Category Archives: Room Designs

The room in our house that was once used as a feeble attempt by both my husband and myself at (barely) hanging on to our younger, cooler identities has slowly made its way into a colorful wonderland of organized childhood chaos (and I don’t necessarily mean ‘colorful’ in a good way – think along the lines of “Elmo” red and other obnoxiously bright colors). Yep, believe it or not, what is the current playroom was once upon a time – not too very long ago – a pretty legit game room with a pool/ping pong table, a dart board, a large fish tank and pictures upon pictures of musicians, breweries, personal photography and the like plastered all over the walls. A reminder to everyone visiting – or more likely just to the two of us – that we were still somewhat hip.

And now, you ask? Now, my friends, is this …

… but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

The toys were once contained in one corner of the den. Once. But the pile gradually became larger and larger and we eventually found the toys spreading into the beloved game room … and so began all the daydreams of how I was going to redo this room. Only natural, right? My original plans involved new paint, new wall decor, new furniture, new lighting and a new rug, among other things; however, with the idea of moving in the near future hot on my husband’s radar, he managed to talk me into a more simple redo (he’s got skills y’all). So there I was – wondering how in the world I was going to organize such chaos without breaking the bank.

First up – accept that the room belonged to our kid now. No 1/2 game room, 1/2 play room – trust me, I tried. We needed all the space we could get though, because oddly enough the bigger our kid gets the bigger his toys get. Who knew? Out went the pool/ping pong table, out went the huge fish tank, and out went the random chairs and bar stools. I promise it was a coincidence that the last fish standing (swimming rather) bailed on us just as I was beginning to redo this room. It was still a sad moment, because yes, I am one of those people who shed a tear or seventy over the death of a fish – but it really couldn’t have come at a better time. This cleared out an enormous amount of space and I felt like I had a blank template (kind of). We didn’t paint, we didn’t add new wall decor, and we actually decided to purge the rug and go rugless. I have to admit the rugless thing feels pretty good – not to mention the room feels SO much bigger. The rug was extremely worn out and never really matched to begin with, so no harm there.

Next up – find toy storage for close to no money. I promise it can be done guys. Get creative and scour the other rooms in your house. You might be surprised at what you can repurpose. Or if you don’t have any luck there, check out your local Goodwill or other thrift stores for some bargains. Luckily we already had this piece of furniture holding our ginormous fish tank, so after clearing it of all the fish supplies, I had 3 cabinets as well as the top and bottom shelves for … you guessed it – toys! And yes, that is a little bitty fish tank you see there. I can’t possibly imagine life without at least one fish in it.

This basket and toy bin were originally in Austin’s room, but their purpose was more for looks than usefulness. Not anymore. I was able to store a good amount of his books in the basket and most of his blocks in the toy bin.

This adorable locker and metal rack with baskets were Goodwill finds from a while back. I had really good intentions of refinishing the locker for Austin’s room, but when I realized he really didn’t need it at the time I stuffed it in the back of my craft closet like I tend to do with projects I have no intention of finishing anytime soon. Did I mention the closet’s stuffed? I purchased the metal rack to hold my craft supplies, but since organizing the craft room is another project I have yet to finish, it too became toy storage.

Lastly – organize it all. I added a foam alphabet mat to one corner of the playroom as an area for playing with blocks. I also wanted a space for Austin’s younger (baby) friends to play since the rest of the room was now rugless. As you can see, this area also serves as the place where he parks his car and pitches his tent. Talk about multi-functional … or a little crammed maybe? It works though.

There was no better place for this giant than where the pool table had been. It’s not quite as big, but it’s close. Best hand-me-down ever.

I organized the rest of the larger pieces along the edges of the room, in the most functional way I could come up with. I also wanted to incorporate some items that could be used as seating for when we add a TV, but I wanted them to ideally have another function as well. I brought up an old bench that had been in my dad’s mountain house to store the ever-growing collection of Elmo dolls. The little table and chairs were mine when I was little, so I thought they would be a sweet addition, not to mention a great place to color. The blue bungee chair was on clearance at Target for $10, so of course I had to. No other function for that one.

As for lighting, I used the same table lamp and floor lamp that we had in our game room. I know, how boring. As much as I wanted to replace them, there really was no need. Plus I found this pendant light stuffed away in my craft closet (notice a pattern here?), which I had bought years back at Target on clearance for $6, and I knew it would add that special lighting touch I craved. I’m telling you guys, check those end caps at Target.

No new paint, no new wall decor, no new furniture aside from the $10 bungee chair … in fact, nothing else in the room really qualifies as “new”.  Okay I lied. I had been eyeing a sea grass screen for quite some time, so I did finally splurge on one at Wayfair. Hey, it keeps the cats happy and adds some nice dimension to the room – two for one. But that’s really it. This room makeover was more about spending very little money and getting super creative by using what we already had, and I have to say I’m digging the way it turned out. I do think in our next home we’ll replace the wall decor with something  a little more kid-friendly, and I imagine there will probably be a fun rug and maybe even a futon or some floor pillows. But the chaos has been organized so this’ll do for now. Austin sure does love it and I sure do love seeing him happy. I also love not tripping over toys 🙂

So about that den redesign I started back in the fall … nope, not much new to report there. I’m still in the process of making it happen but it pretty much feels like forever since I started on that gallery wall. My main roadblock has been my indecisiveness. Go figure. I mean, why are there so many pretty things out there? Why are there so many styles I like? Why do I swear that I want a total farmhouse feel in our house and then buy the loudest most colorful tchotchke I can find?

