"one less lonely child"

Before I force myself to get to work on the house today, I wanted to stop in and let you guys know about an awesome thing happening... My good friend Julia (BlackTag Diaries) and her husband Lance have accepted a referral for their adoption.  They are beginning to fundraise to bring home their beautiful little girl from Uganda ASAP.  

Some things about Julia... girl has talent.  I have always looked forward to her perfectly wrapped and personalized presents, handmade cards, and she is pretty awesome behind a camera... but for this adoption, she is bringing back an old hobby... jewelry making.  She has re-opened her Etsy shop BlackTag Studio, and all proceeds will go toward bringing their precious Gift home.

Not only is her beautiful jewelry being sold, but her father has donated some of his AMAZING handcrafted woodwork; bowls and ink pens.  You have to see this for yourself. 

Please go check out her shop and support this.  They have wanted so long to be parents and it is finally going to be a reality... once the funds are raised.  I can't wait until they have her in their arms.

thankful thursday : oh boy...

I had my first Doctor appointment at our new location on Tuesday.  I was there for 4 hours.  No joke.  

1:30pm : arrive to start filling out paperwork

2:00pm : called back for ultrasound

2:40pm : sent back to waiting room to wait for Education nurse

2:55pm : go upstairs with nurse.  Find out my old office hadn't sent my records.  Sit through nurse trying to get my records from them.  They had tried faxing them to the normal phone number and received a confirmation (go figure).  Will resend.  Finish giving her some of my history and learning about their practice and the hospital's services.

3:30pm : go back to waiting room.  Find out from education nurse that office sent records.

3:35pm : Education nurse comes back... they didn't include my labs.  Start calling Louisville to get this figured out.

3:45pm : Go back to have finger pricked.  Iron is really low. 

3:55pm : back to the waiting room.

4:15pm : starting to get worried... 

4:45pm : called back to exam room.

5:00pm : Dr. sticks head in to apologize and promise she is coming in very soon.

5:08pm : Nurse knocks on the door and offers us Sprite.

5:12pm : Dr. comes in.  Says everything looks great with the baby, wants to give me a bunch of iron, will see me in 4 weeks.

5:20pm : Find out from receptionist that there had been a few "emergencies" and thats why I had waited so long.  Getting an explanation did calm me down a little bit.  I try to understand... Its going to happen a lot from the other side of the situation for me.  Any other day it wouldn't have mattered... but Kyle's parents were back at home alone waiting on me to start grilling the ribs.  

And my amazing husband was able to stay with me the entire time.  His orientation instructor let him leave to be there for the ultrasound.  So thankful that we have ended up in this city, with this program.  It really seems like they are a great family oriented place...at least by Gen Surg standards.  Not all places would have let the intern leave in the middle of the day to be there for the big ultrasound.  And he wouldn't have been able to witness this:

our stubborn baby that wouldn't move arms and hands out of the way.

Oh and we are both also REALLY thankful to find out that this baby is a 



BOY!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Happy Thankful Thursday!

This week I am linking up with Julia at BlackTag Diaries and Theres Just One Mommy.  Stop by and say hello to them!

room by room : spares

This post is all about the spares of the house.  The spare/guest room, and the hall bathroom.  These are the 2 rooms that I have deemed (basically) finished.  Of course I will probably hang a picture or two, and eventually add curtains, but for the most part... they are done.  I'm fine with the beige on the walls in these rooms.  Maybe I will get sick of it eventually...but I don't want to go crazy with painting every single room in the house when neutral is going to sell easier in 5 years.  We shall see.

This time the cats decided to photobomb everything. They like to follow me around the house.  

the guest room:

Since I'm only thinking of subtle changes for this room, I'm not going to bother drawing them out this time.  I'm really only thinking of either a header on top of each window for that final polished look or just a simple long sheer.  Right now I'm fine with just the blinds.  They seem to do their job well of keeping out most of the light.  I also have some paint samples that I scored at the ReStore in both blue and green that would match the comforter... I am thinking about painting the wood portion of that little side table that my aunt gave me before we moved.  Not really sure though if I want to paint it.

No changes here... this is my bedroom furniture from when I was in high school.  It belonged to my great great uncle.  Its a little rough around the edges but I just love it.  The only thing we did to this room was install blinds to the windows on day1.

I will probably put a larger framed something to the left of this window.  Our guests got the upgrade with this move; we (Kyle) put our TV in this room and had a 2nd satellite receiver installed for them.  Our parents have loved it.

the spare bathroom:

There really just wasn't a good way to get any good pictures of this room.  The seller left the shower curtain, which I just love.  My mom bought the extra bathmat to go in front of the tub, and we had to install the towel bar, paper towel holder, and the hand towel ring.  

