I'm still adjusting to the whole being a parent means you don't have long lazy Sunday afternoons to sit and read thing. Every month when I look at how many books I've read, I'm like wow, that's so much less than I used to read. And then I remember it's probably not fair to compare my pre-kid reading volumes to now. Still working on that.

I read a couple of excellent books over the last two months that I've been recommending to everyone.

So without further ado, onto the books.

Five Stars

James by Percival Everett
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This will likely be one of my favorite books of the year This retelling of Huck Finn is so good. I loved to see Jim as a full person, with this whole big life that’s just not there in the original and building such kindness into him, even though he had no real reason to be kind to any of the white people in the book. I couldn’t put this book down and I was sad to leave Jim when it ended.

The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Caused an Epidemic of Mental Illness by Jonathan Haidt
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Reading this book made me a little bit sad about how we destroyed an entire generation of children with screens and social media. But there was so much good food for thought about what we can do to change the tide and create healthier relationships for our kids with the Internet. I appreciated the practical tips especially at the end of the book. I'd say this is a must read for any parent trying to figure out how to manage devices for their kids.

The Small and the Mighty: Twelve Unsung Americans Who Changed the Course of History, from the Founding to the Civil Rights Movement by Sharon McMahon
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Like many others, I've been following Sharon's corner of the Internet since 2020. I've learned a lot from her, and she's introduced to many new authors and other great books. She's also an excellent storyteller on her podcast, so I was looking forward to her book release. Her strong storytelling continues here. In many sections, I could hear her voice in my head as if she was narrating this on her podcast. I enjoyed the stories she shared in this book, each one infused with hope.

Four Stars

Middle of the Night by Riley Sager
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I think this was more like 3.5 stars, but I'm rounding up because I enjoyed the story overall. I did almost throw in the towel because the book opening with creeper lurking in the woods outside of a house was a bit too much for me when I was literally reading this book in the middle of the might. But during the daylight hours the creepy factor was turned down. Ethan Marsh has returned to his childhood home where 30 years ago, his best friend disappeared from the tent where he and Ethan were camping in Ethan's backyard. No body was ever found and no one knew what happened to Billy. But creepy things start happening in the neighborhood, forcing Ethan to reckon with the past.

A Hidden Secret by Linda Castillo
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was another fun Kate Burkholder mystery short story. I listened to the audiobook of this while I was doing chores around the house and it made the time pass very quickly because I just wanted to know where the story was going to go. I really love these short stories that bridge the gap between some of the longer books.

Three Stars

Candy Corn Murder by Leslie Meier
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I really wanted to love this book as much as I loved the Lucy Stone mystery that I read last Halloween, but this book started a little slow for me. It was still a fun and cozy Halloween mystery. It just started a little slowly.

The Next Mrs. Parrish by Liv Constantine
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This book was a fast read, but I really struggled with it. It seemed like Daphne was just so flat in this book and had no real agency. I got frustrated with just about every decision she made and felt like there were a million other choices she could have made instead of the ones she did.

The Midnight Feast by Lucy Foley
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I really liked the payoff at the end of this book, but it was a bit of a journey to get there, and I felt like there needed to be more description or backstory on the mysterious "birds" that supposedly haunt the woods. But besides a few of those challenges I had with the plot, I did enjoy the back and forth timeline building to the climax where almost every character had a motive and almost anyone could have been the dead body found on the beach.

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This post has been a long time coming! I'm so happy to say I finally, finally, finally was able to run a race with my little guy in the running stroller. 

It took me way longer to get to this milestone than I ever expected it would. 

When I was pregnant, I had big dreams of getting back to running quickly, and either running with the little man or having him be at the finish line of my races. After so many unfortunate setbacks, I finally got to have that moment over the weekend. 

We were in Rehoboth for the Seawitch Festival, and the Seashore Striders put on a race every year to coincide with the festival. 

I had planned to walk this with the running stroller last year, but the baby ended up melting down, and so I just walked it myself. 

But this year, we were both ready to run. 

It was a chilly morning, so he got plenty bundled in the stroller, and I wished I hadn't forgotten to pack my ear warmer since there was a pretty steady breeze. 

We did packet pick up in the morning, let the little guy run around the playground until about 10 minutes before the race start and then we lined up and took off. 

Having never run a race with the stroller before, I started a bit toward the back of the pack. I was trying to be respectful of the other runners and didn't want them to get stuck behind me. Running with the stroller slows my pace down big time.

