London’s New Room Update

It may not be painted yet, but London’s new room also doesn’t have a resident lizard any longer. On Saturday, when our friends gathered at Matt & Lynde’s for a BBQ to celebrate Sydney’s pending arrival, Cameron brought the guys over to our house for 20 minutes to move Spaz and his abode to his new spot downstairs, and move the boxes containing London’s new bed upstairs. I can’t thank the guys enough for their muscle!

Of course, Spaz wasn’t too thrilled about the ride he took and proceeded to be a grumpy lizard the rest of the weekend. But with his move, and Cameron moving everything out minus the printer and a file cabinet, the room is empty. Plus, he vacuumed and I have been able to cleam the blinds and prep the entire room for painting. Cameron hopes to get in some good time tonight getting the paint up. Hopefully its all done by the time he leaves for Canada on Thursday. We definitely lost a bit of momentum last week with him gone in Chicago and then both of us being exhuasted this weekend.
On Friday, the knobs I ordered for the dresser arrived, and on Saturday morning Cameron got the drill out so we could complete the coat rack with two of them! Whoo Hoo!

Speaking of the dresser, a little progress has been made on that front.

Saturday morning I began removing the drawer liner to the last drawer! I almost met my goal of removing the liner from a drawer per night but Wednesday, we were obviously busy celebrating Cameron's new job and Friday I was just too tired.

Unfortunately, the liner on this last one didn’t want to budge, either. I wasn’t able to finish it until Saturday evening. On Sunday I was able to get all the sanding done, but lacked the energy to get the coat of primer on.

I’ve hit that point in this pregnancy that I have less energy than I need, which means projects will be slow going from here on out. It will all get done, though. And it helps knowing that Sydney will be in our room the first two months, so I will have some time to complete her room once she is here. And she won't know whether she has a stocking at Christmas or not.

There won’t be an update on Prepping for Sydney this week. My lack of energy is the reason for this. All the clothes have been organized, folded and put away in plastic bins, and I have moved those bins into her closet, but there is still a huge pile of clothes that need to be washed and put away, which won't get put away until London has vacated the room. Plus, there are still a few bins of newborn gear I need to go through and put away. And again, I need a room to put that gear in!

So I really haven’t wanted to focus on any of those to dos as well. Maybe this weekend or next week. Only time and energy will tell.

~ Sarah

Embarking on a New Adventure

Last Wednesday all projects were pushed aside and instead had London and I make a stop at Safeway for Champagne and balloons. Why, you ask? Because after 5 years with Xerox, Cameron has been offered the opportunity to move into the medical sales field! We had to celebrate, of course!

Starting October 8^th, Cameron will be employed by Armstrong Medical.

The opportunity couldn’t have come at a better time. Cameron had originally interviewed with the company back in February or March, but he felt it wasn’t a good time to further explore the opportunity given that things were looking to be going in a great direction for him at Xerox which included a wonderful manager, we had just found out I was pregnant, and we were dealing with 12 newborn pups and one tired Tulley.

We are so glad Cameron entertained that one interview. Armstrong called him about a month ago asking if circumstances had changed with Xerox at all, was he possibly interested in continuing the interview process with them. Coincidentally, some things had changed. We weren’t dealing with 12 puppies anymore and like Xerox has enjoyed doing over the last 5 years, they made some changes that were less than desirable for Cameron to deal with for even the short term, which included the 6^th manager of his career there. Obviously, I’m still pregnant, but not for much longer. 

Last Tuesday, Armstrong flew Cameron out to Chicago, where the company is based, and participated in the final interviews on Wednesday. Everything went very well and they sent him back to the airport that afternoon in a limo after extending him the offer. 

Cameron’s territory will keep us in the Sacramento area, so no moving is involved. But it will result in 3-4 overnights a month as the territory is much larger. He’ll be covering south Fresno up to the Oregon border and over to Reno. 

Cameron has wanted to get into medical sales for quite some time and made it to a few final rounds of interviews but always seemed to lose out to those with actual medical sales experience. Looking back, these missed opportunities were blessings as Armstrong has already impressed us as a good company to work for, plus they can see the value Cameron will bring to their company without having previous medical sales experience. 

