Nate and the Blog

Blogging was awesome when I had two kids.  It was a fun way to share the funny stories and the home improvements and general ramblings percolating in my brain.  It was a hobby that was helpful in a new state with a husband traveling half of the year.  I was consistent, blogging every day, and loved giving myself a deadline.  It made me feel like I had something more than poopy diapers to talk about  Not that I mind talking about poopy diapers.  I blogged daily for well over a year.  It was great.

As I got pretty sick during my pregnancy with Nate, however, the blog was the first thing to go.  Then I broke my ankle when he was seven weeks old.  We didn't have a laptop at the time, so the blog continued to lay dormant. 

When we found we were moving to this house, I was really excited about starting up again, sharing all of our home improvements as we made them {we'd already done a lot to our last house when I started the blog and I hadn't taken many before pictures}.  But life happened.  It got in the way.  It does that sometimes.  At first I didn't blog because we didn't have internet for a few weeks.  Then I didn't blog because I was so busy with the holidays and getting things settled for the kids.  Then I didn't blog because I was potty training Jack. 

Are you getting the picture?

After Nate's illness began, blogging really took a backseat.  I felt like every post should be about him, and frankly, there wasn't too much news to share.  I felt guilty sharing about the house when we had a sick child, but kept taking pictures of our projects and updates for the day I would begin to write again.  After awhile, though, the sheer volume of potential posts from those pictures became overwhelming.  It was easy to just not write when I always felt like the house or the children really needed me more than I needed to write.

But here's the thing.  This little blog of mine has been very helpful to me.  Writing posts about the house helps me to think through financial and design decisions logically.  Writing posts about my kids helps me to view them through the lens of humor.  Writing posts about my faith helps me to grow in it and challenges me to learn more so that I have well thought out positions.  The comments through the blog, facebook, and emails have encouraged me more than you can know. 

I guess what I'm saying is this.  I need to start up this little neglected blog again.  My plan is to write a little each day, which may or may not translate into a blog post every week.  I need an outlet, and this is a good one.  I hope you'll stay with me as I begin the journey again.

On to the important information.  I haven't updated about Nate's condition in awhile.  That's because there isn't much to say.

I struggle with how to describe Nate's condition.  On one hand, as you can see above, he looks great!  He's happy, smiling a lot, looking pretty healthy, if small, and is growing.  On the other hand, his growth rate has drastically reduced recently.  He is nursing poorly and has all but dried me out, but I keep trying because it's the only oral food he gets.  Because of cutting teeth I'm raw and bleeding, but I'm afraid to stop because he might not nurse again if I take a break.  When he pulls the tube out, which he does every couple of weeks, he loses between six and eight ounces each day.  He still won't eat except for the odd seemingly random moment when he'll allow a few tiny bites.

We see three therapists each week.  Each has different things they want me to work on with him multiple times every day, but it's difficult to find the desire because I don't see progress.

Because of the humidity and heat, he's getting a rash under the tape on his cheek.  I know it hurts him and the only thing I can think to do is keep him inside, but that is hard on the other two.

 

If I were to sum up Nate's condition in a nutshell, I would say that no progress has been made in six months.  Something needs to change.  We are going to try a physiatrist as soon as we can get an appointment.  We are hoping that she may be able to at least steer us in some direction.  Neurological?  Muscular?  I don't know.

 

Our Gastroenterologist {GI}, whom we love, is retiring, and it looks as though we may have to travel quite a ways to find another.  We don't think Nate has a GI issue, per say, but the tube that the GI inserted is keeping him alive and kicking, so we would like to find a good doctor to work with, and pediatric gastroenterologists don't grow on trees around here.

It is easy for me to become discouraged over this.  It is easy for me to pity myself.  Every single part of my life has been effected by Nate's illness and I sometimes just want my life back.  Woe is me and all that.  But here's the thing.  The feeding tube is an amazing invention that allows our little guy to grow and I am so thankful for it.  He is so incredibly happy and handles the feedings like a champ.  I'm even thankful for his physical delays because if he were rolling around a lot or crawling, feeding would be much more difficult!

