First Halloween

Like I mentioned in my last post, James has started noticing his hands.  After taking his 6 month pictures I had him lying on the bed still and he started doing it, and I managed to get a few shots.  Yay!  This completely steals my heart.

He caught me.

(My bedroom is definitely in WIP mode.  It drives me nuts, but home improvement is hard.)
Here are some pictures of James' halloween costume.  He is a parrot.  I made it myself, using this tutorial as a starting point.  It's not perfect and was done in a rush because I'm a huge procrastinator, but I feel pretty good about how it turned out.

Taken by my mom's iphone because we were at her house.

And here we are together at the stake halloween party.  I was a pirate because OF COURSE I WAS A PIRATE.  I just can't knock the habit.

He must have really been channeling his inner parrot because he made squawking noises all night.  Of course he had ripped off and tried to eat a few of the feathers before we even made it to the party.  I guess he needed to molt. 

And I forgot what else I was going to say.  It's been one of those days.

THE GREAT PAINTED RUG

This feeling of finishing things I start is way way good.  Like put it in a bowl and pour milk on it and eat it every morning good.

I suckerpunched that painted rug out of the way, and now I'm going to show it to you.

Here's an in-progress shot:

It took way more paint and time than I thought it would, but all told it wasn't very much/long.  Maybe one half to three quarters of that quart of paint, and probably but not quite an hour?  I mean, it was a labor of love, don't get me wrong.  Scooting my fat belly back and forth across that rug got old halfway through, which is why we have this picture at all.

Anecdotal side note: Tony was making mac & cheese while I was painting, and when he came in to check on me he said "It looks like mac & cheese," which it does, and I know that's what I'm going to think of every time I look at it.  Which kind of makes it less charming, in my opinion?

Anyway, here's the finished bedazzling, NOT mac-and-cheesey masterpiece:

 Shazam!

Including this angle so you can see the yellow with the grey wall.  I think it looks smashing.

Including this angle because why the heck not?  Also it's a nice detail shot.  I was nervous going into the actual painting because I wasn't certain the paint wouldn't bleed under the tape, and I was very much not certain it wouldn't look like crap once it was done.  I mean, those lines are not perfectly spaced, people.  So I held my breath when I ripped the first bit of tape off, and lo and behold but I was pleased!  Not only did the lines hold perfectly, but you can't even tell that there is very little precision going on.  (Well, maybe you can, but don't tell me that.  I'm perfectly content seeing what I want to see.)  Even Tony stood back and said "To be honest, I didn't think it was going to work."  Confidence appreciated, sir.

So, some things if I were to do this again, or if I were smarter the first time around:

1. The paint is a little rough to the bare foot.  We're hoping it'll break in with some wear and maybe some vigorous rolling up of the rug, but I suspect if I had mixed in some sort of fabric medium with the paint maybe this wouldn't be a problem?

2. Um...I can't think of any more.  Brain cells, you know.

For those interested, the paint I used was Sun Ray by Behr, in a flat enamel finish.  I didn't want paint with a gloss to it because I thought it would look weird, and the flat enamel is (supposedly) much more durable than straight up flat, which is good because it's a rug and all.

Thursday the man with all the tools mounted my curtain rods, so next on the list is: curtains, and blinds for that one window.

And that's that.

RUGS AND BUNNIES AND YES, MORE PREGNANCY WHINING

Okay, so, the first half of yesterday was productive.  The second half was spent sitting on my bed, staring into space, trying to muster the energy to get dressed and go to the store.  It's been the frustrating dichotomy of being pregnant: the desire to do more than normal, and the energy level to do much less.  I guess they call it nesting?  I call it an irrational worry that enough things won't get done before the baby comes.  I'm not really worried; I know we'll all survive if his room isn't completely finished by the time he arrives.  But I'm also okay riding the nesting wave and letting it push me to begin and finish projects all in one go.  I find I do best with a deadline, and this is a tactic I'm going to have to use if I ever want to get the rest of my house put together.

Slightly off-topic: I, after like a year of talking about it, bought a whole, new, matching set of sheets in a good color.  This may mean nothing to you, but it's the greatest thing in the world to me.  I might even be sleeping better.

Anyway, I wanted to share some of the fruits of my labors from yesterday morning.  First is the painted chevron rug project I'm doing.  I'm sure most of you have seen some form of this DIY.  This is the one that inspired me, and this is what I have so far:

Practically finished!  Or not.  Most of my time yesterday was spent figuring out how to evenly measure things on a rug that is not even on all sides, which is SO HARD TO DO with pregnancy brain.  So this was my solution: a twine grid measured only with my eyeballs.  I don't have the right kind of tape or else I would be working on it right now, but I plan to mark all the places where the twine crosses and use those to place the points of the chevrons.  Very mathematic and such.  I'm just hoping it doesn't turn out looking too DIY, you know?  I also don't know what color to paint it.  I'm trying to decide between a deep teal and a more rustic yellow-orange.  Thoughts?

A SIDE NOTE ABOUT CHEVRONS: I don't know why I'm jumping on this trend bandwagon.  Let's not call it jumping.  Let's call it lightly touching upon.  Most of you may not know about my innate disdain for trend following for the sake of trend following.  (I disdain it.)  But for some reason I really liked the look of the rug I linked to above and like the bold, graphic detail it will, with hope, add to the nursery I'm designing.  Also, I hate the word nursery.   I don't know why I used it.

But enough about that. 

The other thing I have to share I'm actually a little nervous to share, just cause it's been a while since I've painted something and art is very personal.  But I like the way this painting turned out and I'm excited to have something to put on my baby's wall that came directly from me.

Apologies for the flash glare. 
I tried really hard to not make it too girly, but obviously not very hard because there are a lot of flowers you know.  It's not very big, probably 9x12.  I don't know if I want to get it framed or not, and I'm debating if I want to make a companion painting cause I have another canvas the same size.

So many debates!  It's exhausting being me sometimes.