art projects to keep mommy busy

I've been busy "nesting" as some people would call it, I say that I'm bored and need something to keep me busy. To each their own, I've been working on a couple projects while daddy is playing Halo and yelling at the TV for most the night. One of my projects that I worked on was closet dividers so that I know which clothes go for which month of age. I've gotten tons of great reviews so I decided I would post up exactly how I created them.

Supplies (these are the supplies I used but of course you can use what you would like to create your own look):

• hot glue gun (Michaels, a cheap one will run you about $10)
• acrylic paint (You can buy this at Michaels, Walmart, any place that has an arts and crafts section. Each paint color will run you about $0.65)
• sharpie marker (Walmart for about $1.00)
• wooden door hangers (Michaels, $0.79 each)
• shower curtain hooks (Walmart, $1.50)
• ready made wooden animals (Michaels, $0.59 each)
• ABC stencil with numbers (Michasels, $2.00)

I don't have the supplies before I created them (I obviously wasn't prepared to share all of this) so I'll only be able to show you the final product. 

Steps that I took to accomplish the final product:

1. I painted each door hanger a color that would look nice with the animals I selected (animals were ready made so they were already colored and finished).
2. Glue the animal onto the door hanger. You can put it anywhere really, you could even try to cover the hole since you don't need the hole to hang the finished product.
3. Using a stencil, I traced the numbers for each divider and then used a sharpie to create a bolder look.
4. Using a hot glue gun (carefully of course), glue the back of your divider and press the shower curtain hook. Add extra glue on top of the hook to make sure that it is secure.

This is the final product without the shower curtain hooks. I created one for each size that most companies use to break down their infant sizing.  

A close up view of the 3-6 months divider. 

The final product hanging in Baby Chon's closet. 

Hope you enjoy and have fun creating your own homemade closet dividers -=) 

am I having a boy or girl?

Here are some old wives tales that help you predict gender of the baby*.

Highs and Lows

This one you can do just by looking south: if you're carrying high, break out the pink. If your bump is low, you're carrying a boy.
GIRL

Be Still My Beating Heart

Next time your OB pulls out the Doppler to listen to baby's heartbeat, ask her to tell you what the heart rate is. According to legend, 140+ beats per minute indicates a girl, and below 140 a boy.
GIRL

Sweet and Sour

Craving ice cream every single day? Some people believe this means it's a girl. If you have to have salty or sour stuff, then it's a boy.
GIRL

Chinese Birth Chart

This ancient method uses your age at conception and the month you did the deed to determine gender. try it here.
BOY

Even and Odd

Legend has it that the Mayans determined a baby's sex by looking at the mother's age at conception and the year of conception. If both are even or odd, it's a girl. If one's even and one's odd, it's a boy.
GIRL

Unlocking the Mystery

This is one for a friend to try. Place a key in front of your preggo friend and ask her to pick it up. If she grabs it by the narrow part, she's in for sugar and spice and all that. If she picks it up by the round part, it's snips and snails.
GIRL

Spot On

If you're breaking out like crazy, blame it on your girl babe. The belief goes that girls steal their mother's beauty, hence, those annoying zits.
BOY

Nice Ring to It

Pop off your wedding ring -- if you still can! -- and tie it to a string. Hang it over your belly. If it swings in a circle, a little guy's in your future. If it goes back and forth, you've got a girl.
I've tried this but really have no clue how this works, so I can't say boy or girl

Queasy Does It

Sick as a dog during the first trimester -- or still? Signs indicate you're having a girl. Little or no morning sickness points to a boy.
BOY


Now that I've done all the tests and told you exactly what I am having, it is your turn to take a poll on the right hand side and tell me if you think I'm having a boy or a girl

*taken from parenting.com

happy third trimester.. 27 weeks

Congratulations on cooking for 27 weeks, we are finally at the home stretch. I can't believe how fast the road has been traveled but then again, it isn't finishing fast enough.

How Far Along: 27 Weeks

Size of Baby: Baby is the size of an eggplant - 13.6 to 4.8 inch, and 1.5 to 2.2 lbs, you're getting BIG! 

Other things baby is up to: Baby's lungs are going through some major developments these days, which (combined with the opening of previously plugged nostrils) means he's now able to practice inhaling or exhaling. The lack of air in your womb means every "breath" is filled with amniotic fluids, but hey -- its progress.

Total Weight Gain/Loss: 17 pounds, I believe but I'll know for sure when I go in for my appointment next week.

