A big boy room and a TON of yardwork

Josh and I took the whole "labor" day thing a little too literally and decided to make it a big work weekend. The original plan had been camping, a big goodbye to summer, but then we realized how much we have to do to prepare for winter this year and how useful a 3 day weekend would be in jump starting that project list.

So jump start we did.

Saturday we mostly spent working on Zeke's new big boy room. I found, a while back, a bedroom set including a captain's bed with a bookshelf headboard, a nightstand, and a dresser for 300 bucks on Craigslist. Josh thought the deal was awesome enough to give me the go-ahead to buy it and the first thing we did this weekend (after breakfast and dissasembling Zeke's crib) was borrow a truck and go pick it up. Then we got right to the job of trying to fit all of that furniture (plus Blueberry's changing table...more on that later) in his rather teeny tiny bedroom.

Unfortunately we never did fit the nightstand. But hey, he has it available for when he moved upstairs into a bigger room.

And all in all I think the room turned out rather snazzy looking (if not exactly belonging in a Pottery Barn magazine). Here it is!
I think my favorite part is those drawers underneath the bed. Soo nice for extra toy storage and Zeke loves putting his toys away in them...we will see how long that lasts.

And what about Blueberry you ask? Well this is the part that really gets us excluded from the Pottery Barn magazine...she wont have a room. You see, we only have 2 main floor bedrooms, and since Zeke doesnt sleep thru the night regularly enough that we feel comfortable with him on a different floor we found ourselves a little stuck as to what to do. Then we realized a nursery is really pure asthetics. So Blueberry's changing table and all her clothes will be on Ezekiel's 4th wall.
And her crib will go on Josh and I's 4th wall. So in our world two 4th walls a bedroom makes.

At least until next winter (when they are 2.5 and 1 respectively) when we will either move Zeke upstairs and Blueberry into his old room or (even better) just move both children upstairs. I say hopefully both because we plan on them sharing a room together as soon as Blueberry is sleeping thru the night enough to go up there and we have this crazy dream that this might happen by the age of 1. It's honestly probably a less crazy dream than that of Zeke sleeping thru the night enough at 2.5...seriously...sometimes I lose hope in that child (we've had another rash of bad nights, grr...and after a good 2 weeks of sleeping too!). But at least at 2 and a half he's freaking old enough to come down to us instead of us having to go to him, lol. It's really all that I'm just way too lazy to trek stairs at 2 am.

So that took up Saturday. What with the fact that I also took the opportunity to get out Ezekiel's winter clothing and his old 1-3 month plastic tub to fill the changing table with Blueberry's first outfits. Plus we had to go out and buy a matress because the one that came with the bedset smelled like cat (gross) and return the truck we had borrowed. Plus, oh yeah, we have a toddler who requires semi constant feeding and playing.

Sunday was designated to yardwork. In particular (and for my part) it entailed creating large piles of sticks and weeds for Josh to collect.

I was pretty diligent.

Just call me the demon barber of Sanson Avenue. I was trimming back bushes (and we have several, all in need of a good trim) like crazy. It took me probably 5 hours, lol, we have sooo many bushes. But I actually love them. Josh and I are both so happy that our kids will have their own "little forest" in the yard. And trimming bushes is pretty fun work, if you ask me. You get to use those giant scissors. Although after 3 or 4 hours I did start to get a little philisophical about the whole thing and feeling really bad about it. I didnt mind the cuts I made for the health of the bush (diseased branches, or to help with air circulation for example) but all those poor branches that I whacked off because they grew the wrong direction and looked funny got me feeling bad. Who am I to say what shape or size the bush should take? Why do I have the right to inhibit nature in that way in a quest for what I think is "beautiful"?

Luckily before I got too sentimental and decided to turn our yard into a bird sanctuary so that we wouldnt legally have to mow anymore (a mayor did that once) Josh tapped my shoulder to bring to my attention that a pretty good storm was blowing in and maybe we should all go inside. I hadnt noticed between my deep thoughts and my war against a paricularly deep rooted weed.

The storm blew over, dissapointingly, in about 15 minutes. But it was about dinner time so we called it a day.

Monday we finished up the weeding and the last bush. After that we were supposed to rototill our garden plot (for next spring) and spread that winter guard fertilizer on the lawn. But we underestimated the size of even the smallest rototill and it looks like we will have to borrow a truck (again) in order to rent one. And we were advised to actually wait a few more weeks to fertalize (even though we were told memorial day and labor day are the times to do it). So we ended up just actually having a bit of a vacation. We will rototill either next weekend or the weekend after, and the fertalizing will take all of a half hour so we'll do that the last time Josh mows for the year.

So even though we ddint get EVERYTHING done, we got a lot done. One more work weekend for the rototilling and putting in more insulation into the house (another chore we have to do) and we will be done.

At least until leaves start falling and we get to rake them. And then, you know, the shoveling of snow. But THEN it will be spring...and we can start planting the new garden...and powerwash the house... Does the work every actually end?!?