Wardrobe – Favourite second hand store. 1950s. $500

Cot – eBay. Fresh coat of white paint and new screw holes to make it higher (It just had one setting before because it had drop side rails, but I wasn’t interested in using them, so we have raised it and when she grows, we will lower it to its original height) $100

Change Table – Ikea Hemnes hack. Read the tutorial here. $581.70

Bookcase – Designed by me and made by a customer of my husband. This was just a standard bookcase, made back when we were living in our apartment. It floats from room to room as we need it. It has now come to rest in the nursery.

Wingback armchair – Coco Republic. Bought at their warehouse sale. $800

Rug – Coco Republic. 100% wool cream stripe rug. Bought on sale. $300

Curtains – Sewn by me. Indian white cotton with silver metallic stripe. $12 a metre on sale. Deep pleat tape and hooks from Spotlight.

Curtain Rod – Spotlight. $60

Cot skirt – Sewn by me. 100% cotton with embroidery pink dots. $15 a metre

Door stop – Sewn by me from cot skirt fabric and cushion fabric.

Baskets – Ikea. $20 each

Tags – Made my me. See tutorial here.

Ceiling Light – Masters. $80

Lamp – My House. On sale. $140

Side table – Vintage shop. $60

Picture ledges – Ikea

Bebe artwork, Striped bow artwork and leopard spots artwork – Watercolour and acrylic painted by me

Patchwork quilts – Sewn by my Mother.

The room was filled with items that were either 2nd hand/vintage, handmade, on sale or gifts! That is what I set out to achieve from day 1. The only items from a baby shop is the change pad and the mattress.

Click here to see Part One

The before shots

Welcome! This is my first ever room reveal. Finally showing you in full my little girl’s nursery. She is 2 months old now. Shame on me.

Let’ get cracking.

Here is the first look of the nursery

She had yellow walls and pink carpet

An ugly unit under the window and *shudders* vertical blinds!

As well as a built in wardrobe that was just far too big for the room.

So we ripped them out.

A bit of patching was required, because I decided to rip the skirting and architraves off as well

The room was painted Dulux Limed White quarter strength and we put new architraves on and the floors got prepared for sanding.

The floor boards were sanded and stained. 50% walnut strength with a satin polyurethane finish.

We then had to paint the skirting boards

Then attach them.

By this stage, all the ‘bones’ of the room were complete.

Coming up tomorrow – Part Two – After

Supplies:

• Decorative paper
• Card stock
• JAC paper
• Blade/Ruler – Scissors
• Hole punch
• Ribbon
• Printer

First off I duplexed my tags. This involves using the JAC paper (which can be bought from good art stores. It is like double sided contact paper) You place this in between your decorative paper (I used marbled paper) and card stock (I used peach coloured canson card)

This step is not necessary if you don’t want double sided cards and used a heavy weight card stock. I made my double sided so that later I could write what was in the boxes if necessary. At the moment they are pre-emptive, awaiting baby toys.

Download the file you wish to use. One with numbers, one without. Print on card stock. Cut out. Hole punch. Tie ribbon (I used dove grey velvet ribbon)

Tie it to anything you wish. In this case, I tied it to IKEA baskets. I added a pink stripe washi tape around the top edge.

Download the pdf files here:

Enjoy!

x

I commissioned 3 different etsy sellers to create cards with Audrey’s name. The first piece arrived this week.

I’m going to pick the best piece to place in a custom photo album for Audrey.

How can one resist baby clothes. I know my mother and sister can’t. Seriously, nearly all her clothes are purchased by my sister.

Dress and Cardigan for her Baptism reception

These were purchased by me. The trench coat is for next winter!! LOL. I saw it, I loved it and was, most importantly, ON SALE!

$32. It is dead set proper. Check that lining!

And just a sweet little dress for this year’s winter.

Dear little house put a picture up on Instagram and now her blog of her little boys nursery. It is pure genius. I have been racking my brain trying to finish off Audrey’s nursery with the gallery wall, but always apprehensive about the multiple holes in the walls for the countless frames and how to hang them, how to arrange them, what if I get sick of the arrangement? And it was just NOT coming together. The main reason I haven’t done her nursery reveal as yet. Then I saw this:

Huge Light bulb!!! I can move around and mix and match, add and replace to my heart’s content.

  I sincerely hope she doesn’t mind but I am totally appropriating her idea I quickly went to Ikea to facilitate.

On the ledge, One item that will be in prime place is my stripey bow watercolor artwork that I painted.

