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Nursery Pictures!

// December 2nd, 2009 // 3 Comments » // Baby

Over the Thanksgiving break we spent several days painting and decorating the nursery for the baby. Here are some pictures we took along the way!

This is what the room looked like when we bought the house. Reminds me of The Brady Bunch!

Two coats of primer and we’re ready to start taping and painting! Notice the green tape. This is Frog Tape. It’s 10x better than the standard blue painters tape.

Two coats of Sky Blue. Now to move on to the stripes.

Sandstone stripe. It looked pink while it was wet. We we’re a little worried. We also had to use 3 inch blue painters tape for the next stripe we were about to paint. You’ll see the different results from the tape in a moment.

Finishing off the stripes with Starry White

Here’s the difference between Frog Tape and blue painters tape. The top tan line was taped off with blue tape. The bottom blue line was taped off with green Frog tape. Very little paint bled through the Frog tape while the blue tape looked like this around the entire room. We spent an hour going around the room with a little brush touching this up. You can buy Frog Tape at Lowe’s.

You can’t paint a room without having a mess. Don’t forget the drop cloth! We went through about 80-100 yards of tape.

The finished product! Now to clean up and put the furniture in!

The Baby’s Room!

Wifey painted these to go along with the rock star crib bedding.

Wifey painted this for Husbands 27th birthday. It fits nicely with the Rock Star theme so we decided to put it in the babys room.

All in all we spent 3 days painting and putting together furniture. We did learn that if you are going to paint a room, you get what you pay for. Buy a good brand of paint (don’t forget the primer), buy good brushes and rollers (the cheap ones will wear out after one wall), drop cloth ($3 drop cloth is cheaper than replacing carpet when you kick something over), and of course buy Frog Tape. It’s also handy to have some paint that is the same color as the ceiling because you will undoubtedly bump the roller against the ceiling. If you buy a small quart of paint for ceiling touch ups that will be handy. It will cost you an extra $10 or so but well worth it.

If you plan on painting any horizontal or vertical stripes in the room, we would suggest getting a 4ft level to ensure your lines are straight. We picked one up at Wal-Mart for $12. It made taping the lines so much easier! If you just try to eye ball it, it will be crooked!

Also, don’t forget the touch ups at the end. When you think you have everything done you are actually only about 90% done. Go back over each wall and look closely for spots that need a touch up. Do it now while you still have everything out otherwise there’s a 99% chance you will never go back and do it!

So the nursery is all done. Now all we need is the baby. 3 months and counting!

Let us know what you think and we would love to see pictures of your nursery so leave us a comment and a link if you have pictures!

Painting can be easy and a lot of fun if you take the time to do it right. Check out the How-To video that we found on painting a room. You can view it at the top of the page on the right.

Enjoy!

Thanksgiving To Do List

// November 25th, 2009 // 1 Comment » // Around The House, Baby

The great thing about taking a vacation from work is that you mental check out from work a few days before vacation starts. I found myself in this situation last Thursday around 3pm. Sitting at my desk, my work for the week completed, I was looking at my remaining vacation days.

As I was looking at the vacation days I had planned for the rest of the year, Thanksgiving and the last two weeks of December I realized that I had three unaccounted vacation days to use up, score! I decided to take two Fridays off in December to have a two four day work weeks before my 2 week Christmas vacation. But what to do with the one remaining day? Since my Thanksgiving vacation was starting in two days and all of my work was completed I decided to go ahead and start vacation early and take the next day off.

So begins the To-Do list.

Thanksgiving vacation had already been designated to the nursery and getting it ready for baby. After reviewing all kinds of nurseries on Rate My Space we finally decided on a design and it was off to Lowes. We’ll be sharing the details of the painting of the nursery (with pictures) as soon as it’s all completed.

The reason we are painting is because we have a big box sitting in the garage that contains the crib. I was told that the room must be painted before we can assemble the crib so that was the order I was following. I’ve spent the last three days taping, painting, taking tape off, re-taping, painting another color, taking tape off, re-taping, painting yet another color, taking tape off, etc. The goal is to have the nursery done by Thanksgiving Eve and we are well on target.

Thanksgiving Day will bring the usual eating until the button on your pants pops off followed by napping. Naps aren’t just for children you know. I must say though, I’m a little disappointed because I haven’t seen any commercials for a Charlie Brown Thanksgiving special. This makes me sad. On the opposite end of the spectrum is Wifey, happy as can be that there is no Charlie Brown on TV. I’ve told her more than once that had I known she disliked Charlie Brown before we got married there is a strong possibility that I couldn’t have gone through with it. But in typical engagement fashion, we both hid all of flaws until after the honeymoon.

After Thanksgiving is the traditional start of Christmas! We have a 9 ft Christmas Tree we bought on clearance the day after Christmas (the only time you should buy a new Christmas tree) we are dying to take out of the box! It’s also that time of the year when I get to get the ladder out and climb onto the roof to put up Christmas lights. It’s a good time for a man when he is standing on the roof of his house. I wish it were acceptable for me to climb up there even when there is no reason to.

Before I return to painting, a few things we are thankful for this year.

• Our first baby. We cannot wait to meet you.
• Each other. The perfect person to wake up with, come home to and spend the rest of your life with.
• Health. It’s easy to forget about until it quickly fades and reminds you of it’s importance. It’s greatly appreciated to have it around.
• Happiness. You can never have too much of it.

To all of you and your families, Happy Thanksgiving!