I didn't have any time goals for this race. I just wanted to enjoy the experience of finally getting to do a race together.

I stuck to the sides of the road where I could and made sure to not get too close to anyone since I didn't want to accidentally nip them in the heel with a stroller tire. 

The first mile of the race was a little bit congested, but I still had plenty of room to maneuver even with the big stroller.  

I felt mostly good through out the race. It's definitely harder to run with the stroller, but I was just so happy to be out racing again. 

It was fun to run along the ocean. We got some really nice views before turning back into some of the neighborhoods to wind our way to the finish. 

Little man seemed pretty chill the whole time. In fact, for a while I think he might have fallen asleep. 

With just about a half mile to go in the race, I was definitely feel the effort of running with the stroller. 

I tried to pick up the pace a tiny bit as the finish line came into view, but a final kick with a big stroller is definitely different than a final kick without. 

We crossed the finish line in 32:21, which was good enough for 9th place in my age group. 

I was getting a little emotional toward the end of the race. It felt like such a big milestone and accomplishment to finally make it to this day. I'm healthy, he's healthy, and I'm finally back to doing something that I love. 

I'm glad I got to share running and racing with my little buddy. I hope to be able to do a lot more of that together in the future.

It's been a minute since I've done a books update. It's also incredibly hard for me to cope with the fact that summer is pretty much over. I'm not ready to say goodbye to warm pool days. While this summer I didn't get to spend many luxurious days lounging by the pool or at the beach with a book, I did still read a few good things over the last few months -- including a handful of five star books. 

So without further ado, here's what I read over the summer.

Five Stars

Swan Song by Elin Hilderbrand
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Five stars largely in part because I thought this was a lovely send off for the characters from Nantucket that I've grown to love over the last many summers. All of my favorites were back to celebrate the police chief's retirement, but of course, one last case lands in his lap before his retirement date at the end of the summer. I will miss Elin's books every summer.

The Distance Between Us by Reyna Grande
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Even though this memoir is more than 10 years old, it still feels like an important story given all the conversations today around immigration. This is the story of Reyna Grande, who as a child is separated from first her father and then her mother as they came to the United States looking for a better life than what they had in Mexico. Her mother eventually returns to Mexico, and Reyna makes the trip across the border with her father when she's 9 years old. Separated from one of her parents, she grows up in the U.S. with the other. The book is equally really heartbreaking and hopeful. It's not an easy read, but it's a good one.

Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This was just a lovely book to read. My favorite character was an aging octopus that had found ways to escape his enclosure. He was fun and charming, and I wish he had more chapters in the book. The humans in the book were just the right amount of flawed and broken for them to be endearing and lovable without tipping into completely annoying, though at least one of the characters had his moments.

Four Stars

Swimming with Ghosts by Michelle Brafman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book was another one I was introduced to at the Gaithersburg Book Festival. A book set in the DMV at a summer swim club sounded right up my alley. It's a good family drama with trouble brewing at the pool when the club needs to find a new coach when the old one quits a week before the first meeting of the season. This book features and lovable and detestable cast of characters, the derecho that rocked this region in 2012 and the mess that overly involved swim parents bring.

Funny Story by Emily Henry
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Emily Henry tells great stories and this book wasn't any different. This is the funny story of how two people meet after both of their other relationships go belly up. Charming and fun and a great summer read.

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Darling Girls by Sally Hepworth
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I love Sally Hepworth's books. They're twisty mysteries. This one was kind of dark, focusing on three girls who grew up in an abusive foster home. When years later, the home is demolished, a dead body turns up underneath it. The police start to investigate and the girls worry they are suspects.

How to End a Love Story by Yulin Kuang
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I love a good enemies to relationship story line, and this book delivered on that front. Helen and Grant went to high school together, ended up on different sides of a tragedy and haven't seen or spoken since. And then they are thrown together on the set of a TV show where Grant is the screenwriter adapting Helen's book. Tore threw this quickly because it was a good read.

Have I Told You This Already?: Stories I Don’t Want to Forget to Remember by Lauren Graham
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I listened to this as an audiobook and there is something so nostalgic for me about Lauren Graham's voice. I wish there had been more stories from Gilmore Girls in this book, but I appreciated the few references and the handful of references to Parenthood too. Lauren Graham makes me laugh and listening to this book was really enjoyable.

Long Lost by Linda Castillo
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I'm not usually much of a short story person, but this was a nice break from longer books during a bit of a reading slump. Plus it was fun to see one of my favorite detectives solve a mystery in just an afternoon.

