Blogging elsewhere...

I blogged last night about this wonderful guy over on my other pic-chah blog in case you're interested (I have been around, just not here!) 

[Click on the link or hit the "Press the Shutter" button in the sidear to see -->]

Be back later this weekend I hope, today I'm going over to my sister's to see her 10 new baby chicks! Some photos with Victor will definitely be in order :)

Happy sunny Saturday to you,
G.

Victor's Room (The details)

(Thrifted chalkboard with cute postcard from my friend Anna.  Hanging on Victor's door.)

So I've been saying for awhile now that I was going to post pictures of Victor's nursery, but I just haven't gotten around to taking any good pictures of the room yet (I tried once with my mom's camera but they were awful so I'm going to re-take them.)  And while these pictures aren't the best either, it's the best I can come up with for now so they will have to do :)

I wrote about my 'vision' for Victor's room before he was born back in November, and while the room of course didn't turn out exactly the way I had imagined, overall I'm quite happy with it.  Not knowing the shape/size of the room before making the plans made it a bit harder, but I worked with what I had and with what little money I had to spend (I basically got everything in the room from 1 of 4 places: Etsy, Dollarama, Wal-Mart and thrifted/gifted).

So without further ado, here are some close-ups of the room, full shots to come soon I hope!

1. The dresser: I got this awesome art-deco dresser off Kijiji for 80$, I love it and will eventually move it into our room once I re-do Victor's kid-size room in our [eventual] house.  I considered putting a change pad on the top but I figured it wasn't wide enough with the mirror and besides, we change him either on our bed or the couch anyway, so we didn't really need a change station.  Instead I keep a little wooden box I tole-painted (remember tole painting?!) with all his toiletry-type items in it, along with some other little decorations.  It works out really well actually because he loves sitting/standing on the dresser and looking at all the pretties on top and in the mirror.  The llama is real alpaca wool and was a gift from my sister, along with the Baby Blessing candle.  The touch lamp I actually got at a local home-depot type store I think for about 20$.  The print is Ashely g, the little ceramic owl is thrifted and spray painted, the leaf 'soother buffet' dish is thrifted, the black rosary hanging from the mirror is from my trip to Spain in '05 and the rosary in the little heart on the dresser (pink, ha!) is from my trip Italy last August, the picture frame from Wal-Mart and the "joy" ornament is a gift (I need to put a pic in there!)   

(Another view of the dresser from the door, along with the only window.  The curtain panel was thrifted a long time ago and the hanging owls were a gift from my friend Heather. I added them to an already existing mobile-type thing I made a couple of years ago, I need to take a better shot of it.)

2. Chair: Right next to the dresser is this chair, which Heather and I thrifted a couple of years ago (it was hers but she gave it to me when she moved.)  I wanted originally to have a glider or something in the room, but there's just not enough space, and this chair is actually just the right proportion for the room.  Heather had re-covered it in this blue flower fabric and I had been meaning to re-upholster it for a long time, but I find it suits the room now so I decided to keep it.  I recently took out some books and put them near the chair, so this is now our little reading area.

3.Crib/Mobile: I had the hardest time picking out a crib; I wasn't sure if I wanted white or dark wood, and whether I really wanted to spend a bunch of money on it or not.  In the end I went with the cheap white one from Wal-Mart :)  I actually like it though, it's super simple with clean lines and looks a lot like the Gulliver crib from Ikea, which was a close 2nd choice.  It also pops against the green accent wall.  Anyway, I knew I wanted to put some pom poms over the crib instead of a mobile (inspired by Ashley from Under the Sycamore, check out her blog, it's awesome!), so I bought a set of 3 from an Etsy shop...the colours are WAY off from the colours I had in mind (the neon yellow is supposed to be the same colour as the wall and the teal one the same colour as the owl on the dresser), but it was too late so I used 'em anyway, they're cute.  The Chinese lanterns are from the Dollarama, I stuck some scrapbook paper to the bottoms to cover up the cardboard.  I'm thinking I'd like to string a few paper chains down and around the poms, I just haven't gotten around to it yet.

(White fuzzy 'Yeti' fur rug in front of the crib from Wal-Mart)

(Birth announcement print hanging next to crib, from Etsy)

4. Shelving:  On the long wall of the room (opposite wall from the window), I have a 7ft long low-lying shelf (it was actually the top part of a sideboard I had thrifted last year).  There I keep all of Victor's cloth diapers, blankets, bibs, receiving blankets, toys, books, basically everything non-clothes related.  I wasn't able to get any pictures of the entire thing, but I will get some soon and post.  Above the shelf is a big collage of frames/photos/mirrors, etc, which I'll also have to take a pic of soon.

(The shelf-I keep a pillow on top in case I want to nurse in the chair, and Victor's baby book is in the foreground displayed on a metal easel I got from Dollarama.  The little wooden car was hand carved and given to me as a present.)

(These buckets hold Victor's bibs and his hats.  They're also from the Dollarama.  The little clip on chalkboards were another gift from my friend Anna, she got them from a cool paper store, they're so cute, I have them all over the room! And of course Bill, Victor's newborn buddy.)

And, because I'm such a huge nerd and bored on this Monday night, here's a layout sketch of his room:                  

So that's that.  I'll post some full pictures of the room as soon as I remember to get my mom's camera again (and use the settings properly!)

