stuff on it which I had been accumulating before Hannah was born.  The books were largely gifts.  I will talk about a few items:

OWL - purchased from Burlington Coat Factory for $12

TRUCK BANK - Bry's from when he was a little boy - I LOVE that this is in Hannah's room.  The "belly" is see through so you can see the money, but have to undo screws in order to get it out.  Just love this piece.

ELEPHANT BANK - purchased from Urban Outfitters for $12.  Loved the color, loved the shape.  There is an elephant theme in Hannah's room (loosely).

4. CHANGING TABLE

-Table was bought off of Craigslist for <$10.  Originally it is from Ikea.  The changing pad was bought at a store that went out of business.  

-Rug: another Urban Outfitters purchase.  I saw another nursery with the same rug on Pinterest and went straight to Urban Outfitters to buy it.  It is a canvas like rug, not soft and squishy but that's ok because the carpet in her room is in pretty good condition.

 

-Elephant Wall Hooks: purchased from Etsy.com The Shabby Shak.  I see now that she has some huge mounted elephant heads - now I need the will power to not buy them........

-I also have a lot of needle point in the room.  Some of it is very special- made by my mother.  The wall hanging over the crib was made by Bry's Grandma Swenson and was in his room as a baby.  LOVE that too.  This piece was a sampler I found at a thrift store for < $1.  I like the vintage stitching in the modern frame.

5. Chair

This was my dream chair from when I started nannying.  A sort of "push present" to myself.  We ended up buying it in Dallas, TX so we could actually sit in the chairs before buying them.  It is actually a light grey color and we really like it.

There's the nursery!  We are liking it a lot, and it has worked well hosting many guests after Hannah was born (she sleeps in a bassinet in our room - a post will follow on that too!).

Pregnancy Recap

I always said I would NEVER post bare belly photos - so have no fear, there are NO bare belly ones.  But after all was said and done I did want to show the progression of the belly.

Pregnant and didn't know it! 10 days pregnant in San Francisco.

 9 Weeks pregnant - Jenn's Wedding

 

January 8th - 16 weeks pregnant - Larken's Baptism

January 27th - 18 weeks pregnant

 

Valentine's Day February 14th - 21 Weeks Pregnant

February 17th - 21 Weeks Pregnant - In Michigan for Homecoming

 March 11 in Fort Worth, TX - 24 Weeks Pregnant

March 27th - 27 Weeks Pregnant

April 17th - 30 Weeks Pregnant

Matching Maternity shirts!  Dr. LaNou and myself accidentally wore the same shirt to Grand Rounds.  April 26th - 31 Weeks Pregnant

May 2nd - 32 Weeks Pregnant

May 16th - 34 weeks 1 day  - on the way to the hospital!

See?  No bare bellies anywhere!  I actually think I look about the same size in the last few pictures - I definitely never reached the "popping" point.  My belly button got stretched out but stayed an "innie" the whole time.

Overall I really enjoyed the pregnancy.  The first trimester was nerve-wracking and stomach churning.  I lost 7 lbs during the first few weeks!  The second trimester was a blast - I finally LOOKED pregnant and felt great.  I only had a few weeks in the third trimester which weren't too uncomfortable.  The most significant thing was that I developed pre-eclampsia during the last week or so.  This meant that I was on bedrest for 2 days until they determined it was too dangerous to continue the pregnancy and Hannah needed to come out early.  The last 2 days of the pregnancy were scary enough to balance out the rest of the "easy" parts.

Hannah Mae

She's here!  After a very quick, extremely complicated past few days, we have a daughter.

Now she's doing so much better - off of oxygen and starting to feed.  More information to come.

Catch Up

I have found some unexpected time on my hands now so figured a few blog posts should be put up.  A lot has happened since our trip to Texas in March - just wait and see!

Here are a few of the topics we'll be addressing in the next few posts:
1. Pregnancy
2. Baby Shower (MN)
3. Baby Shower (WI)
4. The Nursery

Ok - so there's a definite baby theme going on here.  Sorry about that.  We haven't been up to too much else besides the baby though - and I wouldn't expect that to change anytime soon!  Bry has been really enjoying his work lately - he's co-leading a project and has enjoyed the challenge of being in charge - although this also comes with frustrations and stress.  Luckily this job is very close to home (10 minutes) so he has been able to have a flexible schedule and this should continue to be the case.

Abi has been having a lot of good cases at work lately.  Up until 2 days ago work was going very well - with few complaints.  It's not exactly easy to work an 8-9 hour shift with an extra 20 pounds and being tired all the time, but it hadn't been too bad.  Patients had started to notice too - which was fun, although a little strange to have to redirect them.  "We can talk about the baby later - tell me more about your chest pain" !

That brings us to the pregnancy update.  2 days ago Abi had a doctor's appointment after she had worked all night.  (This seemed like a good idea 3 months ago when the appointment was scheduled.)  Well her blood pressure was very high and they were also worried about the swelling in her legs.  The main concern was for pre-eclampsia.  So she was admitted to labor and delivery for 8 hours of monitoring.  Her blood pressure came down some, but not enough to be cleared for good.  So she was sentenced started on bed rest until Friday when a repeat appointment and evaluation of lab work will determine where to go from there.

We are currently at 34 weeks 1 day.  Baby is doing very well so far.  Our past ultrasounds have been all good news - she's growing right on track, we even saw her "practice breathing" at the last one.  We also got a 4D sneak peak of the little nugget too!  I will try to post some more details about the pregnancy - including (gasp) belly photos.

I Like To Hide My Face

Penny did not want her picture taken yesterday.

I had my growth check ultrasound yesterday.  We also needed to get a peak at her face to check on her palate.  Well she's right on track for growth - it was fun to see how big she had gotten in the past month.  She already up to 1.5 pounds!  But when it came time to see her face, there she had to disagree.  She wouldn't give me one of those beautiful profile pictures, no matter how I jostled and twisted her.  The top photo in here was after about 1/2 hour of scanning and she refused to move out of her little burrow.  (She was basically curled up facing my back with her face down and hidden.)  And she figured out that in this position she can really kick - even the ultrasound tech could feel her kicks - we were both laughing about that.
The doctor was much more optimistic about a full term delivery than they had been.  She will still need to have growth checks (next one in 3 weeks) but otherwise they are hoping she'll make it to at least almost full term.  The only problem they thought would be that she may be breech (facing butt down) and a C-section would be required.  We are at 23 weeks 3 days today - and are so happy that things are looking good with her so far.

I did buy a new book for her this week: Itty Bitty Knits by Susan B. Anderson. I LOVE her books (they were the first books I ever bought). See that giraffe on the cover? That is already ON THE NEEDLES after I ran out to buy the yarn to make it.  So so so cute!  There are a ton of things in this book that will be made in the next few years.  Some super cute toys are in here.  Lucas will be getting one of the amazing reversible toys in here, and I've got a doll with interchangeable clothes in mind for Liza bear.  Larken will be sure to get one of these toys too - maybe I'll work on having one done for her by the time I see her in April.

Also, I dropped the quilt off at its new home and I think she will be very happy there.  That little one is due any day now - can't wait to meet her.

Today I'm off for a breakfast date with a good friend, then back to the grind with a shift at Children's hospital.  I have been off campus for the past month so I think my "bump" will be coming as a surprise to a lot of people since I've really popped out this month.