Nesting...

Baby M's due date is only 6 weeks away, so we are officially in nesting mode.  My version is different than Rob's, but both are equally required in preparing for the baby's arrival.  Rob has been finishing half of our basement to create an office / spare bedroom space now that the 2nd bedroom upstairs is being turned into the nursery.  This project has been going on for a couple of months with a lot of assistance from Pa Wainer when he's not traveling for work and Pa Musci when he came up for the baby shower.  We (I should say Rob) are on track to have it done in the nick of time!  Pictures to be posted at a later date.  My nesting involves organizing every space I can get my hands on... so far I have finished all the closets, the attic, the pantry, and the garage.  We have purged a lot of unnecessary stuff and have had 2 pickups by Big Brother/Big Sister for donations.  It is totally addicting getting rid of things that you don't need to make space for the new addition in our lives!  Today has been dedicated to the nursery... I have put away all the wonderful gifts from the two baby showers (New Jersey and Massachusetts) and I am planning out where to put the wall decal that just arrived today.  Here is a preview of what it looks like... once I have arranged it in the nursery I'll post another one that shows you how it looks in Baby M's room.

By WallArtDesign (www.etsy.com)

The Bump...

I have not been a good blogger.  My updates have been few and far between, but I am determine to get back into it before the baby arrives!  Here are some pictures that show just how much the baby has grown in the last 3 weeks.  I also want to say thank you to all of you that attended my baby showers in New Jersey or Boston. It was so amazing to have so many of my friends and family celebrate this wonderful time in our lives! Baby M will be here before we know it.

28 weeks (3 weeks ago)

Today (31 weeks, well almost 32 weeks - 58 days to go!)

Let the Decorating Begin!

This week marked the half way point of pregnancy at 20 weeks and what better way to celebrate then to begin the decorating process for the nursery!  The bedding set has been chosen so I have the color pallet to start from to choose the paint color, rug, etc.  Oh yeah, and the crib and dresser has been ordered!

Bonding with Neighbors

What an amazing weekend! We could not have asked for a better day to go out on the boat on Northwood Lake in Epsom, New Hampshire with our neighbors Beth and Dan and their kids Cameron and Christopher.  The sky was blue, the humidity was low, and the water temperature was perfect for a day of swimming, tubing, and water-skiing.  Here is a picture and video of Rob learning to water-ski!

Trucks it is!

We are very excited to announce that we are having a baby boy!!!!

Trucks or Dolls?

Tomorrow is the big day... our 18 week ultrasound will reveal the surprise that we have been waiting for since the day the stick said Pregnant... Is it a Boy or a Girl? 

Landscaping 101

Each spring we try to pick one area of the yard to improve.  To get those of you caught up that haven't been to our house yet, I'll start with 2010's improvement - the driveway.  We added pavers to the edges and bought new stone to cover the entire surface.  I've added a few before and after pictures to show you the dramatic difference with simply adding the adding concrete pavers (huge money savings over the granite or marble)!

2010 Project - Driveway

Pre Pavers

The after pictures of the driveway above are not that great because I never took any! Ops!  Just another reason why keeping this blog is a great idea so that I remember to document the projects that we do and adventures that we go on since I haven't made one of my scrapbooks in years!

This year in addition to the annual maintenance of our flower beds where we edged and mulched, we focused our energy on two problem areas... 1) the crazy rock garden that the previous owners have created under the oak tree; and 2) the back edge of our property .  I use the words rock garden loosely as I would say it was more like a weeded mess by the time we moved it.  Maybe at one time with some love it was pretty, but definitely not now!  Since we already have a ton of flower beds in the yard we decided that the best use of this space with not a lot of maintenance would be to remove the rocks, till the land, and plant grass.  It only took a few weeks of work to remove over 20 wheelbarrows filled with rocks, a hour of work with our wonder neighbors tiller (thankfully we did not have to do this by hand), and a rainy spring to grow the grass.... we got exactly the results we were looking for! Now I just need Rob to build me my swing and this spot will be absolutely perfect!  On a side note: I was in my first trimester through all this spring cleanup and had the energy to make it through... I must say I am pretty proud of myself!

Project 1: Removing the Rock Garden under the Oak Tree

Project 2: Planting Wildflowers along the back edge of the property

The wildflowers did not come out perfect this year, but we have heard it is something that is very hard to start so I am pretty impressed with the first results.  This just means that each year we will hopefully continue to get a better quality product which means fresh flowers in the house all summer long!

The before (after tilling the land)