Oak Tree Junction
  • Blog
  • Shop
  • More...
    • Contact
    • Privacy Policy
    • Landing Page

One Onesie

11/15/2018

0 Comments

 
Picture
For months I’ve looked for the perfect pumpkin onesie for Andrew’s first birthday. I know I am picky and not normally cheap when it comes to the perfect outfit. I just couldn’t find one and could get it by the time I needed it.

​So I did what I also do, I make it. I pulled out one of his white onesie and my trust iron transfer paper and got to work. After searching online for a while I found a “one” that I liked and put it into a word document. I ended up printing it in three different sizes since I wasn’t sure what one would work best on the onesie. I also planned on using the other two for another project. Next, I cut out the image, cutting off as much of the blank area I could before ironing onto the onesie.

The onesie came out cuter than I hoped and was the perfect thing for him to wear as he dug into his smash cake!

0 Comments

First Year Photo Collage

11/13/2018

0 Comments

 
I loved how this photo collage turned out for Andrew’s first birthday party. However, it was a lot more challenging than I thought it would be! Why? Because it was so hard picking on only 12 pictures of this little cutie!

After going through all of the months of pictures I narrowed it down to 16, Jack couldn’t help me narrow it down anymore either so I chose to just print out all 16. I bought the little string of lights at Michael’s along with the project board. I taped the lights in place in a zig-zag pattern all over the board then started adding pictures. I actually liked having a choice with the extra pictures because some of the pictures looked dark, too similar, or too crowded next to each other. That ultimately helped me narrow it down to the 12!
​
The photo collage came out great and such a fun way to display his first year!
0 Comments

Surviving Bringing Home a NICU Baby

12/3/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
He's finally home!! And better yet we survived the first week with him at home! I'm not even going to lie and say it went smoothly, it was rough. No one prepared us for how much harder it is bringing home a NICU baby. What do I mean? They are used to the NICU, the environment, the sounds, the schedules. Sounds great and all, but when you remove them away from the environment, the sounds, and the schedules its not only hard on them but exhausting for you.

Environment - Our house was a good 6 degrees cooler than the NICU. Poor Andrew's hands and feet kept turning blue cause they were so cold. We turned up the heater, put socks, mittens and a hat on him. Even swaddled him to help keep him warm. Finally after a few days he body temperature acclimated and he is no longer blue.

Sounds - The NICU is like any other hospital room/Intensive Care Unit. There are beeps and alarms going off everywhere. There are nurses, doctors, and family talking. In all honesty, I think I would go crazy working there because there is never silence. Going from that to a quiet nursery was really hard for Andy even though I was sleeping in there with him. I ended up playing either a podcast or turning on Netflix just so he had some noise and I could drown out all of the thoughts running through my head.

Schedule - This has been the hardest one for us and we are still working on it. The first night I don't think I got more than two hours of sleep total. He cried all night. Between all of the changes he was going through and Jack and I being new parents and just simply not knowing what to do made it even worse. The nurses kept him on a 3-4 hours schedule where they would change and feed him. We tried keeping that schedule as best as we could, but there is one big difference. They got to go home after their shift to sleep...we were getting no sleep. And yes I know that saying sleep when the baby sleeps...but what if your baby isn't sleeping more than 20 minutes at a time? Also, the nurses would do a lot of their test and other things with the babies during the night so they could spend time with the parents during the day. Again great while in the NICU, a nightmare when they are home. It took us a few days but we finally got him to sleep between 1.5 hours to 2 hours at a time during the night. Hopefully, this will continue to increase the older and more comfortable he gets.

After this week, I feel like mom's who had a C-section was discharged right away with their babies and doing it all alone need a medal. I got a few extra days in the hospital to heal, a few days home without my baby so I could sleep, and I have an amazing husband that is there when I need help. I just don't know how those women do it!



