Eleanor, Weeks 6 & 7

THIS LITTLE GIRL.  So cute and so sweet.  Her week 6 photo (below) just slays me.

Eleanor, Week 5

Well, I think she's cute in all of these weekly pictures, but they're not all going to be open eyed and smiley.  :)

Eleanor, Week 4 and Month 1

Just to make things more complicated, I've added a monthly photo to this grand plan for Eleanor's first year. In addition to the weekly photos (week #4 is below), we're going to try to do a family photo every month on the 8th in a cool location. Month 1 is below!

Eleanor, Weeks 2 & 3

Here are photos of baby girl on her second and third week anniversaries (of being out of the womb, I guess?).  You can probably tell from them that she's quite the card already!

Eleanor, Week 1

Remember my weekly photo project?  Well, I may be crazy, but yeah, I'm doing one for the baby.  A photo a week of Miss Eleanor, at least for year one.  Wish me luck!

P.S. I had the baby, by the way.  ;)  Will try to post an actual birth story/OMG we had the baby story soon.  Life with a newborn doesn't leave a lot of time for blogging - imagine that!

Pregnancy Update

Well, I'm now two days past my due date!  That's the pregnancy update so far.  I've had a really good, positive pregnancy, but am definitely getting a little fidgety and impatient now.  I have a check-up ultrasound and appointment on Monday and am penciled in for an induction on Wednesday afternoon if nothing happens naturally before then.  In the meantime, I worked from home this week and am officially on maternity leave as of this weekend.  Trying to just enjoy the time off, get some final projects done, and not stress too much about the baby taking her sweet time to show up.

Since this is probably my last pregnancy post (not that I did that many), I though I'd post my first and last pregnancy selfies.  Maybe if I get bored this weekend, I'll post the other 22.  ;)

8 weeks

40 weeks

Bedroom Updates

In an effort to get a lot of house projects done before there's a little baby requiring our weekend (and 24/7) attention, we've been working through some back burner projects both large and small lately.  The baby's room had to get done, of course, but we've also bought a new sofa bed and storage bed and wardrobe for our own storage.  And, we painted our bedroom this past week and have plans to paint the dining room next weekend.

Below are two images of our bedroom, one taken in 2011 and one taken yesterday.  The recent one is not finished, as I still have to hang the St. Andrews poster back up and "zhush" the room a bit more, but I know which one I definitely prefer!

2011:

2014:

Our Trip to Montreal

We went to Montreal this weekend!  It's starting to become a tradition that every couple of years, we make the drive 5 hours north for a weekend of Quebecois food and fun.  We went for our honeymoon in 2010, for our 2-year anniversary in 2012, and for a bachelor party, also in 2012.  This was the coldest, snowiest trip we've made up there, but still fun.  It was also our "babymoon," i.e. our last planned trip before baby Eleanor joins us.  Here are some of our photos:

Love this huge arched window in our regular suite.

As well as this lovely terrace, overlooking a much snowier Parc la Fontaine than we're used to.

20 degrees and snowy outside meant an afternoon at the Biodome was very welcome.

A marmoset!

A couple of caymans!

Hibernating beaver butts caught on camera!

A huge sturgeon!

Saturday's dinner - the famous poutine at La Banquise.

There were a couple of slightly better post-poutine couple selfies, but I like Justin's face in this one the best.

Parc la Fontaine is lovely, but chilly (about 9 degrees and windy in this photo).

Nursery Montage

I'll probably do a more complete summary of the nursery's transformation from our guest room (formerly my grandparents' room) at some point, but for now, here's a series of photos showing some of the stages (mostly taken from the same angle, except the ones showing the paint samples by the window).

More Baby's Room Stuff

Look what I made today!  I had seen the quote in a couple of places around the internet, then decided I wanted a print with the saying for Eleanor's room.  Rather than try to find one to buy, I ran to Publisher and typed it up, then started pondering a good mountain image to go with it.  Within seconds, I'd thought of Tolkien's mountain drawings (since Justin and I are both big fans) and found a JPG of the cover of our own edition of The Hobbit.  Popped it in behind the quote, made the text box less transparent so you could read the words better, agonized for a little while over fonts & degree of transparency, and voila!

And in other big news, we painted the nursery today!  I'm going to take better photos tomorrow in the daylight, with the furniture back in place, but here's a sneak peek.  The color is a no-VOC match to Valspar's "Balsam," which seemed fitting for a woodland nursery.

IKEA in the House!

In preparation for the baby and to create more general storage in the house, we ordered a bunch of furniture from IKEA and it came today.  And because life is never simple, the delivery came before the scheduled time, while I was at the oral surgeon's getting a wisdom tooth extracted.  !!!  Luckily, I have a lovely friend who lives locally and was able to run over to our house to sign for the packages for us.  Thank goodness!

Here is what the packages look like on our porch right now:

Note to potential thieves: the porch doors are locked and the packages will all be coming inside once my husband gets home and can help me move them!

Here's what it inside all those packages:

Tarva dresser, for the baby's room (you may recognize it from the nursery plan from Tuesday).

Fjell wardrobe, which we have been in love with since we first saw it (proof!).  The baby is kicking Justin's clothes out of the guest room closet, so we needed the wardrobe (since our closet in this 1934 house is tiny).

Currently, we have big storage boxes under our bed that don't work (Justin has to wake me up sometimes and ask me to roll over so he can get to them in the morning).  Hence, this storage bed with two big drawers on each side.

And finally, an awesome sectional couch that opens into a full-size bed.  See where those tags are sticking out on the left?  That section rolls out and pops up like a trundle bed.  My Mum and Dad - God bless their hearts - will be starting two days of regular child care for us in the fall, so we needed the sofa bed for more sleeping space.  Besides, with two dogs who love to be on the couch with us (the hounds) and a baby on the way, we thought we needed a bigger couch as well!