My dad once said, "God never promised us Heaven on earth.  He promised us Heaven in Heaven."  In fact, God promised us that this life would hold trials.  We are not entitled to an easy ride.  The beauty in the Plan is that He gives us the tools to "run with endurance the race marked out for us {Hebrews 12:1}," no matter what it holds.

So I'm running and praying for that endurance.  The race seems to be marked with potholes and uneven pavement right now, but if I keep my head up, looking at the finish line, eye on the prize, I never seem to trip.  It's only when my eyes are down, trying to avoid those problems on my own, that I stumble. 

How's that for an analogy?  You can borrow it, Dad.

Ella's New Room!

Last week while Ella was away visiting my parents, we finally did her room.  In our whole painting-one-room-a-month scheme, the kids' rooms are kind of low on the priority list.  However, with Ella out of the way for a whole week it seemed like the perfect time to do something special for her.  This move has been harder on her than we had anticipated, and we knew this would make her feel really special.

Her room before may not have looked bad in pictures, but the walls were an industrial flat beige with a huge number of holes.  We decorated with a leftover rug and pictures for the interim.

I love these embroidery hoop numbers, but they are a little young for a six-year-old.  Anyone local want them?  They're yours!

About the only thing we had done to update the room was let her pick her own closet door knobs, and she picked the blingiest knobs Hobby Lobby had to offer.  If you've seen Hobby Lobby's knob selection, you know that's saying something.

It's hard to see in the picture, but they're glittery disco balls.

This is the fifth time Ella has had a new room.  Seems like a lot of new rooms for a six-year-old, doesn't it?  The first room, her nursery, is one of my favorite rooms we've ever done.  There were so many friends who helped us to make that space special and beautiful and I still think of those wonderful people every time I think of that room.

When Jack was born, he took over the nursery {it was gender neutral} and she moved into her first big-girl room.

Only six months later, we moved to Wisconsin and Ella moved into her third room.  We didn't do much in terms of decorating, which is good because when we found we were expecting Nate, we decided to have Ella and Jack share a room and redid it {room number four}, building built-ins and getting bunkbeds.

I would have showed pictures of each of those rooms, but I can't get Blogger to upload them.  I actually currently can't upload anything prior to this move.  Bad Blogger!  Sorry about that.

Anyway, back to the present, since apparently that is where I am supposed to stay.  It is likely that Ella will never share a room again, and she only has brothers, so I wanted her room to be unapologetically girly!  I had many thoughts running through my head.  Doing girl rooms is so fun! First, I wanted to do plank walls.  Something like this:

It was going to be awesome.  A little cottagy, a soft, sophisticated yet rustic little girl's room.  Handsome Hero was willing to tackle the job and I was really excited.

 

That is, I was really excited until I started thinking about those knobs.  Those blingy knobs.  Those glittery, over-the-top knobs that did not go with my plank walls at all.  I started to realize that the plank walls were my dream and she would not appreciate them in any way, so why were we going to all that trouble?  It was a hard dream to release, and I may still be gazing longingly at pictures of rooms with plank walls, but she is not a baby anymore and has definite likes and dislikes and this room would only be special if I listened to those.

 

Case in point:  Ella originally wanted to paint her walls red or bold yellow.  Um, no.  It's a basement room, and needs a light color.  She was cool with that, and we alternated between pale pinks and yellows each time we went to Home Depot {we always go by the paint department and the kids each choose a paint swatch, which for some reason entertains them the whole rest of the trip}.  One day, I found a gallon of oops paint in the back.  You know oops paint, right?  The paint that has already been mixed that they sell really cheaply at the back of the paint section?  It's a potential treasure trove.  The oops paint that I found was a really high quality paint in a lavender color.  It was beautiful.  It was perfect.  It was seven dollars.