My mom added the magnifying mirror and I added the toothbrush holder.  Everything else was either here or came with us from Louisville.  We had to put a mat at the foot of the vanity because there is a floor vent under the vanity that makes the tile floor feel like ice!

So those are our "spares" of the house.  Our bed and bath will probably be on here Friday, and once the 3rd bedroom (the baby room) gets cleared, I will take a few pictures of its blank slate before we start figuring out decorations for it.  

If you have missed any of the room by room series, here they are:

kitchen

dining room

living room

Come back tomorrow for some big news on this week's Thankful Thursday!

room by room : living

I have been so excited about doing this post... Like, had to make myself spend time with Kyle when he gets home instead of editing pictures non-stop, excited.  Which means I just started REALLY playing with the pics this morning.  And it became a job.  Not a fun one.  There are just way too many things I want to do to this room... and that isn't very easy to do quickly in Photoshop like I did the past 2 days :/.  So I'm totally not happy with the "dreaming" pictures because well lets face it... I want to find prints... but haven't actually found anything I like yet...and lets face it... I couldn't draw it on here even if I had... so I'm really just TRYING to show some color scheme to you... which looks better in my head than on my poorly Photoshopped drawings.

So here it is...

the living room:

This is from the dining room.  I am in love with that window.  I can't wait to get some plantation blinds in place so we can take down the sheet we nailed over it and actually have some sunshine come in during the day.  

Top top priority for this room is blinds... which we should be dealing with this weekend.  After that... the main large purchases I intend to use our dwindling decorating budget on are new throw pillows and a large rug for this room.  Eventually I would like to do something about curtains... whether hanging to frame it or just a flat modern topper for color.  We have time to deal with that later though.  Not shown in this picture, we are planning to paint the room grey this weekend... too much photoshopping... I couldn't handle it.  But basically the theme is going to be grays and yellows in various shades, maybe some green thrown in.

I swear the front door isn't orange... more of a brick red... but oh well.  I couldn't get the colors right on this one.  Bear with me.  There's the awesome cat tower I mentioned yesterday.  I know you are super excited.  I know Zoe is.  She barely leaves it.  I just love how big this room is.

I tried to color the walls gray, it almost worked, but I am planning a little darker gray than that.  

The media area.  The little window is looking out into the carport.  I will eventually put some hanging curtains on it for a little privacy, but right now the priority is the giant window that everyone can see into from the street.

The bookcase behind the sofa.  I brought this with us to Louisville from Owensboro... I'm so glad I splurged on this thing.  We just love it.  The box on top of it is an old canon ammo box a friend and I found at our favorite antique shop in Louisville.  As you can see on the left side of the picture, that doorway used to have a door... we took it off on our first day in the house... it serves no purpose to have a door when you aren't actually able to keep anyone out since we have the big cut out leading into the dining room.  We will fill the holes and paint over it soon.

Not shown:  behind the loveseat, I would like to put a little sofa table someday.  None of the pictures show that there is a lightless ceiling fan.  All other rooms in the house have overhead lights except for the living room.  Kyle's main request for the entire house is that we replace that fan with one that has a light kit in it.  So that might be happening relatively soon as well.

Kyle's parents are on their way over to visit for the next several days so I will be taking a break until next week.  Come back later for more of the room by room series.  If you have missed out on the other rooms I have covered then here they are:

kitchen

dining room

Have a great weekend!

room by room : dining

In case you missed the first installment of this series, yesterday I unveiled our kitchen.

Today is the room that will probably receive the least amount of attention in the coming months... there are just too many other "top priorities".  However, I enjoy this room because of the sliding doors that let out onto our deck and into the backyard.  So it is not insignificant. 

the dining room:

This is the view from the kitchen.  I love the amount of natural light that comes in through the sliding doors.  The left door goes out to our carport and the right door goes into our laundry room.  I tried desperately to find my candlesticks for the table but its just going to take a lot more digging in the giant boxes that are left to unpack.

Please forgive the poor Photoshop skills...I messed with it forever and that was the best I could do.  I would like to eventually get a long table to act as an entry table/buffet for the dining room.  I'm not sure if I would put it on that wall or the wall that shares the kitchen.  I think a nice large mirror would look good on that wall as well.  Otherwise, the biggest thing I'd like to change is the table and chairs.  They just aren't my style.  I would like cleaner lines, less spindles.  But it just is not a realistic update to be making anytime soon at all.

