Maternity Photoshoot Preview

Last weekend we had maternity photos taken with Theresa of tsaCreations. It was a wonderful experience and this sneak peak has me super excited to see the rest!!

Weeks 26-29

 

 

29 Weeks

How far along? 29 weeks

Baby's size and development? Baby G is now being compared to a butternut squash! 17 inches long, approximately 3lbs and almost done developing all the important stuff (time to get chubby). Little one is losing space in my uterus and is doing less kicking but more throwing of elbows (much as you would in a mosh pit).

Best moment? Buying the first items of clothing for our baby. It has a few outfits from others but for the first time we gave in and bought a couple hats and some socks. :) Also, regstering for the baby shower was fun and it was really nice to see how into it Andrew got. I am incredibly lucky to have him for a husband and this baby has no idea what a good Daddy its going to have. <3

Symptoms/Changes? My net weight gain so far is 8lbs! If I continue at my current rate of a pound a week I will have gained 18 for the whole pregnancy and that seems pretty darn reasonable. My belly gets sore sometimes from feeling so stretched out but no stretch marks yet! I have been getting occasional Braxton Hicks but they are very mild. Every once in a while I get super dizzy and have to sit down, especially when blow drying my hair for some reason. My indigestion is still bad and so is the terrible rash on my face but overall I feel lucky to have had a pretty easy time. My midwife says everything looks good and that we are measuring right on track. :)

What I miss? Cute dresses.

What I'm looking forward to? Picking up the crib next week, my maternity shoot on February 10th, my baby shower on the 23rd and finally meeting this little baby. I have to stop myself from willing it to come early out of impatience but not knowing the gender is starting to wear away at me!

 

The stuff we bought from babyGap.

I'm actually 30 weeks today!

 

Forever 21 Throw Pillow

F21 has a few throw pillows for sale. They are pretty cute I just ordered this one because buying clothes makes me sad right now and I had a gift card. There is also one with an owl on it and a floral/sequined one and they all have two colour options. $23.80 CA

Nursery Progress

The inspiration for our nursery comes mainly from laybabylay.com, she does the most amazing mood boards, but it's her daughter's nursery that I really love. Other bits of inspiration came from pinterest, etc.

Here are some photos that inspire me:

 

 

 

 

 

All photos from laybabylay.com

 

 

There were tons of photos not shown here that I looked at and saved that helped me come up with our idea for the room. The strategy I used was to find common elements in the photos to help pin down exactly what it was I loved about a room. These things tended to be: a Jenny Lind Crib, and black and white chevron rug and a pale aqua wall colour. I also love the grey-taupe dresser/change table and the comfy chair in the top photo. I chose to use these things as a base for our nursery and then add accent colours and details once the baby is born and we know the gender. If it's a girl I will accent with pale pink or coral, and if it's a boy I am thinking more gold, black and neutrals. 

 



 

This is what the room looked like shortly after we moved in. We threw some stuff in there to remind us that this is where our baby would sleep one day. :)

 

 

Our first step was to clean the room out of all our junk and pick a paint colour. We brought home three sample pots from Home Depot (a $5 each) and painted a patch on each wall. We let it sit for a while and looked at it in every possible light before settling on the middle one. "Aqua Sky" from C-I-L paints. We patched holes, sanded, painted baseboards, the closet, the messy edges around the ceiling and the sill inside the window white. We let this dry befrore taping it all off and doing all the cutting in with the aqua before fininshing off with two coats of rollering.

 

 

Terrible shot, I am almost never home during good daylight so it will be a while before I can get a photo of the true colour. It appears paler in person. The cradle will go in our living room once we get a crib. My grandfather made it for me as a baby! Luckily we only needed two coats for the room as it meant only needing one gallon of paint (for a room that is roughly 8'x10'). Our next task will be to find and refinish a dresser!

 

 

Buying Cloth Diapers in Canada

We chose cloth diapers because they not only save money, but they also save waste. The ones we decided on were Bumgenius Elemental One Size All-in-Ones. I chose these partly because they are easy to use (no stuffing), organic, last your baby through pretty much the whole time they are in diapers and because Young House Love swears by them and their word is pretty much gospel. The problem is that buying these in stores in Canada is virtually impossible or super expensive. I knew I had to get them online and in a multi-pack rather than individually. Amazon.com has an 12-pack of neutral colours for $250 while Amazon.ca has the same for $350 (pretty crazy when the Canadian dollar is currently worth $0.01 more than the US). I also found a website called snugglebugz.ca where you can get 12 for $362.75 and one called newandgreen.com who offer a discount based on how many you buy so that 12 cost $328.61. These were both Canadian websites so I wouldn't have to deal with duty or crazy shipping charges and I could feel good about supporting a Canadian company. I could have orderd from Aamazon.com and had it shipped to Ship Happens in Sumas, WA, just across the border and saved money. However I would have ended up saving only about $42, having to deal with a middleman and not getting to choose the colours of the diapers. I opted to go with New and Green and placed an order for 12 diapers in specific colours (white, noodle, butternut, mirror, grasshopper, albert and lovelace). I got my automated confirmation e-mail and all was good. However, the next day I got a personalized e-mail from Collen at New and Green apologizing profusely that they did not currently have all the colours I wanted. She outlined my options and offered a free diaper to make up for the inconvienience. I opted to have her ship what she had then and the rest when she got a new order in. TWO days later there is a knock on the door and 6 diapers (including our free one) have arrived. Inside was a handwritten note apologizing again and reminding us to prewash them. This is some of the best customer service I have ever received! I am so happy I chose to order from them, especially since with the free diaper we spent less than $20 more than we would have ordering from amazon. Thanks Collen and New and Green! I can't wait to get the rest of these diapers!

P.S. Speaking of online Canadian companies with great, personalized customer service have you ever shopped from Dress911.ca? They are awesome and practically a one woman show!