The Wal Mart Canopy Bed Saga

I have been wanting to complete our bedroom set ever since we bought the Wal Mart Canopy nightstands almost a year ago. On line, this set looked fabulous, and all of my friends from the Decorating & Renovating Board on The Nest who have tried this line of furniture have all raved about the quality. So I ordered the nightstands just to see what I thought. We really needed a bedroom set and I really didn't want to spend a lot of money considering we have practically a whole house to furnish. So I ordered the nightstands and we loved them, great quality, great color, an all around good product. And from Wal-Mart!!!
So I decided to order the rest of the set and soon realized the sleigh bed we wanted was out of stock!!!! I kept checking Wal-Mart's website for months to see if it was available! I was really starting to get nervous, what if this was a sign of the bedroom set being discontinued? I started to think of what I should do with the two night stands that we had, should I put them in another room? Use them as end tables? Ugh! I didn't want to start from scratch again and have to look for another bedroom set. This one really fit our needs perfectly and it was beautiful and so reasonably priced! I decided to check Wal-Mart's website again this week just by chance that the bed was back in stock. I really wasn't holding my breath, but did try to check the availability at least once a week. So I checked it on Tuesday and holy lord, it was there!!!! I even sent an email to my sister so she could confirm that I wasn't seeing things. I told Jeff that night that I really think we should order the bed before it went back out of stock again and he gave me the go ahead. The next day, I went on line to order the bed, clicked on the link that I had saved in my favorites, and a big fat red OUT OF STOCK stared at in the face. What the heck? It was only in stock for a day? I was so ticked, I couldn't believe it! Now what was I going to do? Was this really that hot of an item? So I emailed Wal-Mart's customer service and they gave me their basic response that the item would be back in stock eventually but they couldn't commit to a date. Of course. So I tried again the next day just to see what the status was. A beautiful green AVAILABLE! I couldn't believe it, so I ordered the bed immediately. Today I received an email confirming that our bed had already been shipped. Yay!!!!! I can't believe we are finally going to get our bed after months and months of chasing this thing down. Do you realize if you were to check the bed on line just now it is still saying it is out of stock??? I will post pics once we have it, let's pray it arrives in one piece and it is the actual bed that I have been wanting after all these months and that their website is not just playing games with my head!

Take care,

Living Room Update

This room has been two years in the making and I am happy to say it is just about complete! We have had the furniture and drapes for almost a year but it has taken me awhile to find end tables. I decided that I really just wanted this room finished so I purchased the Avington end tables from Target. I have to say they look great and now my room is finally furnished! The two lamps I purchased at JCPenney this winter and they have been sitting in our basement just waiting for me to pick out end tables. With the arrival of our baby just 7 weeks away, it has really put my unfinished home decor projects into over drive!!! It feels good to finally have another room done.





I am thinking of hanging these mirrors above the couch eventually for some wall decor and would like paint the room a warmer brown color.

32 Weeks

How far along? 32 weeks

Total weight gain/loss: 28 lbs. Do I still need to answer this question? It is my blog though, and I do want to document EVERYTHING about this pregnancy, we'll just hope she is a big girl! :) All the Halloween candy I have eaten this week certainly does not help matters! It's all coming to work with me on Monday, it needs to get out of the house.

Maternity clothes? All I do wear is maternity clothes. I am in that stage where I am longing for all of my old clothes and shoes and will be happy if I never see maternity clothes again! At least until the next pregnancy. I miss my stilettos, I miss my tall boots for Fall, I miss my Seven jeans. Most of all, I miss my Ann Taylor and professional looking clothes!!!! I have become "casual Karen" at work lately but it's comfortable and it gets me through the day. Thank god our company has a business casual dress code. Target maternity has become my new friend these past few months and it's hard for me to even justify buying anything else maternity even from there with only 8 weeks left when there are so many other wonderful baby items to buy!

Stretch Marks: Still none to report! My mom and sister didn't have any so I am hoping that it's just great genes working to my advantage.

Sleep: I get up around twice a night to pee and have twice experienced a funky nerve issue in my neck recently that has woken me up from a dead sleep. I have read about some pregnant women getting a sciatic nerve thing from the baby sleeping a certain way. I am assuming this is it!

Best moment this week: Interacting with her. I can push down on her feet and she moves them away from me. She will then put them back and I start pushing on them again. I can play games with her now. I wonder if she realizes it's her crazy mom picking on her?

Movement: Just feeling her whole body move around has been so much fun for me. I love just feeling around my belly and finding out where she is at. She is easy to find now and I love just waking her up when I want to make sure she is OK. Some days she is really active and I can see little body parts pushing out of my belly. I love resting my hands on her little butt, especially at work when things are going crazy. I am really going to miss having my "little buddy" at work!