Just for the Summer by Abby Jimenez
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Read this book in almost one sitting at the pool on my birthday. Just a fun story about a travel nurse who’s never able to settle down, who meets a guy who maybe makes her want to do just that. Highly recommend for an enjoyable read

Three Stars

The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I picked up this book expecting a different kind of story. This book starts with a group of dedicated lap swimmers and what happens to them when the pool has to close because a crack appears. I expected the book to follow more of the characters, but it really zooms in on one. The book ended up being heavier than I expected from the blurb. Not bad, just very, very different than I anticipated.

The Unwedding by Ally Condie
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This book started a little slow for me, but it did pick up fairly quickly. Our recently divorced leading lady ends up trapped at a luxury resort by herself when a landslide blocks off access to the road. Members of the wedding party there are slowly dying one by one, and people are frightened that they will be next. The remaining guests scramble to find the killer and to safely leave the resort.

The God of the Woods by Liz Moore
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I feel like everyone raved about this as the summer's hottest mystery. And the storyline was good, but it was long and there were a lot of players and sometimes I had a very hard time keeping track of who was who. But I am a sucker for a book set at a bougie summer sleep away camp because so many things and go wrong and in this book that's absolutely what happens. The story takes place across multiple timelines (probably also why I was getting confused), and looks into the disappearance of two children from the same family nearly 10 years apart. It was good and I enjoyed the story, but I also got lost a lot because there was so much going on in some many different years.

This Summer Will Be Different by Carley Fortune
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Had a hard time giving this book a rating. I related so much to the main character wanting to find her happy place and finding peace and tranquility near the water. I was also down for a good love story, but there were other story lines here that drove me nuts, like the whole best friend running away before her wedding. It was a fast summer read.

This summer has been a rough one for running. Even though I got the good news from my podiatrist that my toe wasn't broken, I did still have a pretty nasty bone bruise that took almost a full month to heal. 

On top of that, we had record-breaking heat for almost the entire month of July. That left me doing lots of cross training and zero running. 

The heat has finally broken a bit now, and with my toe all healed, it's been nice to get back to some running over the last couple of weeks.

Right before I hurt my toe back in June, I had run 3.5 miles. It was my longest run since before I was pregnant, and I had been so disappointed when I was laid up with another injury because I felt like my progress was halted again. 

But just this week, I managed to work myself back to 3.5 miles again. It was slow. All my times are slow these days, but it was something. 

There's a 5K I'm hoping to do with my son in the running stroller in October. Knowing that I can manage three miles already is a good sign. I will definitely need to work on my endurance to be able to run with my heavy toddler in a stroller over that distance, but I still have some time for that. 

I'm also hoping to be able to run a few 5Ks and maybe even a five miler on my own later this fall. At this point, the five miler seems maybe a bit ambitious, but we'll see how things go this fall. 

Over the next couple of weeks, my focus is going to be on getting some of my running endurance back. If after a couple of weeks getting comfortable at the 5K distance, I'll see about starting to gradual add on the miles. 

I really miss racing and running in general, so I'm trying to focus on building back slowly to avoid any more injuries, so that I can actually run some of the races I have my eye on this fall. 

We got back from a trip to the beach a couple weeks ago, and while we were there, I got in a couple of great stroller runs and one really lovely solo run. And then I hurt my toe, and I haven't been able to run since. 

I've been slowly increasing the distance I can go with the running stroller over the last few months. Running with a stroller is no joke. Throw a 23 pound baby and some hills into the mix, and I was huffing and puffing after barely a mile. 

I was really looking forward to some flat boardwalk stroller running. With the super hot summer we've been having, even the early morning runs were still pretty challenging. But it was nice to get out, and see some different scenery on our runs. And my child only protested slightly when I needed to take walk breaks. 

I also got in one glorious and lovely run by myself at the beach. With the blistering hot weather, it's been pretty much impossible for me to run over my lunch breaks these days, so it was nice to have a morning where someone else could stay with the kiddo and I could get some much needed solo run time. 

My endurance had been slowly coming back. The week before our beach trip, I did a 3.5 miler. It's a distance I never thought much of before, but these days every slight uptick in mileage is a big win in my book. 

But then the morning I got back from my wonderful solo run, I bashed my pinky toe into a baseboard at our beach house, and I haven't been able to run since. 

I've only been able to wear open-toed shoes (thank goodness it's summer). I got it X-rayed at urgent care when we got back and the doctor told me it was broken, which unfortunately was what I expected given the amount of swelling and discoloration. 

