Where are the frogs?

sweater: target   leggings: old navy  boots: amazon

I finally bought myself some rainboots!  After months of wanting them and too many days of them sitting in my cart online I finally got some.  

I bought them on Amazon for $32, which is honestly more money than I usually spend on clothes or shoes but I figured since I wanted them for long enough it will be worth it. 

I do have to say I feel a little silly though wearing them.  Like I should be wading through a pond searching for frogs.  Which I have absolutely no desire to do so. 

So those of you that own rainboots, how often do you wear them and do you wear them all day or just when you're walking to and from places when it's raining?

the beginning

The start of summer has not disappointed me one bit.  With only half a week in, I've already jumped right into summer mode and am loving it. 

       Coffee, tv and slow mornings.               Donuts with my mom.         Reading on our sunny deck. 

And the best is that my sister, niece and nephew came into town and are staying the rest of the week!

If you're not on summer break then you're probably not liking this post very much and I'm sorry.  Thankfully I have some good news for you.  The opportunity to meet a sweet blogger names Cat who blogs at Letters to Baby MC.  Cat shares her life about her, her husband and their adorable little girl, who was born early at 27 weeks.  She is also generously giving away a $50 Visa gift card so read on friends!

Hello For Lauren and Lauren readers!!  My name is Cat and I blog at my little piece of internet awesomeness - Letters to Baby MC.  I am so excited and honored to be posting here on Katie’s fabulous space today!

 Over at Letters to Baby MC, I blog about being a first time mom to our little preemie bundle of joy born at 27 weeks + being a wife to a computer nerd writing his dissertation to finish his PhD.

I also blog about the new house we are building+ design inspiration for our new home, how much I love my crazy job working with college students as a Dean, all the traveling our little family does and anything else that pops into my crazy head!

I hope to meet you over at my little space soon and thank you so much Katie for having me!!

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Thank you so much for your post Cat! 

And today Cat is giving away a $50 Visa giftcard to one lucky reader!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Winner will be contacted after the 14th!  Thanks for entering!

Summer Katie

sweater: target   tee: shade clothing  shorts: borrowed  sandals: target  necklace: pink rust

Hello to my favorite, overly worn summer sandals. 
I wrote a very similar post this time last year about how I used to be offended when Chris called me Summer Katie and implied that I'm much happier and more fun in the summer.  But he is definitely right. 
This summer will be quite different than others though.  But I'm pretty sure summer Katie plus mom Katie is going to be a good combination.
Happy Summer break!!  
and to start off summer break one of you has the chance to win $200!  

I had the pleasure of working with Datevitation back in January and gave Chris one of their customized coupon books.   Datevitation has over 350 different options to make a perfect gift for spouses, parents or kids.  This would be a great Father's Day present too!  And you can take $10 off your first order using code: LAUREN10.  

Now for the giveaway! Enter below for your chance to win $200!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

You're no longer number one

top: old navy   skirt: target   sandals: ?   necklace: gift (groopdealz)

Can we say fourth of July outfit?  Too patriotic looking perhaps? 

I'm pretty sure I've mentioned before Chris' extreme amount of love for our dog Molly.  Now I certainly love Molly and give her quite a lot of attention.  But it can't compare to Chris. 

Sometimes it's almost disturbing how much he treats her like a person.  Playing hide and seek, carrying her around, talking to her like a person.  
The other day I overheard Chris talking to Molly, telling her that once our baby comes she will no longer be number one around here. (Let's just ignore the fact that he was saying that Molly was number one and not me). 
I'm glad he knows that our baby girl will get moved ahead of Molly, as I used to be a little concerned. 

Doesn't everyone carry around their 50 pound dog like this? 

Thankfully Molly is so good around other babies and kids, but I am a little worried how she'll handle our new addition! 
Oh and I've never entered any kind of style or fashion contest until yesterday when I found one that's all about finding good deals, which I think I'm pretty good at. I'm sure you want to help me win! Vote here! 
Thank you!

and there were tears

My sister sent me this video back in March and I watched it and got all teary eyed thinking about becoming a mom.  I saved it and am so glad I did, although this time it produced not just teary eyes but a full streams of tears.  
Lately I have been overcome with so many emotions as our due date gets closer.  I am beyond excited to meet our baby girl and can't even wait to hold her and start our life as a family of three.  
But I am also scared.  Scared of labor, of her being born healthy.  Scared of not knowing what we are doing and the responsibility of taking care of this tiny baby.  Scared that I already love her so much and I haven't even met her.  It scares me to think of how much more I'll love her when she's here, which makes me scared to think of anything ever happening to her. 
This video was such a great reminder that I am far from alone.  A reminder to just breathe and take it day by day.  A reminder that it's okay to be scared and to not know what to expect.   I also remind myself that God loves our baby girl more than I do and is always in control.  


