What They Don't Tell You

Going through my first pregnancy, delivery, and the early days with our son, I felt like there were so many things about this stage of life that no one told me. They didn't tell me about the endless worry during pregnancy, or how fragile it would all feel most of the time. No one mentioned that I would feel like the worst mother on earth when I took their advice and sent the baby to the hospital nursery for a few hours at night (the right decision for us, it just felt so irresponsible!). Definitely no one told me that after three months, I still wouldn't be able to read my baby's cries every time and know what he needs. There are tons of things that no one tells you.

But I think what strikes me the most right now is how inadequate the things they do tell you are. Yes, we've all heard about how tired you'll be with a new baby. No one explains that that means not just physically tired from getting up at night, but the pure emotional and mental drain you feel everyday. How can such a tiny person who doesn't even talk yet drain your mind so much?! How can you use up so much emotion on normal daily activities?

They mention that being a mother is hard, a twenty-four hours-a-day job, that being a stay-at-home mom is the hardest job you'll ever do. But they don't go on to tell you that it isn't just work like you would do at a job, physical, mental, or social effort. It is stress on every ounce of your being for hours at a time. It's a person who depends on you completely and utterly every minute of their existence (at least for awhile). It's so consuming at times that you feel like every aspect of your life is spiraling out of control and you can't get it back.

A lot of that was pretty negative, I know. It's been a rough week at our house. I had no idea I would feel so underprepared and overwhelmed! But for anyone who is contemplating kids and thinks this all sounds horrible, here's something else they didn't quite explain. There are no words to express the joy and love of having this amazing little person who, a year ago, didn't even exist. Watching him grow and learn and change is more wonderful than I could have guessed. It's rough right now, but I'm trusting the part where they say it's worth it will turn out to be better than they said :)

I'm Not Raising a Boy

When we found out we were going to have a baby boy, one of the first thoughts I had was "I have no idea how to raise a boy!"

I have a younger brother, but he's close enough in age to me that I never felt motherly toward him, he was just a pest. I'm a girl, a pretty girly one. In spite of my years of close contact with men like my dad and hubby, I really have no idea what a boy needs. So I started researching (which is always my first reaction to something I don't understand). I found blogs online. I found books at the library. I talked to friends with boys. I got some really great information, and some kind of out-there advice.

But I still don't really know how to raise a boy.

Recently I've come to realize something that I hope will help me as I face the next 18 years or so. I'm not raising a boy. I'm raising a man, and wow, do I want him to be a good one!

I know what a good man is. I'm not that far removed from those dating days when I evaluated guys against the criteria of what I knew a strong, God-fearing man was. I'm not trying to grow my son up too quickly, but I know what I want him to be like as a man, and I think that can help guide us as we figure out this parenting thing.

So, while the day-to-day tasks of raising our son may confound me sometimes, I have a goal in mind and that certainly makes it less intimidating! First of all, I want to raise a man who loves God. I want him to be capable of leading in his family and church. I would love for him to value education, new experiences, and people. I hope he is responsible, fun-loving, confident, and strong. I know that instilling these traits in him won't be easy, but I'm sure it will be a rewarding challenge!

Yep, I'm Part of The Club

Growing up, I always wanted to be a mom. It seemed like this wonderful place where I would be completely in my element. As a young adult, I realized it was a little more than that. You see, since college, I've spent a lot of time with women older than myself, and I never quite felt like I was as much of a woman as they were. They had husbands and children and homes of their own. They were part of The Club. I was an adult, but I wasn't yet enough of one to be in The Club. There were still so many issues that were so integral to these women's lives that I had no idea about.

When I got married, I felt like I was almost there. When I was younger, my mom went to several meetings of the Red Hat Society. If you've never heard of it, these were older ladies who got together wearing red hats and purple clothing. If a woman joined them who was under a certain age (50 maybe? I don't remember), she wore pink and lavender instead of the brighter colors. She was kind of like a trial member. That's how I felt when I got married. I could join more conversations now and I understood more topics the women discussed and I felt like I had valid ideas on more issues. But I still wasn't all the way in the The Club. I still wasn't quite enough of a woman to fully join in every discussion.

But then, I had a baby. He's only 12 weeks old, but I'm already fully part of The Club. And I love The Club. I feel like every woman I talk to finally sees me as a complete equal. I have relevant opinions. My life is approved of. Maybe that shouldn't matter, but it always mattered to me. I wanted to be one of those women who was in the The Club.

Recently, though, I've been thinking a lot about what womanhood really is. And I've come to learn this: being a woman is not about being in The Club. It's not about being married or having babies. It's not about whether I'm a stay-at-home mom or a working mom. To be honest, it's not even about me at all. Being a woman is about being who God wants me to be so other people see Him. I should reflect His gentleness, His love, His vast concern for His children. That is what makes me a woman, not being at a stage in life where other woman see me as an equal.

