Blogging the Remodel: The Nicest Bathroom I've Ever Had

I've had a few friends hassling asking me nicely for photos of our completed home addition/remodel project. There are many reasons I haven't posted them yet, except for a few quick ones on Instagram.  I feel like the rooms need to be unpacked, or at least reasonably uncluttered, before I photograph them to post.  We're still bringing stuff up from the garage, going through bins and making weekly runs to Goodwill. Losing both dogs within two months also made it hard to focus on non-essential tasks.  We've unpacked enough to go through our daily lives, so there's less of a *need* to get the rest done quickly.

Also - we added 1000 square feet, but haven't bought a ton of furniture or decor to fill it up, by design. (Well, partly because we gave all our money to the remodeling firm.)  We want to live with the space and see what we need, and figure out what we can repurpose from the rest of the house first.  So many of the new spaces look empty.  We just got the energy to hang pictures in our living room, which was only barely affected by the project.

I'll start in the top rightmost corner of the house - the master bathroom.   In typical (horrible) 70s style, our sink and vanity were right *in* the bedroom. There was a separate TINY room with the toilet and small fiberglass shower stall.  The toilet/shower area was so small you had to be very careful about where you stood so that you could open the door.  When TJ got up for work super-early, he had to turn on the lights over the sink, which woke both me and whichever baby happened to be sleeping in our room at the time. 

Our house has a lot of recycled rustic barnboard, but in the master bedroom it was overkill - all over the vanity wall, plus the wall behind the bed.  There was also no bathtub, though we did have a (rarely used) hot tub outside on our deck, which we sacrificed for this project.

Here's a drawing of what it looked like:

Here are a couple of photos of the "before" space.  We forgot to take photos of the bathroom before demolition.

One of the listing photos when we bought the house

Our wedding day, 2005

The design for the remodel had our new master bedroom and bath being built from scratch, in the "addition" part of the house.  So we were able to design it exactly how we wanted it:

• Fully enclosed bathroom - vanity area no longer part of the bedroom
• Solid surface countertop - no more tile!!
• Tile floors and shower stall
• Larger shower area, with a bench for "stuff"
• On-demand hot water heater (woot!)
• TWO sinks instead of one
• Large soaking bathtub 
• Room to turn around and close the door
• No barnboard or 70s stained glass

We didn't need a HUGE, luxurious spa bathroom with a seating area - we just wanted it bigger than before and to use the space wisely.  Here's the new design:

We love this one because the bathroom door can be closed, and even when it's not, the vanity lights aren't shining into the sleeping area thanks to that little "hallway" by the door.  The closet door opens to a wall in that same hallway and that also doesn't disrupt the person sleeping.

I'm not a huge fan of the "toilet closet" with a door, since we're almost never in the bathroom at the same time, but apparently that's what people do these days.  

Choosing the tile, cabinet finish, counter and paint was a painful process, and by the time we got to the bathroom, I just wanted to check it off the list.  I found this bathroom online and used it as my inspiration:

Houzz bathroom

Here are the actual photos (you're welcome, A) - click for larger versions:

I chose the wood stain color early on, and had a challenge trying to find a light colored countertop that I liked that wasn't boring.  We ended up with Cambria engineered quartz in Laneshaw, which looks sort of like Reese's peanut butter cup ice cream.  I'm usually not a fan of the "fake marble" look, but it's got enough gold and silver sparkles so that it doesn't look like it's trying too hard to be real.

Most of the choices were cost-driven.  The nice thing is that anything new was an improvement over what we were living with. We chose the same sinks for both the girls' bathroom and ours - a flat modern looking oval with a sharp inside edge by Kohler.  We splurged on the HUGE soaking tub by Mirabelle, but didn't get the version with the jets.  The showerhead and faucets were Grohe in chrome - nothing fancy but much nicer than what we had.  I decided NOT to frame the mirror like the inspiration bathroom - it was just too expensive for the size we needed.

It was easiest to paint the bathroom in the same color as the master bedroom - Benjamin Moore Revere Pewter, which is a warm grey.  I'm surprised at how much we both love the color, considering I'm not usually a fan of neutrals.  The "toilet closet" and ceiling are Benjamin Moore Morning Light - a warm cream color that we used throughout the house for ceilings and hallways.

Tile was the last thing we chose, and at that point, I was SO TIRED of all the choices.  I asked our coordinator at the design/build firm we were using to narrow down the choices to matte cream colored tile with some kind of natural texture and a very subtle pattern.  Bonus points for sparkle.  One of the choices came in a variety of sizes, so I just decided to use that for EVERYTHING.  12x24 rectangles for the shower walls and tub deck, which I love, 12x12 square tiles for the floor, and the 2x2s on the shower floor.  I love the simple, unified look.  She also found a GORGEOUS rectangular mosaic tile by Statements that we used as an accent - it brings together the different colors in the woodwork, tile and paint.  And it's got lots of sparkly bits.

Another choice I'm really happy with was the decision to use frosted glass windows.  They're really opaque and "glow" during the day to let plenty of light in.  At night you can't see *anything* from outside.  This way I don't have to mess with window treatments near the tub and it gives the whole thing a cleaner look.  I'm sure that many interior designers will disagree, but for us, simple and low maintenance is better.

It is pure luxury to take a shower in this lovely space now.  The clear glass takes some getting used to, especially right across from the (frosted) window. But I love having my own sink and my own bank of drawers. And the tub, ahhhh. This is by far the nicest bathroom I've ever had in my own place.

Currently: February 2014

Ooh, a new month, which means I can be lazy and write a "Currently" post and call it good. I haven't felt like blogging much lately.

Sushi with my Big Girl

LOVING - Our newly finished house!!! More photos and stuff later, but everyone has their own bedroom, TJ has his Man Cave/Office, I have my Woman Cave/Craft Room and the girls have their Crazy Cave/Playroom. And I have the nicest bathroom I have ever had in my entire life.

READING - Just finished reading Ames & Ilg's Your One Year Old to understand BabyM's developmental phase a little better. She is definitely a lot more frustrated about her limitations than her older sister was at this age. Also reading Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child AGAIN, because Mama needs to sleep through the night.

ENJOYING - Reading to BabyM. I was "worried" that prior to 13 months, she was not at all interested in sitting and listening to a book, especially once she became mobile. But all of a sudden, in the last 2 weeks, she is ALL about books. We will happily read 5 or 6 in a row, and she is super fun to read to - she makes happy noises when you read familiar parts, points out characters and pictures she likes, and makes the signs for things she recognizes.  Amazing.

EATING - I'm on a fish taco kick. I lived in San Diego for a few months during grad school, and never understood the appeal. It figures now that I'm really far from decent fish tacos, I'd get a craving. So far, the best ones have been at Redmond's Bar and Grill, which has become our new family favorite place to eat out.

LISTENING - Still obsessing about Toad the Wet Sprocket since their show last week. I have seen them 10 times in the last 21 years. That's a lot of Toad.

PLANNING - T has "Midwinter break" next week, and I want to make the most of it. I'm a little sad that her new school is 5 days a week, so having her home for a whole week is going to be nice. But we'll need to schedule some activities so we're not rattling around the house driving each other crazy.

MAKING - I HAVE A CRAFT ROOM AGAIN. I WILL MAKE ALL THE THINGS!  Well, first I have to find the desk surface under all of the crap I need to put away. And then I will make a few jewelry orders for friends and work on client scrapbooks. But just knowing I have dedicated space makes me so happy. I blogged about this scrapbook layout that I made just before the remodel started back in October.

