Chicago in April

The first week of April, we headed to Chicago for 4 days. I knew it would be hard to travel with two kids later on this year so I wanted to go back and visit my parents before I couldn't travel anymore. I made it just in time as I was 32 weeks during the visit and I think the cutoff for flight travel is 32 weeks.

This trip was very Anderson oriented as we hit the spots and sights we thought he would really like. We took advantage of the free night at the Chicago Children's museum on Thursday night (as did a lot of people). This was a great museum (albeit kinda crowded) because it's made for kids and I didn't have to worry about things being destroyed or where he was going. It was a place made for kids to climb, explore, tear apart, etc...

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If there was one thing he loved, it was this excavation pit. They had bark made of recycled tires and kids could pretend they were digging up a dinosaur. The whole looking for a dinosaur thing was totally lost on Anderson. But he did know that he could play with bark and could dig. Two things he loves to do. Oh, and throwing bark. We literally had to drag him out of here kicking and screaming so he we could check out the other exhibits.

Those carrots aren't real kiddo.

The next day, we spent the day at the John Shedd Aquarium. The morning was a little rough since we had to spend quite a bit of time in line, but once we were inside he LOVED it. He loved seeing all the animals, particularly the octopus. It was funny though because being the cautious kid he is, he wanted to get close but not too close, and he wanted to be held the entire time. And when we came home, all the animals we saw at the aquarium were all he could talk about - sharks, dolphins, whales, octopus! He even got his first movie experience with a 10-15 minute movie of Planet Earth. He wouldn't wear the 3D glasses but he loved it anyway. He even had his cheerios and water out while watching the movie to complete his movie experience. And when the movie was over, he just looked around at all the people leaving and said "more movie!"



He didn't want to touch anything or get too close to anything in the aquarium except for this. A wall of star fish with people that donated money. He was all over this.



Our last day in Chicago was a beautiful day. So much so that we were able to walk to Millenium Park to see the bean.

Doesn't this kid look great in yellow??



Let me tell you something about Anderson. He loves himself. He truly, truly loves himself. He loves looking at pictures of himself, he loves looking in the mirror and seeing himself, and he really does think he's just about the cutest thing alive (he is). So when he got to the bean, he loved it. It was Anderson all over all the time!

Super Franks

Now that I'm on maternity leave, I thought I'd try to take some time and catch up on what's been going on with the Jang family of three before we become a family of four!

Early April, we went to Wilson's cousin's son's 2nd birthday party at Super Franks in the Bay Area. Super Franks is a Chuck E Cheese like place - minus the gigantic rat. It has a play area for toddlers, arcade games, etc... Neither Wilson and I have stepped foot into a Chuck E Cheese (or anything similar) in ages - since we were kids so we really didn't know what to expect. Well, we walked in and I think all 3 of ours jaws dropped. We were dumbfounded. There were so many people and kids running around we didn't know what to do, what to say, where to go. Finally, a hostess was kind enough to see this small family frozen at the door and asked if they could help us. They directed us into the right direction and all was good.

Anderson is naturally a cautious kid, especially in new environments so he clung to us for most of the time. But he did explore during the open gym/mat play time area a little bit on his own.




I do think his favorite part of the whole party was eating the cheese pizza, drinking juice and then having ice cream cake. By the time pizza was served, he was starving. So much so that he ate 1.5 pieces of pizza, drank all his juice and then tried to take another kid's juice when she wasn't looking! He didn't even pay attention to the fact that "Cars" was on TV. He was too busy stuffing his face.

Fairytale Town

After many weekends of doing errands and working on our own projects, we decided that it was high time to do something for Anderson. Something fun especially for him. We thought maybe an Easter egg hunt might be fun, but after we got to the park for the scheduled Easter egg hunt and there was no hunt to be found, we thought it best to scrap it and go to Fairytale Town which was in the same park. It was a beautiful day and he had tons of fun running around going from slide to slide, seeing all the different farm animals and just running. The place is geared towards toddlers and kindergarteners so it was the perfect place for him. He had SO much fun and didn't want to leave, but daddy had enough after 1.5 hours (the place isn't that big but we do some slides multiple times) and was getting hungry. And Macau Cafe (a good Chinese restaurant) was just across the street.

I think this one was in the Hiawatha tent...maybe from Peter Pan. This is one of the few pictures with Anderson smiling!

Anderson and daddy looking at the BIG cow! MOO!!!

Driving the tractor.

When you ask Anderson to smile, this is what he does. Sticks his tongue out.

Playing in the crooked mile house, which he did all by himself! The crooked "mile" was just a small sidewalk that when up and down and had some twists and turns. He was a little hesitant about some the the downs and twists and held my hand for some of it, but he did it and was really proud of himself.


