The Wrought Iron Nightmare

The little man is on his way to crawling VERY soon.  A little too soon in my mind but there is no slowing him down!  He is getting up on his hands and knees and rocking back and forth.  He then plops on his belly and rolls or scoots backwards.  Every now and then, I see a scoot forwards.

Yesterday, I noticed that he moved his hands in a forward direction while on his hands and knees.  It is really interesting to see it all take place.

So, our dilema in this house for quite awhile is how to block the stairway from the baby.  It is one of my biggest fears that he is going to get to it when I turn my back for just a second.  My nightmares are are the worst!  See that brick wall of the fireplace at the bottom of the stairs and the ceramic tile?  What a landing that would be!   For anybody...
 

Stairway with Wrought Iron Railing in Main Hall

The problem is two fold:

1.The gate has to attach to the wall on one side and the vintage wrought iron post on the other.

2.  The railing ALL THE WAY AROUND is not "code".  He could easily army crawl under it OR slide through the railing.

So there are a few products our there that we are going to use for a temporary solution.  My husband wants to design something later to look better and match the decor.  However, right now, something just needs to be there for his safety.

Stairs and Nursery View

Here are the products that we are using:

1.  Banister Guard (Found at http://cardinalgates.com/ks15.html  )

The Banister guard is a sheet of plastic that is attached by zip ties.  Cutting it to fit has been a pain and I am not sure that it is going to work because of the gap at the bottom of the railing.   I have a feeling that this is not going to be in place long.

2.   Kidco Safeway Gate (Found at http://www.kidco.com/products-page/hardware-mount-gates/g2001/)

I like this gate for one reason- it attaches to the wall and the post.  I do not trust those compression type of gates for the stairs especially for this type of railing.  A piece of wood will most likely have to be attached to the wrought iron post.  Because of the dimensions, the post will have to be taller than the iron railing which will look strange.  However, as long as it works, I don't care at this time.  It will put my mind at ease so much if the gate was up. 

I will keep you posted on the progress of the gate/guard and Mr. Man's mobility!

The Planning Stage

Geez! I haven't spent time with you since Jan 17th! I had a lot of New Year's resolutions and one of them was to spend more time documenting the changes in our house. Well, I haven't done that much have I?

I have been very tired and very un-virgo like- not worrying about the day to day schedule of life and making it perfect. What is causing these unusual behavior? Pregnancy! YIPPIE! The baby is due to arrive September 13th- so yes, another Virgo in the house. Please, pray for my husband.

So, I am finally feeling more like myself nowadays-not so sick and nauseous with a little boost of energy. Like my doctor says, I am slowly starting to enjoy the pregnancy. I certainly enjoy the eating and resting part of it. I also am enjoying thinking about what kind of parents my husband and I are going to be. We have wanted a child for so long and finally, it is here! I must admit, I am scared out of my wits and at the beginning, I admit that I thought, "Oh God, what have we done?"

Well, that feeling has subsided and I am starting to plan, plan, plan!

For starters, I was worried that I was going to be out of my clothes rather quickly. I stressed about this and talked about clothes non-stop with my husband. I figured one day I would wake up and not have a thing to put on to go to work except sweats.... I know I drove him crazy. Luckily, with my mother's help (and her huge material closet), she boosted my wardrobe by making maternity tops for me. This has taken a huge load off my shoulders.

I have also been working on some sewing projects. I first raided my "give to goodwill" bag and found plenty of dress pants, jeans, capris, and shorts that I could work with. I then turned them into maternity pants.

Here are some good tutorials:

Maternity Pants 1


Maternity Pants 2

These are so simple and well, it didn't cost much. I purchased 10 yards of 2 inch elastic from ebay for $4. I used pants I was going to give away so that didn't cost anything. For the top band I used old tshirts that were going to be shop towels or goodwill and so, that didn't cost anything either. So, total cost $4 and time spent was about 30 minutes-1 hour for each pair.