They taped it and gave me a walking shoe and told me to follow up with an orthopedic. 

I left a message for mine, but then the following day, urgent care called me back and told me the radiologist reviewed my X-rays and actually didn't see a break. So maybe it's not broken.

It's been a few weeks now and my toe definitely feels better. I think I'm going to still follow up with the orthopedist even though urgent care told me I didn't need to. 

I still haven't tried to put on a closed toed shoe and I definitely haven't attempt to run. 

I've taken two full weeks off any sort of exercise, and my toe does mainly seem to be doing better. It's less swollen, but if I push on it where the "break" looks like it was in the X-ray it definitely still hurts. 

So just when I was making some major progress on the running front, I have a stupid injury and I'm back to not running. We'll see how long this injury sidelines me. I'm hoping not for too long. I really, really would like to race in the fall, and good fall race times come from tough summer training runs. 

I'm definitely still adjusting to not having as much free time to read as I used to, especially now that the weather is warmer and I'm used to spending the summer months sitting at the pool with a good book. My days at the pool look a bit different now, and there's definitely no sitting and reading. 

But I still managed to read a few good books in May. 

Four Stars

The Mystery Guest by Nita Prose
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I really enjoyed the first book with Molly the Maid, and I was excited to see her back to her crime-solving ways in this follow up. When a famous author drops dead at a speaking event at her hotel, Molly is yet again a suspect, but so are many other people. Molly works to uncover the identity and motive of the true killer. Just like the first book this was fun and fast and a really enjoyable read.

Women of Good Fortune by Sophie Wan
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I was introduced to Sophie Wan at the Gaithersburg Book Festival, and when she did a reading from the book and I found myself laughing out loud, I knew I wanted to read it. The rest of the book didn't disappoint either. It was a fun read about three friends in China who are all largely unhappy with their place in the world. One is engaged to marry into a wealthy family and the friends plan a heist to steal the traditional wedding gifts. I enjoyed the story of the women, and I even came to like some of the more problematic male characters in the book.

Good Inside: A Guide to Becoming the Parent You Want to Be by Becky Kennedy
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

It's weird to rate a parenting book, but raising kids is hard and there are a million theories on approaches to how to not mess up your kids. I liked the general premise of this book -- that children act out not because they're bad, but because they're dealing with some inside emotion that they haven't yet learned how to manage and that a parent's job is to help teach them how to regulate those emotions so they have vital coping skills for when they're older and life throws tough stuff at them.

The Dead Will Tell by Linda Castillo
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I took an unintentional short break from the Kate Burkholder series because I forgot to put this book on hold at the library for like a full month, but I was excited to dive back in to the next mystery with one of my favorite detectives. In this book, Kate investigates a murder in Amish County only to uncover that it has ties to a cold case from the 1970s. This book had a slightly different twist than some of the others that I've read in this series, and I really liked it, but don't want to say more for the spoiler.

Three Stars

Meet Me at the Lake by Carley Fortune
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

While I didn't love this book as much as Fortune's first book, it was still an enjoyable and easy read. Fern's mom owns a lake resort that gives major Dirty Dancing vibes. When she's killed in a car accident the resort passes to Fern. Fern's moved to Toronto and has no desire to go back to her sleepy lake town, but she knows she has to sort out what to do with the resort. When she arrives she finds Will, a man she met one day 10 years ago checking in. Fern's ex also works at the resort. Things are awkward, but the tension makes for a good story. I struggled with both Will and Fern's characters at points, which is why this is only 3.5 stars, but overall it was still a fun summer read.

Life has been more than a little hectic lately with since I went back to work in January and since the little guy started daycare in April. My free time for reading has felt like it's disappeared, and we've also been battling a string of nonstop sickness in our house since starting daycare. I didn't mean to fall this far behind on book recaps, but alas here we are. 

So here's a round up of the handful of books I've read over the last three months.

February Books

Four Stars

The Whispers by Ashley Audrain
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Nothing like a good neighborhood drama to really suck you in. There are secrets in the neighborhood and uncertainty and competition between the women who live on this street. But when a young boy falls out his bedroom window, the neighborhood rallies in some ways and in other ways, they try to dig deeper to find out what was really going on in that house. This was a good book that had me continually trying to guess what was coming next.

