The Laundry Room Dilemna

I need to be brutally honest with you right now.  My house is far from perfect, and I don't do a very good job at keeping it clean.  But having a messy house stresses me out.  I am constantly in this conundrum between not having a clean house, and really truly desiring for it to be clean.

I tell myself that my house is constantly messy because I have no time.  But let's be honest - mostly my house is in the state it is in because I am lazy.  If I constantly kept up with it, I am sure that my house would look better and I would feel better.  But I put off cleaning until it gets to the stage where it is so messy that I have to clean it, but I never want to.

Don't believe me?  This is what I am looking at right now:

Sorry for the blurriness, I don't know what I was thinking when I took this!

But although my laziness is a major culprit in this issue, I think there is another culprit that is equally to blame.  Ever heard the saying, a place for everything, and everything in its place?  I could live by this motto.  There are some things that have a specific place to go, and I have an exceedingly easy time putting these things away, because I don't have to rummage around and find a place for it, or throw it somewhere only to have to deal with it later.

So I am going to be trying to organize my house piece by piece to ensure everything does have a place.  And I am going to bring you on my journey with me.  I will need your help in order to decide how I should organize and decorate these spaces!  Every Monday (hopefully), I will have a new organizing blog post.  Sometimes it will be projects I have done, and sometimes it will be projects I am thinking of doing and need your help with.  So please, join me and help me organize my life!

There are a couple of other factors that affect these projects as well.  First, as I work on these organizing projects, I will be primarily home with our beautiful daughter, so I rarely have long periods of time to devote to a project, but rather I can only work on things in short intervals (usually while she naps).  Secondly, Dave and I do not own the house we live in, we are renting it.  Our landlords have given us a ton of freedom to do with it as we please, but we definitely do not want to be sinking a lot of money for very little return.  Finally, we are on a tight budget.  I have a limited amount of money set aside every month for 'home improvement', and so anything I do needs to be extremely cost effective!

The Laundry Room

The first area that I have decided to tackle is our laundry room area.  Our washer and dryer are in a dark (hence the awful photos) corner of our basement, slightly out of the way.  The washer and dryer are pretty old, but have worked well for us.   I have also been hanging some of our clothes on the line to dry in order to save electricity.  This works well, but means I need to be even more organized in getting them out to the line, and bringing them in before I forget about them and they are rained on.

There are two shelves above my dryer.  These shelves have been, for the most part, pretty cluttered.  They held my laundry detergent(s), bleach, stain remover, lightbulbs, some cleaners, our iron, our steamer, some dryer balls, dryer sheets, and lots more.  Recently I switched to using soap nuts as our laundry detergent.  This has worked well for us, it means that I am not worrying about what chemicals I am washing our clothes in, and it also means that I can use the same laundry detergent to wash all of our laundry (Ella's diapers, her clothes, our clothes, bedding, towels, etc).  It has decreased the number of bottles I need to have available at all times.

This weekend I cleaned those shelves off.  I forgot to take a before picture, but I hadn't touched the top shelf when I took this picture.  Just take the mess on the top shelf, multiply it exponentially in your mind and you have what the bottom shelf looked like.

I got four glass jars for the bottom shelf, and two small baskets for the top shelf.  I had originally bought the baskets for 7$ a pop at Zelllers, only to find almost the exact same ones at the Dollar store for 2$ - so I returned the ones from Zellers and saved myself 10$.  The glass jars that I got were 2$ each as well (I miss when everything at the Dollar store was actually 1$).

Bottom shelf - Soap Nuts, Baking Soda, Borax, Soap Nuts

I am not done yet though.  Half of the mess from the shelves is still on my dryer.  I need to figure out what to do with the following things:

1) Bleach.  I want to put this in a soap pump container.  Does anyone know if this would destroy the container?  It would be nice to be able to just squirt a couple drops into the washing machine when I need it!
2) Stain Remover.  I am not quite sure how to hide this one - it is a bright pink bottle, so I might just have to live with it!