The frame is from a 2nd hand store. I love its grey and gold frame. I cut a new mat for it and hey presto, re-framed on a budget.

I bought Audrey some stuffed toys. So cute! I couldn’t resist.

Theses toys besides the seal rattle are being packed away in baskets I bought from Ikea

Until she is big enough to enjoy them.

These 3 baskets will be put on top of her wardrobe to hide all her crap, err, toys.

I will be posting a tutorial on the over-sized tags with a free template to download shortly.

Did you happen to spot me over at Centsational Girl Blog this week? I know, right? Big League. Sent my traffic soaring.

My ikea hack Hemnes change table was featured.

Check out the blog post here

Meanwhile, what are you all getting up to this weekend?

I need to clean and finish baby girl’s room as a matter of extreme priority. The lounge room needs a spruce up as well. I lead one of those enviable lives that involve house cleaning and vomit cleaning. Be jealous!

Hi Everyone, I am still around.

Pushing 39 weeks el-preggo-relli. That is Spanish/Italian for up the duff. Or UTD for short.

In other news. Crazy mumma to be nesting has been in full swing.

See here! I made these 3 things in the same day that I went on a mad cooking brigade and whipped up a whole freezer full of meals!

It is a cushion cover, a door stop and a tissue box cover. Made from James Dunlop arabella fabric.

The door stop is a necessity. The door just seems to swing in the nursery. I filled it with a zip lock bag of expired rice (I don’t cook rice ever, Not sure why, I like it, but it is a bit hard for me LOL) then filled it out with stuffing.

The nursery door had been finished painting and hung by my husband all by himself! I think he got the hint from the last blog post LOL!

The cooking involved:

1 bolagnese sauce

4 lasagne dinners

2 cannelloni dinners

1 roast tomato sauce (made from all the tomatoes in my garden)

That is 2 kilos of tomatoes that we grew all by ourselves!

And a widdle capsicum! I roasted that too, I mean, why not!

Then blitzed it all up and this sauce formed the base for the other meals.

I also made:

96 meat balls divided into 4, 24 ball servings. (12 each)

1 meal of the meat balls in the sauce.

I had ambitions to cook up more, but there is only so much cleaning a husband can do. I already made him clean the kitchen twice!

This is the state it was in both times. There is not a spare inch of counter space or a clean item left in our unrenovated kitchen.

He obliged without the slightest hint of a whinge! That, that there is TRUE LOVE!!

See the fan just out of shot? It is $12 of saviour! I have been MELTING! Melting I tell you. I cannot cool down.

Meanwhile in the garden! Isn’t this pretty?

I love it!

The day before, she was still closed and goblet like. The next day I race out to see here and these little things have already fallen off!! Hmmphh! What gives?

I also cut another flower (this time before it had dropped any) and placed it into a vase and it turned brown so fast!

Don’t magnolias make good cut flowers??

Sometime last week (well week before now), my nursery change table was featured on Ikea Hackers. I forgot to state the obvious about removing the aesthetics when it actually comes time to use it for it’s purpose and was semi-slammed in the comments! HEHEHE jealousy.

IKEA – Glamorous girly change table

I also managed to high tail it to Coco Republic for a look-see. A lovely lady spent a bit of her time with me talking about my living room! I didn’t buy anything and she didn’t push me. She was a great help in gaining clarity and direction. It is abundantly clear that I now NEED this fabric!

Alexa Hampton for Kravet

To make 2 throw cushions for my orangey coloured settee.

I honestly thought the settee needed re-upholstering in a more pleasing colour for it to work in my living room. But she proved me wrong! I can see this working.

She told me to save my dough on that. And I am so happy. Because the upholstery on the settee is in PERFECT condition! Sometimes I just wish there was a big hole it in somewhere to force me to re-upholster it! But is perfect luscious velvetiness condition.

How do you even describe this colour? I was trying to describe it to the SA. It is a hard one.

Also at Coco Republic I need to buy this petite chair and foot stool for my baby girls nursery!!!

Too cute! I didn’t dare look at the price tags. It is Oly San Francisco branded. In other words, to me, that means, don’t bother!!

Talking about the nursery. I am NEARLY ready to reveal the nursery!!!

It may be before I give birth, but no promises!

The fastest thing to ever happen around here was the cutting down of a hideous palm tree in our front yard.

From the first phone call to him packing up the ute to leave was about 2 hours.

So happy to see that thing gone. It get dropping it’s big branches on our lawn and the neighbours car. We didn’t know what to do with them and it was as ugly as anything.