This is what we see when sitting on the couch in the living room.  LOVE the sliding door!  

It will be a while of saving... but I would like to get a nice size rug to put in here.  We currently have NO carpet unless you count the bathmats.  It is a bit of a loud house... plus the rug would really just finish up this room nicely.  Once I'm sure I'm not painting this room I will start sorting through my framed pictures and deciding what might go on the walls in here.  The immediate fix I want to make is to do something about that chandelier.  I like the chandelier itself... just not the shades over the bulbs.  So once I make a quick trip to the store and buy some low wattage frosted bulbs for it, those suckers are coming off!

The view into the kitchen.  You know... so you can start understanding how this house is laid out.

 

The only thing from this view I would change is to add some pictures... preferably find some local art/poster prints to frame up.  Its a good size wall, might as well use it!

 

 

This was a last minute change.  This little space next to food storage needed a little something...and after we purchased the big cat tower (you get to see that tomorrow, lucky you!), I decided I could use Kyle's bookshelf that used to hold the millions of med school books as a nice place to hold my DIY books and cookbooks.  The wreath used to be on our door in our apartment hallway and it doesn't quit fit on our weird front door so I thought this was a good enough spot for it.

So that's the dining room!  Tomorrow I hope to share the living room with you!

thankful thursday

Wow, Thursday really snuck up on me this week!  I really thought yesterday was Tuesday for a while!

this Thursday I am thankful for:

closing.  It was a long long road.  No part of it was ideal (except maybe picking out the house on our first day looking).  We had a great realty team there to support us through it all, and our realtor has really become part of the family.  It sounds like we aren't the only ones to have some issues moving in... 2 other residents on Kyle's team have also had problems; one is living in a hotel this week, hoping to close on her house, the other closed a while ago but planned and unplanned renovations have held up their settling in.  Thankful our house was pretty much move-in ready.

my family.  They were with us from Wednesday night to Monday at noon.  From loading the truck to organizing it in the new house.  Couldn't have done as much as we did without them.  Thanks guys for everything; I know I didn't make it easy on you but you were real troopers.  My dad basically worked nonstop as carpenter, gardener, electrician, and plumber from the moment we unlocked the door (except for this quick trip to downtown for dinner).

my backyard.  You cannot imagine how excited I am to finally have a garden and a grill.  I can't wait to start getting in some fresh veggies and I have already put that grill to good use!  Thanks to everyone that made it possible.  Now I just need some patio furniture...

This Thursday I am linking up with my good friend Julia over at BlackTag Diaries.  So pop over and say hi!

room by room : kitchen

We have been pretty busy since the Friday move-in and I've started settling into my new job as a homemaker.  Kyle started orientation on Monday so I've had to keep myself busy.  I've done a little unpacking and tidying up, but mostly running around checking out the local thrift shops.  Today, however, I decided the blog would be my top priority.  

The room of choice to share today is the kitchen.  It is pretty much the first room to be "finished".  I say "finished" because of course I intend to do something to all of the rooms... so the next several posts will be of our rooms with our stuff but little to no improvements done to what existed when we moved in, with some extra photos of changes I would like to make.  

the kitchen:

We had to buy the fridge for ourselves, thankfully it was the only appliance that needed purchasing.  After a lot of issues trying to find the counter-depth Whirlpool Gold that I wanted, at the last minute, we were able to get basically the same thing in a Kenmore Elite (made by Whirlpool) from Sears with a hefty sales sticker on it, delivered exactly when we needed it.  So instead of living out of a cooler for 3 weeks like it was looking like we would need to, we only had to survive about a day.  

I knew immediately that I wanted this big cabinet to be food storage, but I think its original purpose was to store the trash... so I had my Dad order some drawers for easy access to food and helped him install them on Saturday (I glued 2 of the drawers together...he did everything else...thanks Dad!)

I would really like to paint the top panel with chalkboard paint so I can have a fun little spot to write my grocery list as I realize what I'm out of. 

This is from standing next to the fridge, virtually the majority of our cabinets and counter space.  It is more than we had though and we are very thankful.  All of our stuff fits in these cabinets pretty well since we have the food storage surrounding the fridge.

This is the other side of the kitchen.  The microwave is old (and still dirty :/) but the seller installed the dishwasher (which is 100xs quieter than what was in our apartment!) and range.  I chose to turn the empty display area into a built-in coffee bar and am keeping all of my mugs above the various coffee makers.