The blocks in blue are going to appear very soon.  I have some nice frames that I am going to frame these instructions in and hang up!

Your input

This is where I need your help.  If you have any insight about the following things, leave me a comment:

1) What to do with my bleach
2) What to do with my stain remover
3) How to further organize my little bins (note the one on the left isn't really organized), and it will get pretty messy if I leave it like this!

You can also help by voting in one of the polls!

1) Vote on whether I should paint the back wall of my cupboards, leave it bare, or paper it so it will look like this (not necessarily this paper):

Source

2) I want a place to store the laundry that I don't wash all the time, but that I need a place for when they are dirty and I get new ones (like dirty towels, dish clothes, table clothes, hand-wash only clothes, etc).  Should I use a wooden system like this one:

Source

Or a hamper system like this one:

Source

Thanks so much for your help in advance!  I can't wait to hear what you all think!  You can vote in the polls in the right sidebar!

Love,

A Letter to my Two Month Old

Photo taken January 27, 2012.  9 days old.

Ella,

Today, you are 9 weeks and 2 days old.  Nine weeks seems like such a short period of time, and yet I feel like you have been a part of our family forever.

I remember the first time I saw you.  I was so absolutely ecstatic to meet you, but one of the most wonderful things was seeing the look on your daddy's face as he held you.  It was instant love.  That night, they took you to the nursery to sleep, and I remember waking up the morning and not being allowed to get out of bed, but wanting so badly to have you there with me.   Your daddy slept in, and so I couldn't ask him to go fetch you, but I just had this huge desire to have you close to me.  After all, you were mine.

Photo taken February 11, 2012.  3 weeks, 3 days old.

You have done so much growing since you were first born. You weighed in at 11 lb, 4 oz at the doctor's today.  This is a far cry from the 6 lb 10 oz that you were when you were born, or 6 lb 5 oz that you were when you left the hospital.  You have chubbed right out which I am happy about.  I am glad you are healthy.

I now know the answer to many of the questions I had in my last letter to you:

Photo taken February 3, 2012. 2 weeks, 2 days old.

You absolutely love the bath.  You have one every night before going to bed, and you start crying as soon as we take you out.  You haven't learned to splash yet, but I am sure the experience will be all the more enjoyable for you once you figure that out.  After your bath, we get you dressed in your pj's, and read you a Bible story.

You love to look at the pictures of the story when you are not too preoccupied being upset about getting out of the bath or it being bedtime.  After that, we swaddle you up so you are cozy and pray with you.  I think you have yet to not scream through a prayer, but I cherish that time tremendously anyways.  You go to sleep fairly fast after that though, which is nice!

Photo taken March 17, 2012.  8 weeks, 3 days old (1 day shy of 2 months!)

You also love church.  For the most part, you have slept through every service, but whenever you are fussy and we go and listen to your daddy practice with the worship team you always calm down.  You seem to love the music.

I hope you always know how beautiful you are.  Everywhere we go, people tell us how pretty you are.  And they are so right.  Your collection of small features (inherited equally from your father and I) make you absolutely stunning.  And I know you will just become more and more beautiful as you grow.

Photo taken March 9, 2012.  7 weeks, 2 days old.
Her headband is a Posie, they are so cute!

You are kind of sassy.  I never knew that a 2 month-old could have so much personality.  But yours bursts forth from you!

You love the mornings.  Lying beside you and smiling and having fun with you just after you wake up is my favourite part of the day.  I am going to miss this when you move into your own crib for the night.

Photo taken February 3, 2012. 2 weeks, 2 days old.

Before you were born, I wrote about how much your daddy loved you.  But at that time, I really didn't know how much he would love you.  You are the light of his life.  He comes home from work and asks to hold you immediately.  And I know you love him.  You look at him, and smile at him, and have so much fun with him.

Photo taken March 19, 2012. 8 weeks, 5 days old.

