You should have some idea of how long a particular job takes.

Spend the first couple of months learning what is required to care for the baby.

Then, keeping in mind ll those necessities, you can decide if you have the time to do other stuff.

Food for thought. With the newer low VOC water based paints, there really is no reason a baby could not be in the room when you paint.

Redoing a bathroom may be beyond the safe stuff---too involved in certain parts(like tiling) to stop and handle baby.

But, painting, trim work, and similar jobs should be doable.

Depends on how young you are. :)

But don't worry. If you can't do it now, you'll do it when preschool starts. Baby will be just fine living in a retro house. Spend time making sure it's safe. The rest is just extras and you'll get to them when you get to them.

Congratulations!

I'm with fori on a baby will be fine as long as it is safe.

However, unless you ship the baby off to a nanny/grandma, I wouldn't count on getting much DIY done the first year--and nothing at all the first 3 months.

Around here, they say you should expect to do 3 things a day with a newborn outside of newborn stuff... and laundry is 5 (sort, launder, move to dryer/dry, fold, put away).

I think you need to be realistic about this, and wait a few years. It might mean baby #1 and baby #2 aren't as close as you first thought.

Also, don't start more than 1 project at a time. And, do it in chunks (if you need to repaint, do one wall at a time--prep, paint, then wall 2 prep paint, etc--don't try to do allllll the prepping then allllll the painting. You'll never get it done.)

The answer to this question is also--what will your parenting style be? BFing v. formula? cry-it-out v wearing?

And, it will depend on your baby's personality as well.

(IRL, most newborns only sleep in 20 minutes chunks unless you are wearing them/sleeping with them... So, if you aren't tired enough to nap when he is napping, you'll probably have about 20 minutes of him sleeping in his crib at 2mo to do any DIY for every nap time).

It will depend on your child and how soon the baby starts sleeping long stretches at night. If that happens around 3 months then you'll have plenty of time during the day to do things unless you want to hold the baby constantly. If you don't get enough sleep then it could be later. Once they are mobile it will be really hard to get anything done other than during nap time. Now around 3 I can finally do things again when it is not nap time assuming it isn't something she can get into like painting. We are going to paint her room, but at her request and will let her help some then.

How about wearing the baby while painting? Is that crazy?

Thanks for all of your feedback. It's so hard to know what life is going to be like!

Since you're a first time mom, you have no idea how much the birth will affect you, much less caring for a newborn. Nursing alone was a full time job until DD and I figured it out! Honestly, once that baby is born, DIY projects will quickly fall off your radar. You're in full nesting mode right now, the urge will pass.
Enjoy your new baby!

It is difficult to imagine how a baby could be protected from the dust, noise, and chemicals of a renovation; it's enough of a hazard for you.

Don't you more or less rest when baby rests, esp. in the first year with the first one? Painting, maybe. You'll have a better idea after a few months.

If you think a baby is not affected by the level of stress the disruption of a home causes the parents you are mistaken.

Stress is the best case; the worst case is exposure to airborne hazardous materials that can cause medical problems later especially extreme sensitivity to such materials.

"How about wearing the baby while painting? Is that crazy? "

Probbaly.

Infants have a high lung area to weight ration.

While latex paints are far safer than alkyd (oil) paints, even 'no VOC' paints have things that exposing an infant to in larger doses is not likely to be good for them.

From my experience with my two children, now 2.5 and 4, there is no way I could have accomplished anything besides eat, sleep and bathe during the first two months of either baby's life. You really don't need that extra stress of having a to-do list of remodeling while you are adjusting to the new routines you will have. Maybe after the first two months you might start to have some time, doing one little project at a time, but I wouldn't bank on having any time during the first two months.

Great responses. Thanks for the encouragement and also the realty check viewpoints. Appreciate it!

I can speak from experience as I have lived what you are asking. I am a stay-at-home mom, and I nursed my kids. AND I remodeled a home while pregnant, nursing, care of pets, and a home. But, I did set limits on myself. AND if it was something that had to be under a time limit, I tried to do it in steps. I only mixed enough mortar that I could do at a time. I finished a basement, redid windows, painted, landscaped, new flooring (laminate, tile), put in two new bathrooms whereas I learned how to put ceramic tile on floor and up a wall for a shower).
where were my babies and then kids? either in a playpen watching, or napping, or helping. My oldest is in construction now. I had more 'people' tell me I couldn't do it, then I care for. Go for it!