0 Comments

My Birth Story & How I Induced Labor

11/25/2017

0 Comments

 
In my last post I announced our little boy has arrived and this post I am going to share my birth story including tricks I did to induced labor. I am convinced they worked since he came suddenly and a little dramatically. I was 39 weeks and 5 days. At our last appointment on Tuesday it seemed like we weren't making any progress and it started to feel like I was going to be as stuffed as the turkey on Thanksgiving later this week. I'm not sure if it was the lack of sleep or the full bladder every 5 minutes, but I was seriously ready for him to be here already so I decided to see if I can jump-start things. On Wednesday I made a batch of "Labor Day Tea" a high concentrate of Raspberry Tea (16 bags for 3 cups of water). On Thursday I went shopping with my mom at Costco which was a lot of walking, or waddling in my case. On Friday I had another prenatal massage and had her work pressure points to help induce labor and later in the day had another batch of "Labor Day Tea". Later that night I started feeling my tummy get really tight and then release, but no pain. I wasn't sure if it was something that I started making up in my head cause I was getting more anxious or it was the real deal. After talking to some people it seemed I was having Braxton Hicks contractions since there was no pain and they weren't increasing. After getting some good sleep, things started to change and quickly. Around noon we were running errands and started to feel off. No pain, just odd. By two things were getting a lot more intense so I called my mom giving her a heads up. The pain started and contractions were starting to have a little pattern and coming on quick and strong. Jack called the hospital and they said there was no way of knowing for sure and to come in. We waited another 30 minutes and started spotting so I knew I had reached 3cm so we decided it was time to load the car. I went to the bathroom one more time and felt a pop and I knew my water had broke! Amber and Aaron were in their driveway and seen what was happening and once I waddled to the car they knew it was go time. As soon as we got on the freeway my water kept coming...all the way to the hospital emergency room. Around 4 I was in the Labor and Delivery room things started moving very quickly, my contractions felt like minutes apart and strong and an epidural was needed, not that Jack helping me moan through each contraction wasn't sweet, they were just too quick for me to come back from to relax and was worried I would get too tired to push. While waiting for the bloodwork for the epidural Mom and Jeff came into the room even though I think I might have scared my step-father a little with my moaning, lol. By the time I had the epidural I was past 5cm and the pain turned more into a pressure.

Once at 8cm things started to get intense. I could feel him moving down, but not staying down. The doctor even seemed surprised I was still at 8cm, then all of a sudden I was surrounded by about 4-7 nurses and they were giving me oxygen, trying to put a monitor on the baby's head, and having me change positions because his heart rate was skyrocketing and crashing. It was around 8 pm at this time and the doctor came to me and said it's time to get him out. The baby is too stressed and we're not sure why it could be because his umbilical cord wrapped around his neck and my heart sunk. I didn't get this far along to lose him. So I said okay just give me a moment with my family. The four of us prayed and I was whisked off to have a C-section. Jack sat next to me and we just stared into each other eyes and tried to hold hands. With some tugging and pulling he was out and placed into the incubator and we heard him cry for the first time and my eyes filled with tears.

Then things got scary. He wasn't breathing probably and they needed to rush him to the NICU. They stopped by just for a second so we could see him for the first time and both of us were shocked to see how blonde he was! They quickly then rushed him off to NICU with Jack following. All I could do was lay there while they put me back together. Once I was in the recovery room, Jack came in talking about how cute he is and how strong he was. Before heading up to our room they rolled me into the NICU, so I can see him. They told us he had swallowed meconium which was causing some difficulty breathing and was giving him oxygen and he was going to have to stay in the NICU for the night. I don't think I really heard a thing the nurses were saying, all I could do was stare at this little thing that we had created.
0 Comments

We are so Blessed!

11/23/2017

0 Comments

 
​Jack and I are so thankful this Thanksgiving day to announce our little boy was born this past Saturday. Welcome to the world, Andrew Grant! 
Picture
*If you notice in the pictures Andrew is hooked up to a couple of machines. I will post about labor and delivery and his stay in the NICU in a future post. 
0 Comments

Three Unexpected Pregnancy Side Effects

11/14/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
I have been very blessed with this pregnancy. I am currently 39 weeks and a week away from my due date. I never got morning sickness or the aversions to certain smells. My feet didn't start to swell until the beginning of last month and was even able to wear heels at my baby shower. Having to run to the bathroom several times an hour didn't even start to happen until last week. I've had relevantly high energy the whole time; however, there are three things I was not expecting, warned about, or even knew would happen. Since I never knew, I'm sharing it with you so you know what's happening if it does happen to you. Every woman experience side effects differently in pregnancy and pregnancy is different every time, but these are the three things that were the hardest on me.