Movement: You're not as strong as I thought you'd be, I'm feeling you a ton as I write this but for this week I haven't really felt you as much as I think I should have. But I'm not complaining as long as you're happy in there. 

Sleep: Sleep is great except that I need to wake up to roll over since I can't roll over comfortably anymore. Last Saturday I got one of those cramps in my calf and I wanted to die. I was yelling and screaming at dad to wake up so that he could ease the pain. For 3 days afterwards, it was still tender and sore. I'm eating more bananas now so that I hopefully do not have this happen to me again this pregnancy. 

Symptoms: Not being able to breathe, you are right on my lungs and making it quite hard for me to breathe comfortably. Please move down just a bit so that we can both be comfortable. 

Maternity Clothes: All my tops are now not fitting correctly and bump is getting in the way of covering my whole belly. Please let the warm weather come faster so I can wear dresses!!

Belly Button: still an inny!! but one of these days, I'm sure it will pop. 

Milestones: 3rd trimester is a HUGE milestone, I can't believe its already been 2/3s of the way through pregnancy.

Looking forward to: Today Dad and I are going to the hospital that we will deliver you so that we can see exactly what we're in for. We've both never been to the hospital or have any clue where it is so it'll be nice to see where we will deliver you and also where we will spend our first couple nights as a family.

Next appointment: April 13, 2011 - and I get to take that nasty orange liquid to see if I have gestational diabetes, yippeeee (not). What I'm really looking forward to is that 2 weeks afterwards I'll be able to see you again through an ultrasound which is always an exciting visit. 

Other: The fur babies are driving me crazy! Walnut decided to somehow jump his way onto the counter and eat some bagels, obviously sharing with his brother Pistachio. I can't believe how athletic he is and we still don't know how he even managed to get the bagels off the counter. He might have used the chair to help him somehow but I'm thinking he just jumped and jumped until he got the bag of bagels in his mouth just enough for him to bring the whole thing down. Either way, I can't believe they do these things while we're gone and from now on they are in our room until they grow up some more. Walnut is usually the culprit so I let Pistachio out and the bathroom garbage was ransacked and torn apart, I tell you bones are not enough and they obviously need to keep themselves busy with something else -- maybe if I turn on the TV it'll help them concentrate on something other than tearing the house apart. 

kids say the darnest things

Today, just like most Wednesdays, I went to pick up my little girl S from school. This was our conversation:

S: Lois, do you have any snacks in your car?

Me: Nope. What kind of snacks are you talking about anyways?

S: You know, like those cookies with chocolate or mints.

Me: Nope, I ate all the cookies with you last time and I have no other snacks in my car.

S: You usually always have snacks in your car, you must have been hungry to finish everything.

Me: Yup, or baby must have been really hungry.

S: (giving me a blank stare) Baby must have been hungry? The baby can't eat.

Me: Well the baby gets the food that I eat so when I eat something, the baby also gets to eat.

S: Well how can the baby eat if the baby doesn't even have teeth?

Me: Well, the baby gets the nutrition, not the real food.

S: (completely ignoring my last comment) Well the baby can eat pancakes because pancakes are soft and they don't really need to chew it.

By now I'm cracking up and thinking about how cute she is to really think the baby in my belly is chewing and eating the food that I eat.

S: Well, you shouldn't be eating cookies then because cookies aren't healthy for the baby to eat.

Can you say cute? I really just had to mark this down in my blog so that I always remember the innocence of the youth.

98 days and counting

I'm not going to do my weekly survey since for the most everything is the same from last week. I'm almost the exact same other than the fact that I'm feeling you a lot more than before. One thing though, I would really like to ask you to stop kicking my rib.
Milestone: I am now pregnant and not just fat, I don't get weird stares anymore from spectators wondering if I'm just really big or if I'm indeed pregnant. Glad that one is out the way and I can finally sport the bump.

Tomorrow I am meeting with a family doctor that was referred to me through a member from our church. I'm pretty excited to meet her and see if we like her. If we do, we'll have a doctor for you to meet when you get here! Things are slowly all coming together, I can't believe we only have 98 more days to prepare for your arrival. 

100 days and counting down

Yesterday was my birthday and I had work like usual. My kids made me a peanut butter pie and it was DELICIOUS, even if I don't like peanut butter really. But we all know I like anything sweet right now so it HIT THE SPOT.

I ended work early to take my dogs out for a walk, hang out with them for a little bit before heading to the bulls game. My kids and the dad wanted to take me to the bulls game for my birthday since they were playing.

