In the paper!

by Bex

Lots of exciting stuff is happening today people, not only are we spending our first full day in our new house (Eeeep!  You can follow me on instagram for inevitable house updates!) but I'm also being featured in an article written by Michelle about how writing openly about IVF on my blog and my lovely readers helped me cope throughout our horrendous experience over the last couple of years, complete with happy ending of course!

Then & Now
(Unfortunately Nik was working nights when I had my maternity shoot with Louise in our wedding park.)

Some of you may know Michelle as the ex-editor of SWD magazine and I got to know her when our wedding was featured in it back in 2011 and via Gemma who also used to work there.  Anyway, Michelle got in touch with me a few weeks ago to ask if I'd be interested in an interview to discuss the IVF, the blog and my readers now that we're pregnant.  Of course, any excuse for a chinwag over dinner, I was happy to chat about it.  I've always said how I wish it was easier for people to talk about subjects like IVF openly and I truly believe I would have coped much worse without the support I received here after each and every devastating disappointment.  Thank you again you lovely people!  Don't forget to run out and buy the Daily Record today if you fancy reading Michelle's article!

Master Bedroom moodboard

by Bex

Well, this is it, today's the day.  As you read this I'll be boarding my one way flight to Sussex!  Eeek!  Sadly Nik had to work today so I'll be getting the train from Gatwick to Brighton to wait for him to finish as we should get the keys at lunchtime!!  I thought today was a good day to share some of my decor ideas for the new house as I'm just SO excited to get in there and get started making it properly ours!  xx

In between home buying stress, I've been dreaming of what I can do with our new house when we're finally in.  Obviously this has included Pinterest as a stress-relieving pastime ;)  Below is a selection of images I found which inspired our master bedroom colour scheme...

Image Sources:

Top left, Top centre, Top right, Bottom Right, Bottom Left

Since making the above moodboard I have expanded on the idea with my real life moodboard I made at Hege's Pinterest event.  (The top right corner is the master bedroom section although we're going for more gold tones than copper as it fits better with items we already have.)

Photo by Hege

We've also ordered our bed!  We were torn between 2 colours of fabric both of which would look great in the room but in the end we went for the sort of dark greige (I know, it's an annoying made up word but greige just seems to fit - it's much softer than just grey).

The upper image shows the true colours of the fabric better.  We decided the darker colour would provide a bit of contrast rather than having all pale colours in the room.  I'd like to find bed linen in the paler stone/champagne colour though.

We chose the Venice upholstered bed from a local company which makes the beds here in Glasgow and UK-wide delivery is just £55.  Here's a picture of the bed in the Robinsons showroom (in a grey wool fabric)...

The thing is, once we're in the house, there's so much we want to do (on a limited budget bearing in mind our imminent babies and new mortgage) but we haven't much time before the twins arrive in which to get everything organised.  The master bedroom and nursery are taking priority so we have a comfortable room to hide away in our new family bubble and the twins have their room ready to move into once they're old enough.  We aren't sure how much time we'll have to get stuff done once they're here, I'm assuming very little!  And that's all assuming they behave and stay inside as long as they are supposed to and without causing me to need any hospitalisation or bed rest.

Leaving Do

by Bex

Last weekend we had our leaving do.  It was so lovely to see so many of our friends before we leave Scotland.  We hosted the event at The Hope which was an excellent venue and we were very well looked after.

Obviously for our big goodbye party I needed to glam it up and add some bling so I wore my green maternity maxi dress from Seraphine paired with the diamond & emerald earrings I received from my in-laws as a wedding gift, my vintage green necklace from the John Lewis second hand jewellery department and my antique ring (my birthday present from Nik last year).

I had planned to wear my hair down but despite washing it that morning, it ended up quite greasy looking after my free facial (using up my Clarins points) with scalp massage so I just twisted sections up to create a do.

Check out the grey streaks here!

I loved my deep dark green nails - a new polish from Butter London in British Racing Green.

We'd ordered a buffet for the evening catering for 25 people as we were expecting 40-50.  (43 people had confirmed they were coming and we had about 13 maybes, spreadsheets are fab when planning parties, I'm so sad but it makes it a lot easier to keep track of numbers!)  We thought catering for 25 was a good bet for food as not everyone would necessarily eat and there are always a few inevitable cancellations on the day (we had quite a few who had to cancel due to illness or childcare issues but I was quite upset by the 10 people who just didn't show, especially the ones who it turned out had made other plans but neglected to inform me).  Anyhoo, I didn't let it bother me on the night and luckily we didn't cater for everyone as only 26 actually showed up in the end and the buffet was very generous!  There was quite a lot of food left over but we were given boxes by The Hope to bring some of the wraps home for lunch the next day (we are currently on a tight budget after all)!

