Sit Down Dinners

I have to admit we have sat down to dinner in front of the tv since we've been married.  Mostly because we've never had a dining room table (well we did but it was used as a desk instead) or the room to have a dining room, the coffee table was our dining table.  Well, I am determined to change that! I remember siting down to eat as a family when I was a child and I want my children to be able to say they have those same types of memories.  But I didn't think Jonathan would be down for siting on a table cloth and picnic-ing it in the dining/nursery room so I had to carve out any area in our tiny space to make room for those dinner memories.  Thus the small space between the nursery and living room is where I shoved our dining table.
We bought a dining table off Craigslist a few months ago for $40 (a steal considering its worth close to $500 after a little research on the hubby's part) but we haven't had any chairs.  Saturday we found some chairs in our price range, $35 a piece, which is actually a little over our price range but they're solid wood, in good condition and pretty fancy.  We got 4 of them from a hotel liquidation center down the road, which means they are covered in hideous green fabric some designer thought was fabulous 20 years ago.  I thought about painting the frames white but our table is white and that just seemed a little overkill to me so I've kept the original finish (just need to fill in the scuffs and knicks) and recovered the seats.  2 done, 2 to go.  The cushions were already thick and somewhat new so I didn't add any extra batting.  I got a $13 drop cloth from Home Depot, bleached it, bleached it again and used it to recover the seats and there's enough to cover all 4!  Grace and I ventured to Jo-Anns today to look for some trim and found some black trim @.79/yd.  12 yards was enough for all 4 chairs and I had a coupon so I only spent $5 on trim!
We've been siting down for family dinner this week and I gotta say it beats vegging out in front of the tv anyday!

Before:

After:

And here's a glimpse of life lately:

Grace has discovered toilet paper

(that skirt is the leg of an old pair of jeans- super cute and super easy)

She loves the craft boxes in our room, ribbon is her favorite...

the statue in front of our apartments (in the background) after the Saints won last night

Our Bedroom- can you tell everything is in storage and we're using what we've got: pink, red, purple and black; what a color combo 

plus a little cutie tearing into some ribbon

Living room: we're looking for some couches but can't bite the bullet and make a decision (or fork over $1000+). We found the lamps a a salvage store for $5 each, got some lampshades from Target and trimmed them in some yellow ruffles.  The ottoman is the same green leather as the couches but I made a slip-cover from a bleached drop-cloth.  Side table...actually it's a moving box with a yellow floral table cloth I found at goodwill for a few bucks.  The pink suitcase (another goodwill find) in the corner is a good place to keep Grace's toys out and accessible for her but also easy to clean up when it's time to vaccum.

Nursery aka Dining room.  Jonathan didn't want to hang anything on the walls because we're only here a few months....so I taped :)  Just some scrapbook paper and hot glue and you've got monograms and paper pin-wheels.  I'm thinking maybe new bedding?  The bumper is really cute but it's also really thin...I'm not sure yet.

Ashley

Our August

Our August was filled with grandparents, tests, snowballs, baby bottom bumps and grins.  My mom and dad made a visit towards the end of last month to see baby girl.  They stayed downtown and got a first-hand experience of NOLA nightlife.  Grace and I brought them to eat at some of our favorite new places and of course the mall.  No visit is complete without a trip to the mall right?  Totally off topic but has anyone else seen the coupons Gap is giving out for 40% off on Wednesdays? Pretty cool!  
Add another bump to the list.  We had a great time with my parents and look forward to their next visit!
Last week Jonathan's dad came into town on business and we were able to spend a few days with him.  Grace has recently become quite the ham around other people and was more than excited to show Pops all her new funny faces.  
Grace has started pulling up within the past month and is now getting pretty fearless.  Trying no-hands, with her back to the wall....which ends in the bottom bump and cry.  We've been trying not to baby her and clap when she falls which has really helped; she'll make a sad face and then look for our reaction, if you're happy she's happy.  She's playing in her new play area, sucking her entire hand and squishing her face into a stink face right now, oh and trying to pull out the entire contents of the dresser.  
The house is not finished, doesn't even have walls yet....and life is getting a little cramped in this little apartment.  Even Jonathan is ready to get out of here because "it's just not comfortable" which means alot because he never complains about our living situation (and we've had LOTS of living situations since we've been married- 6 homes so far).  They say insulation will go in on Thursday and drywall should begin the next day. 
Jonathan is at school close to 14 hours a day right now.  I bribe him with dinner to get him home for an hour or so at night.  This has been much much much tougher than I had expected but its only 4 years so there's a light at the end of the tunnel.  But we're just entering the tunnel :(  Any prayers you can send our way would be greatly appreciated!  3 tests this week and another major one on Tuesday so we won't be seeing him for a few days.  
We're going to go the park until daddy gets home, here's some pictures.