And this is all we need

Since we cut our family income in half almost exactly a year ago when my paid maternity leave ended, we have re-assessed a lot of the solutions we were using for convenience.

Though I love Amazon Fresh grocery delivery with all my heart and soul, we couldn't justify the higher prices and $75 minimum order, so I stopped using it. For the items we buy regularly it was cheaper for me to go to Whole Foods (!). Given that our "regular" grocery store is Trader Joe's, which is a lot less expensive than either of those options, I went back to traditional grocery shopping.

The other thing we gave up was our weekly yard service. We hate doing yard work, and our yard had never looked better, but at $50/week it was definitely not a necessity.

We dropped our Costco membership - every time we went to the store we'd spend $200 in stuff we weren't intending to buy, just because it was there and a great deal.  See ya!

Ditto the weekly organic vegetable CSA-type box from various places. I was never great at staying on top of it (how healthy we'd be if I was!) and it was more than I'd spend on just the things I know we'd eat, even at Whole Foods, so we dropped it.

But the one thing I haven't quit is our Amazon subscription orders for various household items.  For many items, like non-perishable foods, cleaning products, personal care stuff, and dog food (yay!), Amazon has a special "Subscribe and Save" option that allows you to get that item regularly.  You choose the interval from 1 to 6 months, and you can "skip" months, or postpone deliveries if you don't need it right away. If you have 5 or more items arriving each month, you get 20% off on the whole thing, and that's where the magic happens.

When you don't get the 20%, the subscription is probably slightly more expensive than buying the equivalent item at Target. But for the convenience it can't be beat, especially for things like a 30lb bag of dog food - shlepping that and a 25lb baby to the car at the same time is physically impossible for me.  And now that I've figured out what we need on a regular basis, I've got 5 items every month, so I always get the 20%, which makes it slightly less expensive (and that doesn't even count the gas and time needed to go to the specialty pet store, Target, and the grocery store). 

Amazon has changed the program over time - you no longer get to "lock in" the price at which you subscribed, so I've noticed some things rising in price over time and have had to cancel a few when they got too expensive.  They moved to shipping all subscription items together on the same day each month and I can't adjust that if I need something sooner. You also don't get Prime 2-day shipping on the items, so it can take a week for them to arrive (but they are excellent about getting here before the day Amazon tells me they should arrive).

For the first few months, I had to log in mid-month and adjust things as I figured out how we used them, but now that I've been doing this for a year, most of the "regulars" are set up perfectly.  

Here's a quick list of the things I have on subscription:

• Soy milk - 8 64oz shelf-stable cartons. Only a few dollars more (total) than Trader Joe's and they show up at my door. We go through more than this in one month, but it's a good start.
• Wellness "Old Dog" food - this can only be found locally in specialty stores, for almost $20 more than we pay on Amazon. Plus the bag is HEAVY.
• Organic Applesauce Cups - I use these for T's lunches and quick snacks. Shelf-stable and hard to find locally.
• Peter Rabbit Organics "Squeezy Fruit" - hard to find locally and much cheaper than individual packs at Whole Foods
• Larabars - both girls love these, and the price is comparable to Trader Joe's individual price
• Cetaphil Restoraderm Body Wash - the only thing that works on T's eczema. Not always available locally.
• Toilet paper - I hate running out of paper products so we buy the big box.
• Paper towels - Ditto
• Huggies Overnight Diapers - comparable price to Target which doesn't always have them
• All Free & Clear Laundry "Pods" - can't find these locally

I'm not a personal finance expert, so I won't claim this is some fantastic money saving trick, but it does help me avoid extra trips to Target, affectionately known as the "$50 store". In addition, we rarely run out of the essentials like toilet paper, overnight diapers, or our favorite kid snacks, so there aren't as many "emergency runs" to the grocery store.  Did I mention I dislike grocery shopping?

If we ever have to go into financial lockdown, I'll re-evaluate whether we need all of these things, but for now it works really well for us to have them just show up at various intervals.  If you're on the fence about setting up a subscription, I'd recommend trying it.  You can cancel items anytime before they ship and adjust the timing as needed. I love it, especially since we don't have any kind of "warehouse club" membership.

And yes, I do have Amazon ads on my blog, but I wrote this post spontaneously. I love me some Amazon shopping.

Currently: January 2014

Inspired by Allison, I'm doing a Currently post for this month. It's hard to believe 2014 is well underway already!

READING - Struggling to find time to finish Scott Berkun's Mindfire: Big Ideas for Curious Minds. It's 2 weeks overdue at the library and I'm reading it for continuing education credit for my PMP Project Management certification. Between the nomadic life of the remodeling and figuring out T's new school schedule, finding pockets of time to read isn't easy. It's a fairly easy read, but I like to have time to digest each essay before moving on to the next.

WATCHING - paint dry. Literally. Our entire addition got painted this week. It makes me so happy to see the colors I chose after weeks of contemplation on entire walls in rooms. And it was priceless to watch T's reaction when she saw her Ballet Slippers pink room for the first time.

Follow Anandi's board on Pinterest

MAKING - Lots of One Little Word jewelry and keychains for myself and friends. A client scrapbook for The Papercraft Lab (two pending, three more on the horizon). Life is good.

ANTICIPATING - In 3 more weeks (fingers crossed!), we'll be able to move into the addition! So excited to sleep in our bed again, work on better sleep habits for BabyM, set up the craft room and new playroom, and finally have a linen closet! We may become shut-ins once the project is finished, because we will be so happy to have a real home to ourselves again.

LISTENING - to everything again! We bought two Sonos units and I'm in LOVE. Our music collection is easily accessible in the house over wireless, as is Pandora. Loving Toad the Wet Sprocket's New Constellation - first new album in ages from my Favorite Band Ever.

WANTING - IKEA Expedit shelving for everywhere - playroom, craft room, girls' rooms. Lots and lots of square cubby shelves to put everything in order.  The reality is that we won't be buying much until we can rearrange all of our current furniture and see what we really need.  We also have to figure out window coverings for all of the new windows - boring but necessary as the addition has a lovely view of two of our neighbors' homes.

Got a Currently post?  Let me know in the comments. I love reading these :)

I'm on my way, home sweet home

Our huge remodeling construction project is scheduled to finish in 27 days. It's about 2 weeks behind the very aggressive schedule they posted at the beginning. The estimate was 14-16 weeks, but the actual schedule was for 13 weeks. So the 2 extra weeks aren't terribly unexpected, though I cry a little inside every time we meet with our production manager and he moves the schedule.

Someone told me that cats are very attached to the house they live in, and tend to freak out if you have to take them somewhere else. I must be part cat. We've been in a state of limbo for about 8 weeks and I'm feeling very unsettled and unfocused. 

At first we thought it best for me and the girls to move entirely to my parents' condo (which they don't use in winter), and TJ would stay overnight with the dogs at home, after spending the evenings at the condo with us. We did that for about a month, and it was very stressful for me.  Being the nighttime go-to parent every single night is hard!  (And it made me realize how often TJ picks up night duty!)

So once the major demolition was done and the new portion of the house was framed and insulated, we moved back home. We have a living room, family room, bathroom and kitchen available to us, so it's definitely livable. We're camping out in the living room - BabyM in a Pack N Play, T on her mattress on the floor, and one of us on the couch, while the other sleeps downstairs to keep Peanut company.  (He has too much trouble moving on the hardwood floors to sleep upstairs with us.)  Surprisingly, everyone sleeps pretty well in this arrangement. 

