Friday To Do List

Hey ya'll!

Friday is finally here, and believe me when I say the day could not get here soon enough! With the weeks dwindling down before Brynley's due date, there is only so much time that we have left to get everything done before she gets here. As I've mentioned once or twice before, we are a family of planners, and I married a man who LOVES organization, so you can imagine the lists we had going of things that needed to get done before my due date. Since it was my day off, Scot and I had come up with a few things to try to get accomplished while Ryder was at daycare and we could think without any interruptions.

  But first things first, I also had my OB appointment to attend this morning, bright and early. I planned to have Scot take a picture of me in the exam room, but they were actually running on schedule and I was shocked that I didn't even have to wait, so instead he got one of me out front as we were leaving. The appointment went really well, and I was shocked to learn I had somehow lost a pound or two from my visit 2 weeks ago. I have been trying to eat smaller meals because I get so full and nauseus now, not to mention my loss of appetite lately, so whatever I have been doing seemed to have done the trick. Brynley was still head down, but my midwife recommended I start doing floor excercises a few each night to help gravity rotate her around so that she is face down too, which will make my delivery experience all the faster and better! I plan to get induced, like I did with Ryder, so she put my possible induction date of being September 13th unless Miss B has plans to come earlier. I'm really doing okay, even working full time up to this point, and I don't want to rush things unless she is ready, so we will just have to see how things progress.

Once we got back home, Scot and I were in full on "nesting mode", ready to tackle our list of things to organize around the house. As you can imagine, there was a little whining from me, and a lot of huffs and puffs from him, but we got the jobs done, and I am so happy that everything has become de-cluttered and now we can enjoy the next few weeks as we prepare for Brynley to get here.

BEFORE 

1. We organized the shelves above our washer and dryer, cleaned out baskets of all of Tucker's toys, treats, and dog shampoo's, combined Scot and my gym equipment (ie ipods, gloves for weights, and my tanning bed lotions, all obviously not being used by me right now due to my current state ha!), and moved Ryder's board games and straightened his DVD's and travel games, Tag reader, and electronics to the side to make it all the easier to access when needed. We purged the things we don't use on a regular basis, and made a pile to drop off at Goodwill, and it looks MUCH better!

 AFTER

BEFORE

2. Scot had pulled down all of the baby toys, swing, jumparoo, and activity mat from the attic and brought them all downstairs to the Livingroom so we could see what we would need. Currently, Ryder takes up most of the play area space with his toys and books, and we were trying to come up with a way that we can divide the space up between his things and Brynley's. I started to feel a little overwhelmed at this point, as if our children were truly taking over any leftover livingroom space, so we decided to just have the baby swing and activity mat down for now, and will get the jumparoo from the attic in a few more months when it will be used. Genius thinking, I know ha! We also had moved Ryder's train table up to his room, but after rethinking things, decided it was better to keep in the livingroom for now and we can always change things up later if we need to. I'm sure we will rearrange furniture as we need more space, but for now I was happy with the small changes we made. It was about this time that we were in the kitchen looking at space in our cabinets to store bottles and my breast milk bags, and I had a small meltdown. I think it was more the thinking process of breastfeeding again, and worrying that I wouldn't get it right, and would have to use the nipple shields again, like I had to do with my son, which later led to me solely pumping and bottle feeding. I want so badly to just breastfeed this time around, and just thinking about bottle storage caused my meltdown. Thankfully, the hormones eventually calmed down, and we regrouped and went upstairs to figure out what to do with the kids rooms and bathroom space.

 AFTER

BEFORE

 3. Miss Brynley has many bows and headbands to hang, and they were getting out of control. We still need to buy some clips so I can attach the headbands on her bow holder, but the ones that already had clips, I was able to start hanging, and fill her bow holder out. I'm thinking we will have to get some white baskets to go in her nursery to hold other miscellaneous items, but I loved how the bows looked once they were hung, and I am already making sure we have a bow for each of her outfits that are currently hanging in her closet.

 AFTER

 BEFORE

4. Along with all of the bows that were stashed on top of Brynley's changing table, there were also blankets, her baby monitor, diapers, batteries, receipts, and other odds and ends that needed to find a place to call home. I knew I wanted to get things all put away so that we could start finalizing all of the details in her nursery tonight, as we await my mom and stepdad to get here to hang her chandelier. Again, I am planning on buying a few baskets to store her odds and ends that won't fit in drawers, and we may result to buying some sort of bakers rack or shelving to sit next to her changing table since she is lacking in storage space.

 AFTER

 BEFORE

5. We also wanted to straighten up the clutter that surrounded Brynley's carseat and floor that laid next to the rocking chair. We plan to install her carseat base in another week, but for now, we are just storing her carseat in her nursery so that it doesn't get dirty. I may have mentioned it before, but I found the carseat cover on etsy, and just used Ryder's old Graco snugride underneath. I love the fabric and it looks so girly and pink, so I'm hoping Brynley will never get mistaken as a boy! Once the clutter was put away, I discovered that her baby book we had found at Hallmark last weekend was underneath, so I brought it downstairs to add to my stash of pregnancy journals and albums I saved that I had with Ryder. I can't wait to soon start writing away in her sweet baby book, and keeping up with all of her milestones, as I did with Ryder. A friend I work with gave me the head rest liner to use while Brynley is a newborn, but once she is big enough to hold her head better, we will take it out.

 AFTER

 BEFORE

6. Next stop: Ryder's room. As far as his room was concerned, everything was already pretty much set in place, back from when we turned his nursery into a Big Boy surfer and ocean creature themed room (since he loves crabs, sharks, and all things sea life). We do have a few things still to get, like finding a clear lamp that we can fill with the sand and seashells we found from our many beach trips we took this past summer, and finding the best pictures to put in his surf themed frames. Other than those small details, I just wanted to de clutter his toys, and utilize the space as best as we could. Even though he has a big room, I don't want him to get bored and overwhelmed by so many toys, especially since we will be staying home once I quit my job and we are home most of the day. We reorganized his baskets under his train table, rearranged the existing toys that were in his toy chest, and rotated some of the things that were in either his other toy baskets or closet, and brought some of the things he hadn't played with in awhile either downstairs to go in his toy bin, or to add to either the baby pile to go in the attic, or to be added to the Goodwill stash. I still have to print off activities and crafts I have found online, and come up with some sort of theme to do each week, so we can start a weekly activity, and I want to further organize his paints, crayons, playdoh, and markers that we got last weekend, but I am saving them for when I am actually staying home with him so it will all be new to him.

 AFTER

This was Scot putting the finishing touches on the baby toys that we are storing in the attic for now, until Brynley gets old enough to use. Even though I am bad about saying it all the time, I am very fortunate and thankful to have such an organized husband. I am definitely more messy and disorganized when it comes to keeping house, and I am so blessed to have him to guide me. I am hoping once I start my job as a SAHM, that I will get into a routine of my own, and will figure out my own way to clean house each week. I am happy with all of the organizing we accomplished, and I am looking forward to next weekend for the fun part of finalizing our list. We plan to go shopping for a few Fall clothes for Ryder, and to get any last minute things for Brynley. Pictures to come on Brynley's chandelier!

Hope ya'll have a HAPPY FRIDAY!