For A. Rae of Sunshine

If you need to brighten up your day, head on over to my new blog For A. Rae of Sunshine inspired by the new light in my life:

Ms.  Annie Rae Downs

-jd

Day Three

Ebay rug returned, new temporary rug in place. We got the ebay rug back from Stanley Steamer and it looked wonderful:

It was a little faded and stained, but it was also from the 1940's and had the best colors to start a palette in the house. We sat on the sofa and the smell from the rug hit you in the face like 'whoa'. I got on all fours and started smelling the rug. "Stanely Steamer didn't do crap to this rug". My mom came over and brought her steam cleaner. Drew went over it FOUR times and

each time emptied filthy water, a ton of dirt and hair, and the smell was starting to permeate the house.

Here's just one bottle full of what we found. I could have filled up a truck load of these. Finally, we threw the rug outside in hopes that fresh air would help. 5 hours later, I go outside and I can smell the freaking thing the minute I open the door. Grossed out beyond belief, I told Drew to just return it through Ebay. We opened a case and are out the $31 it costs to ship it back. Lesson Learned!!!! I mourned my beautiful rug for a while and almost felt a slight depression from finally finding something to kick start the major design element in the house. Oh well, press on.

I did still want a rug for a multitude of functional purposes and I knew if I waited, I might not ever have the time or energy to look after the babe is here, so I hopped on craigslist and found this replacement:

Is it my dream rug? Not in a million. Are there any colors in it that I can pull into pillows and art? I don't think so.

But

Does it stink? No. Is it soft? Yes.

Did I mention that it was $45? It could be worse, I know, but it just looks so...........generic and the colors with my sofa aren't ideal.

But it will be staying for a while until I find my dream serapi colored antique oriental that doesn't smell like straight ass. Where are you rug?!?!?

In other news,

I go to the doctor at 10am today in hopes of some news that I've progressed and will not have to be induced on Thursday. I'm trying to stay positive, but I just don't "feel" like anything is happening :(

-jd

Random thoughts of an overdue pregnant woman

Just some simple randomness I've thought of since being on Maternity Leave (day #2)...

1. Grocery shopping while everyone else is at work totally changes the experience.  It was actually enjoyable.

2. My house is the cleanest it has ever been and it's amazing. 

3. When I don't 'have' to get up for work, I only sleep about 15 minutes later than I would waking up to an alarm.

4.  It's weird being able to do stuff when you want and not having to schedule 9,000 things in "after 5" or "on the weekends" or "during lunch".

5. To all of you people who have kids and see a pregnant woman, it's not necessary to tell her  to "get her rest now" or "how hard it will be to leave the house soon" or "how her life is about to change".  Trust me, she hears enough negative random comments.  Try saying something positive or just a simple "congratulations".  If I'm not on my death bed from exhaustion, going endless days without showering and not ever leaving the house, I must say, I'll be a little disappointed because that is definitely the consensus with a newborn!

6.  There's nothing sweeter to me right now than sitting in the house, in silence, listening to my dog sleeping (snoring).  I can't imagine what it will feel like when it's the baby that Drew and I made that I'm listening to.

7.  It's a lot easier to be healthy when I'm at home and reps aren't bringing in sweets and I don't get that 10am, 2pm, 3pm, and 4pm urge to snack from boredom at work.

That's all.  Hopefully pics of the temporary rug to come soon....or pics of the baby.  Either way, stay tuned ;)

-jd

T O T A L L Y O B S E S S E D: Orange and Blue

So, for whatever reason lately, I've been obsessing over navy blue and a combo with pink, orange, salmon or anything in those tones.  I'm thinking I might use the new "temporary" rug in the dining room to test out this color combo in la casa.   I'm having technical difficulties uploading pics of the new rug, but hopefully tomorrow.  We're in the process of giving it a good clean now.  It's not my dream rug by any stretch, but for $45...I'll make it work for a while.

Here's some of my inspiration pics.


I would give my right arm for this rug.




I like the brown up in the mix. 

-jd

bookmarks

I've been seeing these vintage inspired ribbon bookmarks everywhere and had planned to make some for Mother's Day as a tester, but I ran out of time. 

Here's my inspiration:








I busted some out yesterday and this is how they turned out:

Bear with my POS camera, but these are my first three "testers"

The end charms are too long, so I think the next round will have shorter embellishments.  I need to start stocking up on vintage jewelry for the baubles at the ends.

Cute, but I'm thinking not as functional too have such long charms...

But it does make for a cute display like this just sitting on a shelf, in a bookcase or on a table!

This is the other end of the bookmarks which I think has a more appropriate size.  Maybe this end will just receive a silver ball.