And of course there were cut-outs. You all know how I feel about those. This time, I was able to get into the action on some of them.

Why does mommy keep making me do these? They are no fun.

He loved sitting on these horses even though they did nothing at all. But he wanted to sit on all the different ones.

One of the many slides we went on. He likes to go down by himself. When it's a new slide or he's hesitant about it, he'll go down backwards like this.

And since he didn't want to go all the way around to get to the top of the slide, he decided he'd rather walk up the slide. It's faster.

Finished Projects!

I did have some time last night to take pictures of some of our finished projects. These projects were really easy to do.

First, the crayon roll: After spending over an hour in line at Joann's to have fabric cut (yes! over an hour), it took less than that to cut and sew this little baby which I am quite proud of. It was actually really easy to do once I figured it out. I followed a tuturial I found online and made slight changes according to ones I had seen on etsy that I liked and voila! A crayon roll that holds 16 crayons!

Next up is the scrapbook cutout art project. Previously, I showed this as small little hearts. I wasn't feeling the hearts too much and looked through the stencils we did have that came with Anderson's packet of construction paper. It was either a bird or butterfly. Wilson voted for butterfly. I took a look at the scrapbook paper I had on hand leftover from Anderson's birthday and started cutting out shapes while watching TV. I bought some pale pink scrapbook paper at Michaels along with this frame and mat and voila! Art for the little girl. It isn't perfect but it's not too bad either. It's something for the walls.

Oh, and let's talk about these frames. What did we do before blogs? Seriously. I found out about these frames from Michaels through one of my blogs I follow (Little Green Notebook). She's an actual interior designer and she mentioned these frames she buys at Michaels that come in a double pack that were really cheap. Then she buys a mat and it looks great. "Really cheap" is a relative term, especially when it comes to interior designers. They think $40 a yard for fabric is not a bad price. I think $10 a yard is at the top end of my budget. So imagine my surprise when I go to Michaels and check out these "really cheap" frames and they are $7 for 2 11x14 frames!! I go over to the mat section and select a simple white mat for $3.50. So, for this whole project, I spent a little over $8 including taxes. And I will definitely be getting those frames again. I think they also come in black. And I imagine that you could spray paint the white ones whatever color you wanted.

Okay, next up is the Name/Alphabet art that I showed you all a mock-up for. I was lazy and decided to just get it printed up at work on our color laser printer. I brought in some cardstock from home, printed it up and popped it into the other Michaels frame with a mat. And here it is! I tried to take a semi-artistic picture of it just like the people on etsy. If you look closely at the printing, you can see it's not great but I just wanted to see what it will look like. And for right now, it doesn't look too bad. When I get the time, I'll actually get it printed and it'll look a whole lot better. I could probably blow it up a little and pop it into an Ikea frame.

Coming Off the Rails

Before we put Anderson in his twin bed, we decided it would be best to do the transition in baby steps. So we took off the front part of his convertible crib and turned it into a toddler bed. We knew the transition wasn't going to be easy, but we didn't know it would be difficult. At first, during the day, Anderson loved being able to climb into his own bed at any given time. He would even bring books and sit in his bed and read. It was a much different story at bedtime. The little boy that would happily say "night-night" to his mommy and talk/play in his crib before going to sleep now cried when I turned off the lights and had to be coaxed into getting in his bed. The first couple of nights, we stayed with him in his room, thinking he just needed awhile to get used to his new environment, even though everything was the same except the front rail was off. We created a mound/hill of pillows so that if he rolled off, it would be a soft landing. And he rolled off many many times. Every night actually. In fact, one morning, I couldn't open the door to his room and only when I looked down on the floor did I see that it was Anderson on the floor:


I let him be and waited a couple minutes until he moved and was then able to open the door. This kid moves a lot when he sleeps!

So after a few nights staying with him, we decided that it was enough. He could sleep on his own. Well, he didn't want to. He would come out of his room, wanting to play, making his way in his little blanket sleeper and we would dutifully lead him back to his bed. Then it became a game to him. He would peek outside the door, and then take off! Running either to you or in the other direction. Usually, we would end up giving up after 45 minutes of this game. Not only were we tired of playing it, but he was SO riled up from it and he couldn't calm down. So, we gave in, stayed in his room with him, usually holding his hand and pretending to sleep.

Then, we got the baby gate. Every night, we put up the gate at his doorway so he can't get out anymore. The first night was rough. He stood at the gate for about 30 minutes and cried while we hid out of view. He eventually gave up and fell asleep on his mound of pillows. The next night, it was 10 min. of crying and then he climbed back into his bed and fell asleep.

