Better and Better - Life is Grand!

Steve and I both have to keep pinching ourselves that our life has fully turned out GRAND!  We are so blessed with amazing friends, family and just the love we have for one another is tough to find, but then on top of all that...life is just good to us! 

Back in October I attended a conference, as a member I am heavily involved each year but this year in particular was on multiple planning committees and within my first trimester (when most are feeling fatigued) I was working 60 hours weeks at a minimum trying to get ready for the conference.  At the awards night, in front of my entire staff, completely surprised I was awarded the Vice President's Award for the California Association on Post-Secondary Education and Disability (CAPED).  This is such a huge honor and I am still speechless over the thoughtful recognition.  A very proud moment in my life, but then if it couldn't be any better, my supervisor shared the news with our Vice Chancellor within San Diego Community College District and the published an article about me in the District's magazine.  All I could think was "Munchkin is famous," as I was obviously showing in the picture at five months pregnant.  So honored and can't wait to tell Munchkin someday how he or she didn't even slow me down!  http://www.sdccd.edu/public/events/we/Online/2011/WE-Dec2011_LO.pdf Page 11

Then Steve and I are glowing as we are finishing the final touches on all of Munchkin's furniture when Steve checks his email to find out that the new job he "really" wanted was his!!!  He has been working as a Crew Chief for Pacific Ambulance for three years now, promoted multiple times and doing great, he still desired a change.  With his paramedic clinical and internship section around the corner he knew he would need to go part time and wanted to gain experience in other areas.  The job at UCSD was perfect, per diem, great pay, flexible schedule, working as an ER Technician.  It was super competitive though and he had to be diligent with his follow up to even get an interview.  Afraid that he wanted the job almost too much, he was thrilled to learn he was one of four hired.  Steve will now have an $8 an hour raise, a flexible schedule for school and for Munchkin and now emergency room experience.  It would be impossible for a wife to any prouder of what he has accomplished in a short period of time of following his dreams!  We are so BLESSED! 

Our Favorite Pieces

Steve and I each have different pieces that are our absolutely favorite parts of the nursery ~

Steve loves the Cookie Monster Fire Truck of course...

Growing up I had the Grover Saturday Night Fever Record (1978) and thought how cool it would be if I found a record for the year Steve was born (1980) and sure enough on EBay there was a record with Ernie dressed as a Fire Fighter! 

The bathroom has the Rubber Duckie/Ernie theme so I also found on EBay a little Ernie Fire Fighter and Fire Fighter Rubber Duckies to be placed on the bathroom counter!

After all these years I still had two vintage sesame street pillow cases, by a search online I thought of creating a throw pillow, and a hamper.  I can't sew myself so I reached out to a friend and both turned out AMAZING, some of my favorite parts of the room now!  

Other than that, how you can not love the Bert and Ernie that are so obviously Old School!!! 

Steve loves the handpainted dresser knobs I found on EBay, they are each different and the packet of 8 was only $15, such a cute touch! 

The last touches to Munchkin's room will be the maternity and newborn pictures we are getting done.  The frames on the wall will be filled with pictures of Munchkin and then a collage over the bookshelf will combine our wedding, maternity and newborn pictures with a centerpiece quote of "Your First Breath, Took Ours Away." 

We can't wait to rock in the recliner and soak it all in... Can't wait to meet our little Munchkin! 

AFTER

~ Munchkin's Room ~

Steve and I went back and forth as to what design we wanted to use for Munchkin's nursery but once we really had to decide it was impossible to not pick "Vintage Sesame Street" when Steve saw my face as I unpacked my original 1978 Big Bird Lamp Post Lamp.  With my maiden name being "Cook" I had a nickname of "Cookie Monster" and collected Sesame Street as a child all the way into my college years.  I saved EVERYTHING!  Steve and I also knew that we wanted a room that was obviously gender neutral and more modern in style like the rest of the house and not so over the top childlike...

We had so much fun picking out the patterns, designs, furniture, finding the best deal, compromising and then ultimately watching it all come together! 