This was just the start of the food!!

As you can see, we also took along the top tier of our wedding cake.  I decided to defrost this the day before as it obviously wouldn't survive the journey to Sussex frozen so we couldn't hold off any more (the original plan being to keep it for a baby naming ceremony).  We weren't sure if chocolate sponge would be OK after 3 years in the freezer but figured we'd try it!  As it happens, since we  moved it to make way for more nachos, pulled pork and teriyaki skewers, we forgot all about the cake and ended up taking it home again!  We cut it the next day and I'm happy to say it was still as delicious as on our wedding day!  Sorry we didn't get to share it with everyone in the end!!  Luckily my in-laws were staying for the weekend so we all enjoyed it and anyone else who's visited since (Roz).

The food was a hit with everyone and the nachos and chicken skewers disappeared fast.  And after seeing me with a non-alcoholic apple mojito, they proved popular too (with drivers and fellow preggos) and the bar ran out of mint!  Luckily for me they found some more in the kitchen as I was loving them!  (I remember the same thing happening at our engagement party with the Chambord as I was on the French Martinis and a few others followed suit so the bar staff ended up going out for more!!)

We had a fantastic night and loved going round chatting with all our friends who will be sorely missed when we've gone.  I was even still going strong at last orders, quite unheard of since the pregnancy!!  ;)

Thank you so much to everyone who came, including those of you who I've met through this blog!  It's been amazing living in Glasgow with so many awesome people to call our friends!!  Keep in touch!  Mwah!  xx

DIY SOS!

by Roz

Okay it's official the Forever House has become exceptionally stressful!  To be honest it's been challenging from the start juggling the renovations ourselves with two full time jobs, throughout my pregnancy (painting 14 feet high ceilings when you're 38 weeks is not much fun!), and with the arrival of baby star and selling our flat, things have become pretty strained.  I'm torn between spending every single second with A and spending some time doing work in the house to help us one step closer to moving in.  That's one of the reasons I've been pretty quiet on the blog - not having internet for over 2 weeks didn't help either!

Bump and I and our very tall ladder!

So we sold our flat, we got a fantastic offer for it so decided to accept it and are now renting a one bed flat next to our forever house.  Literally next door!  Our fabulous new neighbours saved the day and let us rent their basement flat. Moving from a three bed to a one bed is certainly interesting, the flat is stuffed full of boxes of our stuff, add to that all the baby stuff and it's permanently a mess.  The TV doesn't work either... but enough complaints, it's lovely living in the area with the park on our doorstep and so handy for getting stuff done at the house.  We hope to move in at the start of October, so in 6 weeks time, the countdown is officially on!

We are still doing a lot of the work ourselves - as I type this, B is removing the last of the old bathrooms in the house and when he gets back, he'll look after A while I go and paint.  Decorating wise we have a lot of decisions to make... there have been more than a few heated discussions regarding paint colours, tiles for the bathroom and en suite, wallpaper and the number of TVs to have in the house, hence the title of this post.  B would happily paint the whole house magnolia and he says I would happily paint every room a shade of grey!  We are slowly getting there though, the nursery is nearly complete, I can't wait to share a post on A's room but for now here's a sneak peek:

Yes, baby star's room is grey

The two living rooms have been painted cream so that we can add colour with sofas, curtains etc. and live with the rooms for a while before deciding if we want to add some colour on the walls or leave them as is.  After a great number of sample pots and large swatches of colour painted all over our bedroom we have finally found a colour we agree on!  It's a lovely warm golden cream colour to go with this fabulous All Star wallpaper from Rockett St George.

I've also done a lot of work in my library, the walls are painted a lovely deep blue and I've nearly finished painting the bookcases, fireplace and shutters.  I honestly cannot wait to get my books on those shelves.  The last decision to be made in this room is the colour of the carpet.  I'm tempted to go with a black carpet, the floor area is quite small and the white fireplace, shutters and door add a lot of white to the room.  The only pieces of furniture with be a big comfy chair (no idea what yet) and a table, to sit my glass of wine or cup of tea on :)  Do you think a black carpet would go??

The library shelves

The main thing that's holding up our progress at the house is the plumbing, from the central heating system to the bathrooms there is a lot to do.  We have made great progress with the new boiler system and hope to order it very soon and our en suite is nearly ready to tile... all B and I have to do is agree on the tiles!  Tiling is part of the plan for tomorrow.

We do have our beautiful kitchen fitted, thanks for all your comments on my kitchen planning post, although I can't share the finished look yet.  The worktops cannot be fitted until the floor goes in (and the island will have quartz running down both sides and on to the floor), but the floors cannot go in until the boiler is installed and the heating system is tested.  I did post a picture on Instagram the day it was installed though.