One man's mistake is another man's gain - Steve (the dad) accidently gave the games tickets away to a business friend instead of keeping them since they never go to the weekday games. What he forgot was that it was my birthday, but more importantly that the kids were on spring break. He just assumed he had the tickets all along and on the way home got a phone call from the wife asking if he had the tickets since the tickets weren't in the book. Well, he didn't have the tickets and that's when it hit him that he gave them away and didn't have tickets to the game. As the 4 year old Shyanne is screaming "daddy forgot about us" and 7 year old Justin is upset that both himself and I cannot go to the game, Steve decided he would look for tickets. Usually it's not a hard thing to look for tickets for weekday games but since its spring break for half of the schools in Chicagoland area, all tickets were sold out at ticketmaster and will call. His last resort was to go to Stub Hub and look for tickets, which he lucked out by finding 4 tickets. The only thing is, instead of using his season tickets, he now had to probably pay anywhere from $75-100 per ticket. Nonetheless, we got to sit in awesome seats right behind one of the hoops in the 100 level. Probably the best seats both Eugene and I have ever sat in for a bulls game. Definitely a WIN for us.

Here is what our view looked like, we were close enough that I could actually see D.Rose' facial expressions.

We didn't win, which was a stinker but it was nice to see the game from somewhere we never have before. Justin cried, he wasn't too happy that the bulls lost and well he's never been to a game where they've lost before. He was yelling "that's unfair, unfair, unfair" and it made Eugene and I realize the fanship in Justin. He is a true, loyal fan and he's probably more true to his Bulls than half the people on the stands, and he's only 7 years old. It also helps that he actually understands how to play basketball and is really quite good at playing as well.

______________________________________________

Onto the real great exciting news, today March 29 marks 100 more days left till your expected arrival. I'm hoping and praying that you do come somewhere near the date, please don't take an extra week or 2. I'd really like you to come out on time but if not don't wait too long. I can't believe earlier on in the pregnancy I was counting down for 200+ days and now we're only at 100 days left. Time sure is flying and I can't believe how close we are to the final stretch, this calls for a celebration! 

we're tired of papayas, good thing you've graduated to an eggplant

How Far Along: 25 Weeks

Size of Baby: Baby is the size of an eggplant - 13.6 to 4.8 inch, and 1.5 to 2.2 lbs, you're getting BIG! 

Other things baby is up to: You may not hear baby's heartbeat by just putting ear to belly (no stethoscope required). Inside the womb, the formation of the tiny capillaries is giving baby a healthy pink glow. Baby's also soaking up your antibodies, getting the immune system ready for life outside of the womb. Eyes are forming, and baby will soon perfect the blink -- perfect for batting those freshly grown lashes. 

Total Weight Gain/Loss: I'll go off the scale that I have at work, if that's the case I've gained 16 pounds throughout the pregnancy.

Movement: Getting tons of action from the little one. A little bit more than usual so that definitely brightens my day when I feel baby kicking and squirming inside. Nobody will understand the feeling of movement unless you are a mother or pregnant -- it's the most indescribable, amazing feeling. 

Sleep: I've been getting great sleep, probably thanks to the new place. I'm no longer really stressed about the move and can finally sleep and not worry about much. 

Symptoms: Nope, still lucking out with this one. Wait, I take that back, I get acid reflex which REALLY sucks. 

Maternity Clothes: Yep, just a few tops here and there, I'm still in my stretchy pants. Thank goodness I don't have to wear nice clothes to work. 

Belly Button: still an inny and looking the same. 

Milestones: I am finally in my 6th month of pregnancy! 

Looking forward to: I can't say I'm really looking forward to it, but my birthday is on Monday so I guess I'm looking forward to spending time with my friends and Eugene. On Saturday I'm having a birthday dinner/open house at my house with my family and Eugene's family and my little kid is having his 7th birthday party at his house so we might stop by for a little bit. On Sunday my church is having a bowling tournament. And then on my actual birthday, my kids are taking me to the Bulls game since they're playing on my birthday. Tuesday I'm having my small group from church come over for dinner/open house so that they can see the new place and I can cook them yummy Korean food. 

Next appointment: April 13, 2011 - and I get to take that nasty orange liquid to see if I have gestational diabetes, yippeeee (not). What I'm really looking forward to is that 2 weeks afterwards I'm having another ultrasound which will be exciting!

Other: I'm meeting my mom to get the curtain fabric and fabric for the glider so I'm pretty excited to how that's all going to come out. It'll be nice to have a print that is unique and special just for you.