So I'll enjoy being in The Club, but I hope it can become a place where every woman is accepted just the same, regardless of her spot in life, because we all reflect Christ, and that's a much better club to be part of.

Happy Birthday to Me, AKA Pudgy Cake

Yesterday was my birthday. I'm not ashamed to say, my 30th birthday. I know some people struggle with this one, but I'm thrilled to be 30! The excitement was partly due to this masterpiece:

 

The cake is a spin on this one from Cookie and Cups. It's called "pudgy cake." The most apt name I've ever heard. We changed the top layer to strawberry and used cream cheese buttercream frosting. It. Was. Delightful.

The rest of the day was spent enjoying family and this precious little guy (with his favorite person, Papaw). Such a great start to a new decade!

Two Months

Month two was a big one for Little Man. He didn't gain as much weight as month one, but he had a huge growth spurt in length at the end of the month! He lost a lot of the newborn look and now just looks like a round, sweet baby boy. His pediatrician again kept describing him as perfect at his two month appointment!

One of his favorite things is his Papaw. Just like his cousin, he adores Papaw. He also loves being outside. He instantly stops crying when we take him outside while he's upset. That will be useful, until winter :)

Little Man was dedicated to the Lord at our church this month. A dedication is basically a service where the parents acknowledge that the baby is a gift from God, and promise to raise him to love and honor the Lord. It was a beautiful ceremony, and we were thrilled that our pastor was able to do it on one of his last Sundays before moving away.

Little Man learned so many fun things this month. He started cooing and "talking" to us, and to his toys. And to ceiling fans. And to the dog. His favorite is cooing at his paper airplane mobile when he wakes up and kicking his feet really hard in the crib. He can hold his head up really well now, and support a little weight on his legs when you stand him up. He discovered his fingers this month, laughed once or twice, and started smiling at people.

We started regular story time this month, and he actually pays attention to the book for a few minutes. He slept through the night for the first time, but just once. He also went to his first antique tractor show (one of Papaw's favorite things) and first flea market (one of Momma's favorite things!).

One Month

This is very late. As I write, Little Man is actually 2 1/2 months, but I want this record of his growing up, so I'm posting it anyway.

In his first month, my sweet boy charmed everyone he met. He ate like a champ, gained plently of weight, and continued to be on the longer side for his age. At his two week appointment, the pediatrician just kept saying he was perfect and a big boy :)

 

We celebrated his first holiday, the 4th of July, and hubby and I did some sparklers for him in the driveway (which, at 6 days old, he totally ignored).

 

He went to his first church service, his first day trip to his grandparents house 1 1/2 hours away, and his first time at the county fair.

 

His first smile and first night in the crib in his own room both happened in month one. He also met his cousin for the first time (they live 10 hours away, so that was a big deal!).

 

 

It was a rough month for Mommy and Daddy, but we got through it, and really, he was a pretty easy baby!

Little Man's Nursery

We started work on the baby's nursery long before I was even pregnant. I spent many long hours filling and sanding the existing fake wood panelling to look smooth. We painted the walls and trim and cleaned up the wood floors early in the pregnancy. I'd been planning the room for probably almost a year and collecting the items I wanted to put in it. So here's the reveal!

 

I didn't want a real theme for the room. I want it to be able to grow with Little Man and not be babyish. I think it may be more for me than him right now :) It's full of lots of vintage items and a lot of things from our families and our own childhoods. As he grows and gets more things of his own, we'll add those and take out the delicate things an energetic little boy might destroy!

 

 

I made his mobile with an embroidery hoop and paper airplanes hung with fishing line. At this point, he absolutely loves watching it move in the air from the fan!

 

From the beginning, I planned to use aqua and red in the room. When we found out the baby was a boy, I added bright green to the mix.

 

 

The bookshelf area looks a little different now because I had to make room for the books I can't seem to stop buying for him!

 

 

I adore the pegboard over the changing table. It's really bright and fun and more functional than even I thought it would be! Hubby was not real sure about that one, but he was sweet and put it up for me, anyway! I also love the dresser instead of an actual changing table (which I now realize I didn't get a great picture of). It is so much more functional and versatile than a dedicated changing table.

 

The only furniture we bought for this room was the crib, and the table by my rocking chair. The dresser was my grandparent's, the bookcase was my cousin's, and the rocking chair is the one my mom rocked both my brother and I in as babies. That was such a precious gift!

 

 

And there's me in all my pregnant glory :) I believe I was about 8 months in.

 

My favorite thing about this nursery is all the love it represents. So many items were gifts to us from our families just for this little boy, things that they had cherished and now passed on to us. We're so blessed with a loving family who are all just crazy about our son!