Our kitchen

It's a beautiful bright room and I love the pale green paint.  There is a space at the window to fit a small table for everyday meals and I recently bought A a second hand tripp trapp which is white with a green baby set and cushions.  I can't wait till we sit down in the kitchen as a family of three to eat our first meal here :)

I promise to get back to writing some posts more regularly, A's birth story is nearly finished and I can't wait to share it.

Roz xx

More Pinterest Love with Hege In France

by Bex

Despite having quite a few half written posts I'm desperate to finish, you know I can't resist writing up events I've loved as soon as I can!  This one was written up the day after the event but I held off publishing while I found some better pictures to include, thanks to Hege for sending some over!  On Wednesday night Roz and I went along to a Pinterest UK event and I am SO glad we got to attend!  It was literally my perfect way to spend an evening and I need to do as much of that kind of fun stuff while I still can!  The gorgeous Aaron joined us and was very well behaved for the most part letting mummy Roz enjoy herself too.  I'm not sure turning up with 2 babies would be as acceptable (or noiseless) though so I'm glad mine are still safely inside for now ;)

Photo by Hege

Anyway, the event itself was at South Block and organised by Hege, Pinterest UK's first Pinbassador and was all about interior design and Pinterest.  Totally perfect for both Roz and I at the moment since we're both moving home imminently!  (I actually accepted the invitation from Zoe before even knowing what the event was as I just love Pinterest so much anyway, I was pretty sure I'd have a good time at whatever event they'd arranged!)  Unfortunately, due to the short notice (I really should keep my eye on the Pinterest blog to see what's going on), we were unable to get there for the start as I had other plans for the early evening but as soon as we arrived the activity started so we seem to have made it in time for the fun!  :)

Photo by Hege

Although we missed the first half hour and the presentation from Hege, we soon realised our task for the evening was going to be amazing.  We were provided with interior magazines, wallpaper samples, paint swatches, washi tape, tiles, glue, scissors, fabric samples, flowers...  Basically we were to make our own moodboards like a real life Pinterest board!

Photo by Hege

Photo by Hege

It's exactly what I've been using Pinterest for lately, along with all the baby/twin related stuff I've been finding of course!  In fact I even picked a few of my Pins to make another digital moodboard for the blog recently - I just haven't written the master bedroom post yet but here's one I made earlier ;)

(See original post with links here)

I already love tearing pages out of my food magazines and organising my recipes, sticking them into folders so I can easily find what I'm looking for.  I was in my element with so much new home inspiration around and being able to tear, cut and stick to my heart's content :)  I ended up using just one magazine, I think it was Elle Decoration, but found so many various colour schemes and ideas that I ended up deciding to make my moodboard about multiple rooms for our new home (although the bathroom is mostly not possible for this house but I will definitely be saving those ideas for the future)!

Here is my finished board:

Photo by Hege

I'm very proud of it and had so much fun laying it out and adding bits and bobs.  I was obviously quite determined to fill every space.  There were just so many wonderful materials to use, I couldn't stop!  I've never been one for minimalism ;)

The plum/mauve & grey section is inspiration for our living room.  The teal, seafoam green and champagne colours with copper for our bedroom (I couldn't resist a bit of grey in there too) and of course my favourite, olive green for the bathroom with luscious golds and natural textures.  I think the colours would all flow nicely through the house together too.  I also love that the magazine I picked up had a feature on Brighton which included the picture of the Pavilion which just happened to fit in with one of my colour schemes.  Since our new home is in Sussex I took it as a sign we should definitely have some teal in there ;)

That piece of metallic gold wallpaper you can just see under all of my bathroom snippets was extremely popular with everyone.  Roz loved it too and also used it on her board where you can see it much clearer:

Photo by Hege

Roz asked for the details and it turns out it's from good old B&Q so hopefully not a crazy expensive option as I'd quite like to use it in our new home too.  In fact, I think this might be it here, £17.98 for a 10m roll.  (And I've just found a dragonfly wallpaper!  Not my taste for a whole wall but might be nice as a framed sample.)

Her board was full of inspiration for the grown up L shaped living room in the Forever House.

Not only did we all have an amazing time crafting away and eating cupcakes but we also received seriously amazing goody bags from Hege and her sponsors - Bodie and Fou, Ferm Living, B&Q, Farrow&Ball, Pinterest and Bloomingville!

