Final Nursery - sorry I'm late!

Sorry this took so long, but I forgot that I hadn't done a final nursery post.

Every time I go into Ezra's room it makes me so happy.  It came out just as I had imagined.  Ezra seems to love it in there, too, he's usually pretty happy on his changing table or just laying in his crib looking at the crib bumper.

I love the way the paint, fabrics, and woodwork go together.  I'm surprised that I was actually able to pull off a halfway decent bumper, skirt, and valences.  The saying over the crib says "Every good and perfect gift comes from above" just to remind me where my little baby came from.  The basket on the floor has all of the newborn size clothes that was given to me that Ezra never fit into, I'm thinking once I find a place for all his old clothes, I'll be putting blankets or books in there.

We use this armoire to hold all his blankets, sheets, burp cloths, receiving blankets, and towels.  I also have some baskets inside with hats, gloves, and other miscellaneous items.  The swing in the corner is on loaner from a good friend, we actually ended up being given another identical one that lives in our living room, and Ezra LOVES it.  It's kind of the Cadillac of swings - it has all the features and you can even hook up an iPod to it.  The frames on the wall are one of my favorite things - it has a small frame for each month - can't wait to fill it up and see how he changes each month.

This is kind of my "baby hub" it's where we spend most of our baby time right now.  All of Ezra's clothes are in the drawers.  Just because I've always loved to know how other people organized their itty bitty baby clothes: the top drawer has sleepers, cotton on one side fleece on the other, the second drawer has a basket in the middle for socks and white onsies, pants on one side of the basket and shirts on the other.  The third drawer has diaper related things and things that aren't in use yet (i.e. wipes, baby monitor, some toys, and plastic bags for the trash). 

The top drawer on the right hold the wipes and disposable diapers, the basket on top holds cloth diapers, and the compartment on the bottom has all bath products (soap, lotion, diaper cream) and any cloth diaper stuff that I'm not using right now.  The cloth diaper pail is on the left and his hamper is on the right. 

Eventually we'll move the rocking recliner from our bedroom to this corner when he starts sleeping in here and the night stand will go underneath the painting (that I did myself to match the fabrics).  All of his books, scrapbook, baby book, and picture album are in the night stand.  I'd like to get a small lamp for here, too, for when I'm feeding him at night or just rocking him back to sleep. 

The closet was difficult for me to organize because our generous family and friends gave us lots of stuff and some of it we can't use right away so it's a little bit of a mess.  But I love the fabric boxes for storage, and at least you can't really see what's going on in there.  I have one for all breastfeeding stuff, one for all first aid stuff, one for all his newborn cloth diapers that he doesn't wear anymore, and one for random stuff with no home. 

I'm finding out quickly that I don't really like to have to hang up clothes, so it stays hung when its new but then moves into his drawers after it's been washed.  So the clothes that are hanging up mostly haven't been worn.  I put a lot of the stuff we aren't using right away on the top and I have a container of all the clothes we have that's too big for him right now. 

Shutterfly Christmas Cards

I did say in my last post that I would do shameless plugs for free stuff, so here's one of them!

A friend forwarded me a link to Shutterfly, where bloggers can get 50 free 5x7 Christmas cards for free if they do a shameless plug on their blog.  So here it is ;)

I actually am a big fan of Shutterfly, really, and have used their service to print many prints; you can even have them sent to a local Target for pick up for free.  I also love their photo books, and I'm excited to try out their cards for Christmas this year.  This is the first time we'll be sending out cards and I can't wait to put Ezra's cute little face on them!

I really love this one, the wording and everything.  Favorite #1

I plan to get photos of Mike and I twirling just like the girls in the picture (I kid, I kid) But I do think Ezra's baby face (and maybe some dogs too??) would be just as cute Favorite #2

I love the Christmas tree on this one Favorite #3

We all know if they had a Charlie Brown card, that's definitely the one I'd pick.  So, since this is the first official day of the Christmas Season in my house, Merry Christmas!!

Our Favorite Things - 1 month

Another idea that I'm stealing from some blogs that I like to read... (and I guess from Oprah, except you're not all getting these products, sorry I'm not that famous)  Trust me, these are truthful, I'm not getting paid by anyone to sell you anything (but I'm not against doing shameless plugs for free stuff) ;)

BumGenius 4.0 with snaps

I'm loving my cloth diapers!!

I'm going to hold off on a full fledged review of the ones that I've been using, but I will say that my BumGenius with snaps are my favorite so far.

