Olivia's Nursery

It is such a relief to say that the nursery is finished. It has only taken me several months to complete this project--mostly because I have been working on it here a little and there a little.

What I have learned from this project--sewing custom crib bedding is a lot more work than it seems. I will pay someone to do it in the future.

Deer Valley Madness

Last Saturday Craig and I had another grand design adventure. If Craig had known when he married me that this is what he was in for marrying a designer, he may have had second thoughts. :)

This time we were up at Deer Valley Resort. I am now decorating a rental condominium at the base of the ski slopes at Deer Valley. The condo has four bedrooms, three baths, a kitchen, living room, and game room. The goal was to take out all of the dated (and awful, awful, awful) existing furniture in the rental and replace it with new, updated furniture and accessories in only one day. It was unreal!!

We started out our day at 9:30. We met up with three other employees at the store, loaded up all of the furniture and accessories that I had spent the last three days running all across the valley acquiring, and headed out for a fun filled day of decorating madness.

The first eight hours were spent moving furniture in and out of the house. I couldn't even bear watching these women and Craig carry the furniture up and down four flights of stairs. It was insane!! I honestly thought someone was going to die!

We took a lunch break at about three o'clock, and by that time, I think half of us were dehydrated and on the verge of exhaustion. I was even exhausted--and I wasn't doing any heavy lifting.

When we got back we we finally got started hanging pictures, making beds, and accessorizing. Craig and I even upholstered headboards! They turned out so cute!! I am proud of Craig and his remarkable craftiness! He's such a good sport.

At about ten thirty we finally all realized that we needed to be done for the day. We were all exhausted and overwhelmed by the project at this point. We finished a few final moving projects and loaded up the trailers with all of the awful furniture and headed home.

On the way home we stopped and got ice cream and I got some hot chocolate. We were so relieved to be going home. It was a long, long day, but I couldn't believe how much progress we made. It was unreal how the place was transformed in just twelve hours and under $5k.

The rest of the girls I work with went up again today hoping to finish up with the hanging and accessorizing. They joked that I couldn't come today because they didn't want me to go into labor. It's probably a good thing, because the entire way home from Deer Valley on Saturday I was having really painful contractions--I was ready to tell Craig at any moment to head to Utah Valley Regional Hospital, instead of home. Don't worry, no such luck!

We are having a professional photographer go up and shoot the condominium sometime next week. I will make sure to share the pics with you when we get them back. :)

Hospital visit and other goings about this week

This week started off with a trip to the hospital on Sunday. I woke up Sunday morning with the worst back ache of my life and I was leaking fluid. Craig and I were up at his parents' and we went back and forth for at least a half an hour debating whether or not I should call my doctor. Craig finally called the doctor for me.

The doctor told me that I needed to go into the hospital asap. I kept asking him if I could wait until later that night when we got home, but he insisted that we go up to Mckay-Dee in Ogden. I have to admit, the entire way up to the hospital I had butterflies in my stomach. Going into the hospital is a little unnerving when you don't know what the outcome will be. Craig made me even more nervous when he started saying things like, "We don't have our car seat or an outfit for the baby."

Getting tested for fluid was not the most pleasant experience, as well as waiting for the results of the tests for over an hour. So we just sat in the room and watched Wheel of Fortune and I watched our baby's heart rate and my contractions on the monitor. Who would have thought I was having contractions at 34 weeks--I had no idea.

Todd texted Craig while we were in the hospital and told him that we should induce. We got a good laugh out of that. A maintenance worker from my work called, also, and Craig answered and told him that we were in the hospital. He was alarmed and called another girl that I work with and, within an hour, I had two of my coworkers calling asking me if I was alright. I really appreciated the support from everyone--and Todd, if we could have induced, we would have. :)

The results ended up coming back negative. Craig and I were both thrilled and went on our way. I told Craig that it was a good experience, overall, because now we have a small taste of what to expect when we have our baby. That was a good practice round.

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I started a three week prenatal course on Thursday. Craig thinks he's getting off real easy because he's in school during the classes. I joked with him Thursday morning that he wasn't going to know what the heck was going on during labor, so he had me promise him that I would take detailed notes during the class. *If anyone would like to have an outline of how to differentiate between true and false labor signs and the three stages of labor let Craig know. :)

The Finer Consigner Local Artist Fair

Send an email to tfc@thefiner.com describing your handmade product line including pictures of the product. After being approved for a booth space on the showroom, you will be given a simple contract to fill out and sign explaining *how it works and how you, as the artist/consigner, will be paid out for goods that are sold in the three day event.

*How it works:
Artists will be given a 4’x4’ space to set up booth on the showroom November 5, 6 and 7. Tables will not be provided, so you are welcome to bring in any kind of table or form of display for your product that fits within the space limit from 4:00-7:00pm November 4. Artists will be allowed to have business cards, signage and any other tools to get there name out there. Each Artist/consigner will be given a consigner number to sell their products under. All transactions will be processed through The Finer Consigner at a 70/30% split. In other words, when your items sell in the three day period, you will be paid out 70% of the proceeds of the sale. That’s 20% more than normal consignment!! Consigner payout checks will be available anytime after Monday, November 9.

This will be an event you won’t want to miss. Hurry quick to register for a booth—spaces will fill up fast!!

http://www.thefinerconsignerhome.blogspot.com/

A few things we've been up to in the last week or so...

-We went to the doctor last Monday. The doc said that our baby could come October 21st and she'd be just fine. He joked that if she's not here after Halloween I could go hiking and do anything I wanted to induce labor.

-I worked my head off--111 hours in this last pay period, in fact. Don't know how I'm doing it. It's a miracle. :)

-I finally purchased my vintage hot air balloons for Olivia's mobile for the nursery and they came in the mail last week. They look like they're 40 years old. I'm in love with them! I'll get pictures up of the nursery as soon as I finish the bedding. I'm so excited!

-Craig got a huge crack in his windshield and I got my first ticket.

-Craig won tickets to the BYU-USU football game on Friday. We enjoyed a wonderful pregame dinner as well as half time treat and the best hot cocoa I've ever had. We had a lot of fun and were thrilled that we finally had an afternoon and evening together..those are few and far between!

-We went up to my parents and spent a great conference weekend with my family. The girls went out while the boys went to Priesthood session at Conference Center. I finally got registered at Babies "R" Us. My mom was so overwhelmed by all of the high-tech baby gear out there. Who would have thought "Jeep" had a brand of strollers, and not just that, but 12 different models. It's like car shopping! We are now registered at Babies "R" Us and Target.

-I got the stomach flu yesterday and was sick with something other than morning sickness for the first time my entire pregnancy. Luckily I am feeling a lot better today, but being sick is not fun when you're prego. I felt like a train wreck and probably kept my poor hubby awake all night from all of the moaning and tossing and turning.

Life's been so crazy and the time is flying so fast, but we are having so much fun and feel so blessed. I feel like the luckiest girl in the world to be married to Craig. I can't imagine having a more loving and supportive husband. He takes care of our family so well!

We are so excited for what these next few weeks are going to bring and pray that we'll be ready for our baby girl to join our family. We love her so much and can't wait!!