Despite being pretty cramped, it was SO much less stressful to have everyone in the same house, even if it was a construction zone. We get up just before the construction guys come, get ready, and leave the house for the day. The girls nap at the condo, and we head back around 4 when the construction is finished for the day. On weekends we hang out at home and it feels pretty good to be all together in OUR house, despite the lack of bedrooms and all of us sharing one bathroom.

This week we're back at the condo full-time because they're priming and painting the addition, and it's pretty stinky. So back to being unsettled and solo parenting at night. For a few days it's not too bad. 

This photo that TJ sent me keeps me going:

My craft room got painted today!  The color is Benjamin Moore 606, Island Paradise, a warm saturated aqua green.  I can't wait to see it after the second coat and in person, but I can already tell from the photo that this was the right choice for me.

This and the attached playroom were on my dream list. A purpose-built space for me and the girls to work together on crafts, schoolwork, and fun. I haven't planned out yet where everything will go, and what else we might need to furnish them (definitely more shelving!) but will play it by ear once we unpack everything.

I haven't posted more photos of the project because I haven't gone through them yet.  We've taken a ton, but our lives have been so complicated - construction, travel, holidays, preschool drama, and of course, Spike.

So I've got to live with another month of unsettled-ness, and then we can move back into our space. So exciting!

This has gotta be the good life

We've been working on proposals and plans for our upcoming remodel since early this year. It's been a slow process, and for a patience-challenged person like me, painful. I'm ready to move in already! I finally got used to the wait and thought about the remodel in the future with an unknown start (and end) date, "sometime in 2014".

Except now, it's *really* starting on Monday. Our city approved the construction permit yesterday and at 7:30am on Monday, guys are going to show up to dig a hole in our yard. 

Technically, they've already started. They spent the last week building the fence that will separate the dog area from the kid area in our yard (they'll finally be able to play outside! and not in dog poo! yay!), removing our deck and hot tub to make way for the addition, and taking off the siding to prepare. We also got a new furnace since ours conveniently decided to give up last weekend.  (When it rains...)

But these things still seemed like preparation, part of the many steps and meetings we've had since April. We still didn't have a *real date* when construction would start, and consequently, didn't have the project plan of when it is supposed to be done.

But now? It's ON. And this means we need to get moving on all the interior selections - bathroom counters, flooring, paint. Cabinet hardware and lighting. There are a million tiny decisions that all affect the final price. Many of them are things we genuinely don't have an opinion about, and each item has hundreds of choices. I totally understand why President Obama doesn't choose his own clothes each day. It makes my brain tired, too, to have to evaluate tons of different, mostly equal options about things that aren't going to really affect the quality of our lives.

TJ and I are pretty good at working through decision-y stuff like this. It's very similar to when we were tossing around names for the girls - I bring a handful of options and ask him to choose, or at least eliminate the ones he hates. He brings a few options as well, sometimes. 

There have been a few perfect, lightning-bolt, "that's it!" choices so far, just like with our girls' names. The countertop in the girls' bathroom is Cambria Whitney, a sparkly engineered quartz that's mostly white with silver glittery specks. I love me some sparkle. The photo does not do this justice.

The cabinets in the master bathroom are going to be a deep espresso, almost black. In the girls' bathroom, they'll be a rich reddish brown. Both are shaker-style with very clean lines, like the kitchen cabinets we redid in 2004 and still love.

We found a carpet style that we both like that's got a sort of irregular horizontal line pattern in it, but can't finalize the color. We know we want laminate flooring through the downstairs, including the playroom and craftroom, but again, can't narrow down a color. 

We have no freakin' idea what kind of floor we want in either bathroom. To reduce costs we want to consider alternatives to tile, but TJ hated the funky Marmoleum.

We haven't really thought about paint at all, except that T is VERY SURE she wants pink. I hate taupe-y colors and things that are not-really-a-color. TJ does not want our house to look like Rainbow Brite threw up in it.

So we're kind of stuck and still have a ton of decisions to go. Luckily we have a neighbor who just earned a certificate in Interior Design and she's going to help us. Our first meeting with her is today and I'm so excited to get some of these things narrowed down.  

All these decisions are floating around in an "open loop" inside my head, and it's bugging me.  I can't visualize the room from all these individual pieces - it's so different from putting together a scrapbook page or a card because I can't just lay it all out and look at the end result.

But oh, the luxury of getting to design brand new living space. Lest you think I'm complaining, I realize this is totally a first world "problem". I am so grateful for this chance to make our house into exactly what we need.

We're driving Cadillacs in our dreams

We are about to embark on a HUGE construction project at our house. In fact, we've been in the design process for months, and we're now waiting for the final permits before construction starts. It's been so long that I can't believe it's actually going to happen.

We're living in our "forever" house, at least while we're in Seattle. We fell in love with it as soon as we saw it, and it was the first house we saw. But it's not a house for little kids. It's a crazy 70s multilevel house, so each floor has a couple of rooms and then a half-staircase to the next floor. The kids' bedrooms are two floors away from ours. Great when they're 16, not so great when they're under 5. 

So we consulted with a few local design/build firms and chose one, and they came up with a fabulous design for us, something we never would have thought about doing. The design process actually lived up to my expectations - we gave them a list of our priorities, and they designed an addition that met nearly all of the Pri 1s and 2s (yes, I'm a software geek). 

So our new theoretical addition will have all bedrooms on one floor, an extra bathroom for the girls, an office for TJ, a play room, air conditioning in the bedrooms, and (wait for it) a 13x17' craft room. O.M.G. I can hardly believe how awesome that's going to be.

Some observant readers will remember that this is one of the items on my Mondo Beyondo dream list. And at the time I made my list in late 2011, firmly out of reach. We weren't inclined to take on such a huge project and we weren't sure about staying in Seattle (well, one of us wasn't). 

But then my craft room sprung a leak earlier this year, and we started thinking again. What if? It's been both fun and terrifying to go through the process - looking at different room layouts, choosing countertop surfaces and carpet, assigning rooms to the girls, writing huge enormous checks in exchange for large sheets of paper (so far).

If all goes well, construction will start next month, and it'll be 4 months or so before it's done. We'll probably have to camp out at my parent's place nearby for a while (fortunately they don't use it much in the winter). I'm sure there will be many disrupted naps and frustration with the noise and dust.

But in the end, we will have a house that fits us perfectly. And I just cannot WAIT.

Wordless Wednesday: Full of Possibilities

I knew you were trouble when you walked in

The Two Best Dogs Ever, Spike and Peanut, have had birthdays recently, and are 13 and 11, respectively. Not puppies any more, they spend most of their days napping.  Spike's kidneys aren't doing so well (typical for an old dog), so the vet put him on the Hill's k/d special food which is much lower in protein.

This food is expensive, but that's fine. We're in "do whatever it takes" mode with these guys, since they're both fairly healthy and don't seem to be in pain. The problem, though, is that Spike HATES this food. To the point where he will leave it in the bowl and just not eat. 

This is a BEAGLE, y'all. You know, canine garbage disposal? Crumb vacuum? This is the dog that spent 15 minutes trying to get at a chickpea that rolled under the stove.  For him to refuse food is baffling. And sad. He actually got skinny, down to 21 measly pounds from his fighting weight of 25. 

So we caved and started giving him Peanut's food, which is a high quality dry Old Dog food.  Or maybe it was Fat Dog food.  It was the lowest protein content we could find, around 18%, but not as low as the vet-suggested food.

