Wednesday 25 February 2015

An Airplane Carried Me To Bed


The hardest part about moving out of our place two weeks ago was packing up the "Boys Room."

When I was pregnant with Grant I knew exactly what I wanted to base his nursery design on. One of my favorite bands, Owl City, has a side project called Sky Sailing and he released an album called "An Airplane Carried Me To Bed." It is the perfect mix of chill, lullaby type music that I fell in love with. Their album art was also one of my favorites, and so I just knew that I wanted to do a paper airplane themed nursery.

Before Asher came around, we got busy decorating and re-adjusting the room to make it perfect for our two boys to share. Even though I am sad to say goodbye to their room sooner than we expected, I know that this was only the beginning and they will have their whole childhood to share a room together.

Here is a "tour" of Grant & Asher's Room:












Dresser: Ikea
Change Pad Cover: Etsy




One of the first things I knew I wanted in the room was a paper airplane mobile. I went searching on Etsy and found one for $40. I decided that we could make one ourselves, or at least Garth could. It ended up costing me about $5 in supplies and it looks amazing! I was so impressed with him.






Basket: Superstore
Clock: Winners
Letters: Michaels

For Father's Day last year, I framed Garth's shirt and tag that he wore on his mission. I thought that this would be the perfect place to display it, to remind our boys of their father's amazing example of serving the Lord.



I didn't have time to organize these drawers better to take good pictures, but I wanted to show these organizers I got at Ikea that are perfect. They come with a variety of sizes, perfect for the different sized drawers. They really help utilize every inch of space.








I wanted a gallery wall with a mix of random printables and colors and this is what I came up with. The 'G' is actually orange/white striped. Garth made both the 8x10 printables. The one is based of my favorite children's book "On the Night You Were Born" and the other one is Dr Seuss of course! The smaller ones are a mixture of printables I found online and pretty water color cards that randomly caught my eye one day.



Bed: The Brick
Duvet/Cover: Ikea

Grant loves his "big boy" bed and his transition into it could not have gone smoother. Garth and I were on the same page and saw no point in getting a toddler bed and when we found this one we had to have it. I love that it is lower to the ground which I think helped him ease into it so nicely.



Grant's Aunt Cynthia is super talented with stained glass and went out of her way to make a personalized paper airplane stainglass for Grant's room after he was born. It looks perfect in their room and looks spectacular when the sun is actually shining. (boo winter)



My favorite place in the room is their reading corner. We have spent a lot of time there over the last year and a half and even more when we finally found the perfect chair.



Chair: Ikea
Pillow: Superstore





Basket: Pehr (Chapters)
Stuffies: This picture is decieving but there are a lot of stuffed animals stuffed in that basket haha, im pretty sure there is an alligator, a blue bear and a huge turtle hiding. Some were gifts, and some were mine from when I was growing up.



Shelf: Ikea
Lamp: Walmart
Globe: Winners
Stuffies: Jelly Cat (Chapters)
Paper Airplane Decals: Etsy



Crib: Target
Sheets: Target
Quilt: Made by me and my SIL Chrystal







Our new additions for Asher!


...and because every December baby needs a cute penguin friend!




This is the beautiful album artwork that I was talking about. I wanted it so bad, so I asked my talented sister Mikayla to paint it for their room. She is amazing.





And last but not least the closet!






I have so many amazing memories with Grant in this room, watching him grow from a baby sleeping in the crib, to a toddler in his very own "big boy" bed. I cherish the nightly bedtime routine and I can smell the scent of lavendar baby lotion that filled the room after his bath. I remember how content I was with him on my lap, reading story after story in the dimly orange lit room. I remember when he first started to stand, I would watch him stare out of that window everyday, and I can hear his "tweet tweet"  sounds when he would spot a bird.

I remember his cries in the night and when I walked in and picked him up everything was okay again. I remember singing and rocking him to sleep on those random nights when he needed it most.



Even though Asher's time in this room was much shorter, I will never forget the first time we brought him home and I just sat in the chair, by the window and held him for who knows how long. I won't ever forget those peaceful and excited feelings of having a newborn baby again.




I guess it's pretty obvious I have become attached to this room and yes, it was hard to say goodbye to this chapter of life. I am grateful for all the memories that were made here and I am excited for change and I know there are plenty of new memories to be made in other houses, other rooms, other cities, and I can't wait.

-A.

Wednesday 18 February 2015

All you need is right here in this room.

When Asher was 3 weeks old, we made our way up to Calgary to get some family pictures taken by our friend and amazing photographer, Kimberlee Martin.











We knew that it would be a bit challenging taking the classic newborn pictures at 3 weeks old but that proved to be more challenging than I thought. Our Asher was such a sleepy baby during his first 3 weeks of life, to the point where it became very frustrating trying to feed him because he was never hungry, just sleepy. Well he picked this day, the day when we needed him to sleep, to be awake almost the entire time!





At first it was a little frustrating trying to get him to fall asleep, but looking at the pictures I was actually really happy it worked out the way it did and we were able to see his beautiful eyes in his "newborn" photos.








I was excited to get some cute pictures of the boys, and despite Grant sending the wagon rolling away with Asher inside, and a couple eye gouges, I think we succeeded!















Afterwards, we went upstairs and did some lifestyle type photos with the bed and big windows. I am in love with all of them and how they turned out.


























Kim does the photography for a clothing brand called Sparrow Apparel, so I was happy to model some of their clothes and have even more cute pictures of me and my babe together.












Asher is such a sweet baby and I am so glad that we had the chance to document him at such a sweet and young age. I will be doing a post all about him very soon!

-A.