We finally got our Christmas present! Our steel security door. She is a beauty.

This little porch requires so much work, so much beautification!! I am constantly looking for a nice bench to go where that chair is (there is 2 of those chairs there) and soon we are replacing the door bell button with a brass one.

So much action has been occurring in the nursery, but I best leave that for another post entirely. I have written part one of the nursery posts!

Baby clothes washing has been happening constantly!

(It better be a girl, it better be a girl, look at all that pink!)

I bought a coffee table at the Laura Kincade sale. It is from my favourite furniture makers. The Hickory Chair Co in North Carolina US.

I have been looking for an oval coffee table since 2009. When I was living in my apartment. Both my apartment and this house have long and narrow living areas where a long and narrow coffee table was required. And I always wanted an oval shape as then there were no sharp corners to jab mine or anyone elses legs on for that matter.

When my favourite shop in Sydney announces they are having a floor stock sale, I am right there. (If you are a long term reader of my blog, you know that most of my furniture is 2^nd hand or floorstock, it is the only feasible way that I can furnish my house in the style I would like with the money I have and it doesn’t bother me one bit)
I see a stunning oval coffee table near the door, I can’t see a tag, I assume “Gah it is so beautiful, of course it is already sold to someone else” I keep browsing and look at it from another angle, I see a tag. I mentally prepare myself for heartbreak or cardiac arrest as I slowly turn the tag over to view the price. “Hey now, that is not bad. That is reasonable. . . . . . . .  day dreaming . . . . . .  Oh shit, what will my husband think? . . . . . . . . I can’t, I just can’t walk away from this. I will kick myself forever. How many coffee tables have I seen in the past that I actually want to buy regardless of price, hmm that would be none. . . I’m getting it, because if I don’t get it now, I will come back in a year and buy it full price, so it only makes sense to buy it now, right?”

Does anyone else have full on internal dialogue with themselves?? Please, fess up?? I can’t be the only one.

Laura Kincade wrapped it so nicely and offered a very humble and personable service to me. They even thoughtfully put it in my car in the rain.

It is a wooden table with a bevel glass top and antique silver leaf finish

I bought this table at the same time I bought the sconces for the fireplace

I love wall lights

Just a refresher! The one circled is what I chose!

Can’t wait for them to arrive.

Husband was busy this past week. He painted the architraves around the doors of 3 rooms (our bedroom, the nursery and bathroom 1)

The doors have been removed and he is painting them this week hopefully!

Yesterday was my Birthday!!! I turned a quarter century!! Arghh, wait a minute, wasn’t I 21 just the other day. Here I am married with a baby on the way. What a freak out.

Because there is a baby on the way, I suspect that is the reason I scored such awesome pressies! I was very spoilt!

I love pastels & polka dots, I made no omission of this in my baby shower posts.

Wedgwood polka dot collection.

Obviously my mum picked up on that and I received 2 sets of these plates

As well as the creamer and sugar bowl.

I also got some parfait spoons and cake forks!!!

Now for our kitchen to be renovated and a nice oven, I will bake a nice cake and serve it to you with tea? Who is coming over for afternoon tea?

My sister bought me a beautiful cardigan and TONNES of baby clothes!! They nearly took up a whole clothes airer when hanging them out to dry this morning.

I also got generous gift vouchers, can’t wait to go shopping and buy some expensive stuff I have been going with out.

Husband is getting me the fireplace. I used the baby as bargaining tool and succeeded, little did I know, the poor guy had already bought my birthday presents. He is an organised fellow!!!

He bought me some beautiful new white sheets with the 50cm depth on the fitted sheet (hard to come by and definitely needed for our mattress) Some white towels and some beauty products.

He took me out for dinner as well.

This is a pic of me before heading out the door.

It is getting closer and I am getting BIG!!!

I pottered around the nursery this morning. Still looks like a bomb has hit it since the baby shower. I am trying to find a spot for everything. This is the spot I have chosen for the nappies. Stacked in a corner.

“That’ll do pig, that’ll do”

I love saying that. I love that movie!!!!

(Does anyone know what movie I am referring to?)

Welcome to Part TWO. To see Part ONE – Click here

Then it was time for the gift opening. This was akin to climbing Mt Everest. People are so generous when it comes to babies.

My mum has made me 2 quilts. one was when I was still sleeping in a single bed and the other is a big double size one. She never got around to finishing our wedding quilt (Few technical machine problems, bit too hard basket for that one). Yet, in the space of a few months, she has made THREE quilts for our little baby.