Now, he's in his twin bed and the gate is still up. He still cries at the gate for about 5 minutes, then decides to climb back into his bed with a book, reads, and then falls asleep. But it seems as though it's getting better. He no longer screams at when I put down the last book and tell him it's time to go to sleep. He whines a little but that's about it. He gets into bed with his bear and hippo and waits for mommy to climb in with him and sing him some songs. It's still hard to hear his cry but I know he's fine. I know it's just an adjustment period. I know he will eventually go to sleep when he's ready. As soon as we feel like he might be asleep, we peek in there ever so carefully, cover him with a blanket and wonder how our little baby grew up so fast.

Oh, sorry there aren't any pictures of the finished bed quite yet. It's just that when there is actually time to take pictures of things, he's usually sleeping in it!

Goodbye Old Friend

With Wilson starting a new job (and receiving a new company car) there was just no need to keep this little car around. This car has been with us (or Wilson) quite awhile. I think since 2002! Yikes. Time sure flies by. It's made the trip out to Chicago and back to California. It's seen it's way all over Northern California. For awhile, it was my commuter car to work since it got such great gas mileage (almost 38 mpg!). I even learned how to drive manual on this car. But now that Wilson has the company car and I/we are carrying very precious cargo these days, we decided it was time to see this one go.

It was posted onto craigslist at around 1:30pm a few weeks ago and by 4:30pm, Wilson had already received 12 emails about the car!! We were surprised that so many people would be interested in a 1998 Saturn, with manual transmission and manual everything. And when I say everything, I mean everything. NO power steering, no power locks, no power windows. There's not even a tape player. It's just AM/FM radio with the numbers of the preset stations mostly rubbed off. But it runs well (in fact I was driving it to work when we didn't have a company car) and gets great gas mileage. But it seems as though in this economy, people were looking for a good priced car with great gas mileage. We listed the car according to the blue book value we found online and it was sold for that price.

The first potential buyer we saw tried to haggle with us, giving us her sad story about how she had 4 kids and was starting her own business. Blah, blah, blah. She might have been telling the truth, she might have been playing it up so that we could sell it to her for $200 less than the price we were asking. But in my opinion, you should be willing to pay the full price if the seller keeps saying no. We said no, she walked away. The next buyer came to take a look, actually stated that it was actually a great price for the car and paid the full price in cash. Done deal.

Although I can't say that I am too sad to see this car go, it has been a good car to us. Very reliable and dependable. Got me safely to work and back. Hope you continue to live a long and happy life. And if I happen to see you on the street (the buyer only lives 5 min. from us), I'll give you a little wave.

Crayon Roll

Just want I need. Another project. As though I don't have enough to do around here.

By the way, we have been busy and have actually completed quite a number of projects. Twin bed - done and put into Anderson's room! In fact, he's been sleeping on his new bed since Sunday night. New twin duvet for Anderson - done! Name/Alphabet art - done and printed! (Just need to frame) Butterfly art - done and framed! Just need to take pictures of all these to show the world.

Anyway, we are on our way to Chicago to visit my parents in two weeks and I'm already thinking about how to entertain the little guy on the 4 hour flight. I used to think traveling with an infant was hard. Now I know that it's a piece of cake. Have them fall asleep right before the flight and you're golden. A toddler on the other hand, now that's difficult. They don't understand the concept of sitting still and not running around everywhere. Oh, and they throw tantrums or start to cry when they don't get their way. Fun times. Really fun times.

One of the things Anderon loves to do is art. Whether it be playing with play-doh, coloring with crayons or dot paint, he loves it. Quite the artistic little man. We even hang up his dot paint art on our living room wall (which is completely devoid of any artwork) and he stands in front of them in awe. Says "Wow! So pretty! Anderson did it!" One obvious form or entertainment then would be to bring some crayons and paper/coloring book. Easy enough. Then I remember a friend showing me some crayon rolls on etsy that she was going to get for her nieces and nephews for Christmas. I ventured over there, looked at them. They are all super cute with great fabrics. But I started thinking.....geez, that looks really easy to make. (I also suppose I'm coming off my high at my lovely twin duvet I made for Anderson, thinking I'm a great seamstress!) I then googled "Crayon roll tutorial" and sure enough. It is easy to make! So, I'm going to take a crack at it. Hopefully I'll be able to find a few pieces of cute fabric this weekend and in the words of the great Tim Gunn "Make it work!"

If this does work out, then I suspect that many of Anderson's friends will be getting these as gifts in the near future :)

Art Mockup

Ok, I was able to do a mock-up on Powerpoint of the artwork I posted below. What do you think? In looking at it, I wish the name was larger, but with it being such a long name, it could only be so big without it needing to go into 2 lines. I think that's my only gripe about it now. But, for 30 mins. worth of work, and I'll try printing it on a quality color laser printer on cardstock, it's not bad, right? And to think that I could easily change the name on top and/or colors of the letters if someone wanted a specific color scheme!