My New Man

He's two months old as I write this. In fact, at this time two months ago, I was probably holding him for the first time (I hardly remember that moment, after the drama of his birth).

 

 

 

Yes, I'm just now introducing him to the blogging world. I'm a new mom, and therefore a bit behind :)

 

My sweet Little Man. We call him that because when he was born, his grumpy, thoughtful, and crying faces involved wrinkling his forehead and scrunching up his nose and it all made him look like a little old man. His real name is Lincoln, after my great-grandfather (who was named for the president, in case you were wondering).

Daddy is fascinated with Little Man. The look on his face the night his son was born will be etched in my memory forever. He's an amazing dad and took to it naturally from the first moment. Because I had a c-section and was stuck in bed the first night and day, he changed all the diapers for me, and still changes many of them. He helps with dressing and calming him down. He clearly loves his son dearly. I can't wait to see them play and rough house together someday.

I have lots of catch-up posts coming, since I haven't posted since the very beginning of my pregnancy. Stay tuned for more on our precious boy!

Whew!

I haven't been able to keep up with posts like I want to the last week or two. The morning (or rather, all day) sickness is really kicking my butt! It's amazing how it can suck the inspiration right out of you! But I'm going to try to do some posts about a few small projects I've done in the last couple months that I never got around to sharing, and I'm still planning to do some My DIY Christmas posts!

I shared awhile back about the lamp in my living room that I hate. Well, here's another lamp redo that I think turned out quite a bit better! Hubby and I have actually been working on the nursery for some time, and I've been planning it for even longer :) I have a cute little table that I'm going to use beside a chair in there and I knew I wanted a cute little, tiny lamp that was fun, but not baby-ish. I'm not doing a lot of baby-ish in this nursery. No little Winnie the Poohs or cute cartoony jungle animals. That's just not us. And I want it to be able to function pretty well past the baby stage as is.

Anyway! I was looking for this cute little lamp to put in there, and low and behold, my mother-in-law just happened to have a tiny touch lamp that she wanted to get rid of! Now, I'm not generally a fan of this style, but I thought I could paint the base and maybe find a new shade with some interest to it.

Why didn't I take a before shot with the whole lamp? No idea. This was probably three months ago, and I just don't know what was running through my head at the moment! But you'll see it in the after shots.

So I took the lamp, measured to see how big of a shade I needed, and went to the store......to find that you can't find a shade that attaches at the top in the size I needed, which I believe was chandelier size. And the way this lamp is made, there's no converting it. So, after much frustration, I came to the conclusion that I had to work with the shade that came with it. Lovely little bird pattern and all.

So I dug out my old buddy, spray paint. Ah, the wonders it can work. At first, I wasn't sure what to do with the glass panels in the shade. I wasn't sure they'd paint well. But I gave it a try, and they actually did great!

There's that pretty base! I love the shape of it and how awesome it looks painted a bright color! I'm not sure about the glass panels. They might be too white and plain. I was thinking I could tape them off and paint some stripes or chevrons or something, if I don't like it once I get it in the room.

I also love that pretty, scrolly finial. I think it looks so antique.

So there's my little nursery lamp redo. I will warn you, in case anyone wants to attempt this, when the light is on, that little bird pattern on the glass pieces does show through a little. I'm not sure if that would be fixed by painting them a darker color or not. Personally, it doesn't bother me at all. And, I'm excited to say, the touch feature still functions just fine through the paint!

My Best Announcement Yet

That's right, there's a little one coming to Vintage Ellie! And you know what that means.....endless baby and nursery projects :) Don't worry, I've already got some coming before long!

Ellie's New Bed, Pt. 2

Earlier this week, I posted the first part of my most recent big project, a new bed for our beagle, Ellie (see pt. 1 here). To recap, we started with a nasty pile of dog bed and blanket on the floor, and a cute vintage suitcase found at a local antique shop.

So far, I told you how I tore out the old lining in the suitcase, found an awesome fabric for new lining, and attached little legs to it.



After that came the hard part: getting all that fabric made into some kind of lining and in the suitcase so that it looked halfway decent! I started on the bottom, because I knew if I messed up, it would be covered by the cushion anyway.

I cut out a piece big enough to cover the bottom and come up the sides just a little and hot glued it in.

Then I measured the sides and cut two strips of fabric wide enough to cover the side, plus an inch for a hem. I used two strips because one wasn't long enough to go clear around the sides.

I used iron-on adhesive tape instead of hemming. 'Cause I'm lazy like that :) I hemmed top and bottom on both strips, and the ends on one, since they would overlap once I attached them. I hot glued each strip around the sides. Warning: I can't even count how many glue sticks I used for this project, so I you try it, have lots on hand!