Velvet ribbon has been proven kind of difficult to find.  I think I may try some with a burlap type ribbon next.  I want to make a few to lay around the house....

Happy Sunday

-jd

Drew

I felt overwhelmed with pride today.  We woke up early to go garage sale-ing and with this being my last Saturday to junk for a while, I was hoping we'd pile up...or at least find a desk for our new computer.  We headed out and about 30 minutes into our venture, Drew got called into work.  Bummer.  I peeled around to our house on two wheels to throw him out of the car so I could get back to it. 

About an hour later I get a picture message from him with gold nesting tables followed up by a call to see if I like them.  Now Drew is down to ride around with me occasionally and junk, but for him to go to a garage sale on his own in between work appointments, find tables that I love, and send me a picture!  What a turn on!  lol.  They were $25, so I told him to load them up!  He called me back a couple of minutes later and said he got them down to $12!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Reason #4,987,569 why I love him: he's more frugal than I am.

Not quite sure where they'll go yet, but here they are:

I see these all the time, but neva for twelve bucks!  The white design on the top looks cute next to white upholstery. Probably not going to stay next to that chair, but next to something white...

I'll be celebrating my due date tomorrow by laying out in the pool with Drew and my mom.  Maybe the baby will decide to descend...

-jd

Happy Friday!!!!!

I've been a little MIA lately working on the nursery (pics to come soon), getting ready for my maternity leave, and just being pregnant in general.  But today I am freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.  Free from the eight to five that is.  Starting Monday, I will have four months off of work! 

I started my day at the doctor's in hopes of dilation news.  No such luck.  Baby girl is quite content in my belly and It doesn't look like she's going to make her appearance by her due date on Sunday.  I'm not mad at her though.  My sciatic nerve pain is gone and I'm feeling pretty good.  I get out of breath walking to the bathroom and am not sleeping all that great, but that's to be expected.  I've had two mini freak outs this week thinking about the pain of birth, the babies health, what I'm going to do with her when she gets here, if I'll be a good mom, what a baby will do to my marriage...you know, the normal things moms to be get to think about at 3am!

My induction is set for Thursday at 6:30pm, but I have a doctor's appointment on Wednesday morning and if "things are progressing" then they're going to leave me alone (I'd rather not be induced).  If they're not, the date is probably going to stay as Thursday depending on how the doctor and I feel at that time. 

In other news, the nursery is turning out to be my new favorite room in the house and has actually opened the door to color in the rest of the hizzy.  Can you believe it!?!?  COLOR.  IN.  MY.  HOUSE.

I accidentally bought a rug off of ebay last week and it's at Stanley Steamer right now, but pics soon to follow.  I am an avid craigslist-er and as you all know, I love a good bargain hunt.  I'll e-mail low ball offers and once I get the item down to the lowest possible price, I determine if it's worth it.  Horrible, I know.  Well, Drew is an avid ebay-er and I browse on there from time to time under his account, but have never really been as into ebay stuff because you can't see if before you purchase which makes me nervous.  I'm not a huge online shopper.  So, anyways, I figure out that I like Oushak Turkish Serapi rugs (I know you're thinking "What in the hell is she talking about").  It took me about a month of research to figure out which kind of oriental rugs appeal to me so I knew what to search for.  I liked the Serapi colors and the faded look of an oushak and the patterning of the turkish rugs.  SO, off to ebay I went to browse around.  A few caught my fancy and I saw a little things that said "make an offer".  I'm good at that, so what the hell.  I made an offer of $400 on a $800 rug.  Figured there's no way that deal was going through and if it did, maybe I'll consider the purchase.  Skip to the next night when Drew is like "You bought a rug?"  "No, I just made a few offers on some"  "Um?  It doesn't work like that and one of your offers was accepted....so you bought a rug???"  "Oh."  "Yea, this ain't craigslist honey" "Um".  Of course I freaked until the rug arrived looking at the pictures online like a psycho, e-mailing the seller after the fact asking if there were any stains, if it stunk, etc.  Yesterday Drew calls me that the rug has arrived.  I flew home my heart pounding and walked in.  He had already laid it out and arranged the furniture exactly how I had the past 4 times I've brought living room rugs home from Tuesday Morning (ended up returning every one).  I LOVED IT!  It adds so much color depth to the room.  I can't wait to post pics, but unfortunately it did have some staining and Drew said it smelt "old", so we dropped it off for a good clean just to be safe. 

I finally feel like I have some sort of design direction as far as colors for the abode!

As for next week's agenda: I'm going to clean the house in preparation for the babe's arrival, finish the little onsie and hat I'm making her to come home in, and just try and relax (we all know how that goes).  I'm sure my rambling blog posts will get longer and more frequent now that the eight to five isn't in the way...

Stay tuned!
-jd