Flora

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Here’s Barry hard at work, planting some flowers. My gardening knowledge is next to zilch, so we went for pretty ones. I was in charge of the selection.

I’ve included a little gallery of the flowers we chose, they’re all white and pinky-purple, because everything we have at the minute is pink and white because of our lovely daughter!

The purples go with the garden furniture I haven’t shown you yet.

The flowers are: Nemesia; Garden Pink “Brilliant Star”; Gerbera; Cockscomb “Caracas” (who comes up with these?); Ornamental Sage. Then there’s the white ones near the middle, either side of the sage, which I have no idea what they’re called. I have a strong feeling they begin with G. Geranium? Gardenia? You tell me!

Edited: Chrysanthemums! They’re chrysanthemums!

 

Nursery done!

Nursery

The nursery’s now been painted, hurrah!  In the end we went for Sorbet (Dulux) on two walls, which is a pale pink, and then B&Q’s Grey Hints for the rest of the room.  When the decorator was painting the grey, I was worried it wasn’t quite grey enough and it would just look dirty white, but it seems to have dried really nicely and they’re good contrasting colours.

We’d quite like to put a shelf or two up (especially as we have nothing to put the baby monitor and temperature egg thing on), so we’re on the look out for reasonable shelving, although I could always paint a pine one white I suppose.

Nursery paint

It’s really satisfying to have the room painted – the furniture is all finally where we want it now, so we’re just waiting for the arrival to really complete the room!

I’m expecting a few fabric samples from eBay for the nursing chair and stool and then I’ll have a go at reupholstering that – my lovely friend Charlie is going to lend me her sewing machine (thank you!).  And if it turns out like a dog’s dinner, I’ll put a throw on it.  Nobody need ever know…

Pinks and greys

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We’ve been trying out colours for the nursery in line with the inspiring photo I found and mentioned in this post a little while ago.

This is as far as we’ve got, but I still think the greys are a bit dark, so I think we need to shop around for a paler grey because I don’t want the nursery to be oppressive!

For the pink, we’re sticking with the “Sorbet” from Dulux that my friend Michelle suggested (thank you!), so it really needs to go with that.

We’ve got the decorator in this week to paint the nursery and middle floor hallway (the hallway won’t be very exciting – we’re covering magnolia paint with “Almond White”, but it’ll freshen it up), so we need to decide quickly.

Bedding

We also got some new bedding for our bedroom now we’ve moved the beds around, finally got a King Size quilt!  It’s so soft – if I had loads of money I would just have new bedding on my bed all the time!  It’s pink and stripy, and the alternative set we got is white with a cute little ditsy pattern, I’ll put a little photo up when I change the bed and remember to take a photo.

Procrastination with good reason

Oh dear, oh dear.  I haven’t posted in almost a month, and literally nothing’s changed, house-wise.  A lot’s been changing with me, but house-wise it’s exactly the same.

The prints are all safely nestled in their frames, and are waiting patiently on the dining room table to be put up on the wall.  According to Barry, I’m in charge of logistics of how we’re going to arrange them.  That should go well.  The pressure’s on to get them up this weekend, because my Aunty and cousins are coming on Monday for the first time and we want it to look great.

In kitchen news, the great black wall still lies unfinished, and we’re going to cave.  Next door have given us the number of a painter/decorator so we’re going to get a quote.  In the last month, Barry’s moved jobs as well as started his own company, and it’s just not going to happen, so we’d rather get it sorted.  The stairs are going to be a major issue anyway, best leave it to the professionals.

As well as the black wall, I think we’ll get a quote for our room to be painted so it no longer looks like a shooting’s taken place, and (wait for it), we’ll need our third bedroom painting as it looks like that will be the nursery.

Yes, I’m pregnant, up the duff, bun in the oven, knocked up.  14 weeks and 2 days to be precise.  I’ll try not to harp on about it, I know it’s not a baby blog, but my mind has been on other things lately and I’m poring over prams instead of paint like porn in my lunch hour.

We were dithering about which room to make the nursery.  To begin with, the baby can reside in our little nook off our main bedroom, but I think it would be nice to do up a bedroom for when it’s ready to move on and be a bit more independent.  At about 6 months.  Charlie’s giving us lots of good advice, and she thinks that would be good for the daytime anyway, and then the baby can get used to the room.

We initially thought the spare room with the yellow bed, as it’s the nearest to our bedroom. However, Barry’s made the excellent point that it’s nearer the road, and therefore noisier.  They’re both the same size, so I think we’re going to go with the one that’s further back.  We’ll have to get rid of the double bed that’s in there, but I think we’ll get a nice fold-out sofa bed in there for when Barry’s family comes over.

We won’t know what colour we’re going for until around October time (forget team yellow, we want to know!), which is also putting the brakes on which colour and design of pram we want.  For anyone who’s interested, we’re getting an iCandy.  Now I’m going to daydream…

Colour me beautiful

I’ve been following a few other decorating/DIY blogs, and one writer has recently come up with a couple of kitchen posts I found interesting – one about white ones and one about kitchens with flashes of colour.  It’s nice to see trends on the other side of the pond, and shows how a bit of colour can really work.  I’m unsure about the brightly coloured units in three different shades in one kitchen though – it would have to be huge to carry that off.

I love the idea of having chalkboard paint from this blogger.  We’re having one wall matt black anyway, so we’re looking into this – it’s definitely a possibility!  From the big UK stores, I’ve found this one from B&Q, and this one from Wickes.  If anyone actually has experience of doing this, it would be much appreciated.  I’m not sure how much control you would have with a spray one, and I’m not sure how much you’d need to cover a wall that goes up the stairs!