Working on the weekend!

Its hardly a big project, but the results will be life changing. No, really. Tonight I'm working on Levi's little duvet cover. We are converting his cot to a bed tomorrow and giving him his freedom. Kinda. He already HAS his freedom - he sniffed it once and grabbed onto it with both hands and never let go, he was 16months old at the time - he has been climbing in and out of his cot, in his sleeping bag, all the time for 14months. We are just making him more safe by removing the bars and giving him the opportunity to be a big boy, to make good choices... Like sleep! Im realising that persisting with putting him into the cot, isnt going to keep him there. I think 14 months of trying is, well, adequate!

He has taken to napping on my bed in the afternoon - he LOVES the duvet, the pillows, the plushness. He is a little creature of comfort - for sure. SO rather than throwing him onto a prison style bare mattressed bed in a sleeping bag, I thought I would make him a mini version of our bed - in both style and comfort!

Given that I have finally "completed" the nursery, I wanted something that would add to it, rather than take away from its loveliness. SO I'm putting together a little cowboy duvet set for him. Hopefully tomorrow I'll be able to show you the finished product!

The Nursery - at last!

After fighting with a broken blog and then giving up, and then going on holiday to America, I have returned to find that blogger has been updated (hooraaah!) and I can edit things easily and freely without having to rope the tech savy tri-corn in. JOY! SO, now that I have worked out how to have larger format photos (because in the case of pictures bigger really IS better). I can now finally share with you what the nursery is looking like - the first room in the house to be close to completion. 

BEFORE... 

This is the nursery when it was just home to little Levi, before his brother joined in to bunk. 

AFTER... 

Arm chair came in our container from SA, the LOVE pillow is from Primark. Cribs are from e-bay.

The drawers belonged to my Edwardian dressing table, but the mirror had sadly broken and the piece was well past its best. The bookshelf was purchased off ebay as is for £5 and collected from under 2miles away. 

An old wooden milk bottle crate now stores their shoes. 

I have had the hot air balloons in Levi's room since he was born. I was worried about having to recover the arm chair and im so surprised and excited that it works so well as it is.

Looking out from Asher's cot.

Looking back towards Asher's cot.

All in all I'm really pleased with how this has worked out. I spent very little and mainly repurposed what I had (even the rug was out of shed, it used to be in my old livingroom). Id really like to hang some pictures on the wall but as we are renting Im not sure thats going to happen!

Next projects - dining room and living room - all to be done before Christmas!

The house part...

Life has, once again, slowly slip slided into utter chaos. We have had all our major furniture deliveries, and my gorgeous french wardrobe is literally ONE INCH too big to get up the stairs! It has made its new (temporary?) home in the diningroom (which is feeling like a one day, next year project...) and as a result Im still seriously lacking in storage for the spare room.

I have approximately 4 garbage bags FULL of baby clothes and sweet things that I am not longer willing to hold onto (unless someone is harbouring a lion/witch wardrobe in their garage and wants to pass it on to me so that I can start using Narnia as a storage space?) an additional 4 bags full of linen and much chaos in between...I mean, seriously, the pile is PERSON hight.... BUT the new drawers are here - so at some point (hopefully soon) we can pack into them and clean some space! I would show you pics of it now but its SO bad that I can only show you the before shots once I have the afters! Its not that I fear you will judge me, because even with your best intentions, let me tell you , you will - it just that I am the queen of chaos. I see hope and potential where other people only see rubbish, and there is a little way to go before Im ready to show you all what I have been quite literally just closing the door on.

The nursery is coming along splendidly - when I have a minute to pick up Levi's strewn wardrobe (he now insists on wading through his cupboard and looking at everything before we are allowed to dress him) I will take some progress pics, and update you with the new plans.

Life has take over once again so progress on the "house part" is a little slow. But it WILL come - I promise!

Lining up some future recipe blogs - any requests?

Love and Blessings - with a yawn!

Delivery day!

Today has been a little like Christmas. Because I seem to have very expensive taste (not on purpose, just so happens if you give me two options I tend to like the more expensive one!) and am accustomed to having to meet my particular requirements on a tight budget (although MikeDreamy is always very generous with me and my "needs") I have become an avid ebayer and bargain hunter.

I hate to pay a penny more than I absolutely have to, for anything. That doesnt mean I want the cheapest crib, or the plainest linen. What it really means is that I want to pay the very best price for the exact thing I want... I have no problem buying used furniture, table linens, mirrors etc. But when I set my heart on the exact thing I want, I will stop at nothing to get a discount. This may have started out of necessity, when I had only my budget to work with and there was simply no room at all to add to it. These days, even if there was is room to say steal from the living room budget to give to the nursery, I still need that bargain!

For this reason I have an hyperactive ebay account. If you have never used ebay, I highly recommend you give it a go - just dont blame ME for the consequences!!! Lets not get me started on ebay though, it deserves a whole post - or a dedicated blog maybe- of its own.

When it came to redoing the nursery (see my very first post on this blog) I decided I wanted really good quality cots that where going to last the boys a number of years, so the cotbed design was a natural choice. I chose a few designs that I liked and then got started on trying to find not one, but TWO of a cot that I liked at a rocking price. I managed, after a bit of haggling and praying, to secure two cot beds and one luxury cot bed mattress (I already have one for the other cot) all brand new for less that the full RRP of one of the cots. That includes the delivery charge! It does, however, mean that the two cots are each being delivered from different suppliers (they each only had one available on discount) on two different days, one of which happened to be today. I have also bought two sets of cot linen (bumpers and quilts) from a discontinued Cath Kidston range (well the range isn't discontinued, but for some reason the nursery linens are?) which are also coming from two different places, one of which arrived today. YAY!

The moral of the story for today is that you should never feel you cant have something you like, because you feel its out of your reach financially. Chances are there is something very similar (or if you are lucky the exact thing you want!) available to achieve the look you have fallen for, at a much better price than the store catalogue leads you to believe. Maybe what you find is preloved or needs a lick of paint to bring it back to life, and it means you spend a day or two in to sign for the packages (its not a babiesrus service after all!) but if you are wise about choosing key pieces for your rooms you can fill in the blanks with bargains and compromises and get the look you are after. Most times it even works out better than the whole store package - your room can be unique, have its own character and the best part is you have fun along the way!

Check out www.ebay.com and www.ikea.com or your local charity store for some great bargains!

Love and blessings.

Progress

I suppose for me to be truely accountable, I should blog every day just to let you all in on what exactly it is I've done towards getting my tip, I mean house, sorted and looking beautiful....

Today was a bank holiday so I had my dreamy man home. Its been a bit of an unproductive housewife day, given the aim was to do some more unpacking- I didnt even get a load of WASHING on (gasp!) but I did wash my hair LOL. There are still many hours left in it though so I suppose I will have to make up for lost time tonight.

I did shop today (online of course) and am now one quilt and one cot bumper closer to the boys' new room. I am waiting on the end of the auction for the second one now (how amazing that I found TWO on ebay in the same day??).

Im also LOVING the colour *RED* since, well, day before yesterday? Ive been trying to dig up some pictures of Levi's original nursery for you but no luck yet. Really need to get these pictures sorted.

Until then...