1. PUPPP: Never heard of it? Neither did I. PUPPP stands for Pruritic Urticarial Papules and Plaques of Pregnancy. I'm not going to go over all of the details of what is it, you can read more about it here, but what I will tell you it is by far the most irritating side effect of pregnancy and having to pee every five minutes is a walk in the park in comparison. I started experiencing this a few days ago and it leaves me in tears. I start itching uncontrollably on my chest and under my arms. The scary thing is there is only redness from my scratching and no bumps or rash. It's basically invisible hell. I look like a mental case trying to scratch off my skin in these areas. I have tried several itch relief creams and they only help for a few minutes. The best relief I have found as of right now is a warm bath and eucalyptus body wash.

2. Numbness: The most debilitating has been hand numbness. Since a few days before my baby shower, my hands have started to become numb. I can't do anything without my hands tingling in pain after a few minutes. From what I have gathered it is because baby boy is on my spine and messing with my nerves. Since we know he is going to take after his father and be a big baby, I think that it was causing the severity of it. I can't even hold a fork and forget about writing or typing. Talk about frustrating!! There were times at dinner when I would stop eating and begin crying, poor Jack didn’t know what to do to help. Sleeping at first was a nightmare. I would wake up in unbearable pain and couldn’t get it to stop enough to fall back to sleep. Finally, I bought wrist braces and started sleeping on my back with a pillow on each side to keep me slightly tilted. It helped, but I still wake up in pain from the numbness.

3. Intimacy: Or the lack of. The most frustrating side effect has been the lack of intimacy with Jack. During the first trimester, he was too scared he would cause me to have another panic attack like what happened during our miscarriage earlier this year. Thankfully in the second trimester, it was a lot better and we were able to enjoy some quality time. Then the third trimester when the baby boy really started moving and any time together stopped. He couldn’t get over how weird it was once he could see the baby moving. I guess I don't blame him, but I'm carrying all the baby weight in the front and can't even tell I am when my back was turned towards you. Needless to say, I have spent the last few months very frustrated.

These may come to no surprise for you, but they did for me. They have made my last trimester very challenging and I am really starting to count down the days until this little one is out!

0 Comments

​Nursery

10/20/2017

0 Comments

 
Our little bundle of joy will be arriving next month and we are in full preparation mode. This past weekend we put the finishing touches on the nursery. I am so excited and relieved that it is finally finished!

As in my normal style, I didn’t want this room to be too babyish, boyish, or themeish. The walls were already a neutral shade of grey and thankfully didn’t have to repaint. However, Jack had to install a classic Americana light fixture since the old one was a tad too florally for the room. I knew I wanted to add a few more Americana touches, along with a little world travel thrown in. I started by finding the vintage canvas map at Hobby Lobby. I also got the moon and cloud from there but changed them. I ordered some vintage travel poster from Zazzle, they were places where Jack and I have traveled together. I used simple frames I got at Target to hang them in. The two storage boxes I used as shelves were also from Target. The only artwork that remained in the room was a drawing of the Paris Statue of Liberty in front of the Eiffel Tower, representing the two countries of Jack and me.

I wanted to keep the guest bed in the nursery since I figured there will be some nights I would have to sleep in thereafter he is born. I added fun Americana pillows and even a cute vintage map pillow I found at Hobby Lobby. We bought the crib from Wayfair that looked similar to the guest bed and I love that it had a storage drawer underneath. We bought a desk from there as well to use it as the changing table.

Lastly, I found the perfect nursery rocking chair on clearance at Target. It was half off and I am so glad it fit in my Jeep! We installed the perfect reading light next to the chair about the antique side table that belonged to my grandmother that we refurbished. We also refurbished her old pantry cabinet to use as a bookcase.
​
To complete the room we installed new blackout curtains in navy, added a few stuffed animals. I even put the flag quilt I made years ago along with the new baby quilt I just made for him. Now, all we have to do is wait for him to arrive!
0 Comments

My Beautiful Americana Baby Shower Cake

10/11/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
This cake is the perfect representation of what I wanted for my baby shower to be. It is beautiful, classy, elegant, and Americana. With the beautiful fresh strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, and blueberries topping it, to it’s rich and delicious cream cheese frosting, even the simple French vanilla cake was absolutely perfect and everything I could have hoped for.