But Spike's latest bloodwork showed that his kidneys were still not working well, and we needed to reduce his protein intake to help. The vet asked me if I would consider home cooking for him. I looked at him like he was crazy. Then I said yes.

I still can't believe it. But Spike is my second baby. Despite all his annoying barking, refusal to do anything that HE doesn't want to do, and the tiny black and white hairs ALL OVER EVERYTHING, including BabyM, he's part of our family. And I'm willing to do what it takes to keep him healthy.

So here I am, cooking for the DOG every 3-4 days. Fortunately it's pretty easy.  I mix equal ratios by weight of meat, vegetables, and grains after cooking, and the doctor gave me a list of each to choose from.

Meat: beef, chicken, tofu, beans, turkey, cottage cheese

Vegetables: Pumpkin, squash, green beans, carrots  (no leafy greens or onions)

Grains: Brown rice (best), quinoa, amaranth, white rice (no wheat or corn)

Doesn't actually look too bad, right?

So far I've used ground beef because it's inexpensive and easy to cook, canned pumpkin because it's easy to open a pre-weighed can, and whatever grains are languishing in our pantry now that I haven't been cooking them (all of which I can just throw in the rice cooker).  So far he's had quinoa and wild rice and likes them both.

The size of my pans and bowls limits me to cooking about 6 lbs of food at a time, which is about 4 days' worth.  I've been trolling the "manager's special" meat section at the grocery store, because they mark down the meat with sell-by dates coming soon.  I cook the meat the day I buy it, so that works well.

Spike is also taking a bunch of supplements to help his kidneys, and fortunately we can just add the pills to his food, and he doesn't even notice.

Because Peanut is over 100lb, I decided not to cook for him. He'd require 4 cups of food a day which means I'd need to cook daily to make enough for both of them.  So he gets whatever is left over after portioning out Spike's food, and is happy about that, but seems a little sad the rest of the week when he's eating his regular food. I'm not THAT crazy yet.

In 6-8 weeks, we'll go back to the vet and see how Spike's kidneys are doing. I'll be disappointed if all this effort isn't helping.  Then again, I haven't seen him this excited about his food in a long time, so that's something.

If you need an ego boost, I recommend cooking for a dog. Never has anyone been so excited about my cooking skills!

So, would you cook for your pets?

Wishing you ham and pie

tiny pie from Whole Foods

Happy Thanksgiving! We had a low key lovely Thanksgiving Day together. Just the 4 of us at home, hanging out.

T chose the menu for dinner earlier in the week. Apparently she had learned about Thanksgiving at preschool and informed us that she wasn't sure she would like turkey.  So I suggested ham and she thought that was a great idea.  And pie, she said. We have to eat pie at Thanksgiving.

So that's what we did. Yesterday we went to Whole Foods and bought a ham steak, four tiny pies (one for each of the pie eaters in the house plus a spare) and some brussels sprouts from the prepared food counter. I made mashed garlic sweet potatoes today and TJ baked biscuits from a tube.

We ate on our fancy china, and enjoyed each others' company. We even made our Creath Family Holiday Fun List, which I'll post in the next few days.

Today was a good day. Hope yours was too!

It's my godforsaken right

BabyM for President in 2048!

Election Day is not that exciting here in Washington where we all vote by mail. TJ and I completed our ballots on Halloween night and I dropped them off at a ballot box last week.

As the daughter of 2 naturalized citizens, it's been ingrained into me that voting is REALLY important. My first presidential election was in 1996. I was in grad school in San Diego and was very proud to get my "I voted" sticker.

We're not always on top of the primaries here, but are pretty good about voting in the regular election. I like our current process - we gather our ballots, voter info pamphlets, my laptop, and a frosty beverage of our choosing, and go through the items line by line. It's fun - we don't have a lot of political discussions in our house, but it's nice to chat about our views in this context.

My reference source is our local alternative newspaper, The Stranger, which publishes a useful Election Guide with their endorsements.

I know that sounds sketchy but they actually interview the candidates and do a good job of explaining why they favor a particular candidate or position.  I don't always agree with their conclusions but their info is helpful for the local elections where we don't know much about either side.

I HATE the game of politics, though.  HATE it.  I don't see this as a spectator sport, and hate the ridiculousness spewed by both sides.  If I could block all political posts on Facebook, I would.  Luckily we don't have TV anymore, so we don't see political commercials except for a handful on Hulu.com. We got rid of our home phone line so we don't get robocalls.

A few things I noticed about our voting preferences:

• TJ doesn't vote on uncontested elections.  I thought that was interesting.  I need to look up what happens with those - if those candidates get just 1 vote do they automatically win? 
• For local races where we didn't have a strong preference (like Lands Commissioner), we tended to vote for the candidate with a better educational pedigree.  PhD scientist from Berkeley, we voted for you!  Editor of Yale Law Review and Rhodes Scholar, we voted for you too.  Make us proud :)
• If one candidate didn't bother sending in summary info for the pamphlet, we tended not to vote for him/her.  Seems sort of important, considering most people don't do extensive research on their state representatives and other local officials.
• As much as we don't discuss politics in our house, we're in agreement on most of the bigger issues and candidates, which is nice.

I feel good about completing my civic duty for another year. Now onto holiday preparations!

Been around the world

I'm a sucker for 30-day challenges.  Like doing the Whole30, or 30 Days of Lists, or my crafty 30 Days of Thankful.  (More on the last two in a future post!)  30 days is short enough that I won't get bored, but long enough to accomplish something.

I just found out that November is National Blog Posting Month, where people are challenged to post *every day* for a month.  There are even daily prompts for it. So I guess I'll give it a shot!  This means I need to go back and do a post for yesterday since I didn't know about this challenge.

Today's prompt is: If you could live anywhere, where would it be?

Photo by jcolman on Flickr

I can fantasize about tropical islands with palm trees, daily 75 degree weather and no snow, ever. But that's not my real answer.  My real answer is right where I live now.  We live in a not-so-hip suburb of Seattle.  Everything is closed by 9pm.  But it's home to me like nowhere else has ever felt.

Maybe it's because I love our house.  It was the first one we saw when we started looking to buy a home, but I knew right away that it was "the one".  We've already agreed that we won't ever move to a different house in Seattle.

Another reason is that I love the diversity of our area. There are people from all over the world in our tiny suburb.  There are also TONS of interracial and inter-cultural families.  I noticed at a restaurant one evening that 5 of the 7 other tables near us had interracial couples or families.  As a consequence, it's not weird or unusual that my kids are mixed-race.  No one bats an eye, or even asks about it.  LOVE that.

The small but awesome side effect of all this diversity is that we can get nearly any international cuisine we can think of, within a 25 minute drive, similar to Los Angeles or the Bay Area. Well, except for really good Mexican food.  I'm still searching for that.

One other huge factor is my feeling of "community", which I wrote about 5 years ago, and it's only gotten stronger.  Because I live so close to work and I've been at the same company for almost 10 years, I constantly see people I know when I'm out and about.  Just today I ran into a neighbor and former coworker at Old Navy.  When we took T trick-or-treating, we met up with another neighbor who also used to be a coworker of mine.

We love T's preschool, which is right down our street and has only about 10 families in it right now.  And of course, having lived in Seattle for most of the years since 1997, I have tons of friends in the area.  I can't imagine starting over from scratch in a new town.  Even looking for a Space Needle photo on Flickr yielded one from an acquaintance's husband.  How crazy is that?!