I also speak from experience. My two kids are 2 and 3. They are exactly 11 and a half months apart (no I am not crazy and did NOT plan it that way I swear!). I am a stay at home mom and we are living in and completely gutting and remodeling our home. We also added an addition. We are doing ALL the work ourselves, with the exception of the building of the structure of the addition, which we hired my brother in law to build the walls and roof. These are not little projects. You can handle what you are asking about.

Your first few months are a complete system shock, so don't try to do anything all at once. Ease yourself in. Just concentrate on sleeping, feeding baby, and feeding yourself and hubby. Then you can start peppering in little projects here and there. I also agree with the poster who said not to break off too much at once with a big project. Even now, whatever schedule I think my kids are on (2 year old naps 3 year old doesn't) if I have a tile project my 3 year old will help, while 2 year old sleeps, but I will not do a large section of mortar because my luck is something will wake my son up from his nap early and he will try to "help" too.

I also have no family in the area, we have no nanny or any other child care help. The only thing I do have is that our house is such an huge undertaking this is a joint effort between my husband and I. There are many very large projects, like demolition of old floors, building of cabinets, and hanging of drywall that do not get done until both of us are together and can tag team the kids. But I have laid tile, grouted, painted, taped and plastered drywal, sanded drywall, hung trim, and countless other tasks with BOTH my kids in my care (not in the room when painting or sanding that is for sure).

What does make it easier to do a lot of this is planning my dinner schedules and things in advance. I do a lot of "pre" cooking things like making a large batch of homemade stuffed shells one week and freezing them in smaller dinner sized batches that I can just pour sauce over and bake. When dinner only takes 5 minutes to pop in the oven a leave bake for an hour I don't have to stop a project to prepare dinner. My husband and I also don't go all out every day, every week. Our house is going to take a long time to finish and we knew that going in. So I may start a project and work on it Mon - Wed alone one week, then Thur we go to the zoo and Fri to the park, then Sat work on the house with hubby and Sun family outing day. We don't ever want the house to consume our lives and make us miss these precious early years with our kids.

But for all my rambling take this away, I am really not sure why anyone would tell you can't do anything just because you have a child. Yes, your life changes, and yes, it gets a bit chaotic, but there is not reason everything comes to a halt and you become incapable of doing anything except laundry and cooking. Especially with one child. I mean in the old days our grandparents and great grandparents generations raised many more children, farmed for themselves, tended the animals, put up food for the winter and did much more to keep up the houses and barns around themselves from falling down (without calling someone to come in and fix it for them). At least mine did.

Family farms were family and neighborhood things. There were barn-raising parties, and when a baby was born, the family kicked in to help. If you don't have support (that includes hubby)... if YOU are expecting to do all this DIY yourself, you need to give it a second thought.

Kali seems to have a good balance and lots of help, support, and time from her DH. Not all SAHMs have that. So, it really depends on where you are. And, only YOU can evaluate that.

BTW--is your baby here? I'm hoping you haven't replied back yet because you ARE super busy loving on that baby, learning how to be a family of 3 with 4 relationships instead of a family of 2 with 1 relationship, etc.

Best to you!

I remember mu mother sitting on the toilet and having the thing lurch down and left.

My sister was an infant, I was about 3, brother 2.

She put sister in her crib for her afternoon nap (one of the deadly drop side models we all survived, along with some cousins eventually) and proceeded to remove the toilet after finding the sub-floor under the vinyl tile was rotted.

She pulled up the nvinyl sheet flooring, and proceeded to tear out the rotted 1x6 sub-floor planks.

My father and uncle returned home to no toilet, and a gaping hole into the crawl space.

The two of them worked till midnight sistering (pieces of 2x6) the top edge of a damaged joist (a 16 x 4 about 30 feet long) so there was something to fasten the new sub-floor onto.

They then installed a new sub-floor (1x6 diagonal) and managed to get the toilet flange supported and then installed the toilet.

All with just a hammer, a handsaw, and a pair of slip joint pliers (small chrome plated, still down in by drawer over 50 years later).

Mom put down a new sheet of vinyl flooring the next day (yep, load three kids in the small 2-door Renault (no seat belts yet)) and drive the flooring store salesman crazy.

Kennedy was killed a few days later ( I remember that in great detail on the TV, along with the funeral).

I can still describe the exact arrangement of the living room and the old brown plastic cased Philco B&W TV sitting in the living room on a stand my grandfather had made for it.

And we all survived.