                                                             baby stove from a diaper box

                                                                     play suitcase


Ashley

And she's off...

Grace started crawling recently and is discovering her independence with unbridled joy and tepid curiosity.   She started with the army crawl at the beginning of this month, began pushing herself up into the sitting position about a week later and got her knees under her as she crawled just yesterday.  She seems like such a big girl but because of the complete lack of hair and petite size she still looks like a baby baby.  Pulling out ALL of her books by the tv is her favorite activity right now, along with smashing toys (i thought girls were supposed to be gentle?) and brushing her teeth.  Daddy is very excited about that last one!  She is very excited about the fact she can move around on her own but doesn't like to be out of eyesight of mommy so there is alot of nervous cries when she finds she's crawled out of sight.  I've tried to introduce Grace to many different foods (hoping not to have a picky eater in the future!) and she's done awesome so far; only gaged up lima beans and I don't blame her on that one.  She is eating yogurt, tofu, egg yolks and just today we added cottage cheese to the list of dairy and proteins.  Act excited when you feed them new foods and they get excited too I've learned.  Chicken and turkey are coming next month; I have no clue how to prepare them so I've better get on it.  
Jonathan started Gross Anatomy today, they are jumping right in and get their cadavers today and begin dissection.  He was much more excited then I would ever be, I've only dissected a star fish and I don't think that really counts.  Along with anatomy come hours and hours of MORE study time each day, not too excited about that.  
I'm trying to slip cover and old ottoman right now but I can't get motivated to start so the fabric is just wraped around it at this point.  I picked up a drop cloth from Home Depot yesterday, really cheap: $10 bucks compared to $60 bucks in what it would cost in fabric.  I like the simple clean color anyways so I bleached the heck out of it to soften and lighten it up and I think it's going to be pretty cool as soon as I find some motivation.  I've also got to shower, do dishes, laundry, iron, vaccum and mop.  Still no motivation, I better go chug a coke.




Ashley

Per Request

I'm alive.  Just thought I would make that clear seeing how long it's been since the last post.  Life with a first year Dental school student and an 8 month old is pretty exhausting.  Especially when the 8 month old no longer likes to sleep and the Dental student has classes all day and can't help at the midnight and 4 am scream-fests anymore.  I'm really hoping Grace is teething and those suckers poke through soon!
Getting adjusted to life in a big city hasn't been as difficult as I would have thought; but everything takes longer to get to, traffic hours have to be avoided and all these one-way streets are kicking my butt.  I have not caused a crash or been involved in one yet, although Jonathan says it's just a matter of time because I'm a woman. (That's his kind of joke, most woman get offended when they hear him say it but it's just a joke, calm down)   Jonathan and I have re-discovered our love for snow-cones aka SnowBalls here in Nola.  I don't understand how those BahamaBucks can charge such ridiculous prices! I get a medium stuffed (with ice cream) for $2.00 and it's huge.  Because they're so cheap we get them most everyday.  I've learned you can always justify some things :)  We also eat a lot of po-boys which are basically sandwiches for really poor guys I'm assuming.  I'm learning to like seafood, heavily battered and fried of course.  

