Making Progress?

Although it might not look like it, we have (hopefully) made a lot of progress recently getting ready for Elisabeth’s arrival. 

The kids went to spend the weekend with Mimi and Bebe a few weeks ago so that Stephen and I could get the room painted.  I always have the super fun job of taping all the molding and ceilings.  It took a lot of work, especially with the 10 foot ceilings in half the room, but the room is finally painted a pretty shade of purple!  Stephen said each of our kids gets their room painted by us once, and that is it!  Next time it will be done by a professional!

We were not looking forward to the cost of getting new furniture for Elisabeth.  When Abbie and Carter were little, we bought them very nice furniture that they will use until they leave our home.  This time that just wasn’t in the budget, at least not yet.  Grandmere was very sweet and bought us a new crib and changing table.  We chose not to reuse Abbie and Carter’s old crib because it has since been turned into Carter’s big boy bed.  (The changing table was sold a long time ago after Carter jumped off of it and broke his arm!) I was also excited to be able to have a white nursery this time around.  I chose darker wood when we had Abbie in an attempt to be practical about use with future children, but think white is cute for a little girl’s nursery.  I found a really good deal on the crib form Target and the changing table from Babies R Us.  Steve and I put the crib together this weekend.

I also really got lucky on Craigslist and found the perfect white baby armoire for only $160.  It is in really good condition and probably cost over $500 new.  I was so excited!  It looks great in the nursery. 

I also found a solid wood bookcase at a baby store in the “As Is” section for a good price.  It was a darker color of wood so I spent one whole weekend painting it white.  Never again!  It’s not perfect, and it looks fine in her room, but it was SO much more work than I thought it would be.  I am so glad that is over!

Overall I feel very happy with the furniture we have in the room and the amount of money we spent on it.

Elisabeth is using Abbie’s old crib bedding, which I still love.  We also still have our old rocking chair which is now in her room.  Since I sold many of our baby things about a year ago at a garage sale thinking we were done having kids (ha!), I have had to try to find good deals on things.  I found a swing just like our old one, a papasan chair, a bouncy chair and various baby toys at a consignment sale last fall.  All of them were in great shape and much cheaper than buying them new!  The nice thing about baby things is they are made of mostly easy-to-clean materials.  I have sanitized all of our baby things and they are ready to go! 

I also recently purchased a really nice bassinet from one of my friends.  I was happy to find an inexpensive one and to help out a friend looking to get rid of baby stuff.  She only used it for 3 months with her youngest daughter, and it is still in great shape.  It is a bassinet and also a changing table, which is perfect because I plan to use it as a changing table downstairs long after she is sleeping in her crib.  I washed it and wiped it down this weekend so now it is ready to go!  I can’t believe their will be a little baby sleeping in there soon!

Obviously things are much different this time around!  Abbie got everything brand new and this time we tried to be more money conscious and make smart buying decisions.  I think everything still turned out  perfectly, even though we spent a lot less money this time around!  Really all I have left to do before she arrives is to clean out her closet.  It is currently the dumping ground for everyone’s extra stuff.  I just need to do some rearranging and then we will hopefully be ready!