Ella, you need to know that I love you more and more every day despite believing that there is no way I could love you one bit more than I already do.  I don't think you will be able to comprehend how much we love you until you have your own little ones, but I hope that someday you do.

Photo taken March 19, 2012. 8 weeks, 5 days old.

I thank God daily that He lent you to us.  We love watching you grow, and cannot wait to see all the things you will accomplish with your life.

Love always,

Your mom.

Some Of My Favourite Pictures From Your First Two Months

Photo taken March 21, 2012. 9 weeks old.

Photo taken January 21, 2012. 3 days old.

Photo taken January 27, 2012. 9 days old.

Photo taken March 14, 2012. 8 weeks old.

Photo taken March 22, 2012. 9 weeks, 2 days old.

Photo taken January 27, 2012. 9 days old.

Love,

The 10 Best Things About Being A New Mother

To balance my last post on the 10 Hardest Things about Being a New Mother, I wrote this post.  Again, they are in no particular order.

Ella smiling at us.  Photo taken on February 22, 2012 (1 month, 4 days old)

1.  Having my daughter smile at me. (whether it is intentional or not).


2.  Seeing my husband interact with and love our daughter.

3.  Watching my daughter sleep beside me at night.

Ella trying hard to stay awake.  Photo taken on January 26, 2012 (8 days old)

4.  Kissing her precious little head.

5.  Feeling her breathe on me while she sleeps on my chest.

6.  Watching her learn new things every day.

Dave & Ella. Photo taken February 22, 2012 (1 month, 4 days old)

7.  Being needed by her.

8.  Listening to her make her wonderful little noises.

9.  Watching her grow bigger and bigger and develop more into her looks each day.

Ella & I.  Photo taken January 18, 2012 (1 1/2 hours old)

10.  The way it feels so right, her being a part of our family.  I wonder how we ever felt like our family was complete without her in it.

The 10 Hardest Things About Being A New Mother

Ella at four weeks old, February 15th, 2011

I have listed the 10 Hardest Things About Being a New Mother in no particular order.  Please know that I wouldn't give her up for anything though.  And you should stay tuned for my next post, the 10 Best Things About Being a New Mother!

1.  Breastfeeding - It hurt more than I thought it would at first, and it is frustrating being constantly tethered to her.

2.  Everything takes longer - There is no easy running to the grocery store anymore!  Everything takes time.  If we want to go out, we usually have to make sure she has eaten first, and then changed, and in her car seat, and then she is probably screaming, and we have to make sure we have everything we need in her diaper bag, and then I have to make sure I am presentable (as usually, I am not).

3.  Using the washroom and taking a shower is much harder - It isn't too bad when Dave is around, but when he isn't around it is ridiculously hard to use the washroom or take a shower!

4.  Being peed and pooped on, especially in the middle of the night - It is the most frustrating thing to be awake in the middle of the night and then be peed and pooped on while trying to change a diaper and have her gett pee and poop all over everything.  It makes me want to cry.

5.  Having Ella spit everything up after I just fed her - This kind of relates to number one.  This is especially frustrating in the middle of the night.  It means we have to start back at square one.

6.  Breastfeeding between 2 and 5 am - I can handle before 2, and after 6.  But between 2 and 5, I am literally exhausted and it is hard to stay awake.  This is obviously also related to #1.

7.  Not being as productive - I love holding my little baby girl.  But sometimes it is hard when I am holding her and all I can see is a room that looks like a tornado went through it, and I can't get up to clean it up.

8.  Feeling useless - I know in my head that taking care of a baby is useful.  But not doing other things for the world makes me feel useless.

9.  Loneliness - Staying at home all day is hard.  Especially with a child who can't talk to me.

10.  The Screaming - It breaks my heart.  And it also gives me headaches.

What about you?  Do you have children?  What did you find hardest about being a new mother or father?  If you don't have children, what do you think will be hardest for you if/when you do have kids?

My Daughter's Father

Photo credit to my brother-in-law, Dan O'Rourke!