I did struggle a little the day of the baby shower with finishing the cake and the matching elegant cupcakes because my hands have started to go numb on Apparently baby boy is on a nerve in my spine and has been causing the numbness. This made it difficult to pip the cream cheese frosting and I had to take breaks to give my hurting hands a rest. Thankfully I was able to push through and was able to complete everything in time. I couldn’t be happier with how the cake and cupcakes turned out and how fabulous they looked displayed in the art gallery where the shower was held. I dare to say it all looked just like a work of art!
​

Picture
Picture
0 Comments

Elegant Baby Shower

10/9/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
I know what about I am about to say may be sacrilege, but I don't like baby themed things. I knew as soon as I found out I was pregnant that my baby shower wasn't going to have a cuties baby theme. Sorry, no vintage Pooh Bear, Noah's Ark, Jungle, not even baby pink or blue. This sadly crushed some of my family members, but I promised them that it would be beautiful, classy, elegant, and most importantly will have alcohol. After all just because I can't drink doesn't mean my guest shouldn't.

Once our budget was in place I started looking for a location. I knew a house was going to be too small since there was a lot of people invited and I didn't want to blow the whole budget on just on the location. Randomly one day on Facebook an ad popped up for a local downtown gallery talking about their $500 package and the ad included several pictures of baby showers they had there. Immediately booked an appointment to view and put the deposit down as soon as I saw the place in person. It was perfect. Beautiful hardwood floors, concrete walls, this awesome downtown industrial feel, and it even had a separate bar area for the food! I send a few pictures of the location to my friends and they even said it was totally me: vintage, classy and elegant. Just the vibe I wanted for my baby shower.

After the location was booked, we found a great local restaurant that could cater an event on a Sunday; something that actually turned out harder than we were expecting! For the drinks, we purchased apple cider, small bottles of water, and Carlo Rossi's Moscato Sangria that we added frozen raspberries, strawberries, and blueberries to help keep it cool. And not surprisingly, I did the cake with matching cupcakes.

​Although I didn't want a cuties baby theme, there was still a theme, sort of. Since we were having a little boy I wanted to have an Americana theme to match what we were doing in his nursery. The colors of the decorations, table settings, candy bar and even the cake were red, white, blue, with touches of gold and silver. Most of the decorations were provided by the gallery and we only had to bring in a few for the gift tables. All of the tablecloths I either already owned or brought on eBay, including the awesome blue and white striped table runners. It turns out it was actually cheaper to buy them than rent them! I did end up renting some candle holder that we used to put vanilla scented candles and larger holder to put the flower centerpieces in. The flowers were ordered at the local flower market and my aunt made the arrangements. To fit with the color scheme, we ordered white roses, red hypericum berry flowers, and eryngium thistle. We decided not to rent table settings and just bought nice quality plastic plates, silverware, and cups from Costco.

Yes, there were a few baby shower games, but I was very careful about the ones I picked. Sorry no, guess the candy bar for me thank you. Since I am such a detailed person, everything from the labels on the homemade shower gifts, to the game cards, to the food labels all matched the invitations. We tried to keep the prizes simple and just did four fun themed gifts baskets: movie, spa, baking, and fall. I even had background music for the shower. I found lullaby versions of some of the songs from mine and Jack's favorite bands so people had no idea they were listening to Green Day, Five Finger Death Punch, Metallica or Queen! My favorite thing from the baby shower was the guest book. I bought Dr. Seuss's Happy Birthday to You and had the guest write something special to our Baby Boy. I plan on readying it to him every year on his birthday along with all of the wonderful things people wrote to him. 

The shower was incredible and was so perfect. It was everything I have ever wanted for my baby shower. Everyone seemed to have a fun time, was really impressed with the classy and elegant feel of it, just what I was hoping for!

0 Comments

My Awesome Baby Shower Favors

9/25/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
I have had my baby shower favors planned out for years. I’m not kidding. Years ago I took a soap and lotion making class with my aunt and ever since I thought how fun it would be to make them as favors.

I made small bars of soap that were supposed to be red, white and blue to go along with the Americana theme of the shower, but the red turned out a little pinker. Oh well, the goat milk soap smells amazing and feels great on the skin! I also made little tubes of lotion but didn’t risk coloring them for fear they would color skin too. My wonderful aunt made the blue bath bombs and I was so happy that her first batch crumbled because I was able to take the broken ones and use them in my baths. Lastly, my sweet friend Angie made the amazing sugar scrub; it’s too rough to be used on ¬¬the face, but makes your hands and feet feel as smooth as a baby’s bottom.

4I made matching labels for all of the containers and even matched the thank you tags. These not only will match the game cards and food table labels at the shower but also save the date cards and the shower invitations. I know I am really OCD, but it was so pretty!

