House projects and a bubble party

August has been a busy month! I cant believe my baby will be here in 3 weeks or less! My c-section is scheduled for 3 weeks from tomorrow. YAY! We've been busy trying to get the house cleaned and organized before the new addition arrives. The big thing that we needed to do was replace the carpet in our bedroom and the mancave/office. The carpet in those two rooms was already pretty matted and worn down when we bought our house 4 years ago. We replaced Lily's carpet before her room became a nursery, but we put off the other two rooms due to the cost and the effort of that undertaking. It may not seem like it, but it was a major undertaking for us to gut those two bedrooms and closets in preparation for new carpet. In 4 years those rooms have accumulated TONS of junk, dust, and miscellaneous items. I truly wish I was a better organizer! Anyway...we somehow managed to get the two rooms cleared by Friday morning the 17th, and the carpet guys came around 10. We were told the carpet in the mancave/office was absolutely disgusting underneath due to pet stains and I am very glad we got that out before the room will become a nursery (at some point). Clint and I spent most of today setting that room back up. Not sure if I have any before pictures, but here are the afters:

The plan is that if the new baby is a boy, he will get a Yankees/Seminole themed nursery that is going to have to double as an office because we have no other place for Clint's books, dvds, and other chotchskies. If the new baby is a girl,she will share a room with Lily for as long as we can swing that and eventually the man cave will become a little girl's room. We're hoping Lily's room could house a baby sister for at least a year. Everything is still up in the air now! Have I mentioned how I would kill for a 4 bedroom house?? Oh well, we will make it work. :)

The other house projects we've been working on are the kitchen and Lily's room. I had a handyman come over twice and remove the wallpaper, paint the kitchen green, take down the dated curvy wood piece, replace the hallogen light with a more decorative one, and paint one wall in Lily's room pink. Clint and I also bought a $120 dresser at Target that needed to be assembled. It turned out to be the WORST piece of crap dresser ever! We spent probably 4-5 hours assembling it in the living room and when we moved it to Lily's room in completely fell apart. I have a lot less patience when I'm pregnant in general, and this dresser almost took me over the edge! I guess you get what you pay for...but geez! And we already had to wait a week for a replacement drawer panel to come in, because after wasting 45 minutes, we realized the panel the dresser came with was defective and couldnt be used. Anyway, I still need to finish putting decorative stuff on the dresser, but here is the darn thing. Luckily, when Kevin the handyman was here this morning he used his own support brackets and drill and fixed it. We were about to go all Office Space on it and beat it with a hammer like they did to the fax machine in the movie. :)

 

The kitchen still needs some pictures to go above the sink or a valence or something. I couldnt find quite the light fixture I wanted (one with 3 globes in a row)...so I had to get a single globed one and I think I'll add pictures to fill the empty space. I am just happy the curvy wood panel courtesy of 1974 is gone!

                                                                        The before....

Amidst all the mess getting new carpet in, I've been trying to make some special time for Lily during her last few weeks as an only child. I had my heart set on the beach this weekend, but we were just too exhausted on Saturday from a very long day Friday. So, we did the next best thing for Lily, a Bubble party! Truthfully, Lily probably had more fun playing with her new colored bubbles and her water beach ball than she would have had at the beach. Lily is completely obsessed with bubbles.

"Bu-BBLES!" she yells again and again when there are bubbles around. Its super cute. Before we started the bubble party, Lily threw the giant beach ball around the house shouting "Ball, weeeeee, ball, weeeee!" and then had a full melt down when we took it away for a minute to set it up outside. Lily's tantrum quickly faded when she realized she got to play outside with water and bubbles. Her favorites! Unfortunately, the mosquitos have been terrible all summer in our yard, and we havent let Lily play outside that much because she gets eaten alive. Clint just mowed the front yard Saturday morning, so we figured we'd let Lily play out front and see if the mosquitos would be better without all the tall grass to fester in. Lily had such a good time! She had another melt down when we took her inside for a bath, but she loves her tubby time, so she cheered up soon. At 18 months, Lily is becoming very passionate about the things she loves, and she really pitches a fit if you put an end to her fun.

This is the only picture I could get of Lily looking up once the bubbles came out. She makes her focus noise ("Ahhhhhhh") and is in full worker bee mode. So even though she wouldnt smile for the camera, she was having a great time. :)

I have about 30 more pictures of Lily Kate immersed in her bubbles...but I suppose I don't need to post them all! ;) Next weekend I want to attempt making playdough and jello jigglers with Lily...I'll be sure to post pictures, whether or not that goes well!

Lastly, here's Pugsley, me, and 36 weeks worth of belly...