I married a great man.  I have known this for a long time.  Dave immediately grabbed my attention when I first met him, and it took much longer for me to grab his.  But recently, I have been reminded of how amazing he is, and in a blog that contains all aspects of my life, I would be remiss not to write about one of the most important people in my life.

So today I have decided to list just some of the things that I appreciate about Dave.  This list is by no means exhaustive, as there are so many more things about Dave that I just don't have the space to list.

Dave watches out for me.  To be honest, sometimes this drives me nuts.  If I feel pain somewhere, and I tell Dave, he will automatically suggest we go to the hospital, or insists that I call a doctor.  I, almost always, dismiss his advice.  However, I know that his concern comes from a place of deep concern and care for me, and I appreciate that.

Photo credit to my sister-in-law, Leanne Pike!

Dave is proactive with Ella.  When he is around, he takes the initiative to change her diaper so I don't have to.  Dave bathes her for me, and even when he works first thing in the morning he tries his hardest to wake up and offer me things when I am up with her in the night.  If Ella is fussy at night, he takes her downstairs and sleeps on our spare bed with her so that I can get a good sleep.

Dave loves his daughter.  As we get into bed at night, Dave cuddles with Ella.  He even asked me once if I felt he was hogging her because I didn't get the chance to cuddle with her at night.  But what he didn't understand was that seeing him hold her close every night was the greatest gift that he could possibly give me.

At Ella's 1-week doctor appointment, one of the women commented about how helpful Dave was, and how rare that is.  He is so great, other people notice.

He works hard.  When Dave puts his mind to something, he makes sure it is completed fully and appropriately.  He doesn't cut corner.  Dave works hard to support Ella and I, and doesn't ever complain about having to work.

When Dave has an issue with something, he gets in and tackles it instead of ignoring it.  He confronts issues head on, instead of dancing around them (like I do).

Photo credit to my sister-in-law, Leanne Pike!

Dave makes me laugh.  It's funny how much I took this for granted before Ella was around.  It is harder now, because I am more tired, and more stressed, and laughing and letting loose is harder for me, but I love laughing with Dave.  He is so much fun, and I appreciate that.


I love my daughter's father - my husband.  He is a great man.  And I don't convey that to him enough.

Ella's Arrival

Ella Susan Margaret Pike.
Photo taken January 20, 2012.

Before I forget the whole thing, I thought I would write a post about Ella's arrival.  It isn't too detailed or gruesome - but there are some parts that are honest, so I thought I would warn everyone in advance!  This post is also quite lengthy, which I also want to apologize for!

In the afternoon on Monday, January 16th (Dave's 25th birthday), I got a call from our family doctor that she had scheduled me to be induced the next morning at 7:15am at the hospital.  That pretty much killed the rest of the day for us.  I was too nervous to do anything really nice for Dave so he probably had a pretty awful birthday (I hadn't even gotten him a birthday gift at that point!).

The next day, we woke up at 6:00 to get ready to go to the hospital.  Most things were packed, but we just grabbed the last couple of essentials, had some breakfast, got ready, and left.  We left the house at 6:45 (the drive to the hospital takes about 15 minutes), because Dave wanted to stop at McDonald's to get a coffee.  Well, of course we get to McDonald's and something has happened and there is an ambulance there and they are even more slow than they usually are.  Needless to say, I walked into the ward of the hospital I was supposed to be in around 7:16 or 7:17 (oops!).

I thought that they would monitor me for a while before inducing me, but the Doctor was in, and I had been given a dose of the gel by about 7:40.  I started to have contractions at this point, but I wasn't quite sure what I was feeling.  The nurses would ask how bad 'the tightenings' hurt, but given that I had nothing to compare the pain to, they all seemed extremely painful (later in the day I looked back at those early ones and realized how not painful they were).

Dave and I spent most of the morning walking around.  We played cards for a while and just tried to keep ourselves busy!