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Three Stars

The Other Mothers by Katherine Faulkner
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I thought this book took a little while to get going. A young nanny is found dead and the police rule her death a tragic accident. But when the girl's mother seeks out Tash, a freelance journalist and insists there had been foul play, Tash finds herself being sucked into a group of glamorous, rich mothers from a local children's playgroup. The circle welcomes her and soon Tash finds herself sucked into their world. She claims its all part of the investigation, but she might be in too deep. This book picked up a lot toward the end, but I wish it had had a bit of a faster pace throughout.

March Books

Five Stars

The Women by Kristin Hannah
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Even though I definitely thought the first half of this book was stronger than the second half, this is a five star book. It was beautifully written. I keep telling everyone to read it and I keep wanting to talk about it. After her brother is killed in the Vietnam War, Frankie McGrath signs up to be an Army nurse. The first half of the book covers her time during the war, and the second half covers life when she gets home. Parts of this book made me so mad I wanted to chuck it across the room, but I loved it. I also felt a really personal connection to this story since my aunt served as an Army nurse in Vietnam -- in one of the hospitals mentioned in this book -- and it was something that I didn't know much about. This book touches a lot on how the women who served in Vietnam were often unseen and their service was unvalued when they came home. It's a must read.

Three Stars

One in a Millennial: On Friendship, Feelings, Fangirls, and Fitting In by Kate Kennedy
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I wanted to love this book so much and I thought I would with all the nostalgia it packed into it, but I found the essays to be a bit of a mixed bag. Some were really good and enjoyable, and others I just struggled to get through.

Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I was really excited for this book that reimagined the Ted Bundy story through the lens of one of the women in the sorority house in Florida, but I found it fell a little flat for me and at times felt like a real slog to get through. I did like the push back that Bundy was this incredibly intelligent person, but I just think I had such high expectations of this book, and while it wasn't bad at all, I just found it a bit slow.

April Books

Four Stars

The House of Eve by Sadeqa Johnson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I really loved this book. It follows two Black women in the 1950s. Ruby lives in Philadelphia and is dreaming of being the first in her family to go to college. Eleanor just moved to Washington, D.C. to attend Howard University where she meets and falls in love with a man from a very wealthy family, where she also feels she doesn't fit in. I didn't realize when I picked up this book that it would center so much on babies and trying to build families, but I loved the way Johnson bounced back and forth between both characters and their unique circumstances and how she eventually brought them together.

Killers of a Certain Age by Deanna Raybourn
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was such a fun and fast read. A group of female assassins have been working together since they were in their 20s. They're now in their 60s and ready to enjoy retirement -- except their employer puts a hit out on them. This was a great read with characters I loved working together to take down the man.

First Lie Wins by Ashley Elston
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was another fun and twisty read. Evie Porter isn't who her boyfriend Ryan thinks she is. In fact, Ryan is her mark and while she's awaiting the next instructions from her boss on how to gather the intel she's been assigned to gather, she learns this job might not be as straight forward as it seems. This book flashes back and forth in time so you get a glimpse at Evie's other jobs and what led her to this life. I enjoyed the twist at the end and thought this book was great overall.

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It's been a little over a year since I was medically benched from running because of complications discovered during my 20-week ultrasound when I was pregnant.

I remember how hard and disheartening it was at the time to get scary news about a pregnancy complication and in the same breath find out that all my favorite ways to manage stress (running, working out in general) were largely wiped off the table. 

I cried a lot, but eventually with a few weeks of space from the news, got to a place mentally of knowing this was just a temporary setback. I started plotting my postpartum running comeback. 

But that comeback has been so humbling and not at all what I imagined it would be. 

Originally, I had a target half marathon in mind for March. I figured I had all summer to heal and then in the fall could slowly start building up my mileage and by winter, I'd be back to my normal training volume. 

Then I had all those postpartum health issues and needed surgery again in September, and I threw the idea of a March 2024 half marathon right out the window. 

I set my sights on a five miler in December 2023 instead, thinking maybe I could do a run-walk situation, under the impression from my doctor's initial thoughts that this recovery would be quicker. It wasn't quicker, and that race got thrown out the window too. 

Ever since then, I feel like it's been one step forward and a bunch of steps back trying to get back to regular running. 

I got an initial clearance to slowly work some running into my walks around six to eight weeks after that second surgery. I proceeded cautiously, introducing running in 1 minute increments. Then bumping to 1:30 and 2 minute increments. 

And then I had some more surgery setbacks and more doctor follow ups, and finally, finally in December, I think I was really cleared. 