Cameron’s starting the job in October will make things a bit interesting given Sydney’s arrival, but Armstrong is doing their best to work around her arrival. Cameron will be out in the field with another representative the week of October 8^th – away from home. We don’t know where he will be yet, exactly, but they are trying to arrange this off site to be a quick airplane ride home, should someone make an early appearance. The week of October 15^th Cameron will be in his territory with his new manager, so he will be close to home and I’m still planning on working that week as well. He does have to go back to Chicago the week of Halloween, the week after Sydney arrives – but Armstrong is making sure he is home for Syd’s scheduled arrival. 

We are only now announcing this exciting news, as we wanted to wait until Cameron gave his notice to Xerox, which took place this morning. It has been interesting as higher ups are now coming to Cameron trying to find out if there is any way to keep him with the company. Unfortunately for them they are a day late and a dollar short though they promise to do everything in their power over the next 3 weeks to entice Cameron to stay. We'll see.

All in all, we are very excited about this opportunity for Cameron and can hardly wait for his first day to arrive, which will be here before we know it, given he’s off to Canada on Thursday for 10 days to go Goose hunting.

~ Sarah

Weekend Update: a Baby Shower BBQ

Saturday Matt & Lynde threw us a Baby Shower BBQ, which really was just an excuse for our friends to get together. It was a nice, low key event, as many friends were not able to make it due to conflicting calendars but in the end there were still 10 adults and three crazy little girls. It was just what we needed given Cameron and I were both pretty tired from al that happened last week.


London had a grand time running around with Km & Pat’s daughters, Kaley & Paige. Paige, who is only 1 ½ years older than London, still calls London “Baby London”. I wonder if she will ever stop calling her that, given there are new babies already here and Sydney will be here soon?

At one point, given the 95 degree weather, Lynde brought out Cody’s kiddie pool and the girls splashed away, to my surprise, given London isn’t a fan of cold water. We hadn’t brought her bathing suit or swim diaper so she was out there in all her naked glory having the time of her life!

And that was about all I could handle this weekend. Minus checking off a few things to do for London’s new room and dresser, I was spent. Sunday I could barely survive a walk around Costco. It probably didn’t help that I was a bit dehydrated.

That’s because of what I did Saturday. Even after watching Cameron place a Pepsi in the ice bin to cool it down, I went to get ice out of the ice maker. Usually I open the door and grab ice from the top, as I am not a fan of the noise and time it takes to get ice through the door. But for some reason, this time I did. And suddenly I had ice cold Pepsi coming out with my ice! My getting the ice out of the door caused the spinny thing (ice hook?) in the ice bucket to turn and punctured Cameron’s Pepsi can. We had to toss out all the ice.

But we were at Matt & Lynde’s house most of Saturday so I had plenty of access to ice-cold water there. The problem back at home was that in the process of removing and putting back the clean bucket, we turned the ice maker off. Cameron figured this out around 10 AM on Sunday. I tried to drink water throughout the day, but it just wouldn’t stay cold for me – I like really cold water and rarely get water without ice. By the time we finished the Costco trip (maybe 4 PM), I had probably only had 4 glasses of water versus my usual 10-12. I’m serious – I drink lots of water, even when I am not pregnant.

After the Costco run and feeling miserable throughout the trip, I made Cameron stop at Walgreens for ice. And while I had several large glasses of wonderful ice water that evening, the damage had been done and I was in bed by 8:30 PM. I also proceeded to drink most of the 32 oz of water I took to bed with me – which included ice. I find it stays cooler and fresh throughout the night if it starts out with ice.

~ Sarah

Preparing For Sydney Update

Looking at Sydney’s To Do list, it doesn’t look like I accomplished all that much over the last week:

But the one thing I was able to cross off, the organizing aspect of London’s old clothes, was a HUGE undertaking. Just take a look at the mess I made in the loft, to get started:

This is before the clothes came out of the tubs

And here is my little helper after all the clothes came out!

All the clothes are sorted and most are back in tubs. I even was able to reduce the number of tubs being used. I just have two tubs of clothes to fold nicely and close up. Then the tubs will go back into the closet.