Yes, the weather from October to May sucks.  But we're getting better at taking advantage of the dry days, so we're not trapped inside.  And after 10 years, I think I'm getting used to it.  If we strategically plan a good vacation in February or March, the dreary gray season is bearable.

Your turn.  Where would you live?

Give me something good to eat

OK, so I'm cheating a little for National Blog Posting Month (NaBloPoMo) because I didn't realize it was this month and I hadn't posted on Nov 1.  So I'm backdating this one.  My blog, my rules, yo.

Our neighborhood is pretty sad on Halloween.  In the 8 years we've lived here, we've gotten about 2 trick or treaters.  EVER. Most of our neighbors have grown children, plus we live at the top of a dark hill, so it's a lot of work for kids to come up, and probably doesn't seem very safe.  Judging from the number of neighbors with their lights on this year, it wouldn't have been worth all that walking anyway.

But despite my lack of enthusiasm for Halloween, I feel like if you're going to trick or treat, you should do it in your own neighborhood. I don't really get the mall thing, or this "trunk or treat" thing that local churches do. I'm only lukewarm about taking kids to work for the planned festivities, though it's nice to see a different side of my coworkers when their kids are around.

So I was determined that T's first ToT experience would be walking around our neighborhood in the cold and dark.  We all set out together, which was really nice.  We chatted with the neighbors we knew, and T was probably their only trick or treater, so they made a big deal out of it.  It was fun, and after the first house, T declared "we should do MORE trick or treating".  Though we couldn't actually get her to say "Trick or treat", so we settled on "can I please have a candy?" and "Happy Halloween!".

A good time was had by all and the wee ones were in bed by 7:30pm.  What more could we want?

Operation Ducks in a Row

I was just telling someone the other day that I was sleeping well, surprising for the 3rd trimester of pregnancy.  Of course this resulted in me waking at 2am the last few nights and not being able to get back to sleep.  For now I can enjoy that there's no one yelling at me for food and a new diaper, I guess.

I used the time wisely to create my list of Things I'd Like to Finish Before Baby X' Arrives.  And I'm calling this project "Operation Ducks in a Row", because it needs a catchy title, right?  Also because I was up at 2am.

Ducks in a Row (of course) by gdjewell on Flickr

I started with about 65 things on the list on Friday night and have crossed off 9.5 of them already.  Not too shabby. 

I won't bore you with the contents, but they include buying things for the new baby, getting T's birthday party and Halloween costume planned, preschool paperwork since T is changing schools, attempting to get both baby books in a decent state, and a lot of baby laundry.

I'm a list maker.  The problem is that I like to make lists on a new unblemished sheet of paper, so I have lists in random notebooks and single sheets everywhere, and a hard time keeping them together. 

I hate electronic lists.  I don't get the same satisfaction entering items, and definitely not crossing them off.  I've grudgingly moved to an electronic shopping list app for my phone (Out of Milk), because it's easier to regenerate recurring items and make sure I actually have the list with me, but for to-dos, I like my handcrafted lists.


In graduate school, a colleague introduced me to the idea of creating a task list for the day ahead.  He did his the night before, so he could hit the ground running the next day.  I loved that, and refined it a bit more after reading ZenHabits, to make my list of 3 Most Important Tasks for the day - things I absolutely need to accomplish.

I usually do this at work on a sticky note and then I've got this collection of Post-its with half the items crossed off.  (I said I like lists, not that I'm great at completing them!)  So I bought myself a cute little Moleskine notebook and try to put my daily tasks in there.  That's helped the clutter, and also helped me see what tasks were left undone and need to be moved forward, or just dropped off the list because they're not important enough.


At a work conference a few years ago, one of the speakers made the bold statement "You will never get everything on your to-do list done."  As a young, ambitious single person, I scoffed at the idea, but now have come to realize she's right.  There's always *something* and it's up to me to prioritize whether that's more important than the other things I like to spend my time on: hanging out with T and TJ, crafting, working.


And this is why my Operation Ducks in a Row is so long, and why I look at it as things I'd LIKE to get done, not HAVE to get done.  The "have-tos" are already done - we have diapers, wipes, clothes, a crib and a car seat.  The end.  The baby will be just fine with those items and not much more.


But I know our life will be crazy while we figure out 2 kids, newborn sleep foo, and breastfeeding for hours again.  So I'd like to front-load some of the tasks now, like finding T and X' the perfect ladybug costumes and getting through my photo backlog.



Thanks to this list, I finished the lower priority but fun item of getting T's daycare and toddler group papers, photos and artwork into a (simple) scrapbook album.  I've wanted to do this since March when she left daycare with a deluge of papers detailing her development over the past 18 months, every art project she ever did, and some cute photos of her daily activities.   But it never bubbled up the priority list.  Finally, once I added it to The List, I decided to tackle it this weekend and the happiness and satisfaction I get from seeing the completed album on our kitchen table was totally worth it.  I can't wait to go through it with T.



Tomorrow I've got to work, and am hoping to cross off a few more items, maybe even 4 or 5.  Woot!

Are you a list maker?  What good tips or practices can you share?

Function over Tradition: Kids Art Supply Storage

Baby X Prime (X') is kicking me out of my craft room and I'm moving it downstairs into what is now affectionately known as the Dog Room.  Which means everything currently being stored in the craft room either needs to find a new home (hello crafts I never started!) or a different storage space in our house.

BabyT has acquired quite the collection of art supplies because we love doing "Art Projects", as she calls them.  They didn't really have a home.  Some of them live on our kitchen counter for easy access (watercolor paint, crayons and coloring books), and the rest are scattered in drawers in my craft room wherever I had space. 

Not  a good solution for me to see *what* we have.  So I only ever used the crayons and watercolors because going through "the pile" was too hard.

Clearly this wasn't working, and now that T is in such a structured preschool, I want to spend lots of time doing art with her.  She definitely gets some at school, but not every day, and she loves it.  (I miss that about daycare!)

When we remodeled our kitchen in 2004, we took out all the old oak cabinets, but saved one of the glass-door ones to be mounted in the dining area for our glassware.  We got tons of wine and champagne glasses as wedding presents, and also inherited a bunch of glasses from TJ's grandmother.  The cabinet was quite full.

It occurred to me the other night that we don't need to have such easy access to *that many* wineglasses.  We don't drink that much wine and only have lots of people over on rare occasions, maybe a few times a year.  If that.

So we decided to move our glassware to a different high shelf in the kitchen, box up the extra ones and our fancy china which we use only once or twice a year.  TJ picked up some dishware boxes from UHaul and packed it all away one day when I was at work (*swoon*).

Which left this handy, spacious cabinet available for toddler art supply storage.  Hooray!

I know it's traditionally not what we're supposed to put in a glass-front cabinet in our dining area.  But it's *so* much more functional for us.  And I have a better idea of what we have, and what we need.  And what we most definitely don't need (no more paper or coloring books!).

It makes it so much easier to set up a project for T quickly on the dining table since it's right there.  When she's a little older, she'll be able to reach the cabinet and get things out for herself.

I'm considering putting some decorative paper inside the glass doors to hide the stuff inside from view, since it's not particularly pretty, but that may never happen.

This simple change makes me ridiculously happy (sort of like paring our kitchen knife collection down to just 7 that we use all the time).  Strange, I know.

Got any good storage hacks to share?  :)

We (heart) Google Calendar

Even before we had BabyT, we realized we had a need for a shared calendar so that we could add family birthdays, upcoming travel, concerts and sporting events for which we had tickets, and anything else we needed the other person to know about.  Like TJ's motorcycle track days/weekends, or my girls' nights out.