You may not be able to tell from the photo very well, but we started changing out the knobs on the cabinets.  The left side shows how small the existing ones were (gunmetal plain), and the coffee bar has the larger ones (gunmetal with a basket weave design).  The new knobs were left overs from a job my Dad did so we are going to need to order some more to finish up.  I've highlighted the background of the coffee bar in grey; I hope to eventually put a tile backsplash of some sort in there.  Not drawn in,  I want to install a small light in the top of this space and I would also like to find a cute colorful little tray to put the sugar bowl and spoon on to keep the surface from getting coffee stains.

 

I love that I have a window to look out of now.  To add a little color and to soften the area, I am dreaming up some curtain plans:  

 

My original thought was to go with an orange theme and do a little curtain on the bottom half... probably with a design.  I had picked out a cute Ikat print that I thought would work great here...

Since getting here though and getting a better look at the countertop... I'm thinking green would probably be the safer color to go in here... and the rug I brought is also blue and green and I really like the look of it with the hardwood.  I also feel like it MIGHT be better to put the curtain at the top so I am sure to be able to look out the window rather than straining to see over the curtain.

So what do you think?  I can't wait to see how this space evolves.  Green is really growing on me for this room... 

weekend replay : under construction

Move in went smoothly, we happened to move in on a perfectly "cool" South Carolina day, plenty of sunshine and breezes, we have all of the furniture placed, satellite and internet hooked up, a few boxes unpacked, and my raised gardens built and planted.


But I'm still not ready to share the goods :)

We have a lot left to do... and while there is some order to life now, there is still a lot to figure out!  So stay tuned for some photos of the house with our stuff in it after we have everything unpacked room by room. 

There have been a few hiccups along the way this weekend, but many victories and I am in recovery mode.  This pregnant lady feels like she has barely slept in a week... because I haven't.  So bear with me and my lack of posting.

finally.

finally a good day.
 
8am: breakfast with a good friend + 2hours of conversations and encouragement.

9am: my realtor calls and has me laughing with the conversation replay she gave me from her talk with our loan people this morning. ("let me tell you a story... my clients are a 4 months pregnant young woman and her Lt in the Air Force Dr. husband and if we don't make this happen for them by Friday, they will be homeless.  Please don't make them be homeless.  Do I need to send you donuts?  Coffee?")  Have I said lately how much I love my realtor?

11:30am: realtor calls to say we are clear to close on FRIDAY!!!! 

The truck is booked for Thursday.  More boxes are packed.  Linens are being washed.  Fridge will be ordered tomorrow. 

My excitement meter is starting to go up. 

So I'm probably going to be MIA for a while as we finish all of this and get moved in.

Wish us luck! 

weekend replay : last weekend

It wasn't a super exciting weekend but it was pretty good.  We did a few chores, played some games, I laid out, Kyle got a few modules done for the hospital and a few hours in at the volleyball court.  We had big plans to spend Saturday evening at the zoo... picnic packed and everything, to arrive to find out they closed early for a special event.

We spent (probably) our last Sunday at our church.  We had our favorite Louisville pizza afterward (Bearnos).  I packed up all of our winter clothes into big plastic storage tubs.

We watched the season finale of Game of Thrones, and the season premier of Falling Skys.  We caught a few movies on HBO, and went to the movies to see Now You See Me (go see it).  Movies and TV are our thing (for now).

And now begins our last week (we hope...Kyle's for sure), in Louisville.  Maybe if I stay up all night I will sleep through the worst of the stress tomorrow while waiting to hear what our closing date is going to be.  No, I will be in bed soon... I'm a morning person no matter what time I go to sleep.

Only thing I know for sure:  we are moving our stuff out of this apartment this week.  

Whether its into a small truck to go 3 miles to my aunt's garage or a big truck 7 hours to South Carolina is yet to be seen.   

One day at a time.
 

pregnancy : 17 weeks

I was reminded this week that I have yet to do a "bump" photo on here... Well as you are about to see... there isn't much of one to show.  It is noticeable in person, and I definitely feel like my body is starting to be taken over, but its just not a majorly impressive bump yet.

• due mid-November.
• I do have to do special stuff with a few pairs of my jeans now to be comfortable.
• most of my shirts still fit pretty well.
• laying on my back is officially a bad idea.
• I still feel pretty normal... no food aversions.
• I'm still kinda craving donuts, lemonade sounds good a lot.  For the most part though its just whatever I see I want.
• less than 3 weeks before we know what it is!
• we have names picked out either way.
• no you don't get to know what those are. ;-)

last day. last week?