Linking up to: random wednesday

Dressing my pregnant self

dress: Monica's Closet Essentials

This dress may be my favorite maxi dress I own.  I won a credit to this store and am SO happy with my choice. I know I will get lots of wear out of it! 

After this last pregnancy recap, I intended to do another at 30 weeks but here I am four weeks late. Oops! 

While one of the biggest lessons I have learned is that every pregnant woman is so different, and you can only take so much advice from someone as I think you have to live it yourself, I thought maybe it'd be helpful to share a few things I've learned about dressing my pregnant self: 

1. I'd have to say that weeks 27 to 33 were probably my favorite weeks in terms of how I looked pregnant.  I was passed the stage of just feeling like I gained a lot of weight and finally had a hard, pregnant looking belly.  

2. I probably bought way more maternity clothes than I really needed, but I'm okay with that as I was SO excited to finally be pregnant and still did not spend much money as most were pretty cheap!  I bought a handful of things well before getting pregnant when I saw them on sale and then most of the rest near the beginning.  If I would've held off a little longer I would have realized that I there were some items that I didn't end up liking or really needing.  

3. I wore more maternity clothes the first trimester and first half of the second trimester, which seems backwards to me.  But once I had a real "bump" I felt much more comfortable wearing some of my non-maternity dresses and tops, where at the beginning I loved the looser fitting, maternity clothes.  

4. I bought a few of the maternity jeans with the under the belly panel thinking that would be more comfortable.  I was WAY wrong and can't imagine choosing those over the full panel jeans.  The idea of wearing pants with a button ever again sounds foreign.  (which makes me nervous). 

5.  A lot of clothes I thought I could wear when I was pregnant aren't even close to possibilities.  There have been so many times I thought of a dress or a top that I thought would be so cute, only to put it on and have nothing to do but laugh at myself.  (Okay I wish I could say I laughed every time, but there definitely were times of crying getting dressed).  Not only has my belly drastically grown, but my growing chest has made many clothes far from an option! 

6.  There have been many days or even a week at a time that I've been happy with and loved my pregnant belly and then days or a week that I feel the exact opposite.  But this happens not pregnant so I shouldn't be surprised!

7.  My most successful places to find cheap, comfortable, and cute maternity clothing has been old navy and shade maternity.  I've found many tops and dresses for under $5 online at both places. 

8.  I keep reminding myself that I am only pregnant for a short time and should do my best to enjoy all these changes as it will be over soon! 

Baby Bedding & Curtains

I am so happy with how our nursery is looking and it has definitely become my favorite room in our house!  I looked at a LOT of bedding and curtains online and at stores and couldn't find any that I loved, let alone any that I wanted to spend that much money on.  I'm so happy I decided to make my own!

I wanted these curtains to be to the floor but am terrible at measuring fabric.  It's more like I don't measure and just think a yard is bigger than it is.  I got 5 yards so each panel is 2.5 yards and was just each for just the window length. 

(And let me first apologize for my messy room and really gross ironing table.)

Lay out your panels and make sure they are the same size. 

 Take one side and iron down about 1/4 inch of fabric.

Fold it over again and iron down. Then sew right down the middle of your double fold.

Do this to the left, right and bottom of your panel.  Take the top side and iron down once.  

Fold over as big of a space as your curtain rod will be, plus a little extra.  Mine was 2 inches. 

Do the same to the other panel.  

For the baby bedding I really didn't follow a tutorial nor did I take pictures as I went, as I really wasn't sure what it would turn out like or what I was really doing.  Thankfully it all worked and was pretty easy!

For the bed skirt I made three rectangles, following the same steps as the curtains, to double fold and hem the three sides.  I was going to sew them to a piece of fabric in the middle but know that we'll soon be lowering our crib and I didn't want to have to re-hem it again.  So like a professional seamstress I have three separate panels and taped them to the wood under the mattress of the crib.  This way I can just move up each panel when we lower the crib.  

I bought a plain bumper panel at IKEA for $10.  Again I had some measuring issues and had to go back to the store for more fabric.  I made three separate tubes and sewed them together.  Then I put the bumper on the crib to mark where the ties would go and sewed those in.  
Sounds quick but this one took me a really long time!  (And I know bumpers are pretty much a no for baby cribs.  Thankfully if I pull it down all the way it barely sticks up from the mattress so I feel just find about using it!)

I think my favorite part of the bedding is the quilt and pillow.  I saw a similar pillow and blanket on etsy that was SO expensive.  I made both for under $20.  No tutorial for this but if you wanted to know how I made it feel free to ask! 

Her room is just about all ready to go! Now we just need the real stuff like a carseat and stroller. :)