Jonathan's family came in town this past weekend and we got to do the downtown thing and had dinner and a boat ride on an old steamboat.  Grace ended the ride naked because it was so dang hot.  I can't wait till fall, July in New Orleans is almost unbearable, another justification for daily snowball trips.  

baby meeting the silver man

baby being cleaned by aunties after being covered in silver paint

Steamboat

naked baby enjoying the ride with her aunt

Sorry this has all been such a random assortments of ramblings but the baby is actually taking a nap and it is blowing my mind. I guess I should get the vacuuming done before she wakes up and tries to eat everything she can find on the ground.  Then I'm guessing a trip to the snowball hut :)

I'm going to try and get back to regular posting.  No promises but I'll try!

new sleeping position

pulling up

crawling

ASHLEY

House and High Chairs

Ok, so she's a little rough right now.  It's a Katrina victim and needs some much needed attention but give it a few months (hopefully no more than 3 more months because our lease is up then).  Everything was striped down to the studs and built back up again, new roof is on and windows and doors are going in this week.  

Looking into the kitchen from the dining room

Looking into the living room from the kitchen

dining room, the pink studs frame out the walk-in pantry and yes that pantry will be painted pink :)

 Since we moved to New Orleans about 2 weeks ago we haven't had more than a few minutes to just sit. Moving, unpacking, repacking things for storage and building decisions among just a few of the things going on.  So I hope to get back on a normal routine of blogging because I know some grandparents out there are very eager to see baby girl!

She likes to watch us in the kitchen. I'm looking for a high chair because she's started trying to eat the carpet.  Wierd. I'm thinking this Boon Flair Pedestal High Chair. It's one solid piece so crumbs and junk doesn't build up in the cracks, it rolls and the height adjusts.

Plus it matches her bow.

ASHLEY

NOLA

So we are official New Orleans residents.  It's the 4th of July and we can see some amazing fireworks displays right outside our window, beside a church dome and above the cemetery.  Did I mention we live directly beside a cemetery? Not the type where people are buried below the ground, but above in marble tombs.  About 40 feet away from the back door.  We may also be some of the few residents under the age of 75 in our apartment building which is nice that there isn't a ton of parties going on but there are a ton of yappy lap dogs walking around.  We are living in a one bed, one bath place for the next 3 months until the house is finished and surprisingly it is much bigger than I expected.  I had never seen the place, no pictures, nothing, before I walked in the door with Gracie and our suitcases.  Grace is sleeping in the dining room aka the nursery.  I'm not quite sure where exactly we live but someone said we live right on St. John Bayou. We're directly on the water, what type of water? No clue. A bayou I guess but I'm not sure what a bayou is so...  But across the water is an amazing children's playground based on all the fairy tale characters that Grace will love when she can walk in talk and get into trouble.  
We are absolutely exhausted and would like nothing more than to sleep for 3 days but with a baby I guess you can't do that.  I plan on exploring our neighborhood tomorrow, hopefully I can find my way back home.  
Ashley

Still here

Wow, it's been awhile since I've posted, sorry guys! We have been busy packing up again.  3 days until the big move and I think this is the most organized move yet.  Have I ever mentioned this is the 5th move since we've been married. We've been married 2 years.  Just 2.  


We each sent a big box of shoes and clothes to goodwill (aka my mom who brings it to a place called Trade n Treasure to sell it) and we've been purging all the junk and misc, things that:
a) don't know what it is but have held onto it thinking we would figure it out 
b) high school clothes we always held out hope that we could fit into again (I'm 23, if it doesn't fit now it sure won't fit in 5 years) 
c) those clothes that are really cute on the hanger but nowhere else  
d) boxes of random loose paper (where did this come from)
e) 100's of notebooks and notes from college science classes
(I could go through the entire alphabet but I'm sure you get that we had a bunch of junk)


Bye bye college papasan chair- i loved it, he hated it and Grace will kill herself trying to climb it.  Adios the first sofa I ever bought, a $400 Ashley's Furniture score that was only worth about $50 seeing as the cardboard arms have caved in.  I saved for months to get that thing too.  Peace bookcase, side table and tv stand.  But now we have room for the beautiful dresser Jonny re-finished! Pictures coming soon.  


So Wednesday morning with our little family packed up, a truck, a volkswagon and a u-haul trailer we're driving across Texas and down the Louisiana coast to move into our tiny 1 bedroom apartment 2 minutes from dental school.  If you think of us by chance please say a little prayer for us. Thanks and here's some swimming pictures, as you can tell she is becoming quite photogenic.

Ashley 


ps. feel free to leave comments :)