Food cravings: Really nothing significant unless you want to count the Halloween candy. I have also been wanting Panera a lot too, I just love all their different soups for Fall. They have recently built a Panera right across the street from our office so I have been occasionally grabbing a Asiago cheese bagel with sun dried tomato cream cheese or a reduced fat blue berry muffin in the morning before work. I have been doing this at least once a week latey. Yum!!!

Gender: Girl! After all of the ultra sounds we have had, this has remained the same! Thank god, what little boy would want a pink room???

Labor Signs: Thankfully none so far. I have had only one or two braxton hicks contractions that really haven't been anything to speak of.

Belly Button in or out? Still out.

What I miss: diet pop! I broke down and had a few sips yesterday of Jeff's and it was heaven!!!!!!

What I am looking forward to: finally meeting her, I am in the final stretch and these last few weeks are going to drag I have a feeling!!!! Work has been nuts lately and just knowing I don't have to deal with it for around 12 weeks is really keeping me going!

Weekly Wisdom: My neighbor was telling me last night at our neighbor's Halloween party how this is the time where everything starts to hurt and my hip's really start to spread out. Ugh, can't wait for that! Luckily I have been still feeling pretty good, no major aches or pains to complain about.

Milestones: Making it to almost 32 weeks, my niece Nicole was born at 33 weeks in March. I have been watching this video all weekend just amazed that our little girl looks like this now! In the beginning, she looks small, but you do not realize how small she is until my sister's husband puts his hand out and it takes up practically her whole body!!!!!



Take care,

More nursery progress.....

We officially have our first piece of baby furniture in Baby Jillian's room. We bought her glider this week at Babies R Us and Jeff put it together today. It's so wonderful to watch the progress of her room. I can now sit in there and just picture myself holding her and enjoying the view of our backyard. I can not wait!!!!!!

Her mommy is already taking full advantage of both her closets!


All her clothes...


I had to buy her the same lamp base as mommy and daddy!!!


Take care,

Show Us Your Life: Fall Decor

It's time for another post from Kelly's Korner, "Show Us Your Life". Today's post is all about Fall Decor. I do not have that much inside fall decor to share with you so here is the outside. The mums are from our shower this year which makes them even more special to me!!!!! The little black sticks in the front are pumpkin votive holders, they are a little hard to see. My fall decor is not that outstanding this year since I am at the mercy of my husband, I am on "house arrest" until the baby gets here which means no shopping alone time for me. I can certainly understand his concern, there are just too many crazies out there with obsessions with pregnant women, not to mention the risk of being exposed to H1N1. I made the decision NOT to get the H1N1 vaccine. Our future pediatrician advised against pregnant women getting it due to the lack of research on unborn babies and my OB recommended I get it. The fact that they both have differing opinions is enough for me to just lay low and prevent the flu the old fashion way, a lot of hand washing and hand sanitizer.



Take care,

Our Baby Shower!

Our baby shower was so much fun, I can not believe that it is already over with! How is that possible? I feel like we have been planning it for years and now it is over. Our home obviously looks like we are a couple with a baby on the way. What a whirlwind of a day it was. I didn't even get to take that many pictures because from the moment I arrived, I was too busy talking and laughing with my friends and family. Thank God my sister sent these along for me to remember one of the best days of my life.

My mom, sister, and mother-in-law did such a great job which I am so thankful!!!! The shower took place at Pine Ridge Country Club which is extra special for us because this is also where we had our wedding reception. The table center pieces were decorated with purple fall mums which are now planted in the urns outside of our home. I hope to take a few pictures of them with the next sunny day. (That may take awhile given our weather these days, but I am hopeful!).

I thought for sure I was going to cry that day, but the mood was so much fun, that I didn't. I was just too happy for words all day. After we ate lunch, played a few games, Jeff showed up to help me open gifts. He is so sweet, he showed up with a bouquet of roses for me which was of course met with all sorts of ooh's and ahh's from the ladies. He is just so cute sometimes, I don't know how I got so lucky. At the end of the shower, we decided to reveal her name. I wasn't sure if Jeff was ready to do it but I was so happy that he was! We finally 100% committed to her name. Her name will be Jillian Ann, and we will call her Jill. I just love it, Jillian is just so pretty to me. I am so glad we finally agreed on this! Now I can order all sorts of cute items with her name on it!!!!

I also have to share a crazy story that happened the morning after the shower. Once we got home from the shower, we placed all of our gifts in our den. It's the first room to your left as you walk into our home so it was an easy gift drop off place for us. I tried to keep the gifts to the back of the room because anyone could easily see them if you were standing on our front porch looking into our home. Our shower was on a Sunday and I really didn't have the time or the energy to look at the gifts that evening after everyone left our home. Boy did it feel like Christmas morning in our house as I came down the stairs the next day. I couldn't wait for that Monday workday to be over with so I could finally go through all of our beautiful presents.