The doctor came back shortly after 1 to check on me.  In the morning he had thought that he would break my water at this point, but given my lack of progress, he just gave me another dose of the gel.  My mother arrived to be with me around the same time.  My mother was the first person to justify my pain as contractions, which I appreciated.  When the nurses kept calling them 'tightenings', I wasn't sure what pain I was experiencing or if they even were contractions!  My contractions slowly got worse throughout the day.  We tried to make the time pass throughout the afternoon as well - talking, walking around, watching tv, and playing Dutch Blitz (which I whooped Dave and Mom at despite the contractions).

As a side note, I wasn't allowed any meals (only clear fluids) during the day.  But even those did not stay down.  I was sick to my stomach 3 times that day.  Everyone kept telling me I wouldn't want to eat while in labour, and I didn't believe that that would be the case - but it was, I was not hungry once!

At 4:00, the Doctor came back and broke my water, which increased the strength of my contractions even more, but they started me on a Pitocin drip shortly after 7:00.  My contractions got ridiculously bad at this point, and lying in bed was the worst.  By this point in time, I had only dilated to about 3 cm.  The nurses let me sit up in a glider chair where they set up the monitors so I wouldn't have to be monitored in bed.

Here in Miramichi, the nurses can't call in the anesthesiologist after midnight, so at about 11:30 the nurse came in and asked if I wanted an epidural.  By this point in time, I was pretty convinced that I did, and so they called him in, and I received it at about midnight.  He was great, and all my fear about the epidural was in vain!  It did not hurt a bit, and I definitely did not feel like I got a big needle in my spine!  Having the epidural allowed me to finally sleep a bit which was very appreciated.

After the epidural!  I felt much better.

At 1:30, the nurse came back to check how dilated I was.  I had not progressed.  I found out at this point as well that the babies heartbeat had started to vary greatly.  It would speed up and then drop sharply - the baby was obviously in distress.  The nurse stopped the drip, and my contractions stopped altogether.  The nurse called my family doctor in who decided I needed an emergency c-section.  She called in the obstitrican, who agreed with her - and they called in the OR staff (it was a snowy night) to come in so that our little baby could be born.

They were all very efficient, and we were in the operating room by about 2:00.  My mom could not come with us, so she waited for us back in our room, but Dave came down with me.  In order to have the c-section, I had to lie my arms out straight to either side so that they could work close to my side.  This ended up giving me significant pain in my shoulders afterwards which subsided after a couple of days.

I couldn't see anything while having my section.  Dave could though.  At one point, as they were just starting, Dave mentioned to me about how there was a tube that ran near him, and there was nothing in it and then all of sudden there was a large gush of blood through it.  I told him he probably should not tell me anything more like that.

I could not feel anything except pressure during the c-section.  I had no idea what they were doing, or even when the baby was out of me.  At one point, the anesthesiologist said, very calmly, to me "you have a little girl!"  I didn't believe him though as I didn't feel any lighter, and no one else seemed to be saying anything (nor did I hear any crying).  All I wanted was for someone else to confirm this for me but no one did!

Soon enough though, I saw her for the first time.  It turns out that the umbilical chord had been wrapped very tightly around her neck.  As I understand it, this had prevented her from descending, which made me not able to dilate as I was supposed to, so it is a very good thing we had a c-section!

Dave held Ella as they stitched me back up.  She was very good from the very beginning - she didn't cry, but just kept looking back and forth between Dave and I.   I fed Ella a bit and then brought her upstairs.  She stayed in the nursery that night - and my recollection between after the c-section and when I woke up the next day is very limited.  I couldn't get out of bed until the next afternoon so I obviously stayed in bed Wednesday morning!

Dave and I couldn't pick a name for her at first.  We had had three top names already: Ella, Emma, and Lucy, but after she was born, I really wanted to name her Lucy, and Dave really wanted to name her Emma.  Seeing as Ella was the second pick for both of us we settled on that.  Deciding on middle names was no issue for us though.  I knew I wanted to name her Susan after my mother, and Dave wanted Margaret after his (their middle names).