Quilt 1 – Aussie Animals. This was made before we knew what gender the baby was. This is the biggest one as well.

Quilt 2 – I call it pretty purple parasols.

Quilt 3 – This is the quilt I designed and purchased the fabric for on my babymoon.

All 3 quilts have been professional quilted by a friend of my mothers, Julie. She is amazing. If you are a patch-worker and looking at out-sourcing your quilting, I can pass on her details to you.

She also did the last quilt as a rushed order so that it was ready in time for the baby shower. I am so grateful for that!

The first one has outlines of Australian animals and boomerangs. The second one has rain clouds and parasols. The third one has hearts and butterflies.

She also knitted this little cardi (Just needs a button)

My Aunty also made a patchwork quilt.

My long term friend who is starting out sewing, like me, made me a quilt. I love the colours. One side is flannelette and the other cotton.

(As well as a fabulous nappy tower/cake filled with so many goodies)

Photo courtesy of my friend

I love polka dots!!

Thankfully I am having a baby in the colder seasons. These gorgeous blankies will get plenty of use.

I LOVED every gift I received!!! Here are some more.

This doll is just GORGEOUS! So, so so so so so so cute

.

The plushies I received. Who remembers golliwogs? I had one. Did you? Now my little girl will have 2. A boy and a girl.

Comes with little bloomers as well. It is from Stevie & Me. Cute little brand and made in Australia. I know, I’m shocked too.

Cute little playsuit

Wooden bird mobile

I love this photo so much!!! My husband took this pic while I was at work. My heart is just swelling up, thinking about him pottering around the nursery playing with things!!!

My sister got the baby this swing. My brother bought us a car seat.

YAY!! Not one but two purebaby jumpsuits.

Here are my lovely guests who braved the torrential weather to cosy up with me in my house to celebrate.

(P.S, as well as plentiful flowers, we also went crazy on balloons too)

I didn’t get any photos once the party started, so these last few are from my sister’s mobile off the trusty facebook.

I really believe now that I am ready for this baby and I don’t need to go to the shops for anything else besides a baby monitor and bottle steriliser. Items I knew I needed but decided not to buy I was given as gifts! Like baby bath products, nappies!! cloth nappies (I couldn’t find them anyways) nappy bins, baby bag, clothes hangers, bibs, all sorts of items.

I just need to pack my hospital bag now and wash EVERYTHING.

Oh and also do a nursery blog post. You can see quite a bit of the nursery in these pics, but it will have more details.

I think this will be my most prettiest post ever!

Behold,

My baby shower!

I have to write my thank you cards before I forget everything (too late, already have! I have this super rare condition that effects every pregnant woman, it is called ‘baby brain’ That’s a technical term. I got it bad.)

Thankfully my wonderful god mother wrote everything down for me. She is truly the best.

I went for a very loose theme of ‘nesting’

First of all, thank you to my husband, my sister and my mother for helping me pull this off! Thanks for making fun of me when the day was over for being a sooky la-la in the morning. I was all devo’d about the weather and teary up, acting like, what’s the point, no ones coming!!!

In the end, everyone showed and the weather wasn’t a factor one bit.

In November we attended this wedding in those pics you will notice my sister wearing a gorgeous dress. I said to her, “that dress, my baby shower, I want!!!” And I prayed and prayed that I would be able to fit into it. She kindly obliged and it just fit.

(Do you borrow clothes from your siblings? It is the best)

If I had my baby shower any time hereafter, it would have been a no go. So that worked out well. It is by David Lawrence.

I actioned this clothes line to hang it my bay window. I bought these onsies from Coles for a whopping $2 each! (On sale)

I then went to spotlight and bought these iron on transfers! What a great way to jazz them up for a couple of dollars.

On Friday I woke at 5am and went to the flower markets. I didn’t really have a plan or idea, I know I just like pastel colours and pretty. So I did a lap and still hadn’t purchased anything, then I was getting completely overwhelmed, I did another lap and I could see that lots of the flowers were disappearing and it was starting to become slim pickings. I had to spring into action and talk to myself a bit. I then went on a frenzy and bought so many flowers. I came home and started arranging them.

And making a HUGE mess!

I am most impressed with them. I used up every spare vase, jar, glass, bottle, vessel I could get my hands on to. They were some desperate times.

This is my favourite arrangement and also the last one I put together.