 

I bought it, keeping in mind this fabric I had in my stash that I've been waiting for the opportunity to use.  It's VERY expensive fabric {like, $100/yard} that I found in an end-of-roll bin for two dollars years ago.  It was a great match to the paint, and the room started taking form.  I showed the color to Ella and asked her what she thought of this pretty shade and she said slowly, "Well, if you painted my room that color it would make me very sad."

 

Dream number two shattered.

 

This was distressing.  And not fair.  How could she stomp on my dreams for my her room like that?  What a rude thing to do!

 

I went around in circles for a bit, regrouped, and came up with this.

 

 

I'm actually pretty proud of the space, and she loves it.  Want to see her reaction?

 

 

 

So here are the details.  The walls are a pale pink {I can't remember the name but it came from the white section of paint colors}.  The furniture is the same, but I added the yellow table {and painted the top shiny silver}.  I would have loved to put an awesome statement lamp on it, but she loves this princess lamp that some neighbors gave her a few years ago.  I would love if it "accidentally" broke, but hey, it's not my room.  I may still be working on realizing that.

 

Last weekend I found this hand-crocheted afghan at a yard sale.  It was in perfect condition {if a bit stinky} and after a few washes it is one of my favorite parts of her room.

 

The curtains were some leftovers that I made for our last house, so they were free.  The branch is from our backyard {I sprayed it gold.  Can you tell?  Neither can I}, and I already had most of the little creatures on the branches that I'd saved from various other projects.  The pom-poms cost about a dollar apiece to make {except the silver - that was about three dollars} and took about ten minutes each following this easy tutorial.

 

 

Handsome Hero changed out the puny 1986 light fixture for a ceiling fan.  So much better.  I would have loved a little, shiny, crystal chandelier, but ceiling fans are infinitely more practical, and there are enough other cute girly pieces in the room to make up for not having a chandelier.  Plus, it has a remote control.  Awesome.

 

Ella needed a place to display her artwork and cards, and I came up with the idea of hanging her papers from a clothesline {it went with the plank walls}.  With the new motif, the clothesline morphed into this little display.

She has a contained place to store her pictures, but once the clips are full, she needs to edit.  I hope it will be a fun way for her to learn to do something that does not come naturally.

 

Our only real splurge in the room was the area rug.  It was from Homegoods for $150.  It may seem silly to spend real money on a rug for a kid's room, but:
 

1.  The carpeting is ugly.

2.  The rug is soft and she plays on her floor all the time.

3.  It's an indoor/outdoor rug, so we can hose it down if we need to.

4.  I love the rug in or out of her room.  I already have three places in mind to put it if it doesn't work out in her room.  It will not be a waste of $150.
5.  The same rug at other stores was close to $300.

I know that in pictures it looks a bit small, but in person I really like the size because it separates the space into zones.  Originally, I had wanted two small rugs for either side of the bed, which I would put where the dresser is now.  But when I started moving furniture, I realized that with the placement of doors and windows, most pieces were in the best place for them.  The only big changes ended up being the direction of the bed and the play kitchen moving to the opposite wall.

Originally, we challenged ourselves to do this room for under $250.  How did we do?

 

Fan: $70
Afghan: $10
Pompoms: $5
Curtain rods: $15
Area rug: $150
Pink bins: $20
Spray paint: $5
Clothesline billboard wall: $10
Paint: $60
Oh, and those knobs.  Those perfectly fitting blingy knobs:  $5
Total:  $350

Um, yikes!  We would have been fine except for the purchase of the rug, and we would make the same decision again for the reasons listed above.  I guess it's a bit of comfort that plank walls would have cost significantly more, and we had been planning on putting in crown moulding, and may in the future, but decided that the carpet was more important for now.  So really, we saved a lot {picture me winking with a Cheshire cat smile}!  In fact, I think we should go out and celebrate our savings with a little shopping spree!  What do you think?