With the arrival of BabyT, that became even more important since we had to track all my prenatal doctors' appointments, and then the million appointments for BabyT in her first year, not to mention her physical therapy, allergist appointments, and all of those enrichment classes I signed her up for.

Super cute calendar from milk and cookies on Flickr

After bouncing around a bunch of different solutions, we're using Google Calendar for shared family stuff.  We started with Windows Live Calendar when I had a Windows Phone, because it synced the best.  TJ had an Android phone app that would allow him to view our Windows Live Calendar.  That worked fine, but was a bit of a hassle for me to get to online since I rarely log into my Hotmail account.

I played with Cosi for a while, but it was more complicated than we needed.

But once I switched to my new fancy Android phone, I figured we should just switch over completely to Google Calendar.  TJ was using it for some of his own personal calendars, and I set one up for our Toddler Group.  I'm nearly always logged into my Gmail, which has a convenient "Calendar" link right at the top of the page. 

Functionally, the Windows Live and Google Calendars are pretty similar.  They let you set up a bunch of different calendars under the same account and you can hide/show them as needed.

I can display either of them in my Outlook calendar at work but keep the appointments separated.  Unfortunately, Outlook doesn't let me edit my Google calendar, which is a bummer, but I can live with editing online or on my phone. Interestingly, my Windows Phone let me edit my Google Calendar just fine, so props to them for making it interoperable.

We have a shared calendar for family stuff:  all of Trillian's appointments, social outings that involve one parent being out and thus another to cover, trips, our Seahawks football tickets, and concerts.  We have another one for family birthdays. 

I also have one for my "routine" tasks, like monthly housekeeping/errandy-type stuff, to remind me to do stuff like swap out my disposable contacts or process photos for the week.

Most of the appointments are set to send an email reminder. I set up text message reminders but it got too crazy.  I love that we can both access the calendar on our phones or on our computers.  We don't use a paper calendar at all.

TJ points out every now and then that we *do* actually have to talk about the items.  Sometimes I'll put something on the calendar, and expect him to see it and forget that we never actually discussed it.  In general, I guess it's good for married people to you know, actually TALK to each other.

It's not perfect, but it's working for us.  What do you use?

Livin' the dream



this is why we do it

In honor of International Womens' Day, I'm contributing to the Blog Carnival hosted by feMOMhist on how I got the life I wanted.

I'm not sure if I've ever explicitly stated it, but I really am Living The Dream.  Not in a snarky, sarcastic way, but FOR REAL. I came to the realization only recently that it IS under my control.  It may not be easy, or the accepted "right" way to do things, but it's in my power to get what I want out of life.

For the first 24 years of my life, I did what was expected of me, for the most part.  Got good grades, went to fancypants Institute of Technology, set off to get a PhD in Molecular Biology.

Until one day I realized the path I was on was *not* what I wanted.

At that point, it took me only 2 months to get on a new train, the one that took me to my current destination.  I quit grad school, got a job in technology consulting despite having NO experience in the field, ditched the guy who was all wrong for me, and started a friendship with the man who is now my husband.

What can I say?  When I know what I want, I go after it, and quickly.

Four years of Traveling Consulting Job led to my seriously awesome job as a Program Manager at Microsoft.  The boyfriend (now husband) came to Seattle with me, and became the fiance, then finally (!) The Husband.  Somewhere in there, two dogs came to live with us and we bought a house together, despite (oh no!) not being married yet.

On a whim, I decided to take a Project Manager job at a local startup to see what life was like at a tiny company.  Turns out it wasn't for me - I missed Microsoft too much.  So I came back in 2008, and it was easy-peasy to get back in - a favorite previous manager had an open spot on his team.  I've been there ever since, and even managed to negotiate a sweet part-time gig after maternity leave with Miss Baby in 2010.

So that's where the big parts of the story fell into place.  The Blog Carnival is focusing on the day-to-day of How We Make It Work.  Honestly, for me that's the easy part.  Once I know *what* I want, I can usually figure out some way to get it.  I guess that's the Project Manager in me - the devil is in the details, but the details are easy for me to wrangle.

The Work Situation

As I mentioned before, I work part-time.  I work 20 hours a week, which is half-time.  I spend two days in the office, though it'll be closer to 2.5 now that Miss Baby is in preschool 3 days a week (and I'll likely increase my hours just a tiny bit).  This enables me to spend the other weekdays at home with BabyT.  When I'm at work, she's at preschool. 

I drop her off and TJ picks her up, so we stagger our schedules.  He goes into work ridiculously early (6am) so he can pick her up at 4pm.  He works a full time+ schedule at a tech company and his job is fairly demanding.

Our priority is for her not to spend too many hours away from home - she had been in daycare for 2 approx 8-hour days before preschool started this month.

If T is too sick to go to child care/school, we assess whose day will be disrupted least.  My work days are more "precious" since I'm not in the office much, so we try to protect those.  Sometimes we trade off - I'll go in for important meetings, and then TJ will go to work later in the day.

My parents are in town part of the year, about 15 min from where we live, so during those times, they're also happy to spend time with T if she's too sick for school, or I need to go in to work on an extra day.  They also just like it when she hangs out at their place, so I drop her off there about once a week when they're around.  It's very nice :)

The Home Situation

Our lifesaver is the woman who comes to clean our house every 2 weeks.  She spends only 2 hours cleaning, but gets all the stuff we don't want to do: bathrooms, primarily, but manages to vacuum and change sheets as well.  We do some interim vacuuming/kitchen cleaning ourselves.

Right now we're trying to cut expenses, so we ditched the Yard Guy.  It's winter, so not an issue now, but come Spring we'll need to reassess.  I HATE yard work/weeding with a passion and in this rainy climate we get a lot of weeds.

I handle chores like laundry and dishes most of the time, with occasional help from TJ.  He handles the finances and bills, and fixes stuff that breaks.  He also does most of the Dog Maintenance and vet visits, as I'm usually the one to take T to her various appointments on my days off (doctors, physical therapy, etc.)

I do a lot of the errandy stuff like Target runs and making appointments.  So far I've been packing T's lunches.  I do most of the grocery shopping, though TJ also does some.  He does a lot of Baby Maintenance in evenings (bedtime) and weekends (mornings when I can sleep in!!).  He's much better at just sitting on the floor playing with her than I am.  I guess I always feel like we need to be *doing* stuff, though I'm getting better about that.

Now that T has both Little Gym and Spanish on weekends, we split those up.  He takes her to Little Gym, and I take her to Spanish (and usually a restaurant for dinner afterwards).  This gives us each a little chunk of "alone time" in the house.

We use Google Calendar to track our home stuff (link will take you to my post about it.  We're fanatical about being home from wherever we are in time for T's naptime and bedtime (noon and 6:15pm, respectively) so for now that dictates our schedule.  It also makes it easy for one of us to slip out and do something fun in the evenings with friends - the person left at home gets a quiet house, and since T is normally a good sleeper, there's not much to do on the toddler front either.

We eat out more than we should, though it goes in spurts.  I try to cook something on weekends that'll last a few days.  Some weeks are better than others.  That's one area I'm still working on to try and get into a rhythm.  Thing is, I LIKE eating out, so I'm not sure it's something we'll ever fully eliminate.


And that's about it for our logistics.  If you read this far, congratulations :)  If you want to participate in the Blog Carnival, wander on over to FeMOMHist and look at the details.  Also, leave your link here because I want to be sure to read it :)

Happy. Valentine's. Day. Daddy!