Today is my last day at work.  A bittersweet moment.  I have dubbed it my early retirement.  Instead of a retirement package of $X each month though I will be getting:

• less stress... anyone that knows me knows that I will still be stressed regardless, but there is something to say for the amount of stress that is about to be taken off of my daily agenda from my job.
• more outdoor time... unfortunately this week the best weather was on the 3 days I worked.  I just feel less stressed and happy when I can actually enjoy a sunny day.
• more time to rediscover old hobbies... I haven't painted in years and only been marginally crafty
• plenty of time to discover new hobbies... I can't wait to garden, learn how to can food, maybe bake my own bread, volunteer somewhere, fix up old furniture.  Who knows, maybe I could go crazy and save up for a bike?
• the ability to be home when my husband is home...this is a big part of my decision to stay home.
• and eventually... the new job of stay at home mom will be the main focus.

What am I losing in this?

• daily interpersonal interaction... I'm a bit of a homebody so it will take a little forcing on my part to make me get out and make friends when we move.  Having a full time job has been my reason to get out and see people everyday.
• a pretty cool job... I started my science career working with plants.  I love plants.  But this being the only job offer I received...I had to get out of my comfort zone and get used to animals.  Specifically rodents.  And I have loved it.  No more will I be able to shock people with descriptions of what I do on a normal basis... spinal cord injury microsurgery, animal care, histology, staining, working with expensive microscopy equipment, injections into a mouse's tail vein, behavior testing, dissections... just a few things I have done in the past 3.5 years.  My normal day for a while is going to be along the lines of "oh yeah I cleaned the toilet and fixed dinner."
• an amazing work family... these people are hands down the best people I could have spent my last 3.5 years with.  We have laughed and cried and supported each other over the years and I will really miss them.
• a paycheck... Kyle's new income is going to be enough for us to live on without me working, but we are definitely going to have to tighten our belts a little and change up our budget.  I think it is going to be well worth it though.  Sure we won't be able to do the fancy vacations that others in his class may can handle with working wives, and shopping is going to be a more extravagant luxury, but the ability to see Kyle during his crazy schedule and be there for all the "firsts" of our kid are a pretty good trade to that stuff I think.

So is this our last week in Louisville?  We are still waiting for that to be answered.  The underwriter hasn't gotten back to us yet about an approval and closing date.  I'm still really hoping for early next week like they said our best case scenario is but who knows... We have to be out of our apartment by the 14th though.  

One day at a time.

weekend replay : going aways

It was a very busy weekend for us!

Friday I left work later than expected... found out we would be having the apartment shown to potential renters the next morning... So rushed home and cleaned for an hour before we went to our next going away party at Four Pegs with some friends from church at 7pm.  It was also our 5 year anniversary and was a pretty fun night of celebrating.

Got home around 11pm.

Fell asleep shortly before midnight.

Woke up around 6:30, got up a bit later, and started the finishing touches on cleaning the apartment.

Hit up the Farmers Market with the bestie, followed by some omelet making back at her house.

Grocery and home around 1pm to start cooking for our next event.

A second going away party/pot luck at my boss's house.  Our lab is losing me and a Postdoc to residency within the next few weeks!

Left there completely miserable.  Because I've started to get a baby bump!!! And I had squeezed myself into my nice jeans for the past few hours.... we left their house right before 8pm and headed straight to the mall for some maternity clothes.  The idea of which already had me in a tizzy... I just really don't want to deal with this yet.  And it just didn't get any better because:

Louisville's JCPenney's DOESN'T HAVE A MATERNITY SECTION.

Louisville's Dillards DOESN'T HAVE A MATERNITY SECTION.

KOHLS has a PITIFUL MATERNITY SECTION.

After an hour of running around, finally ended up at Target and bought the BeBand so I can just keep wearing my normal pants for a while longer... because the bump is obviously not going to fill out maternity pants yet.  I was maybe a little bit traumatized by the experience.

Sunday was a perfect day.  Perfect weather.  Church was good.  Met up with my brother for some lunch at our favorite Asian place (YangKee Noodle), talked Kyle into buying some new shorts at Old Navy, where he made me pick out a maternity shirt to finish off his gift card, and then headed to my aunt's backyard for some alone time in the sun with a book.  I made it home before Kyle (he went to play volleyball with my bro), and got some more alone time with my current game of choice (Skyrim).  Dinner of homemade chilidogs while watching Trouble With The Curve (highly recommend!).  Ended the night with a shocking episode of Game of Thrones and it was a fantastic Sunday. (Though that episode about made me mad enough to stop watching...not really...but come on!!!)

And today is Medical Monday!  What a great way to start off my last week at work!  (My last day is Wed!)  Looking forward to reading what is going on with the rest of the medical life community today! I hope all of you moving are having an easier time of it than us!