Hope you enjoyed the little tour,

G.

Jolly Jumper Lover

Victor has been using the Jolly Jumper since he was about 2 months old (since he could hold his head steady enough basically), but it has only been in the last month or so that he has really started getting into it.  Compare the videos below and you'll see what I mean.  The first was taken when he was 3 months old (12 Weeks) and he basically just hung there and occasionally stiffened his body...then check out the next video taken this week at 4 months old (18.5 Weeks) and see the difference!  He looooves it now and can stay in there for 30-45 mins, bouncing and happy the entire time.  He goes in it at least once a day (usually first thing in the morning, we call it his 'morning workout'), but he's usually up for it at any time of day. 

Whoever invented the Jolly Jumper is a genius.

(PS-Sorry for the crappy video quality, these were taken on my cell phone, I really need to get some sort of cheap point and shoot that takes videos.)

Happy rainy Sunday to you, be back soon!
G.

Ways to keep cool...

We, like most other people it seems, are suffering through this terrible heat wave, and let me tell you, living in an old Victorian upstairs flat with windows that DO NOT open is making it even harder!  So we're trying to find ways to keep cool, such as:

*Fans-which don't do a whole heck of a lot, but it's something
*Hanging old, ugly, holey curtains that were being saved for broadcloth in the living room because they are red and block out the sunlight
*Iced coffees.  SO MANY ICED COFFEES.
*Escaping to the parents' house or Wal Mart...anywhere with air conditioning
*Cold washcloth "hats" (see above)
*Dressing in as little as possible
*Closing off the back part of our house and hanging out in our bedroom where it's coolest (I even moved the rocking chair in there from the living room)
*Hopefully buying a kiddie pool soon to dip our feet (and the baby) in...

It's still pretty miserable though.

How are you all beating the heat?  Are you one of the lucky ones with AC?

Magic.

From the session I had last night with my sister and her husband.  The light was INSANE.  And the couple was beautiful :)

Happy Sunday.

26. I'm afraid of being in wide open spaces, especially in the dark.
27. Actually, I'm kind of afraid of the dark in general.
28. I've had my heart broken once and never want to go through that pain again.
29. I have one sister, Daphné, and we're 18 months apart.  We've gotten along great all our lives except for one period from about age 14 to 19 or so (just teenagers I guess).
30. I only have 2 grandmothers left, but am only close to one (we're estranged from the other).
31. I have Marfan Syndrome, though it's very mild and we mostly just joke about it.
32. My first trip on a plane was from Montreal to Cancun when I was 8.
33. I have flown quite a bit but dislike it.
34. I always eat the caramel off the top of Mars bars before the nougat part.
35. I have little sympathy for hypochondriacs and people who are 'tired all the time'...get over it.
36. When I was in elementary school, I wanted to be a writer or an artist when I grew up.
37. When I was in high school, I wanted to be a translator when I grew up.
38. Now, I want to be a photographer and stay at home mom when I grow up.
39. I cannot understand (nor do I want to understand) philosophy, I just can't wrap my brain around it and find it to be a waste of time.
40. I'm a history nerd, but mostly only about Europe.
41. I am a Christian but have always been curious about Wiccans and their beliefs.
42. For the longest time, Braveheart was my favourite movie. Now I have a few, but they change frequently.
43. Dan and I have only gone swimming together maybe 5-6 times in the 7 years we've been together.

44. I speak English and French, used to be able to speak Spanish fairly well, and studied 3 years of German. I'd like to learn Gaelic and Croatian.

45. I used to not eat anything 'red' (meaning strawberries, raspberries, berry-flavoured drinks or candies), but now I do (even though I don't like berry or fruit punch).

46. I love Thai food and sushi, but am also not ashamed to say I like or eat Mcdonald's.

47. I ran a 10km in 2007 and am currently training for a 4-person marathon relay in October...but I don't like running all that much.

48. My favourite holiday is Halloween, though I hardly ever do anything on the actual day (hoping that will change this year with Victor).

49. I'm currently a bit obsessed with Henry VIII and the show "The Tudors".
50. I really love seafood but only kind of like fish.
51. I've stepped my toes in the Atlantic Ocean (from both sides), Pacific Ocean, Adriatic Sea, Gulf of Mexico, and Mediterranean Sea.

Happy Saturday, and happy long weekend to all the Americans! :)

Until next time,
G.

Coupla layouts...

Besides the A Week in the Life album I'm still working on (well, kind of working on...), I've scrapped a few layouts to go into Victor's album. My mom and I are combining our pages to put into one album that we ordered, we're just waiting for it to arrive at the local scrap store.  Anyway, here are a few I've done in the past couple of weeks.

This one was based on a sketch, but I can't remember from where...anyway, it was a 'let's throw a bunch of random stuff from my stash on the page' kind of layout, but it worked.  And you can't go wrong with black polka dots.

And here's one I did just a couple of nights ago, based on the latest pencillines sketch.  A different style for me, but I really like it.

Here's the sketch:

As for WITL, I'm still waiting for the collage pages to arrive from scrapbookpictures.com (it's been pver 2 weeks), I feel like the poject has been stalled a bit.  We also ran out of black printer ink so I need to buy more before being able to print the rest of the journaling cards...c'est la vie I suppose, I want to get it done though, so it WILL happen!

Happy scrappy,
G.