Still Nesting: More Nursery Projects

We have been plugging away at Baby Gaudette's nursery, and are so so close to having it all done. Click here and here to see our progress. All we need to do this weekend is hang the cute little birdie mobile we bought from Pottery Barn Kids, and we're all set. Before we show off pictures of the completed room (stay tuned!), I thought I would share a couple of fun projects:

1) The Bookshelves: It was important to Grant and me that the nursery have books in it -- after all, we want our little Grunkaberry to be a smarty-pants! :) The only problem was that we had absolutely no space in the tiny room to fit a bookcase. Then came Tia Purnima to the rescue with an awesome idea that she'd seen on a design blog -- bookshelves made of IKEA spice racks! Click here for a picture of the inspiration. And see below for our completed project!

The best part about this project was that the spice racks were SUPER cheap -- only $3.99 each at IKEA. The worst part about the project is that it was very time consuming to measure everything out in order to get them lined up perfectly. Thankfully, my wonderful father and I did it together! And Dad's motto -- "measure twice, drill once" -- definitely came in handy here.

2) Pictures: In addition to Tia Katherine's amazing painting that we have hanging in the babies room, shown here, we decided to put up some fun black-and-white pictures to give the room some more character. Here are the pictures we chose:
Harry:
Ginny:

And Betinho:

They look absolutely adorable hanging over the queen bed!

August 2011: Planting Baby Gaudette's Fig Tree

When my sister, brother and I were each born, my parents planted a tree in their yard to commemorate our births. Mine was a fig tree, and it still stands in my parent's back yard, now surrounded by large Veronica Heather hedges. Here's a picture.

I've always loved fig trees, not just because I adore eating delicious figs, but also because it is a tree that reminds me of family. In addition to my fig tree, pictured above, I remember my Grandma having a huge fig tree at her home in Los Banos. And, if my memory serves me correctly, even my Ava (Great Grandma) had a big fig tree in her back yard.

So, with the impending arrival of Baby Gaudette, I couldn't think of a more fitting way to express how thrilled I am to be adding new roots to the family tree than by planting our little girl a fig tree of her own. Grant and Dad did the manual labor of actually planting the tree, and we think it looks great!


I hope that, someday, Baby Gaudette and I will share the same giddiness over a delicous basket of ripe, black figs that my mom and I share to this day!

August 20, 2011: Palo Alto Baby Shower

The weekend after our lovely baby shower in Pacific Grove, we were so lucky to have Grandma Rose, Tia Heather, and Grammy throw us another shower up in Palo Alto. The weather was perfect, and it was so much fun to have a blend of friends and family join us from near and far. Thank you so much, in particular, to Hannah, Kari, Pat, Grammy and Tia Kat who made especially long trips to be there. As you'll remember from my nesting post about the backyard, we were in a hurry to get everything completed in time for the shower. And it looked great! Here's a photo of the setup:


Baby Gaudette is going to LOVE those cute dresses! Once again, the food was delicious, the games were fun, and we were spoiled with so many gifts to celebrate and prepare for the arrival of our little girl. Thank you all for your amazing generosity!


And here's a photo collage that captures the perfect day (click to enlarge):