I am at work for only an hour when I received a scary phone call. It was a dispatcher from our security system saying that one of the motion detectors in our home was going off and it triggered the alarm. The police were on their way to our home to check things out. She then asked me how quickly I could get there and what I would be driving. I tried to call Jeff and let him know of what was going on and then I remembered he had an early morning meeting. So I drove home in a panic thinking to myself, was someone trying to steal all of our baby gifts? Living in a new construction development, people were in and out of there all day long, who knows if someone caught a glimpse of all the great presents sitting in our den. I called my father-in-law who I knew had just gotten off of work. I asked him to meet me at home since Jeff was in a meeting. I did not want to meet the police myself and certainly wasn't going into a home that had been broken into. I don't think a pregnant lady would be able to scare off any burglars.

When I arrived home, the police were gone, but my father in law had just arrived. I was a bit ticked off that the police hadn't bothered to wait for me. So my father-in-law and I walked into our home, alarm still going off as we entered. We slowly walked into the hall, not sure what to expect on the inside. No main entryway had been broken into or the woman who I spoke to over the phone would have told me. As soon as we walked inside, it was obvious to what had happened. We had placed the huge bouquet of mylar balloons from our shower in our great room, next to our fireplace, for us to enjoy. Apparently these balloons also set off motion detectors!!!!! So the balloons were our "burglar". Apparently when the furnace turned on and off, the balloons started to sway, setting off the motion detector. Unbelievable!!! I returned to work feeling a little embarreseed, I had left in a state of panic and then had to try to explain to my co-workers that a bouquet of balloons was the culprit.

My sister and I:


Her first Cleveland Indians shirt:


My sister-in-law Stephanie admiring the bump:


So blessed....


The beautiful tables, note our "burglar" in the back corner!


Our den after the shower...



Take care,

Indian Summer

We had a very brief and pathetic two day Indian Summer this week that we took advantage of. On Wednesday, we decided to take the afternoon off and head to a local pumpkin patch. The day was gorgeous and I couldn't imagine spending it inside in a cubicle. It would be one thing if we were having a beautiful October, but we are not, not one nice day to speak of so we had to take advantage!!! So off to Pattersons Fruit Farm we went and it was so much fun. We bought pumpkins, sampled the apple cider, and even had an apple cider donut from their bakery. Yum! I can certainly seeing enjoying one of those a new tradition for us. I have to be honest that this trip to Pattersons was also monumental to us for other reasons. Looking back, we have not been to a pumpkin patch since this. We had only been trying for a few months and even then little thoughts started to enter our heads about what if something was wrong with one of us? And when would it be our turn to have a cute little baby to take pictures of at a pumpkin patch? That feeling stuck with us for awhile and we knew even the thought of returning to a pumpkin patch while dealing with infertility and loss would have just been a miserable time. It's little moments like this that just make us so happy and grateful to be blessed with a healthy baby girl on the way.



Take care,

BOO!

Our neighborhood loves to boo each other and this year we received the cutest boo on our door step. Apparently the neighbor who booed us knows we are expecting from all the little baby gifts that we received. Isn't that the cutest onesie ever? I can't wait for her to wear it next Halloween.

What is "booing" you ask? The purpose of booing your neighbor is to surprise them with candy and other fun Halloween items and leaving them on their doorstep. You have to fill a plastic bucket or pumpkin with a bunch of candy and Halloween trinkets including a poem and a "BOO" sign. The poem contains the instructions on what to do next once your received your boo. The boo sign hangs on your door so other neighbors know that you have already been "booed". You are supposed to create two boo packages similar to the one below for two other neighbors who have not yet been booed and secretly place them on their doorstep. You are then supposed to ring the doorbell and run so you don't get caught. We were totally busted this year by both neighbors who we tried to boo. Who is hanging out by their door at 9pm at night? I am thinking these neighbors were anxious to receive their boo gifts from us, I know I would be :)



BOO

The air is cool, the season is fall
soon Boo's will come to all.

The treat that came with the special note
Is yours to keep, enjoy them both.

The fun comes with friends like you
now copy this and make it two.

Then others here among our friends,
will give warm fuzzies that will never end.

We'll all have smiles upon our face,
no one will know who BOOed each place.

Just one short day to work your fun,
or a big ZAP will strike, SO RUN!

And don't forget a nifty treat,
like something cute or something sweet.

Please join the fun, let's really hear it,
and spread some Boo's and lot's of spirit.

Directions:
1. Enjoy your treat.
2. Place the picture of your BOO on your front door.
3. Now you have 24 hours to copy this twice, make 2 treats and 2 BOO's and secretly deliver them to 2 neighbors who do not have BOO on their front door.
4. Then watch how far this spreads by Halloween.




Take care,