Smidge

is a she. We just found out today and had the most amazing time watching her on the ultrasound. All's normal, thankfully. I have some pictures to post as soon as the mister gets them ready in photoshop. I can't believe I'm gonna be somebody's momma.

I found this little gem of a shop in Portland over the weekend called Grasshopper with cute clothes and great toys and books. I'll definitely be back for some of their adorable dresses from their own line called Wild Carrots:

Threadless

At the last Bring it Girls meeting, I got turned on to this really cool site called Threadless.

Homegrown Heartbreak

I love this local Seattle blogger Breakup Babe. She just published a book (Breakup Babe) based on her blog fodder - very Carrie from Sex in the City!

Glider

Found the right rocking chair at Design Within Reach:



I'll have to either buy or make some cushions - but what I love about it is that we can move it into the studio or living room when we don't need it in the nursery anymore. Plus it's an Eames design, how can you go wrong with that?

Bassinets

Boy, it's hard to find cool bassinets. Most of them are super frilly and ugly. Luckily, I've found just the right one from Modern Nursery:



I just love it. Now I have to find a good rocking chair...

Wee Gallery

I'm exploring a whole new world of magazines: those marketed towards hip moms. The most recent on I've picked up is Cookie. I'm not in love with it - but it's fun to explore a new demographic and see exactly how manipulated I can be. One reason why I picked up this particular issue was a feature they had on mobiles (I love mobiles, remember?) and I found one that would be perfect for smidge's room:



Another mobile caught my eye from a cool site called Wee Gallery, Smart Art for Little Minds:



The cards come in a box like flash cards and you can mix and match the black and white graphic images. Babies see in black and white apparently, so these are perfect to stimulate that little brain.

Look how cute

Remember these?



See how they look today:



Soon they'll be ripe and ready to eat.

Frere Farms

The mister is also known as the Frere in some circles - it is an endearing nickname that has just stuck over the years. One day we were trying to figure out a name for our backyard farm and we came up with Frere Farms, we like it because it designates location as well as action. The Frere farms at Frere Farms. Here is our first logo:

Bird House Gourds

When we were buying our seeds in the spring, I got a wild hair and decided to grow bird house gourds:



They took well and I planted them in my medicinal herb garden because that's where my trellise space is.



The most amazing thing so far about this plant is how fast growing and curly the tendrils are:



Once the gourds mature on the vine (which could be right around the first frost), you pluck them and let them dry until you hear the seeds rattling around. Then you rub off the outer membrane with steel wool, drill a hole in one side large enough for a bird and paint them.

Smidge's nursery in the Land of Nod

Smidge's nursery is going to be a bird theme. I don't love birds in general, but I have seen so many cute bird things since I've been pregnant, that I just had to go with it. The Land of Nod reliably has some great bird things:







I've been trying to be good and wait on buying anything, but the singing bird in the birdcage above reminded me so much of one that my grandmother had, that I had to snatch it up immediately. I've been so nostalgic lately.

The room that is currently the mister's office that will be Smidge's nursery is painted a really nice yellow, "honeyed pear" is the color. The mister thinks I chose it because that room was going to be my craft room once the he got the garage studio built. Secretly, I picked that color because I thought it would be a lovely color for a nursery. It will be perfect for a boy or a girl.

ps. think how perfect a painted birdhouse gourd will be in this nursery.

Jenny Lind

Jenny Lind was a Swedish Opera singer known as the "Swedish Nightengale". She was famous in Europe in the 1840's and was brought to the United States by P.T. Barnum and toured the Eastern US to great acclaim. While she was in the states, she was known to have slept in a bed with turned spindles. Due to her incredible popularity, a line of cribs were created in the 1850's with vertical turned spindles and called the Jenny Lind crib.



I learned all of this recently as I was registering for Smidge. Jenny Lind cribs are still available from Babies R Us to Target to my new personal favorite and registry destination the Land of Nod. The crib converts into a toddler bed, too.

I also registered for the Jenny Lind bookcase, which I love. You can really see the spindles in this photo.