New Adventures on the Horizon

Happy Friday y’all! It’s been an amazing day of rest for me. Sometimes we just need it, right?

Well today’s day of rest was not like many others for me, it was the start of my maternity leave 🍋 Prior to today, it’s been a long week of 10 to 12 hour work days. It’s been at least 6 weeks of working at least 6 if not 7 days a week. It’s been just shy of 4 months of starting this new job that I love (yes, I started a new job in the middle of covid, craziness I know). It’s been 7 months of sheltering in place and 9 months of being pregnant while managing my first time being pregnant let alone during covid plus a job change/this work hustle. Needless to say, MY BODY IS TIRED!

Today I allowed my body to catch up. There are 18 things I wanted to do today, but I told myself there is always tomorrow. So I made myself a fancy coffee, whipped up a veggie scramble, took a nice long walk at the park, read, watched some tv and took a nap. How glorious it was! ✨ I am excited to finally be on maternity leave and let my body rest before our baby girl arrives. This time is most importantly about her, and my husband and I welcoming her into our family but selfishly (and so I have heard from other moms) it’s about me too. Resting, healing, and staying fulfilled as a person, hustling in my career, while also becoming a mom to this amazing little girl. I am excited to get to those 18 other things too during this time off, while nurturing my little one and teaching her to be a woman of strength and grace. It will be such an adventure, one that I am so excited to begin for our soon-to-be family of three ❤️ (well if you count the dogs, family of five 🦮🐕‍🦺)

One Room Challenge – Final Bathroom Reveal

Well the week is finally here! It is the #oneroomchallenge final reveal week and I am so excited to share our our bathroom remodel.

This was my very first time doing the one room challenge and I could not have had done a better project in our house. The bathroom was the perfect balance of challenges and real hands on work that we got to do ourselves combined with the fun of redecorating an entire room top to bottom.

The design I was going for was a simple black and white bathroom with subtle beige accents and greenery. Our bathroom now feels like a sanctuary! I love spending time in there because it is just so darn stylish!

The major steps to our remodel included:

-replacing our pedestal sink bowl

-replacing the sink faucet

-removing the old medicine cabinet

-re-texturizing the walls and doors

-lowering our bathroom storage unit

-spray painting the accents like door handles, toilet roll holder, cabinet handles black matte

-sponge painting the walls inspired by everyday kait

-wallpapering

-painting the tub black

-decorating with faux plants

-installing a bamboo shade above the bathroom window

-installing additional hooks

-installing our bathroom ‘his and hers’ art from Simply Stained Shop on Etsy

-replacing and installing a new mirror

-getting black bath mats to tie in the theme

We tackled the hard steps first and saved the fun decor as the final finishes in the last week. Here is a flashback of the pink version and original green version of our bathroom. What a transformation this bathroom has gone through!

To view more room renovations from the official One Room Challenge blog, please visit:

www.oneroomchallenge.com/orc-blog

New Adventures on the Horizon

Time has escaped me over the last 6 months, but for some understandably good reasons. 2020 has certainly been a year of firsts for many of us: a global health crisis emerged, our economy has come to a standstill with the mandatory sheltering in place, and a first-in-my-lifetime social justice movement has swept our nation. Maybe different generations have experienced other global events like this, but 2020 has felt unprecedented for me in so many ways.

In addition to these unprecedented and life-altering experiences, I have been experiencing another unprecedented feeling – becoming pregnant with a baby girl and a mother for the first time. Epp, I am overjoyed to be pregnant and feel like becoming a mother has always been a part of my path and my purpose in this life. I am so fortunate to have met a partner who shares this purpose of wanting to be a parent. We are thrilled to have the opportunity to raise a smart and strong daughter who will help make this world a better place.

However I am also reflecting over the fact that I know many other women who are also experiencing pregnancy for the first time among these monumental societal changes. Its a whole new layer to the already new circumstance of our bodies carrying a life for the first time. I’m have been excited but also scared to be pregnant during this time. There are such joyous moments that I have felt with this being my first pregnancy. I have been so thankful to be quarantined at home and ‘nesting’ for our baby girl on the way. I have really focused on creating our home as a space and that will be function for our soon-to-be family of three. However I’ve also experienced some worrisome scares of general health concerns, needing to stay isolated and safe to not only protect my health but her health.

My mixed messages of excitement and joy paired with fear and anxiety in this post are the reality I live every day as an expecting mom-to-be. If there’s one thing I keep centering around is the need to be resilient. Resilience is going to be so important for me to continue to have in being pregnant, to have in childbirth in just a few months, and in life as we know it today and moving into then future to manage any circumstance that will impact our society. I’ll be facing these new adventures on the horizon with a new motivation of perseverance and resilience.