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Uniformly Christmas

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Barry and I have been talking this week about Christmas decorations.  For a few years now, we’ve hauled the same stuff from under the bed to go on the tree, and that stuff is all red and silver.  Barry tried to put a red and blue bauble on the tree that someone had given us and (in my humble opinion) it stood out like a sore thumb.  It’s now mysteriously disappeared.

Which is better, coordinated colours or a festive free-for-all?  Growing up, my family’s tree was a mish-mash of various inherited baubles, balding tinsel and lights that you had to test every year, along with an artistic sprinkling of lametta at the end by my Dad.  I do think that makes for a welcoming tree, but it’s not like I’ve inherited any of these decorations, so we had to settle for Ikea’s finest.

I have been inspired by a blog for next year though – Jen from A Little Bird Told Me bought some hand-painted baubles from eBay and some ribbon and her tree looks amazing!  I think this may be the way to go next year (which, by then, our baby will be able to pull over herself, no doubt!).

Hope everyone has a very merry Christmas!

Oh, Christmas tree

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Oh Christmas tree 2012Has everyone got their Christmas decorations up yet?  I spent Friday night doing that and wrapping presents.  Not all of the presents – I have a threshold – I managed about half and now I’ll have to wait another week before I can face wrapping anything more.

There’s a rule in our house that we can’t have anything Christmassy up until at least a week after my birthday, which is at the end of November (it’s usually two weeks but I jumped ahead this year because I’m excited about Christmas).

Most of my shopping is done now, just a few bits left to get.  On more of a countdown than usual this year as I’m finishing work at Christmas (hurray!).  Nine working days to go!

Booties

One of my schoolfriends who moved away to France after university is expecting the same day as me, so I decided to get crafty and make her a little present – here’s the result…

The booties were a lot less traumatic to sew than the supergirl boots!  I’m working on a sampler at the moment for the nursery, hopefully I’ll get a bit more time to do that when I’m on maternity.

The neverending tale of the black wall has an end

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Changed radiatorFinally! We’ve had a decorator in for the last few days to paint the black wall that has been looking at me since we half painted it in, erm, well, embarrassingly… March.  Time flies!

Here’s a reminder of how the wall has looked since then.  Yes, that is indeed been like that for eight whole months.

As I mentioned recently, we asked our shiny new decorator, Josh, to split the jobs we’d asked him to quote for into three parts, and he’s been busy doing the first (and cheapest!).  And now the wall is completely black!  Hurrah!

Black wall

Our new wall is not only sleek and sexy, but it sports straight lines and a glossy newly painted bannister.  Oh yes.

Josh has whizzed through quite a few of the “to-dos” on my depressing visual representation of all the jobs left to do: the kitchen post from way back in April – sanding and repainting the rest of the kitchen ceiling and walls, glossing the skirting boards, and painting the stairs wall, ceiling and handrail.

Black wall 2

In fact, we’ve only got two jobs left on that list now – tile the kitchen walls and replace the switches with brushed silver ones.  Both things that can wait a little bit, so I’m feeling a bit smug.  I think I’ve got enough lists going on without that one anyway (do two things make a list?).

We’ve asked the decorator to come back in early January to do the next instalment (middle floor hallway/stairs up to our room/nursery), can’t wait!

Nursery inspiration

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I had a look round a lot of websites for inspiration on nursery themes and colours, and this was by far our favourite, from Project Nursery. The soft pink and grey is really soothing and calm, and it’s also very girly, which I love!

My friend Michelle saw this and immediately went and bought a tester pot of Dulux’s Sorbet, which is a similar pale pink, and it seems pretty perfect! We’ll go for a lighter grey than we’ve used in the living room, and try to break it up with the white furniture and pictures.


My friend Helen’s given us a rocking nursing chair and stool which are currently cream, but I think we’re going to try and dye the covers or re-upholster them so they’re grey to match the room.

Room of shame

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Thanks to our incredibly generous friends and family (namely my brother, Martin, and my friends Charlie and Helen), the room that is destined to be the nursery is filled to the gunnels with baby clothes, baths, baskets, footstools, etc.  Not to mention the freebies we’ve received and the bits we’ve been buying like nappies.

Anyway, you get the picture.  Actually, you don’t get the picture, because I’m too ashamed to take one.  It’s our room of shame, as everything is just getting dumped in there at the moment.  It’s like those programmes you see where people hoard things for 20 years and then a presenter goes over to make fun of them.

I’ll post about this separately, but we’ve just bought a nursery furniture set, so no more room of shame!  I can’t wait to get everything washed and put away.  Then I’ll take a photo!

Quote

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We’ve made a tiny bit of progress in that we finally have a quote from a decorator!  Barry had a guy round just before we went on holiday, we then had a lovely time in Majorca (see left, didn’t do much!), and when we got back, a quote was waiting for us on the doormat.

He was quite young, but Barry said he looked like he knew what he was doing and he seems to have a lot of work on, which is a good sign.

Barry asked him to quote separately for three different areas; so the quote is (excluding materials):

  • Finish sanding in kitchen, finish painting, take the black wall up the stairs and gloss the handrail and skirting board up the stairs – £120
  • Paint the middle hallway and ceiling (dealing with nail pops as he goes), the nursery walls and ceiling and gloss everything that needs it – £240
  • Paint up to our bedroom, walls, ceiling and black gloss – £240

So £600 altogether.  When you break it down into the number of days it would take (we think five), it doesn’t seem too bad, considering the same amount of work would take Barry weeks with him having two jobs now and all, but it is a bit shocking seeing it written down like that!  We’re giving him the go-ahead for the first bit so that the black wall is sorted out for Christmas as we’re having relatives over.  Think that will be done at the end of November.  For the other two bits, I think we may wait until January and get them done when I’m on maternity leave so we don’t have to take annual leave.

Still no decorator

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Trying to find a decorator is proving to be more difficult than we first thought.  We gave up on the one that never got back to us, and have moved onto another one.  Unfortunately, as we’re in London this weekend, and then on holiday the week after, the next one we rang is only available on weekends.  Normally perfect, but it means it’s going to be another month before we can get him in to even quote!

In baby news, we’ve ordered the pram now we’ve found out we’re having a girl and bought these beautiful shoes out of crazed excitement.  Got a bit overwhelmed by the amount of stuff in H&M for babies!

Baby news

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Well, we left a message with the decorator, but we’ve had no response yet, so we’re going to have to find another one!  I think three weeks is long enough to wait.  Just need to get Barry geared up for ringing another decorator now…

On the baby front, we’ve discovered we’re having a girl!  Not sure what we’ll do with her room yet, but we’re ordering the pram this weekend which is making me a bit giddy!  We’ve chosen the iCandy Peach 2 in Berry Bon Bon and my mum’s kindly offered to buy the stroller and we’re getting the other bits.  There’s more to it than you think!  Not the cheapest, but we’ve tried so many different prams that we were going cross eyed – I’ll be relieved to have it ticked off the list!

 

She’s like the wind

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In our endeavour to sort stuff (read: everything) before the baby comes in February, we’ve started by completing the appliances in the kitchen with this beauty…

It’s a condenser dryer, bought just as the sun seems to be coming out again.  As Barry had the foresight to drill a hole for a plug through the cupboard, but not the end panel, we haven’t tried it out yet but we should have it on at some point this weekend.  I’d better buy some Bounce!

Many thanks to Barry’s Mum for the dryer!

Barry did mention that the dryer delivery men had the audacity to ask how long the wall had been like that (i.e. not painted up the stairs).  Think we need to give that decorator a call soon…