Brody the Bumblebee

So a while back (in this post), I mentioned that we wanted Brody to be a bee for Halloween since his initials were BEE. Originally, I was wanting to try to be crafty and make him a bee costume, but I found this adorable bee costume for 8 dollars at a consignment store, and figured if I made one I would spend at least that much on materials to make one. And given my very novice sewing skills, I figured I'd spend 8 dollars on something that I knew was cute rather than at least that much to make something that might end up looking stupid! :)




Thrilled to be going out and trick-or-treating :P



Happy Halloween!

Furniture Rearranging!

A while ago I mentioned that I rearranged our living room furniture. Here is a before and after of our living and dining room area from 1L year till now.

BEFORE:





The L-shaped couch and loveseat arrangement was driving me CRAZY, cause I hated the dead space behind the loveseat. I also hated the choppy floor lamp dividing up the "wall art" (or more accurately, just the "stuff on the wall") and the exposed outlet. But as anyone who's been in my apartment--or ANY of the Regent Village apartments, you know that you need all the light you can get!



The dining room before. I painted those little mirrors from Ikea, and they were really fun to paint, but every time I looked at them I thought "stoplight!" Also, when you walk in the house, the corner where the lamp is is the far corner of the living area, so it's what you see immediately when you walk in the apartment (well, besides the tv, but that's another story :) ). Anyway, I thought it was a bit of a visual letdown.

So after thinking about moving the furniture for like a year, I was finally inspired and not pregnant at the same time!

AFTER



So I moved the bookcase out of the corner, and put the loveseat caddy corner--no more awkward L-shape! And another perk is that the caddy corner loveseat provides the perfect stash for baby stuff--you should see everything that's behind it, haha! Also, we painted a few things white, which helps lighten up the dungeon. :)


Here's a view of how it really opened things up, and how it flows into the dining room. Now there's plenty of room for Brody to play on the floor!


And now the bookcase provides a much more pleasing focal point for the room and cozies things up! It's amazing what just a little moving things around can accomplish, without spending a dime!

Fall Break Beach Trip

For fall break this year, we headed down to Charleston, SC to meet up with my family (minus the British ones--missed you Brad and Rache!), Julie's boyfriend Nathan, family friend Lizzie, and my grandmother Ami, to celebrate Ami's 75th birthday.




Brody had a blast, haha.

Actually he really did have a blast with Auntie Em, as she liked to be called. Em is super great with her nephews, and got Brody to enjoy himself on the beach, despite the fact that his mom forgot to bring him a hat to protect him from the elements.

We enjoyed walking and chilling on the beach (and some people enjoyed the freezing ocean--not me--I like water to be at least 80 degrees :) ), playing games inside, and standing on the porch watching the alligator in the pond below as he stalked turtles.

Saturday morning we all decided to wake up to see the sunrise on the beach!






And we seized the opportunity for a family pic!

{image via Ohdeedoh}

Ellis just brought me a mum a couple days ago, and thanks to this post on Ohdeedoh, I think I'll have to go get a pumpkin for it now!

Cloth Diapering, Round One

This is the first of many posts to come, I'm sure.

When I first started thinking about and researching cloth diapers, I noticed something strange about a lot of the people that cloth diapered: they all seemed to approach it like a hobby. And the really weird part is that this no longer seems strange to me. I have a cloth diaper blog as one of my favorite links (All About Cloth Diapers), and I visit Nicki's Diapers multiple times a day to check their stock. Every time I get on Craigs List I do a quick search for cloth diapers. It's become a quest!

The thing that overwhelmed me at the beginning (and still does...) is the sheer variety of cloth diapers out there, and the strong but varying opinions people seem to have about them. I'd seen a bunch of people talk about investing in their system of cloth diapers, buying a whole stash of one kind of diaper. And so I thought I needed to have it all figured out beforehand, so I could buy a dozen of one kind of diaper, and overnight never need another disposable.

I've been glad to discover that that's not at all how things need to go. My friend Tamara had recommended the Flip diaper system to me, and so I decided to buy a daypack of 2 covers and 6 inserts as a starter. I bought them from a locally based online company called Diaper Junction, which has local pick-up, so free shipping. They also had a 30 day return policy so it didn't feel like quite as big a commitment, which is ALWAYS a plus for me! :)


Flips from Diaper Junction!

So I tried out the Flips and LOVED them! I also had a BumGenius 3.0 I'd picked up at a consignment shop last year, so my little stash (1 pocket diaper, 2 covers, and 6 inserts) obviously wasn't enough to last me long. So basically I've been putting Brody in cloth for a day, washing, and putting him back in disposables in the meantime. I'm wanting to switch over entirely to cloth, but for now the mixing and matching with disposables is working just fine.


Looks pretty pumped, huh?