Trader Joe's Dark Chocolate Pretzel Slims

These things, are ridiculously good.

Wilson is not a fan of dark chocolate which means more for me! I gave one to Anderson and it put a big smile on his face.

Butterfly Chandelier

Another super cute idea that could be done for the new baby girl's room! Found on The Mother Huddle via Ohdeedoh. She gives a step by step on how to make it. It looks pretty easy. Just time consuming.

More Possible DIY Art

As I was trolling around the internet, I happened upon an Ikea hack of a dresser that someone did that turned out really nice. So nice that maybe someday, I might do the same thing (although I do remember browsing the Ikea catalog awhile ago and thinking that I could do something with that dresser). Anyway, this person happens to have her own business, pennypeople designs, that sells these personalized art on etsy. Cute huh? I like it. And at $25 for a 13 x 19 print, it's a good price. But then I checked out shipping: $25!!! Maybe it's because she's in Canada that it's so expensive to ship to the US.

But the more I look at it, it's pretty simple. It's just the name on top and the letters in different colors and sizes underneath. Could I do this? Of course I'd have to send it out to get it professionally printed, but I don't see it being too difficult to whip up in Microsoft publisher or even powerpoint. Thoughts? Ideas? Suggestions?

Treasure Hunting on Craigslist

I've been stalking craigslist lately to find a new dresser for either Anderson or the baby girl. And when I say "stalking," I mean STALKING. The craigslist tab is always in my browser at work and I'm hitting refresh every minute. I also browse around to see what other furniture is out there since I've seen so many other bloggers get such great deals on things, refinish them and the pieces are gorgeous. I'm not even looking for for a dining room table (well, I would if I had space for one!) but the title of "Retro Dining Rm Table, 6 Chairs, Buffet $300" caught my eye.

I clicked and .... I want it. Okay, I know it doesn't look like much, but think of the potential. It is solid wood so it could easily be sanded down and stained a darker wood color. The chairs are interesting and has a nice patterned back to it and the chair cushions could easily be reupholstered with a more graphic print.

And what about this buffet? I have dreams of painting it (not sure what color) and having it as a TV console! Like this one here.

All this for $300! (Plus some new sandpaper, paint, stain, fabric, elbow grease....which means - All this for $400!)

Easy DIY Art

Again, more of a post for myself to collect ideas. I think this art could easily be DIY'd with any shape you want. For the little girl, maybe I could do this with birds or butterflies on different scrapbook paper glued to a foam board. Cut out and then put on heavy duty card stock, frame it and voila!

Found on ohdeedoh

Stenciling

Here is someone who stenciled a wall with a stencil they made themselves and it turned out really nice.

From a new design blog I found this morning :) The Domestic Wannabe.

Design Blogs

I've been asked what design blogs are on my Google Reader and here is a list of them. Some are better than others and I've tried to group them according to ones I really like and ones that are okay. I tend to gravitate towards one that are heavy on DIY and bargain hunting because I find them much more practical and I can actually do (and afford) some of the things they suggest. I've linked all the blogs so just click on them to take a look see. But some I go to for pretty pictures and inspiration.

Blogs I love:
Adventures in Renovating a Brooklyn Limestone
Design Sponge
Emily A. Clark
Knock Off Wood
Little Green Notebook
Ohdeedoh
Three Men and a Lady
Urban Grace Interiors
Young House Love
Copy Cat Chic


Blogs that are Good:
bryn alexandra interiors
Haven and Home
Making It Lovely
Nuestra Vida Dulce
(this is a new one to me which specializes in craigslist finds. Don't know how good it is)

Project: Farmhouse Bed Part III

Like I said earlier, Wilson was able to put in a few hours this weekend to finish up the bed for Anderson.

Welcome to my workshop!

Checking to see if it's level....looks good!

Headboard and footboard complete and level. You can see from this picture that the headboard is really high. This is when we decided to trim off 5 inches from the headboard to make it more proportional.

There, looks better huh? Side rails are up and attached! Bed is complete! There are two pieces of trim attached to the side rails that will hide the rails but I wasn't able to get a picture of it before Wilson took it down. But rest assured that the side rails (what the bed actually sits on) won't be visible.



All that's left is some priming and painting. We're planning to paint the bed a navy blue, much like the Pottery Barn Kids bed. And here are the sheets that I picked up this weekend to make the duvet. As you can see, it's mostly white with multi-colored stripes that will brighten up his room. (What is it with me and stripes??) I was thinking about using some red piping along the edge of the duvet to give it a little more design aspect. I'm hoping I can pull it off!