The bedding we found on a site where we could custom make it, so cool!  All the sesame street goodies were hand washed by my mother and given to me after a drive all the way from Page (have not seen the toys and stuffed animals since I was 18).  

So many people played a part in making the nursery happen: My mom paid for the paint, Joe lent us the painting materials, Bree helped us decorate, Cuz B touched up the paint, and Soren helped put together the furniture! 

So many nights laying in bed dreaming of this very room!!!

BEFORE

We currently live in a good size two bedroom, but we used to be in three/four bedroom so there was a lot of work involved to make sure we had room for all the goodies that come along with a baby!

 

So with that, the guest room turned into the Munchkin's room...and Steve's Man Cave turned into the office!  

Time to Decorate for Christmas

The last three years we have had all of our decorations buried in a garage so this year was a treat to be able to decorate the house for every holiday and Christmas was not any different.  I couldn't wait, in fact made sure to pick the first night Steve was off to go get our tree.  Now because our place is smaller, it worked out great for the decorations because it was so cute and saturated with snowmen....but the challenging part was finding a creative place for the tree, not to mention having it smaller than ever before...all in all though, it worked out great!  I was stoked on my centerpiece because I found sticks to make the tree hold the ornaments that matched the wall paper gifts and the Christmas plates...  It has only been in the last few years that I have really tapped into the decorating side of me!  

Although, Steve hates storing the decorations, and counts the boxes of what goes back in the closet to make sure I didn't buy too much new stuff but at the end of the day I know he loves the house decorated as much as I do...except he was not thrilled to learn that the wrapping paper I picked to wrap the huge picture frames was in red glitter.  We were vacuuming glitter up for weeks but good to know for next year!  Ha ha

My mother got us a Baby's First Christmas ornament for next year but for this year we had to do something (since every year we pick out two new ornaments for the tree, one that is a cool snowman one and the other to represent what is going on our in lives that year so we got a Father and Mother Snowman picture frame and put Munchkin's ultrasound picture in it!  So Cute!

                                                                        

Munchkin is Moving In!!!

I was off for two weeks for Christmas and for the first time in years I would be off from all jobs! 

My plans involved lunch with a few friends, a friends birthday party, decorating for Christmas, but most importantly get ready for Munchkin to move in...

I have always wanted to be so organized, knowing that every hidden closet stash is somewhat organized but it wasn't until this break that I would finally have the time and the nesting desire to make it a reality.  I spent everyday for at least 8 hours a day just cleaning out closets, throwing stuff away, finding new places to store memories and soon enough there was open space throughout our humble home for all of Munchkin's stuff!  I focused on having an empty guest closet, space in the kitchen, bathroom and even a section in the laundry room for Munchkin!  The whole process had it highs and lows but when it was all done the feeling of being more organized than I have ever been; words cannot express.  I saw papers from graduate school, bills of the last ten years, anything lost was found and much more!   Steve was frightened quite a few nights knowing that our house would never look like the picture above if it wasn't for Munchkin coming soon but was so excited to see the boxes of trash building up in the garage!  Honestly the only thing I was missing was a label maker!

Good Times ~ Good Friends

Our good friends, Chris & Shay invited us over for dinner and wow were we treated like royalty!  We started with catching up over an outstanding cheese plate and moved into a salad made of arugula with goat cheese and pomegranates.  Delish!  Then amazing wine with a ridiculous dinner made up of grilled lamb, potatoes au gratin from scratch and asparagus with homemade garlic bread!!!  Heaven, you can probably tell I am pregnant just by my dinner descriptions!  The night was a great break for Steve but the cutest part was that it was so late when the night finally wrapped up but we spent another 30 - 45 minutes just trying to get Munchkin to move because Chris and Shay desperately wanted to feel the baby kick.  Finally they both felt it at the same time and their faces were priceless!!!  It is common to find that some of your friends will be more excited than others about the baby on the way, so it is so refreshing to know that Chris & Shay are counting down the days to be an aunt and uncle to this little one!