Decisions Have Been Made

We took a family trip to Lowe's today and made our final decisions on the vanity, countertop/sink, tile, grout and toilet. We got a bunch of paint color samples to ponder...I didn't want to get too matchy matchy with the tile, grout and counter top but the only things that make sense to my Type A brain are colors that are in the countertop. We chose a granite counter top called 'Desert Gold' which is a lighter colored granite with varying brown flecks, some black flecks and some that are almost a salmon color. I wasn't too keen on the salmon part but when we priced out the other options (of which there weren't that many) it made the most economical sense to just suck it up.

Our options for other colors were to do a special order which jacked the price up about $400 more and I still didn't love any of the colors. I think my problem is that it's hard to visualize what will look the best when all of these individualized pieces are in one room. We're basically taking a guess....

So anyway, our original idea of an orange in there is pretty much out, nothing in that tone seemed to make sense when we held the granite near it. The ones that actually jumped out were tans or taupes that actually complemented the salmonish color that I initially didn't like.

We chose a lighter colored tile with a darker tone grout so we were also trying to find paint that will complement both of those. We have it narrowed down to 6 different tan/taupe colors in varying hues. They're taped up in the bathroom now so we can see how they'll look in different light, maybe one will stand out....but they would all pretty much work with the granite and flooring so hopefully the lighting will help us make the decision.

We let our contractor know that we bought all of the pieces, he will go pick them up in about a week and then we will iron out exactly when he will start. With our luck, it will be the weekend that M's parents are coming down to visit!

Baby Consumerism

How cute is this little dress from Old Navy? The answer: so cute.

Bathroom Reno

So our contractor can start on the bathroom in a few weeks...we just have to find time to buy all the stuff (tile, grout, vanity, vanity top/sink, hardware, paint). I called Restoration Hardware and of course, they don't carry the Dillon hardware in the oiled bronze in the store and there is no option to ship it to the store and pick it up to avoid shipping. So it looks like we will be paying $80 in shipping! At least, everything we need from there is 25% off until February 2 to make up for it.....

Nuptials

I can't believe Little Bro got married this weekend! He's 30...he's not really Little Bro but he'll always be my Little Bro. We went home for the wedding and A was an absolute dream! She slept on 3 of 4 of the plane rides and was playful and quiet on the one she was awake for. The trip was a whirlwind but it was great to see everyone...lots of family and friends that I rarely get to see.

The wedding was wonderful, I was pretty emotional but did not have a total meltdown. That happened more at the rehearsal dinner when we received the bridal party gift which was a wine glass that H had hand etched with their initials and the date of the wedding.

I looked at my Mom and she looked at me...game over. I'm very happy for J, he's very happy. They are off to SF for a few days before settling into their new marriage.

Bathroom Reno

Today we made some headway on the bathroom renovations....the contractor sent us the estimator but forgot to attach it, so we at least know it's done and it's on the way. We went to Lowe's and to another bath showroom to look at vanities and countertops. We went to the local place first and found this vanity. It's about $650 without the countertop, sink, or fixtures. It's solid wood.

Then we stopped at Lowe's to see if we could find anything similar but cheaper. Honestly, we don't care if it's solid hardwood or not. We just couldn't even find anything we liked looks-wise at Home Depot the other weekend which is why we tried the showroom. Any improvements we make in our bathroom will be great, anything to get the boring lowest end possible countertap/vanity combo that's currently in there out. So we found this vanity which is similar in color, we liked that it has the legs like the more expensive one instead of just sitting squarely on the ground.

We also kind of wanted to go cheaper on the vanity itself because we want to get these nice fixtures from Restoration Hardware. We're planning to get the fixtures below, the toilet paper holder, light fixture, and the towel ring (which is a square).

Then to finish it off, we will have to still choose the counter top and sink (I think we are going to go with a combo set from Lowe's), tile for the floor, and the toilet. I was initially against getting a new toilet, ours works just fine and isn't a toilet a toilet? But M prefers to get a new one since we are updating everything else. We looked and found one that has a cool almost crown molding looking top to it that I think we will get.

After all of that, we will have to finally decide on that paint color. Decisions decisions.

Bittersweet

She's doing more on her own now, including sit up...but at least she still needs a little help from Mom.

Re-Design

New Year, New Design. I was sick of the other one for awhile now but 1. my time is limited and 2. I don't know what I'm doing in the world of web design.

I'm still tweaking somethings but I like it much better so far!

Weekend Wrap Up

Best laid plans....right? We had planned to go to Vermont this weekend to attend M's extended family's late Christmas shin dig. We spent Friday night packing up the entire house to accommodate Miss A's needs, lined up everything by the door. Earlier in the week, we emailed our friends that we would be staying with on Saturday to make sure we were all set. They were planning on making home made chicken pot pie for us and pancakes on Sunday morning before we set out for the get together.

Then, M started talking about how his stomach was bothering him ever since he ate avocado at lunch mistakenly (gives him indigestion/heartburn) and that he was feeling kind of chilly and hot at the same time. We decided to see how he felt in the morning before making any decisions...morning rolled around after a timultuous night (A picked up a bad habit this week of being fully awake and ready to not sleep anymore at about 330am every night since last Monday, it would take us over an hour to get her to go back to bed...very exhausting) and M was not feeling any better and was still having the chills/feverishness. We decided to cancel with our friends who were pretty disappointed but understood. We were going to play it by ear as far as driving up on Sunday just for the family thing but in the end, it wasn't worth it. M still wasn't feeling the greatest and the idea of driving 4.5 hours to spend 3 hours up there, then another 4.5h in the car again seemed like lunacy. If it was back in our pre-parenthood days, maybe but I certainly didn't want to put A through 9 hours in a carseat knowing she's not one of those kids who really cherishes the time in the car.

Instead, we had a quiet weekend at home and I should have really gotten more done than I did. I was rather sloth like but that's ok. We got the house somewhat back in order (and unpacked all of our gear piled neatly by the door from our Friday night packing session), went grocery shopping. I worked on my mittens from Mostly Mittens...I usually test run knitting books from the library first to see if they are worth ordering. Most aren't, but this one is the book that keeps on giving. There are lots of different patterns, but they are all in the style of the 'Komi' people but the color possibilities are endless and they are all done from basically the same template, so once you've got it, you're good to go. I ended up ordering it from Amazon last night, along with a high chair for A! It will sure be nice to not use her bouncy seat anymore.

I talked to day care this morning about bringing some food to day care and we are all set to start bringing it on wednesday. Yesterday, before each bottle feeding, I offered solids till she was sick of them and then offered her a 6 oz bottle. Last night was the first night in a week that she hasn't gotten up for at least an hour so maybe there is something to what my Mom said about her needing more calories during the day...or it's dumb luck. We'll find out tonight I guess, she's not getting any solids at day care today.

Running Widget

Thanks to Anonymous who sent me the link to get this handy little running mileage tracker! Now I have to get M involved because I can't figure out how to resize it so I can actually see it.

I'm hoping I can run again on Friday morning. My plan is to try to do it during her first nap which seems to be about 35-40 minutes. Perfect length of time for a work out.

Running

I saw a widget on someone's blog that tracks how many miles they've run in a year..I have yet to figure out how to get this on my blog so until then I'm just going to keep track of it in posts.

I think...no, hope, I can run more this year. A is taking more predictable naps and she is napping in the crib so that will be my chance to run. She's been taking a 35 minute nap in the morning and afternoon a longer one around 11 or so.

So to kick off the New Year, I have run a total of one mile so far. Yes, only one. It's been awhile, I have to ease into this!

Total Miles Run 2011: 1