I've only had 1 leak with them, and that's because I was a neglectful mom and left him in the diaper for like 4 hours (where was my mind that morning).  I am looking forward to using the regular size inserts and not the newborn ones because I'm thinking they look much more absorbent.

As far as washing, I haven't had any problems.  Cold rinse, hot wash with 2nd rinse, covers hang in the baby's room over night, inserts in the dryer for 20 minutes.  I've only been doing laundry every other day, and using disposables at night or if/when I run out of these.

I've tried using my softbums when I run out, but I just don't like those as much.  I'm going to try them with some larger, more absorbent inserts to see if that helps me like them more.

I do prefer the snaps over aplix/velcro because you don't end up with diapers and inserts all stuck together in the wash (even when I use the laundry tabs this still happens!).  Just a preference, I still love my BumGenius with aplix!

Soothie pacifier

These are recommended by lactation consultant for breastfed babies to help prevent nipple confusion.  They're also latex free, one piece, and made from hospital grade silicone.  They are the ones that some hospitals give to babies.

Ezra took this pacifier one week after he had been born with no problems.  We haven't had any kind of issues with nipple confusion or him refusing to take my nipple.

I am not a pacifier advocate, and I'm already having anxiety about having to take it away from him in a few months, but it definitely helps calm him when he's really upset and helps him to fall asleep when he's tired but fighting it.

Also, it gives my nipples a break because he is definitely a nursing-for-comfort baby and I think he'd be attached to my boob if I wasn't careful.

Circo socks from Target

Yes, these socks are on my favorites list.  You can laugh at me, it's ok.

Socks for a newborn have to be one of the most irritating and frustrating things.  No one likes to have cold feet, I'm sure Ezra doesn't either, but it took me almost 4 weeks of his life to find socks that actually stay on his feet, no matter how much he moves them around.

Sometimes I feel like a crazy sock obsessed mother
"You dropped his sock"
"Where's his sock?"
"Oh no, his sock is falling off"

He doesn't like me to put socks on him, he screams.  When I'm hungry, I don't want you to take a minute to put your sock on before you feed me.  I don't know how many times I've almost dropped him trying to pick up a freaking sock off the floor.  And I'm already finding friendless newborn socks strewn around the house.  I prefer clothes with feet, but I love the cute little outfits I have for him and most of them are footless.

So these socks are a dollar a pair, but they do not fall off.  Not even all day.  Not even when I take his pants off.

They even have grips on the bottom in case he decides to make a run for it, he'll have traction on the hardwoods.

Graco Pack 'n Play with Newborn Napper

This lives in our room right now and Ezra is sleeping in it.

The best feature of this pack 'n play is the newborn napper.  It has an attachment for a light, music, nature sounds, and a vibration setting.  Ezra LOVES the vibration setting and mom and dad would probably get less sleep if it didn't have this setting.

The newborn napper on the top, hugs him perfectly (although he's almost grown out of it) and we can usually get him from almost asleep to passed out with a push of the vibrations button.

I'm a little worried about putting him in his crib eventually because his crib does not have a vibrations setting.  EEK.

The First Years Newborn to Toddler bath tub

Now that Ezra has the cutest belly button ever, we get to take real baths, and I love this tub.

It fits almost perfectly in our kitchen sink (it's a little funny because our counter top sits on top of the sink, so it's higher on the counter side than in the middle, we have a double sink) and Ezra gets to look out the window while he bathes.

It has a handy newborn sling that goes in it too, but my baby is too big for it.  He sits right in the water and kicks his feet.  I like that it holds his butt and keeps him upright, for the most part, but he does end up leaning over to one side and is not usually happy about it.  Also, it will supposedly grow with him - when he can sit up, he'll sit on the other side.

It's a good size, too, not too big.  Some of the tubs are HUGE.  It has a nice plug in the bottom that you can pull to drain the water and I keep his body wash and lotion in the little compartment at the end so I have everything I need in one place.  Plus, it's only $20 bucks, I love a bargain!



I'm hoping in our next installment of our favorite things, I'll be able to add some things that Ezra actually likes, but right now it's really just my favorite things.  He's not really interested in his toys yet, so maybe he'll have a few favorites at 2 months. 

P.S. I know it's supposed to be Wordless Wednesday but I'm hoping to get a good picture with Daddy for his birthday tonight, so you might get Wordless Wednesday later today or tomorrow. :)