Of course, I still have a lot of tubs full of non-clothes (full of other baby gear) to go through still. And this pile is waiting for my mom for washing: 

Can I just say I am so glad my mom will be out here in just over a week, for a week and is willing to help get the washing done? By then we should have a place to put the clothes once they are washed, too. Maybe by then, the room will be set up for Sydney. One can hope.

Don’t worry though; Sydney isn’t far from our minds these days. Last Friday, during our evening errands we needed to make a stop at Target. When we walked by the baby section, I couldn’t help but pick this little onesie up for her:

~ Sarah

London’s New Room Update

This last weekend was quite successful in completing projects for London’s new room, starting on Friday. The 3 of us spent Friday evening running quick errands, and that included a trip to Michael’s where I got the last of what I needed for London’s room. Gotta love coupons too, as I saved 15% on the total purchase, even if it wasn’t a large purchase.

All I got were the shelves, the back of the coat rack and the stand for the letters project. Looking at the list of to dos now, there isn’t much more to do other than move her in and finish the shelves (which all I need to do is seal them along with the bedstand - this will be done this weekend). Of course, I have added to the list again, as well, with the final steps:

By Sunday night, the letters stand and coat rack were painted and sealed. And London’s letters were also painted and sealed, so I got my trusty glue gun out and created the final product. What do you think?



Sorry for the poor qualilty photo - it's off of my phone from this morning. I forgot to take a picture when I finished the project in the kitchen and for safe keeping, these are now stored in the cluttered loft



My plan is to place this near the dresser.

The coat rack will have to wait until this weekend to be completed. And that’s only because I need the drawer knobs for the dresser to arrive, which should be Friday, according to my tracking info. Two of the knobs will go on the coat rack. After a few quick drill holes and the spinning of a screwdriver, it will be done.
And who knows, maybe I’ll be able to hang the coat rack up by the end of the weekend! All that depends on whether we manage to get London's room emptied of Cameron's office equipment and painted. Cameron's making great progress to, as tonight I plan to be cleaning the blinds and window and prepping it for paint.

In reality, once the room is ready for moving in, I think I can have London’s new room setup and ready to go in an afternoon.

As planned I did get to London’s dresser, but I was not able to devote as much time as I would have liked on it this weekend. You will see why tomorrow when I show you what I did to the loft.

I also didn’t expect to spend an hour trying to remove the doors and hardware from it. I thought it would only take 5 minutes. When I set to work on the dresser Sunday afternoon while London napped, I discovered that the person who painted it last, painted over the hardware, covering the screw heads.

I literally had to chisel the paint away to get a screwdriver into turn the screws. And I ended up stripping each screw along the way, making it even more difficult. But this did help me decide that we definitely need to get new doors, and hardware, for the dresser.

But...Cameron and I also agreed that if new doors were necessary, they can wait a while so we won’t be ordering any doors any time soon. I set aside one of the old doors for when we do, for measurement and matching design purposes.

The other more time-consuming process was removing the back. While the back panel itself basically disintegrated in my hands, the nails did not. And where the nails were, the back panel decided to stay and not disintegrate!

Once I did get the parts of back panel left around the nails removed, the nail heads would bend when I would try to remove them with the hammer, making the hammer slip right off.

Eventually, I was able to get them all removed. I also decided that we need to replace the back, especially if we are going to go without doors for a while. Luckily, I have the backing to Cameron and my dressers as we felt ours didn’t need backs when we built them, so I already have the material on hand.

Between the nails and the hinge hardware, I’m surprised I still had time to scrub down the frame of the dresser before London woke up from her nap.

I also was not able to get to the 6 drawers on Sunday. I've been trying to tackle one drawer a night. So far, i have been able to remove the old liner and scrub down 3 of the 6 drawers. I figure if I can get to one a night, I’ll be in good shape for sanding, priming and maybe painting by the weekend. We’ll see.

If London has to live with clothes in boxes or on the floor for a while, so be it. I’m definitely feeling my body slowing down due to the pregnancy. And given that we don’t want Sydney to arrive early, I have to listen to it and not push myself. At the same time, that is a tall order for me these days as I can’t seem to sit still for very long when I am at home. I sit at work all day so when I get home I want to get things done.
At least I have some energy, even if it is diminishing, versus the no energy I had in July thanks to my colds.

~ Sarah