Mantel Decor.

My sister came and stayed with us for 9 days. It was so good to see her! It had been over a year since I had seen her. Too long... She met Camden for the first time and got to know Weston. She hadn't seen him since he was 9 weeks old. She was tremendously helpful with the kids. I am still overwhelmed and exhausted trying to figure out how to balance 2 kids under 2. It's a work in progress! Hopefully one day I'll figure it out and not go crazy every day. She helped me make a pom pom garland while she was here to spruce up my boring mantel. I think it's really fun and happy. Here's some pics of it. Thanks for coming Haley! 

A Few Christmasy Things

So we bought a house a couple of weeks ago! Anyway, more on that later. I also need to post about Thanksgiving. Anyway, I didn't really have any money to get Christmas decor this year, and I needed a little artwork above the mantel. I had this yellow foam board on hand and just cut a quick tree out of some wrapping paper and glued it on. It's not straight and not smoothed on the foam board very well, but I think it adds a fun touch of funky whimsy. I love the Holidays. On Monday we are getting a fresh tree. Yay! So happy to have a mantel for the first time and actually hang stockings etc...

Texas Apartment: Bedroom/Nursery

Here are the last two spaces in our apartment. I was so excited for Wes to have his own room! It was so hard when it came time for him to sleep when he just slept in a pack n play next to our couch in the living room in NYC. It has taken him some time to get used to sleeping in a crib. His new trick is to stand himself up in his crib. I hate this! It's very cute to come in there and see him standing, but he doesn't know how to sit himself back down after he stands and it keeps him up! He just stands in there screaming. Haha. Anyway, it was fun to decorate a little room for him. It also doubles as a guest room because we had an extra bed from NYC. I wish the bed weren't in there, but we had no where else to put it. It needs bedding on it still and I am still going to add some book shelves and a place for his stuffed animals, but other than that it's pretty much done. The only new pieces are the changing table and crib. Most of the stuff I already had. One day I hope to be able to design a dream nursery just how I'd like it, but until then, this one works! 

Our bedroom actually isn't totally put together either, but I took some shots of just the bed and nightstands. We didn't have a headboard, so I just used a big picture of NYC to act as a headboard. I did buy new bedside lamps and an Eiffel Tower Canvas, other than that nothing in our room is new. 

Texas Apartment: Living Room/Dining Room

We are mostly done with our 2 bedroom apartment here in Houston. It's the biggest apartment we've had so far at 960 square feet. It's a little older, especially the kitchen and bathroom, but they put in new carpet before we moved in. I probably wouldn't be so done with our place but we had help unpacking and stuff from my parents. I am so grateful for all their help. It was kind of hard blending our old stuff that we had in storage in CA with the new stuff we bought in NYC. I had different tastes back then and a different color scheme going. I only bought a few new things. This is 95% our old stuff just blended together and definitely on a budget. It's not perfect, but I think it turned out fun. I'm going to add some different wallpaper to the oriental screen to make it more modern. We are using an old patio table for our dining room table for now. Haha! We are hoping to buy a home here in the near future, so we didn't want to buy stuff for this apartment only to not have it work in our new home. I will post the baby's room and our bedroom in the next post.

My pillows arrived!

John's mom shipped us some of our pillows from our old apartment. She also put in there a quilt we had and those two colorful bird artwork pictures. I'm so happy they arrived right in time for my b- day today! Yay! John put together the nightstands and now there is some more color in the bedroom. I put a yellow pillow on the chair in the living room to tie in the yellow from the taxi picture above our couch.

For my birthday, John made me breakfast this morning and he is making me dinner right now! Thanks babe! I think we will go get dessert at the River Walk Grill. I can't believe I'm 28! I feel so old! Well actually I sound old and feel like I'm 21 still. I guess that is good! ; ) Hope you all have a great weekend. We will be watching the BYU Vs. Utah game tonight. Go Cougars!

NYC Apartment!

We are almost all done with our apartment. There are some boxes left to unpack and some more furniture pieces to put together, but we are pretty much done. We had 5 big carts at IKEA. It was quite the sight! It makes me laugh seeing the pic of all the boxes! My mom, dad, and I worked like dogs to get it basically finished before they took off. My dad put together all the furniture while John was at school and my mom and I did the finishing touches. My dad put up the curtain rods and helped hang the pictures. I love how different this apartment looks than all of our other ones. It feels like a "city" apartment. It's tight in the bedroom, but the kitchen/living room has plenty of space in it. I am loving it so far. I'm so grateful for my parents and all the help they gave us! I went to the doctor today and she was better/nicer than I thought she would be considering her bad reviews online. She was a little worried that my stomach was measuring small, so she sent us next door to get an ultra sound to see how much the baby weighs. It had me a little worried. We went and had the ultra sound after waiting almost 2 hours to be seen. So annoying... They said he looked good and he is weighing 4.7 pounds. So I am glad he is growing normal. I will post pics later when it gets all finished. I hope you like it!

Flower Pillow

I got this gray flower petal pillow a little while back and thought I'd show you it. I love how Carlyle is checking it out. I guess she approves?