Photo by Hege

Thank you so much to everyone involved for having us along!  It was the perfect break amongst all the moving house stress I've been having to deal with this week!  :)

Our baby books - Loved So Much - review

by Bex

After previously looking online for a baby book I liked and receiving some recommendations from mum friends, I also managed to get into town to see some of the ones I'd found so I could check them out properly and see the insides.  I was surprised to find a lot of them had random pictures of babies printed in them as part of the design.  I'm sorry but I want my babies' books to only have pictures of them inside not someone else's children!  I was not surprised to find that a lot of them were also in the standard 'baby colours', eg. pastels, yellow, and with the usual baby doodles like rattles, etc.  None of them jumped out at me and they were all pretty similar and a bit too cutesy for my taste.  Luckily, Steff had recommended the ones she bought for her twins and although I never actually found this one in 'real life', there were places online showing the inside and it had nice, bright, varied colours and lots of quirky pictures.  It was definitely the one I was going to get but without holding it and seeing what kind of pouches, space, etc. it had for photos and keepsakes I wasn't yet ready to buy it.

Luckily I spotted a different one in Mothercare, behind the usual soft, pastelly white baby books.  One designed specifically for their 'Loved So Much' range (I didn't realise this was a range at the time but am not particularly a fan of all the other stuff).  I do, however, LOVE the baby book!

It does have a cute teddy on it but it's a bit more my style (and I have to admit, I do quite like the teddy!) with green, brown, plum and burgundy colours, it's much less 'typical baby' than the other books I'd seen and it has plenty of space for little bits n bobs to be tucked into, including wee envelopes for a lock of hair, etc.

There's even a section for shopping!  :)

It has all the prompts I wanted to help me jot down things as well as plenty of space for photos.  It's all held together with large rings so it opens easily (unlike some tightly bound hardbacks) and even when things are stuck in and I've filled the pouches with keepsakes, it should still close properly too.  I've included lots of internal pictures below as a few people were interested in more info when I put them on instagram :)

There are plenty of spaces for decent sized pictures, even of the scan pics (a lot of the ones I looked had had tiny sections) which is great since we have so many!

And a section about the pregnancy, again with space for pictures:

It has a section for the nursery design:

Prompts to fill in current information about us and the world today:

And lots of firsts like first bath:

It goes all the way up to the second birthday and has space for any other photos you want to add:

I showed it to Nik and he was immediately convinced (I'd already shown him a few in John Lewis and he didn't like them either) but of course, being Nik wanted to search online for a bargain!  :)  The books are £14.99 in Mothercare but he managed to find them on books etc..  They're currently £8.85 each with free P&P!  So we paid just £17.70 for the two we needed!

Rhubarb & Apple Crumble

by Bex

You may have noticed a couple of my instagram pictures since being pregnant have featured apple crumbles, despite it being summer.  I have been loving a bit of comfort food served with lashing of yummy thick cream.  I certainly seem to have a much sweeter tooth since while I'm pregnant!  Anyway, one of the more fun aspects about moving house is having to eat as much as possible before the packers come!  I have a lot of fruit in the freezer from when I used to make lots of smoothies (something I've actually been off lately) and I had a huge pack of rhubarb in there (although I don't think I ever planned to make a rhubarb smoothie!) which needed using.

Obviously the perfect solution was to make rhubarb crumble!  I also have a couple of ropey apples to use up so added them in too!  I found a few recipes online to get an idea of how long to bake it for (and saw one by Gregg Wallace which included port which I thought might be a nice addition!) and basically made up my own recipe.  Lets face it. it's pretty hard to go wrong with crumble, unlike cakes it's much less precise and scientific!  Luckily it worked out well so here's my recipe below as I think I'll be making this one again, maybe with a bit of stem ginger added next time for a proper warming treat in winter...

For the filling:
500g rhubarb, chopped
3 apples, peeled, cored & chopped (this made the filling quite a large quantity but they needed using up!)
100g golden caster sugar
3 tbsp port (optional - makes it smell quite Christmassy!)

For the topping:
140g flour
100g butter
100g demerara sugar
60g rolled oats (I used 28g as that's all I had)

Place the rhubarb, apple, sugar and port (if using) into a saucepan, cover and simmer for 15 minutes over a low heat.  Add more sugar to taste and when the fruit is soft but still holding it's shape, remove from the heat.

Preheat oven to 200 degrees.  Place all the ingredients for the topping into a food processor and blitz until you have a crumbly mixture.

Pour the fruit mixture into a shallow oven proof dish and sprinkle over the topping.

Bake for 30 minutes or until the top is golden brown and the filling is bubbling.

Serve with custard or my favourite - lots of lovely extra thick double cream!

I only had pouring cream and not enough patience to whip it!

It was nice and tart without being too sour (although you could obviously add more sugar if you wanted)