Add Baby Shower planning to our list of To Do's

With all the stuff we've been doing on the house, we've kinda lagged on the whole baby shower thing.  (I know you don't typically throw your own baby shower, and we're not.  My mom is technically hosting.  But since we like to do things our way, we have a BIG say in the matter, plus, my mom lives far away from us so it's easier for us to do some of the planning). So anyway....

We decided a while ago that we wanted to do a couples shower, because Rogér is a part of this whole shindig too!  And I don't really do well when the spotlight is all on me either. We also decided to have it at our house.  Why?!  Oh my gosh! Why?!  Well, we wanted all our friends/fam to see our place and see the baby's room and we thought it'd be fun. And it will be, except for the whole part about us not having a kitchen yet and the fact that most of our belongings are piled in a big mess in the enclosed patio (or Trophy Room, as Rogér has decided to entitle it).

With the shower only a few weeks away, we're still trying to come up with a good food option (that doesn't require us to have a kitchen of course), some fun co-ed activities and prizes, favors, and some sort of strategy for the whole day.  I'm sure it will all pull together though.  At least today I got a start on the favors.  See them at my other blog, HERE.

Just another crazy week  :)

Attempting Organization

Some people are great at making a place for everything and keeping everything in it's place.  Not us.  We're remarkably disorganized.  Sometimes we pretend that our "system" works for us, but, seriously, who are we trying to kid?  Every now and then, we do give a good effort at getting it together.

We just got a bunch of hand-me-down clothes from our neighbors (hand-me-downs are KEY!).  Since they're for 18 months, I had to store them away for a little while, so I told myself I would "do this right".  I grabbed a Sterlite tub and marked it with "18 Months", folded up the clothes, closed the lid, and shoved it up in the top closet cabinet in the baby's room!  Go me!  Since I was on a roll, here's what else I did:

Dang, that's pretty good, for me!  How long do you think it'll last?  Probably like a day.  But at least we're starting out in a good place.

HGTV's Curb Appeal

We just sent in our application for a show on HGTV, called Curb Appeal.  They go around fixing up the front of people's run down houses so that they're not an eyesore to the neighborhood (if our house isn't an eyesore right now, I don't know what is!).

Anyone watched or been on the show? I've never seen it actually.  Maybe I've seen it a long time ago, like one of the summers during college, if it was around way back then. Not sure.

It would be so cool to get this, but who knows.  I'm sure there's lots of worthy entries....but hopefully, our case is the winning one!

Wish us luck, pretty please :)

Another Ranch Day

Rogér and Ronin are making a great team these days.

A Fan for the Baby's Room

Rogér installed a ceiling fan in the Baby's room.  Supposedly, good air circulation is one factor in preventing SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome).  We want our little loaf to be safe.

Looks like the install went well.  Rogér is doing his victory dance:

Our Kitchen Cabinets are Here!!

Yay!

We shopped around a little for cabinets.  Debated over the pros and cons of laminate vs. wood, custom vs semi-custom vs. modular.  But, ultimately, no one could beat the Ikea prices or timeline (we broke & we need to get this kitchen show on the road!).  On Saturday we walked into Ikea....4 hours and a couple G's later, our cabs were ordered and scheduled for next day delivery!

The girl at the Ikea kitchen center was super helpful and made sure we were getting all the right pieces....well, almost...she told us what countertops we'd need, but did forget to put them on the initial quote.  We had to go back upstairs and add them on, then go back to the register and pay for them separate.  No small feat for my pregnant butt.

The friendly kitchen girl and the loads of tall, blonde, pregnant ladies almost made us forget that we were in East Palo Alto.  But don't worry, we got reminded.  While counting our delivery items (we were instructed to do this), a big, bitchy, ghetto-EPA-lady yelled at Rogér to "Back Away".  She assured him that she would do the counting for him, then sat her fat butt down behind a counter and ignored us the rest of the time.  Thank goodness the nice delivery-scheduling guy appeared and set everything right.

BTW, the girls in the Returns Center didn't sound fun to deal with either.  If you have an Ikea return, maybe take your chances at the Emeryville location.

So we were scheduled for delivery this evening, but the guys called around 3pm and asked if we would be available to take the delivery in 10-15mins....SWEEEEEEEEEEET!  Now it's all piled up in our living room.

90 or so boxes of cabinets

Current kitchen situation...or should I say, crisis?

Adventures in Kitchen Troubleshooting

Rogér's latest handy work resulted in our diswasher out on the front porch, awaiting pickup from the Salvation Army, and a strict request not to use the kitchen sink...at least not the hot water.

 
  Oh well, at least this is more motivation to get the new kitchen in!

Why We Love Spots

Domino is always dead tired after a night or two at his favorite kennel, Spots.  It's an open kennel, so he gets to run around all day with his doggie pals....a beautiful idea!  Plus, it's open 24 hours, which works out great when we need to drop Pups off at 4am before heading to Tahoe for some snow ;)

House Update.....Switching Out the Switches

Before we left for our friends' Labor Day BBQ in Sacramento, we decided to tackle a couple of the lower hanging fruits around the house.  First, changing out the light switches in the hallway and nursery, and then since the electricity was already turned off, replacing the outlet in the nursery.  I also worked on painting the baseboard in the hallway.  Note to self:  Next time, rip off the old baseboard and paint the new baseboard before you put it on!  I HATE painting baseboard!!

Here's the before and after photos:

Hallway light switch

Nursery light switch

Nursery outlet

The Test

And the results....

TA DA!