Another Room Makeover: Nursery!

After finding our we were pregnant, we got to work repainting the baby's room.

When we moved in, we installed shelves one of the walls with the intention of using them for books and teddy bears and other stuffies (at our last place). However, once I started putting some books on the shelves they started to pull away from the wall. I was not impressed, especially considering that at our last place these shelves lived in the kitchen and held a couple dozen large cookbooks with no complaints. Needless to say the books came off the shelf and were replaced with yet more stuffies. 

Before the room reno could start, I wanted to remove the shelves from the wall. Unfortunately we used metal plugs (which I really don't recommend!) and when they were removed they left a 1" hole in the wall. So I had lots of patching to do to repair the damage. Once the repairs were complete, it was time for paint. 

As much as I like the colour of the "blue room", I found the blue had a lot of grey in it and looked kind of dingy. I wanted a colour that had more life in it so we went with an aqua blue (Premier's Tahoe Blue from Canadian Tire). 

Before

Cutting In - You can see the difference in colour

Finished: View from the door

View from the window opposite the door

We still have to get some furniture to go in this room. Up until now it has been used as a guest room, and had 2 single beds in it. We removed one of the bed frames and put it's mattress under the bed in case we still needed the extra bed. We're hoping to pick up a bookshelf from Ikea in the next few weeks (the same one that we used here, and then we'll need a crib, change table and glider all before the end of February!

Between being back to work and "morning" sickness (what a stupid name that is!), time has just been flying by! Today I finally had a chance to go around and take some pictures of our gardens! Our flowers that were supposed to flower in August have finally decided it was time to bloom.

Some of the dahlias we planted are blooming. The plants themselves don't look very big, but the flowers sure are!

The gladiolas started to bloom a few weeks ago. Unfortunately, we didn't plant them deep enough and the wind knocked most of them over. We've taken to cutting the flower spikes once they start to bloom so we've had some nice fresh cut flowers inside.

The gardens that we worked so hard on earlier this summer have been doing well. The first one we tackled is filled with blooms. We even discovered some yellow cone flowers that we didn't see last year (lucky they survived the rebuild!), and it seems some seeds from a ground cherry plant that was planted 30 feet away made it in there as well. David has been enjoying harvesting the surprise crop!

Our shaded rock-garden is also doing well, although it will still need some work next year. Some of the ferns I thought I moved have come back, but with the new rock placement it works well. 

Our neighbour's chicken have gotten big and she often lets them roam free...

And finally, a sure sign that summer is coming to an end: the Canadian Geese have begun their fall migration south.

New Addition!

We found out at the beginning of July that we're going to be parents! According to our calculations, our estimated date of delivery was March 12th, 2012. However, at our fist ultrasound last week, the technician told us that I'm actually a little further along than I thought. Instead of being 12 weeks, 4 days the baby was measuring 14 weeks, 4 days moving the due date to February 26th! Needless to say we're very excited! It's still too early to know if it's a boy or a girl, but we should be finding out at our next ultrasound. 

Our Little Jumping Bean

And we're back!

I was hoping to start posting earlier than this, but my body demanded that I take some time to rest and relax as best I could before starting back to work. Just to warn you, this post is a little long... photos will be added a little later.

David and I left for Newfoundland a couple of days after my last post. It was my grandparent's 70th wedding anniversary and family traveled from all over to be there to help them celebrate. Unfortunately, my grandfather fell ill just a few days before the big party and was taken to hospital (he's doing very good now, and is back home), so my grandparents ended up spending their anniversary in the hospital. The party went ahead as scheduled and we made a video for them with all their well-wishers. For the rest of the week, my grandparents had a never ending line of visitors as everyone stopped by to visit.

As for the rest of our vacation, David finally achieved his goal of climbing Gros Morne Mountain (the mountain the National Park is named for).

On our way back, we decided to stop over in PEI for one night. David had never been there before, and there was a mini mill on our way that we could visit (it's David's dream that in addition to an alpaca farm, we also process and spin our own fiber). We had a beautiful campsite at Lord Selkirk Provincial Park, and spent a couple of hours touring and learning about the Belfast Mini Mill. We met some wonderful people and had a great time!

We timed everything perfectly - we made it back home just in time to celebrate our 1st wedding anniversary!

That week was quite hectic as I raced to finish putting together a show book for the Navan Fair Alpaca show the following week. Once it was all done and sent off to the printers I had a couple of days to relax before the Alpaca show started. Once again, we volunteered as Alpaca Security and camped in the alpaca tent with the animals. It was kind of noisy, and I'll admit I didn't get as much sleep as I was hoping for, but it was much quieter than last year! We had a great time at the show; I even had some family come by to see what it was all about.

A couple days later and I was back to work. Looking back our summer passed in a whirlwind. Now I'm looking forward to our labs starting up and getting back into the swing of things!

And for those that may be curious: planning for our next Halloween party is well under way...

Tiny break

With summer finally in full swing, we're going to take a couple of weeks off to recharge our batteries. We'll be back in August with some new adventures!

New Pony!

Our neighbours bought a new pony a few months back, and she finally arrived last Saturday morning. Her name is Kate, and she is 8 years old. They got her to teach their young daughter how to ride. (The still have Zara, the grey mare. She is in the shelter... you can kind of see her legs in this picture.)

Silver, the pony they had last year, was too nervous and they were worried that he might throw their daughter if something happened to startle him. He was sold to an equestrian centre, where they will work with him to get him more used to being around people. Eventually, he will also be able to teach new young riders how to ride.

Cats go Free!

After unsuccessfully trying to keep our cats within our "enclosure" (i.e., our deck) David decided it was time to let them run free in our yard. So far, we'd only had 2 cats who came and went as they pleased. Today, that number is up to seven!

Cleo exploring

 What's really cute about it, is that several of them like to stay together as they explore the yard.

Kali, Cleo, and Pepper, intrigued by the garage...

If either one of us goes out with them, they have a tendency to lay down near us and, usually, roll around.

Caesar and Cleo, taking a break