Then I repeated the process for the top, with one exception. The fabric is a little thin and I wasn't sure it would look substantial enough (it didn't matter on the bottom since it won't be seen often). So before putting in the fabric, I hot glued two layers of batting in first. It turned out just right!

And the finished product, in it's spot in our room:

I had to throw in that last one....just seconds before she jumped on me and tried to lick my camera, then pulled the blanket out of her bed and dragged it around the house. Ah, the calm before the storm :) So there's Ellie's new bed!





Announcing....

I'm so excited about this, folks! I'm going to do my first series of posts in November! It won't be every day, and I'll mix other posts in, but I think it's going to be so much fun!

I'm working hard this year to come up with some awesome homemade gifts for my side of the family as a way to save a little money. There are getting to be more of us, and it's getting harder and harder to buy a nice gift for everyone. There are still some gifts we're going to buy, but I've been storing up Pinterest ideas for months in anticipation of making quite a few gifts! I feel that everyone should have plenty of fun packages to open on Christmas morning, even if there is just something small inside.

So through the month of November, I'm going to be making Christmas gifts and showing you the process and results! Very few of these are things I've come up with on my own, so I'll also show you the inspiration behind each gift.

I'm thrilled and can't wait to get started. I hope you'll all enjoy My DIY Christmas!

Pinterest Again?!

I feel I owe you all an apology. The inspration for almost every single project I do these days comes from Pinterest. I am sorry if the word Pinterest starts to get on your nerves, if you start to notice that the vast majority of my post titles contain the word Pinterest, if you get an urge to cover your ears and scream every time you hear Pinterest because of my blog. I just can't help it! So forgive me, but here is yet another project I saw on Pinterest :)

This is the lovely sight that used to greet me every time I walked into our bedroom. A squished-down-to-nothing, torn up, worn out dog bed with a ratty blanket thrown on top. And periodically, our sweet beagle, Ellie (yes, my blog is named after my little love!) would pull her bed out into the hallway and proceed to tear a hole in a seam and pull out the stuffing. Fuzzy greenish stuffing. Which in turn would get spread clear through my entire house, sticking to everything fabric it came within 10 feet of. Is anyone sensing my dislike of this situation?

Source: ilovemyapartment.tumblr.com via Abbey on Pinterest

Enter Pinterest. I saw this delightful idea one day and thought "oh that's cute, but she'd probably hate it." My Ellie is a bit picky about her bedding. Plus, at the time I thought I wanted to get a stack of old suitcases to make into a bedside table on my side, which is right by her bed (the table by the bed in the picture above is part of my birthday gift from hubby and came after I got the suitcase for Ellie. The old table was awful). I wasn't sure a suitcase dog bed next to a stack-of-suitcases table was the look I wanted. Maybe a little overkill. Although vintage suitcases are super cool. But still.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized Ellie would probably love it. She loves soft, comfy, warm things. She loves jumping up into things. She gets cold at night on the wood floor in our room, even through the dog bed and blanket. Then I saw a lovely blue vintage suitcase at an antique store that usually overprices things a bit. Marked $12. Hubby and I went out later that week and looked at another store where we usually buy our old junk antiques and every suitcase there that was the right size, hard-sided, in nice shape, and old enough for me was also at least $20. Most were nearing $35. So went right back and got the blue one.

Isn't it pretty?! But oh yes, that is some awful pink lining! Actually, it might not have been so bad if it wasn't completely water stained and musty. Still, once I got the stuffed dog bed down in it (I wanted to use an old pillow, but she wasn't having it!) and she got used to the smell, Ellie jumped right in and happily laid right down. And the rest of the evening, whenever hubby or I got up, she ran into the bedroom, jumped in her new bed, and waited for someone to come in and say it was time for bed! It was too cute.

Anyway, I lived with the lining for awhile, wondering if I could keep it. I have trouble redoing things that are original sometimes. I'm a conservationist at heart. But the musty lining had to go. I have to admit it was pretty fun to tear out, although dusty and gross.

Then time to find fabric. I was stalled at that stage for several weeks. I'm getting better, but sometimes choices overwhelm me. I had to go home several times and just look at the suitcase in our room and visualize what I wanted it to look like. But I finally found a beautiful fabric that I'm just crazy about at Jo-Ann Fabric. To me, it feels vintage and current at the same time. It matches the colors in our room perfectly, as well as the other fabric I have on some accents in our room.

Ah, I could stare at that all day! I also picked up some little legs at Lowe's. They're by the trim section, and I believe the ones I got were around $1.50 each. I sprayed them with Krylon's Ivy Leaf. Love the color, not sold on the paint yet. I thought I'd used Krylon before and liked it, but I had problems with coverage this time. But once it's on, the result is beautiful! Hubby was sweet enough to attach them for me.

I was going to do this project all in one post, but it's getting a little long here! So, I'll leave it here and show you the rest next time!