I normally HATE Valentine's Day.  Stupid holiday.  You should always be nice to the people you love.  Doing something sappy on Valentine's Day just makes you a sheep, blah blah blah.

And then I had a kid.  One whose little face lights up when we I suggest just about anything.  Wanna go help me sort laundry?  Sure, mama!  Want to put away the clean silverware from the dishwasher?  YES!!  So when she asked me a few weeks ago if we could decorate cookies again, what was a mama to do?

We made cookies for Valentine's Day.  Since she was cleared to have milk in baked goods, I made real sugar cookies and they were amazing.  The recipe made around 30 medium sized cookies, with perfect sharp edges.  The dough was delightful and easy to work with.

We invited our friends C and J over to decorate them with us and had a blast.

But wait!  There's more!  We also made Valentines!  Click to see a larger photo.

This was a great project for a 2 year old (with minimal work for Mama):

1.  Raided my scrap paper for pink patterned papers to match the pink envelopes I had, cut them all to approx 4x6" and rounded the corners.

2.  Cut a bunch of smaller rectangles from solid paper and asked T to stick them to the patterned paper (for that random look!)

3.  Cut many hearts from white cardstock with my Silhouette SD machine, and asked T to decorate them.  She used oil pastels, stickers, crayons, rubber stamps and colored pencils. 

4.  Asked her to pick hearts for each card and helped her adhere them to the cards (this was mama directed so that we didn't have any overhanging hearts).  When T got bored, I did the rest by myself :)  Wrote a short note on the back. I had fun using my "new" typewriter to address the envelopes.

We sent them to close relatives and a few friends.  She insisted on choosing one specifically for TJ, and I told her she should say "Happy Valentine's Day Daddy!" when she gave it to him.

I got a blank look.   She refused to try saying it.  So we broke it down, and practiced. 

Me: Happy
T: Happy Birthday!
Me: Valentine's
T: Happy Birthday Valentine!
Me: Day
T:  Happy Birthday Valentine's Day!
Me: Daddy
T, after several tries, sounding like a robot and trying very hard to get it right:
Happy (pause, thinking hard) Valentine's (pause) Day. (pause)  Daddy!!

TJ was suitably impressed and was surprised to learn that we practiced saying it.  Just like the pumpkin farm, I'm all in on Valentine's Day!

6 Tips for Convenience Parenting Without Being an Eco-terrorist

I live in the great metropolis of Seattle, where recycling and compost are sacred.  Seriously.  Once I threw away a diet Coke can in the trash because there was no nearby recycle bin.  A stranger accosted me, fished out the can and took it home to recycle.  I just stood there, dumbfounded that someone would go to that kind of trouble.  Crazy.

So I've just outed my deep dark secret.  I live for convenience.  Sure, I'll choose the environmentally friendly option when it's there and just as easy.  But it's just not a priority for me to be eco-friendly if it makes things harder on myself.  (*ducks to avoid composting fruit scraps*)

So, when it came to the inevitable cloth vs. disposable debate before BabyT was born, I chose disposable without a second thought.  I did not want to wash poopy diapers.  I did not want to store a bag of poopy diapers somewhere in our (storage-challenged) house waiting for the diaper service to pick them up.  I knew I'd have to buy disposables for backup, for nighttime, and for daycare, so it was just easier to choose disposable overall.  I'm not here to argue, I'm just saying it was easier for our lifestyle.

But, it turns out, we're not the total eco-terrorists I thought we were.  We do a handful of things that could actually be considered green, or at least, not totally awful.  So I thought I'd share those with you, because they're also easy and convenient.  

1.  Burp cloths are multi-purpose!

Before T was born, I didn't really get the idea of burp cloths.  A close friend whose baby was a few weeks older than T clued us in, and generously bought us a pack of those really thin "cloth diapers" from Target, which are just great for absorbing spit-up.  We're long past the spit-up stage, but we still use those cloths *all the time*.  T uses them as "blankets" for her dolls.  We use them to wipe her constantly runny nose (thanks, daycare!).  One of them is the "eraser" for T's chalkboard easel.  They're handy for cleaning up spilled soymilk when T leaves her sippy cup on its side.  I've even used one to dry off a damp beagle.  They're even great for the icky stuff, like vomit, or as a makeshift changing pad cover.

Eco-bonus:  We're not using a crapload of paper towels, Kleenex or heavy bath towels (that would then need to be washed) for little jobs. We just toss them into the washer and they get clean and dry easily.

2.  WTH do I do with these washcloths?

My pre-baby shopping included one memorable IKEA run where I bought every cute thing in their baby section because "it's so cheap! of course I'll find a use for it!".  So we ended up with a couple of nice-sized but totally non-absorbent burp cloths, which have now been put into use as changing pad covers. 

But the other *score* that I regretted buying at first, was a 10 pack of small washcloths (KRAMA, if you must know).  We didn't use washcloths for T's bath, so they sat around for months.  Until she started eating solid food.  Or just mashing it all over her face.  These washcloths were ideal for cleaning up her face and hands after a particularly satisfying meal, because I could wet them with warm water, and scrub her as needed.

Eco-bonus:  We don't use a crapload of baby wipes or wet paper towels to clean her up after a meal.  Now, of course, she can climb into her Baby Tower and wash her own hands, but it's still easier to use the washcloth if she's super-messy.

3.  You might be Indian if...

One of those Internet memes told me that using plastic grocery bags to line small trash cans was *totally* an Indian thing.  Apparently we Indians are a frugal people (!) so we balk at buying small trash bags.  No idea if this is true, but I think it was something I learned from my mom, and seemed like a reasonable thing to do.  All of our bathroom trash cans are lined with plastic grocery bags.  We have so many, it seems like a shame not to re-use them.

The baby angle?  Well, any of you with a kid over 6 months knows the unpleasantness of changing a dirty diaper when the kid starts eating real food.  Our diaper trashcan was not doing a good job of controlling the smell, so we switched to a new system.  Dirty diapers go in a plastic bag and directly outside to the trash.  This works *so* much better, and then we don't need to change the diaper trash bag as often, either.  *And* our plastic bag stash is finally down to a manageable level.  In fact, we're actually perilously close to running out.  (Time for another Target run!)

Eco-bonus: We re-use those plastic grocery bags, instead of throwing them away and buying new plastic bags for trash.  Granted this is a stretch, because of the number of disposable diapers we're sending to the landfill, and the fact that there isn't really a good reason to get plastic bags anymore, but at least we are using the ones we have, right?

4.  We don't need no stinkin' boxes

This one is not rocket science.  We bought 2 boxes of baby wipes to get the fancy plastic box for each changing station, then just bought refill packs by the case to fill those boxes.   Cheaper, and we don't have to figure out what to do with all those empty boxes.  For the diaper bag, I got a cute personalized wipes case on Etsy, and I just grab a stack of wipes from one of the boxes.  It's smaller and I don't have to buy special travel-sized packs just for the diaper bag.

Eco-bonus: No dubiously recyclable plastic wipes boxes to get rid of.  Again, we're talking about convenience here.  Yes, I could make myself reusable wipes out of washcloths, etc.  But I don't have that kind of time or desire.

5.  No special kid foods

One of the crunchy parenting decisions we made was to introduce BabyT to solids via baby-led weaning.  The quick summary - you give the baby slices or pieces of food that they can easily pick up.  No purees, no tedious spoon-feeding.  I liked the idea, and frankly, it seemed a heck of a lot easier than making my own pureed baby food, or trying to spoonfeed anything into a suspicious baby.  If she picked up something and ate it, great.  If not, that was fine too.  It helped set the stage for us to be able to deal with toddler pickiness without getting terribly upset about what she's not eating.