All that time healing meant, I was unable to run for almost my entire maternity leave, and that was rough. But I told myself that once I was back to work, I'd be able to get back into a running groove. 

Pre-baby, I either worked out before work or over my lunch break. I knew before work was largely going to be out of the question, at least for running, while I'm still breastfeeding. That's a level of discomfort I'm not really into. So I was ready to really embrace lunch time runs. 

And then I went back to work and was so overwhelmed by trying to catch up that for the first three weeks, I don't think I took a single break of more than five minutes. 

As I've settled in more, I've managed to run about once a week, sometimes twice. It's not what I envisioned, but it's better than nothing. 

And I'm finding a new problem cropping up with my toes, that I think is related to perhaps some slight foot growth I had during pregnancy. I got it checked out by a podiatrist and he told me I didn't need to stop running as long as I've adjusted my shoe size.

Now the only other main barrier to getting into a really good running routine is the constant daycare sicknesses that seem to be cycling through our house. Every time I get in a string of consistent runs I feel like we knocked out with another illness. As of now, it's been about two weeks since I've run last because I've had some combo of strep throat, some other upper respiratory virus, maybe bronchitis, and who even knows what else. 

The baby has been home sick from daycare for over a week too now so that's been rough to juggle. 

I'm hoping we're coming out of this phase soon. I'm so antsy to get back to running, especially as the weather is getting nicer. I'm eyeing races for the fall, and I'm hoping I'll get this huge part of my life back soon. 

It's been a minute since we've had a home improvement post to share. But this one has been sitting in the drafts folder for a while now, and it seems time to share. 

Once we got through the scariest parts of my pregnancy and were pretty confident we'd be bringing home a baby in the summer, we got to work converting the room that had been our home office into a room for the baby. 

The room is the smallest of the three in our house, and I knew since it wasn't huge, I wanted to do some sort of wall feature. We debated a bit between board and batten or picture frame moulding, but before we could do anything to add some character to the room, we had to do some basic repairs. 

The floor in this room squeaked horribly from the house settling over the years. We tried a couple of simpler solutions that ended up not solving the problem, so we had to open the wall and add a bunch of screws into the wall framing to tighten things up. 

Once the squeaking was eliminated we patched the wall back up.

(I promise I didn't just take the pictures. I did work too). 

Once we had the wall repaired, we had our blank slate to work with. We settled on board and batten for our wall feature, and started using painters tape to visualize the height and width of our potential battens. I will not tell you how long we spent on getting all the measurements right and trying to figure out how to make sure no battens overlapped outlets or created awkward spacing in corners or by doors. The prep work and the math took a lot of time, but it was worth it because once this was done, it was a matter of getting the supplies and diving right into the work. 

I also went a bit overboard on the paint samples in my quest to find a green that would feeling calming and soothing. 

Since this was a small room, I wanted to make sure our battens were very thin and wouldn't make the furniture sit off the wall too much. We priced out quarter inch thick wood boards and realized it would cost us a lot of money to buy all the battens individually. Instead, we bought a single piece of quarter inch thick plywood and used my dad's table saw to rip it down to 3 inch wide pieces for the battens and 4 inch wide pieces for the horizontal boards at the top. 

Once we got all the wood home, it was time to start nailing it to the walls. We worked section by section, hanging our horizontal pieces first to ensure they were level and then fitting our vertical battens in as we went. Since our walls aren't perfectly level, we had to get creative at some points and add some filler at the bottom of some of the battens so everything would line up nicely between the baseboard and the top board. 

Oh look, a picture of me actually doing work. 

After we got the wood all hung, it was time for my least favorite part of any project -- the caulking and the wood filing. There were tons of small nail holes that needed to be filled in, though that part went fairly quickly. The caulking always takes me forever. I knocked it out in an afternoon though, and let it sit to dry overnight so that I could dive into the priming and painting. 

The wood all got a coat of primer and so did the areas of the wall that we had patched.

Then we hit everything with two coats of Benjamin Moore's Jack and the Beanstalk. The painting took some time as we had to alternate between brushes and rollers to get clean edges around the wood and smooth finishes on the walls. 

To brighten the room a bit, we also painted the top half of the walls Benjamin Moore's Chantilly Lace. 

For safety, we changed all the outlets, replacing them with childproof ones. We also rehung one of the closet doors to make it easier to open after we had the crib in the room. 

We built the furniture, hung the bookshelves, and then just waited for our little guy to be ready to move in. 

I spend a lot of time in this room now, and I love the way it turned out.