Half Bath Remodel....Day 1

Painting and trim touch ups are done....what do you think of the color? We really like it, feels warm and cozy and I'm almost wishing I chose this for our living room! But I'm sure I can find other warm and cozy colors when we actually get around to that.

Cabin Fever...

Today I'm dreaming of....

Open windows and fresh air
Crickets chirping (as long as they keep their distance)
Using our patio sat
A picnic lunch with A in our backyard
Walking around the neighborhood with A in the stroller (she too, is yearning to be outside. Trust me I can tell)
Having the half bath done

MY NEW JOB! I found my first NP job and will be starting in early April. I'm nervous but really excited at the same time. It's very strange to be wrapping things up at my current job, I've been in that position for six years! It's bittersweet in that I generally like my job (there are days where I can't stand it but we all have those don't we?) and I'm comfortable in it. I'll be going into something totally new, with lots of new responsibilities where I'll be totally outside my comfort zone. But, there are many things that I'm looking forward to. Using that shiny new master's degree, meeting new people, new patient population, a commute that's drastically shorter than my current one, learning new things....

Running

I tell you, having that Log Your Run widget on my blog sure has guilted me into running more than I usually would! By the way, I can't always see it on IE but it comes up all the time with Google Chrome (incidentally my border is much more aligned on Google Chrome).

Anyway, here are my totals so far:
January: 6.3 miles (yeah, I know...pretty weak)
February: 14.2 miles

2011 total: 20.5 miles/3:27:48 (hours run)

Bathroom Reno Day #1...in pictures

A keen eye will show you our nosy cat who just couldn't stay away and at one point ventured onto the back porch and was found just sitting there waiting to come back in. He's all talk I guess.

Half Bath Remodel

This weekend, our contractor got started on redoing our half bath. Unfortunately, we will live with no half bath (and the contents of the half bath and the toilet, vanity, granite top, mirror are in our dining room and on our dining room table) until at least next weekend. My understanding is that he will be back to lay the tile and do the grout work. Then he needs a plumber to come in to do the toilet and vanity, then he can install the lighting and finish things up. This is going to be a longer process than I thought it would be, I was envisioning them coming back tomorrow and finishing up without really factoring in that he needs a plumber for some of it. Luckily, he put the washer and dryer back so I have laundry access for the week.

Today they demo'd the bathroom, there is no floor in there and they painted and touched up the trim. The new paint color is really nice, the bathroom looks small right now though. Not sure if it is the darker paint color or the fact that there is nothing in there so it just looks like this tiny space. I'll post more pics tomorrow of their progress.

Here are the before pics....

Weekend Recap

M's parents were down for the weekend...we went out to eat with them for the first time since A was born! This was a typical thing for us to do pre-A, we've all got a touch of the foodie gene in us, so we would try out different foodie worthy restaurants when they came down which all had to change when we had A. We had to resort to ordering in and the area we live in has crap for food. There is one great Indian restaurant which isn't that close to us and 2 pretty good Thai restaurants and that's it.

So it was a major milestone this weekend when we actually went out to lunch at a kid friendly chain restaurant (a major compromise for all involved) and went to brunch yesterday morning. Of course, A was good as usual so it was a nice time for all of us.

A continues to pretty much sleep through the night after doing only one night of the Ferber Method. She now will occasionally wake up and cry for 5-7 minutes, but then puts herself back to sleep. Last night, she was up for awhile just kind of babbling so I did go in and give her the pacifier but mostly because I was sick of listening to her babble because it kept me up, thinking that it was going to turn into a cry any second.

This week is exciting, I think the renovations will start on our bathroom. I have to make sure I take those before pictures and then some during pics. We finally decided on the paint color...Benjamin Moore 'Colorado Clay'. We were thinking of something a little more brown initially but M was worried that it was too monochromatic and it didn't have any flair. It was very stately looking but I worried the richness of it was too much for the small space. The Colorado Clay brings out the accents in the tile and the granite countertop and is a nice contrast to the vanity, which were the reasons that we were liking the darker brown color. This color is more vibrant, has the orange undertones I was initially looking for, and is lighter than the other color.

We can't wait for our contractor to get started!

The Ferbs

So, we're doing it. We're Ferberizing....Miss A has yet to sleep through the night (I think once when she was ten weeks old she slept for 10 hours straight, that would be the only time). She's almost 8 months old and this tired Mom thinks it's time!

We've gotten so used to being up in the middle of the night it's almost not a big deal anymore. It wasn't, anyway, until she decided a few weeks ago that she wanted to randomly get up for 90 minute intervals during the middle of the night and our usual tricks no longer worked. Or they did, till we had to put her in the crib and the silence would last about five minutes and she would be whining/crying again. We would quickly run in because we didn't want her to fully wake up again. This, of course, was reinforcing the whining/crying/waking up.

I started reading Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child which my friend S recommended and it was hitting home that our soothing techniques of picking her up, rocking her, singing to her in the middle of the night were just reinforcing her and encouraging her to continue getting up in the middle of the night.

The lure of Ferberizing aka progressive waiting/gradual extinction is that it has fairly quick results. And sure, the nights spent Ferberizing will be filled with crying and little sleep, but that's not that much different than what we are currently experiencing where she's waking up and we try to figure out which soothing method will illicit the least crying when we put her back down. So if we're going to be up for 90 minutes in the middle of the night anyway, why not work on getting rid of this little sleep problem?

Last night was the first night we did it and we kind of modified it to what we are already sort of doing. When she cried last night, we waited five minutes before going in to comfort her. We patted her back and butt, gave her the pacifier etc but just did not pick her up. We could always quiet her down and pretty much as soon as we did we scooted out. We had to do this six times before she fell asleep 75 minutes later. Better odds than our normal nights, although listening to her cry, especially towards the end, was absolutely torturous. She was pretty hysterical by the end of it and it was hard to calm her down even when I went in there. Eventually, after some back rubbing and soft singing, she got it down to a mere whimper and I could get her to take the pacifier again. After that, she was quiet but I stayed a bit long to pat her on the back and make sure she was comfortable. After that, she did whine a little bit more but by 3 minutes, she was quite. About 30 minutes after that I heard a little cry, and then nothing more till we woke her up at 620.

We are totally committed to this and are gearing up for tonight's cryfest....but it will be so worth it when she sleeps through the night! We can't even really imagine it at this point!

Bathroom in the Dining Room

Just for now...thank goodness. K (contractor) picked up our purchases from Lowe's yesterday with his nifty large and in charge truck and brought them over. M was more than excited to open each box (he's saving the toilet for tonight) to make sure everything looks ok. It all looks really nice together, but we still can't decide on a paint color! We both like one that is kind of a darker taupe but wonder if it's too dark. It looks really nice with the wood and tile though. We also had a sample of a light tan-ish one but it looks too peanut buttery and they didn't have samples of any other lighter tan/taupe colors. I think this weekend we are going to head over to Ben Moore and see if they have samples. They always look so different on the wall, I'd prefer to see it up before choosing to have my entire bathroom painted in it.

K is planning to start next week on the bathroom, he assures me that I'll be out of a washer and dryer only for one day while the tile is installed and setting. Whew! I'll be sure to post before and after pics! Exciting!