So we were able to skip the whole baby-food jar stage completely.  With T's dairy allergy, a lot of the packaged "toddler foods" were out too: most Puffs, yogurt drops, etc had dairy ingredients in them.  But even the "safe" ones seemed junky and ridiculously expensive for what you got.  So I didn't buy any of those cute containers with individually packaged snacks.  If we needed dry snacks on the run, I bought Kix, Cheerios, freeze dried fruit or pretzels and put them in a little container. 

Eco-bonus: No precious individual packaging to throw away.  We bought normal sized containers of snacks and put them into reusable covered bowls for travel.  We didn't give in to the food industry's idea of specialized (unnecessary) baby and toddler foods.  Sticking it to The Man, I say!

6.  Used stuff is ok.  (Really!)

My mom will laugh at this, because I was *not* into thrifting or wearing clothes from discount stores, etc. when I was growing up.  And I won't make BabyT do it if she doesn't want to once she is old enough to have an opinion.  But for now, we gladly welcome hand-me-downs.  We sometimes cruise our local (swanky) Goodwill to find babyGap and miniBoden clothes I'd never pay full price for.  T also thinks it's great that her clothes came from "big girls" like our friends C or Z.  

I like buying nice toys used, especially the large plastic contraptions babies seem to require (swing, bouncer, etc.).  I am super picky about brands and condition, but can almost always find exactly what I'm looking for on Craigslist or our internal mailing list at work.  Or, even better, from my mama friends with older kids.  I scored a huge Plan Toys wooden dollhouse on Craigslist for $70 that retails for $150 or more, new.  T's not that into it yet, so it's just as well.

About 75% of T's clothes and toys are pre-owned. Our friends are pretty much on the same wavelengths about "good" toys and appropriate clothes, so nearly everything I get from them works for us.  So easy!

Eco-bonus:  Reuse, baby!  Not buying new large plastic things that will only be useful for a few months.  Not having to throw away perfectly good clothes or toys with lots of life still in them.

Shirt courtesy of Z, and pants from C

Pretty easy, right?  Committed environmentalists will scoff at this list while they cloth diaper with their reusable wipes, grow their own food, and compost and recycle every last bit of waste they generate.  Props to them.

Of course there's more I could do, if I had the time or inclination.  I'm getting used to bringing my own reusable bags to the grocery, and I even remembered to do it at Target a few times.  But for now, I'm happy to do just a little bit while still keeping life manageable.

So, tell me.  What easy eco-friendly thing does your household do?  I'm up for suggestions!

Kids' Artwork Display Banner - Experiment 6

I just completed this project today but I was so excited about it that I had to write it up. 

Long before I had a baby, I remember seeing photos of homes with kids' artwork framed beautifully and hung up. I loved the idea - I'm not a fan of buying artwork that just matches a room, but for hanging up things that really speak to me or tell a story about the people who live here. 

T's daycare regularly does messy art projects with all the kids, even the infants. We do art projects at home, but they're not as organized and cute as the ones they plan at daycare. Every couple of months her teachers send home the last several projects.

I'm not a pack rat (despite my huge collection of shiny new supplies) so I can easily let go of some of the pieces she brings home. We also have two adoring sets of grandparents who appreciate T's art, so I give them some. But I want to keep and display some of them. Until now I hadn't done much except stick a few  up on the magnet boards in my craft room.

A few months ago, while reading a craft book, I saw a photo of a bulletin board with a cute handmade sign to showcase the kids' art projects.  I knew I wanted to make something like that for our house, so I put it on the list of "someday maybe" projects.

Yesterday, I got motivated to FINALLY pick up all the stuff sitting on the floor of the craft room and DO something with it.  I threw away some things, found better storage places for others, and unearthed a bulletin board that was just the perfect size for the hallway outside T's room. 

I put up the board and tacked on three of her recent art projects.  And today, while my fabulous husband was at the football game, and my fabulous daughter went to her fabulous grandparents' place for an afternoon of fun, I got crafty.

I wanted to make a sign that announced Trillian's art. I love making banners.  Since I didn't have much time and really wanted to finish it in one sitting, I decided to use my largest circle punch and glittery letter stickers from my stash. 

Rather than a typical banner where the letters are attached to each other, I used my jewelry making brainspace and decided to "string" the letters onto ribbon, using brightly colored jump rings.  I figured this would give the sign more motion, and I also wanted to see if I could make what I pictured in my head.  Since the "beads" were made of paper, I thought I should reinforce the holes with metal eyelets.

Stuff
Fiskars Squeeze Punch X-Large, Round 'n Round
BasicGrey patterned cardstock
Pink Paislee glitter chipboard alphabet stickers
Crop-A-Dile Hole Punch and Eyelet Setter
Satin ribbon, 5/8" wide
Large 3/16" silver eyelets
Large anodized aluminum jump rings (1/4")
Packaging tape or nails/tacks for hanging

How

1. I cut out enough circles from the cardstock with the circle cutter to spell out "trillian's art".  12, to be precise, plus a couple extra for mistakes.
2. I arranged the cardstock circles with the patterns in the order I wanted them, and then stuck on the letter stickers, which I chose in a color and size so they'd be easy to read from a few feet. 
3. I marked where I wanted the eyelets with a pencil. 
4. Using the Crop-A-Dile, I punched 1/8" holes at the top of each letter of her name, and then the top and bottom of the ones spelling 'art' since they'd hang vertically.
5. Using the wondrous Crop-A-Dile, I put in the eyelets. 
6. Then, using pliers, I opened the jump rings, slipped them in the eyelets, and then closed them.  For the word 'art' I chained the letters together so they'd hang vertically.
7. I cut a length of ribbon (about 3 feet) and strung the name letters on them, tying a knot at each end to keep the letters on. 
8. At the beginning, before the knot, I added the string of letters spelling "art" and then tied another knot to keep that in place.
9. I used clear packaging tape to secure the ends of the ribbon to the bulletin board.  Since the banner is small and light, this should be enough to hold it in place.

Tips & Tricks

• Doing projects with repetitive elements goes a lot faster if you do it assembly line style - cut all pieces, then punch holes, then add eyelets, etc.
• Count on making some mistakes, and make sure you have extra paper, eyelets, and stickers as needed.  Sometimes elements can be salvaged from the mistakes (I'm thrifty like that.)
• When adding eyelets to punched holes,  make sure you've got enough space from the edge of the paper to the rim of the eyelet.  Also make sure the hole you're punching is big enough for the base of the eyelet - I like them to fit a little snugly, so I was using 1/8" holes for a 3/16" eyelet, but with delicate papers, this won't work well.
• Don't cut ribbon until you're sure you have enough for your project.  You can always cut something shorter, but it's hard to make it longer. I always have to remind myself of this.
• Look for materials in other departments of the craft store.  The jump rings I used were in the jewelry-making area. You never know what you might find!  In the same vein, when solving an "engineering" problem of how to attach things, or support things, think outside of your own craft, to another craft, or another application entirely!  I've gotten some interesting ideas from my husband, who is not a crafter, but is very mechanically inclined and handy.

BabyT liked the sign, which is appreciation enough for me. And I can assure you that I'll do everything in my power to keep that adorable jellyfish she made. I envision it hanging on the wall in my nursing home far in the future.  But for now, its rightful home is on her new art board, just outside her room.

What do you do with your kids' art projects?