​We used clear 4X4 boxes to put everything in and added some red basket filler and tied it all together with a blue bow. That’s one big to do off of my list to still get done before the baby shower which is only a few weeks away!!
Picture
Picture of display at the baby shower
Picture
0 Comments

Gender Reveal Treat

6/21/2017

0 Comments

 
As announced on Monday, We are having a little boy. Last weekend we had a gender reveal party. I know some think these are a little cheesy, and normally I would agree, but I needed the distraction from my Dad and I’m always willing to host a theme party.

I struggled to try to figure out how we should make the big reveal for weeks. I search Pinterest for ideas but I wanted something different. Then I realized I had all of these white colored M&M’s leftover from the Nuts/No Nuts snacks. I decided to be a little extra mean to the guest. I placed all of the white M&M’s in cute little kraft favor boxes and put a question mark on the bottom of the lid, before wrapping the box with a red and blue gingham ribbon topped with a small fake sunflower. Only one box had the actual answer and Auntie Amber got the honor of telling everyone that we are having a boy!
0 Comments

We're Having A. . .

6/19/2017

0 Comments

 
It's a Boy! Our little bundle of joy is a boy! Last month we announced we're pregnant and yesterday on Father's Day we posted that Jack is going to be an amazing father to our son.

The day before Father's Day we hosted a Gender Reveal party for close family and friends (will post about soon) and they were the first to learn the wonderful news through a special box of treats. Everyone is excited we are having a little boy and the baby shower plans are already in the works!

We are so excited and can't wait for him to be here.
​
Picture
0 Comments

Exciting News.!!!

5/15/2017

0 Comments

 
Jack and I are so excited to announce that we're PREGNANT! This is the answer to many many prayers, we've been struggling with getting pregnant for the last several years and even started seeing specialists. We even went through a very devastating miscarriage at the beginning of the year. We are looking forward to our Rainbow Baby arrival in November!

We had some fun telling a few friends and family members over the last few weeks. We shared the news with my mom with Starbucks with Grandma on her cup, it took her over an hour to figure it out and thought I was lying when I finally told her. My aunt learned when we were on our way out of town and my mom was saying a prayer for her, me and the baby to be safe. Amber learned by getting a bottle of wine that said: "Only the Best Super gets Promoted to Auntie". We decided to make the public announcement yesterday on Facebook on Mother's Day. I posted "Jack and I wanted to wish everyone out there a Happy Mother's Day; especially to my wonderful mother, who's being promoted to Grandma!" I included a collage of photos Amber took of us announcing it.

​If all goes according to plan we might just be announcing the gender reveal on Father's Day....so keep an eye out!
Picture
0 Comments

    From Me...

    I created this blog to share my creations with hopes that it will inspire others to show their creative side.

    Food Advertisements by
    logo

Categories

All
1920's
Beautiful Spaces
Bebe
Bebe Learning Tools
Birthday
Bon Voyage
Breakfast Recipes
Cakes
Camping
Christmas
Costumes
County Fair
Craft Projects
Cupcakes
Desserts
Dinner Recipes
Do It Yourself
Freezer Meal Recipes
Good Eats
Halloween
Homemade Gifts
Inspiration
My Secret Garden
Organization
Other Holidays
OTJ Etsy Shop
OTJ How To Videos
OTJ News!
Parties!
Patriotic
Photography
Pre Made Mixes
Puppy Love
Quilts
Reading Corner
Repli Kates
Running
Sewing
Snack Time
The House That Jack Built

Archives

May 2020
April 2020
March 2020
February 2020
January 2020
December 2019
November 2019
October 2019
September 2019
August 2019
July 2019
June 2019
May 2019
April 2019
March 2019
February 2019
January 2019
December 2018
November 2018
October 2018
September 2018
August 2018
July 2018
June 2018
May 2018
April 2018
March 2018
February 2018
January 2018
December 2017
November 2017
October 2017
September 2017
August 2017
July 2017
June 2017
May 2017
April 2017
March 2017
February 2017
January 2017
December 2016
November 2016
October 2016
September 2016
August 2016
July 2016
June 2016
May 2016
April 2016
March 2016
February 2016
January 2016
December 2015
November 2015
October 2015
September 2015
August 2015
July 2015
June 2015
May 2015
April 2015
March 2015
February 2015
January 2015
December 2014
November 2014
October 2014
September 2014
August 2014
July 2014
June 2014

    Sign up for the OTJ Newsletter​

Subscribe to Newsletter
Food Advertisements by
logo
Proudly powered by Weebly