The worst part about the whole ordeal for me was probably when they would check how effaced/dilated I was.  No one told me how bad that would hurt!

The most surprising thing for me was how much I didn't care who saw me half naked.  People told me I wouldn't care, but being the prude I am, I definitely didn't believe them - but they were so right!

I was so happy with the care we received at the hospital though, and I am grateful for all of the Doctors and nurses who helped little Ella arrive!  I am also very grateful for Dave and my mom.  They were both extremely helpful and encouraging to me throughout this ordeal, and through the days that follow.  I will never be able to thank them enough!

Name: Ella Susan Margaret Pike
Weight: 6 lb, 10 oz
Height: 19 inches
Birthdate: January 18th, 2012
Birth time: 2:14 am

Ella's first picture.  With her Daddy.
Taken January 18th - sometime in the early morning.

Ella always looks perplexed!
Photo taken January 18th, 2012.

A letter to my little one

Picture taken on January 12, 2012 - 39 weeks, 5 days.

Note: I have been wanting for a while to put my thoughts together in the form of a letter for my unborn child.  Not that the baby will have any idea that I did this.  But I wanted my child to someday be able to read of the great joy that (s)he brought to mine and Dave's life even before his/her birth.

Dear Little Baby,

Today is your due date.  It comes as no surprise to your daddy or I that you have not arrived yet - we imagined you would be late.  I can imagine it is warm, and comfortable (getting more uncomfortable by the day though, I am sure), and familiar in there for you - so I understand why you want to stay!

You have been part of our lives for 9 months today.  I remember when I first found out I was pregnant with you.  Your daddy was at work, and I was so sure that I wasn't pregnant that I took the risk of taking a test while he was gone.  When the first test (and the second) both came back indicating that I was pregnant, I was so excited and absolutely terrified at the same time.  I picked your daddy up from work that night bawling because I just didn't know how I was ever going to be a mother.

And even though at that point I knew in my head we were going to have a baby, I never imagined we actually would.  It wasn't real to me.  But you are so real to me now.

You formed inside of me, and grew, and we saw you through an ultrasound three times.  I started to feel you kick and move around and that was so exciting for me.  And your daddy was so jealous that he couldn't feel it - until he did.  He loved it.  It still brings such a large smile to your daddy's face when you kick his hand, or you move in such a way that he can see.

You are your father's child though.  You are a little trickster.  You will move for me a lot but as soon as I tell anyone you are moving and they watch or feel, you stop.  But the moment they look away or move their hand, you start kicking up a storm again.  Your daddy and I laugh about this often.

I know how much your daddy loves you.  He talks to you all the time and tells you that.  He is so excited to meet his little son/daughter.  And from the moment I told him I was pregnant, whenever I have been afraid of what the future may hold, or doubtful of our abilities to care for you, he has been reassuring and supportive, and I can tell how much he cannot wait for you to be a full part of our family.

I feel like I know you so well.  I know that you either love or hate when I shower because you always kick lots when the warm water touches my belly.  You either love or hate movies (and or popcorn).  We went to see TinTin last night and you kicked me the entire time - you do this whenever we go to the theatre.  And you either love or hate church - from early on you kicked me constantly whenever we were there for a service.

And yet at the same time I know so little about you.  I don't know if you will have dark hair like me, or blonde hair like your daddy.  I don't know if your eyes will be blue, or green, or hazel, or brown.  I don't know if you will be born with a full head of hair or barely any.  I don't know what your name will be.  I don't even know if you are a girl or a boy.  But I love you.  I love you so much.  You are a part of me, and you have been for the last nine months.

And I know I will be far from a perfect mother.  But know that I loved you even before I knew you.  And I will continue to love you forever.

I promise you that.

Love always,

Your Mommy.

Our 2012 Canadian baby. Photo taken on January 11, 2012. 39 weeks, 6 days.

Photo taken on January 11, 2012. 39 weeks, 6 days.