This vase is from my wedding 

I have never known what to do with it, because the opening is so wide, flowers just flop all over the place. But because I had so many bunches of beautiful flowers left over and I was determined not to waste them. I just shoved them all in there with some vines in the bottom acting as quasi florist foam to hold everything upright. PERFECTION! (I know, I am SO modest) Possibly better then my wedding flowers. (but probably not)

Here is my sweets table.

It was the plan to action this with the help of The Home Empress, Leah, but due to a truly regrettable and unforeseeable sad event. She was unable to assist, obviously.

So the table looks a little sparse, but I did the best I could on my own and no guest went hungry. I made the cake in the centre. I cut one slice towards the end, because it is so tall, 3 people shared that one slice and that was that with the cake, in the bin it went. It had cream cheese in the icing and it had been sitting out. I wasn’t upset by this as it was just packet mix that was on special (I can hear Leah’s disapproval over this LOL) I would have loved to make a gourmet yummy cake, but so thankful that I didn’t bother considering it’s fate.

The cupcakes were from Vanilla Cupcakery in Kingsgrove. I thoroughly recommend this place! They are so fresh and yummy! I ordered cupcakes from this place way back in August last year to announce to our families that my husband and I were expecting a baby. We communicated this message via them opening the box and seeing this:

They were quizzical for a few seconds, then the penny dropped. Applause all round.Then the dads went to the bottle shop for champagne and the mums cried.

Sorry about that interlude, I never got around to posting that, back to the main event, the baby shower.

We played some really great games. First up was “The price is right”

We had 10 baby related items (That I displayed in my hideous un-renovated 70’s kitchen cabinet) That ghastly thing finally got put to use.

You had to put them in order of lowest cost to highest.

My friend who has 3 bubs won this, with a dismal 5 out of 10 correct. (I think we made it a bit too hard) But when the husband came home after the party had ended, I asked him to play and he got 6 correct. THAT WAS SHOCKING!!!!!!!!!!

We also played “Spit the dummy” Who can spit the dummy the furthest. THIS WAS HILARIOUSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My gorgeous god sister was so shy to spit it out. She has way too much class and this was obviously beneath her LOL but was a good sport in the end and spat that thing across the room! My cousin who has a 1 year old decided to B.Y.O dummy from her son, she thought it had better aerodynamics! Sadly not, as my Aunty Barb was the biggest dummy spitter of all with an impressive length achieved.

We played the game where you cut a length of string (In this case pink knitting wool) Wrap it around my belly and who ever is the closest wins. Oddly my mother in law won this game! She thinks I am much smaller then I am and often buys me clothes that don’t fit, yet keeps buying our baby clothes that are so far advance, She bought some size 3, YES THREE clothes for the baby (erm toddler). They are going to be practically vintage by the time the baby can wear it LOL. Bless her heart. I’ll never understand.

 We wanted to eat donuts hung from the clothes line without hands, but sadly, because of the weather, this didn’t happen.

We also had jelly babies in a jar and you had to guess the amount. My cousin who got married over a year ago won it. I told her that she was next to make a baby now. (like catching the bouquet at a wedding) Because the last baby shower I went to, I guessed the amount of popcorn in the baby bottle correctly and everyone was asking me at the shower, oh when are you guys going to have a baby and I was like, pffft please, I am not ready. Then bam! 2 weeks later. “Rob, I want to have a baby”

So we are eagerly awaiting to hear news in a couple of months LOL.

My sister also made a “baby” play list. Featuring songs like Britney spears, hit me baby one more time. Justin Beiber and I was like baby, baby, baby Oh!!

This was the bon bons. Easter eggs in bird nests. My baby is due around Easter time and fits with the nesting/bird theme.

Part TWO – Coming up next!

Here we are! We have finally made it. I know you have been waiting patiently. Preparations for the baby shower have taken me away from photographing this project.

BUT HERE IT IS!

What do you think? Nailed it! Pun INTENDED!! LOL

Yes, you can see the wonky donkey nail tacks and in the last picture, you can see how the nails don’t line up, but I am still super pleased with it.

I am using my Ikea Hemnes as a change table for my little girls nursery,

I have used Ikea drawer dividers to be super organised and as my mum would say, very anal and up myself.

That is a whole Huggies 108 pack of newborn nappies in there. Which I am told will last a newborn under 2 weeks. WOW. Fun times ahead for me.

Just need to hang the artwork on the wall.

 Breakdown:

Ikea Hemnes drawers = $249

Wallpaper = $Free

Nail Tacks = $127.70

Handles = $120

Glass = $85

Total = $581.70

To see Part ONE – Part TWO – Part THREE – Part FOUR – Part FIVE