Because that’s me. And it drives me nuts. I have narrowed down my favorite “style” to four (not bad for someone like me): mid-century modern, bohemian, farmhouse, with a touch of glam. No joke. When I began this den redesign I decided to make it our mid-century modern room with some major boho touches. But then I kept seeing velvet furniture and modern gold accessories I liked and I started leaning towards a modern romantic glam room. And then I had a moment where I wanted cacti and kilim in every corner of the room and wanted to go boho all the way. And then I just got plain confused about what I really wanted so I gave up. But sometimes putting a problem that’s not really a problem (you know, like a den redesign that doesn’t even need to be done) on the back burner is the best thing you can do.

As of a couple months ago, I was stuck in the “I want the entire den to feel like a bohemian wonderland” mindset, but I’m slowly trying to pull myself away from that one. Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t have a problem with the boho style AT ALL. But knowing myself the way I do, I know our den would have been overkill and you’d probably have cactus pricks on your face when you left our house and you’d probably be color-blind from seeing too many colors and patterns all at one time. If there’s anything I’ve learned from painting the majority of our house teal, it’s that you really can have too much color. I know, it’s a sad realization. I also realized I hate painting.

I created a mood board (yay Olioboard!) with some of my most favorite bohemian touches. I plan to use this as a guideline when picking pieces and hopefully it will help me not to go too overboard in the land of boho goodness. From all the research I’ve done (aka shopping and perusing Pinterest), I’ve determined that there are 6 aspects to focus on when trying to create a bohemian-inspired room: leather, wood, greenery, rattan, faux fur and colorful patterns. My board is made up of some amazing pieces (in my opinion at least) that fall into these 6 categories.

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Leather Sofa – Pinterest (I can not find the source for the life of me). I LOVE the simple style & that color is perfection. https://olioboard.com/items/6332495-tan-leather-sofa

Metal Woven Chindi Chair – Cost Plus World Market ($170)  https://olioboard.com/items/6332433-metal-woven-chindi-chair

Metal Woven Chindi Bench – Cost Plus World Market ($150) https://olioboard.com/items/6332434-woven-chindi-metal-bench

Mid-Century Media Console – West Elm ($1599)          https://olioboard.com/items/6332414-mid-century-media-console

Rattan Bar Stool – Tropical Breeze ($339)                        https://olioboard.com/items/6332413-rattan-bar-stool

Torres Wool Kilim Rug – West Elm ($349)                      https://olioboard.com/items/6332470-torres-wool-kilim-5×8

Faux Fur Throw Pillow Cover – OIJA ($20)                      https://olioboard.com/items/6332370-18×18-soft-plus-mongolian-faux-fur-throw-pillow-cover-cushion-case

Fiddle Leaf Fig – picture courtesy of Google.                 https://olioboard.com/items/6332469-fiddle-leaf-fig

Bowl Full of Colorful Succulents – picture courtesy of Pinterest. This is an easy DIY! https://olioboard.com/items/6332468-succulent-display

Now the objective is to try to recreate these pieces (at least some of them) for a tad bit cheaper so that my love for boho doesn’t break the bank. Who doesn’t love a challenge though, right? I’ve already checked off a couple of these items and I’ll be sharing what I’ve found with you in a future post. Hopefully my hand-picked items will give any of you readers looking for some insight to the boho style a little push in the right direction. It doesn’t take much if you pick the right stuff. Happy shopping!

In an effort to wrap up my post series featuring the dining room, I thought I’d share some of the little bitty details that work together to help make the dining room my favorite room in the house (yep, still). That could change though as I’m currently working on some things in our den and game room/play room, but that’s a whole other story (aka post series) …

It took me quite some time to come up with the perfect tablescape for the dining room table. I can’t even begin to tell you how much buying, returning and rearranging I did. And look what I ended up with – simplicity.

My mom bought the vase (Pottery Barn) and twigs to use as a picture display at our wedding a few years back and of course she wanted me to keep it for the sentimental value. I was okay with that. I happened upon these cute little paper mache owls and birds at the Dollar Tree – I kid you not. I will admit that I frequent the Dollar Tree for gift-wrapping supplies. Why spend $5 on a bag when you can get one for $1? I just don’t get it. Anyway, these owls and birds were calling my name and I found the most perfect spot for them on the twigs. The water carafe came from Target and since it’s hard to see I’ll just tell you that it says WATER on it in yellow print, which for some reason makes it even cuter. Throw in a salt & pepper shaker and a mercury glass candle and call it a day.

I bought the burlap-ish table runner from Target, but it just looked too plain on the table so I did a little DIY and glued some lace to the edges – perfection (at least in my eyes).

The mirror may not look like anything exciting, but it’s actually made up of 9 smaller mirrors hung together. My mom and I found oodles of them at some store that doesn’t even exist anymore and she had the bright idea of grouping them together into one large mirror. It’s bugging me to no end that I can’t remember the name of the store. It was one of those stores that had everything from clothing to nail polish and hair accessories to random home decor items at a super cheap price. I sometimes wondered if the stuff was stolen, but I’m sad to say that didn’t stop me from shopping there.

As you can see from the pictures, I love adding decorations to the mirrors – all the way from funky garlands to Christmas ornaments that aren’t really “Christmas-y” to fun initial decor. It might be getting on the verge of tacky at this point. I wanted to do something a little different when it came to the sconces so I found a couple mercury glass vases at Homegoods (which just happened to have rope already conveniently wrapped around them) and I hung them from decorative hooks found at my local Home Depot – so although they don’t add any value in the lighting area, I think they look pretty darn good.

Decorating the bar was almost as fun as decorating the china cabinet that’s not really a china cabinet (see previous post). My mother-in-law gifted me with the bowl on the stand for Christmas one year. I loved it as soon as I opened it – the colors in the bowl were right up my alley. I had a tough time deciding where to put it but when I realized I needed something to display some candles in, I thought it would work perfectly.

The wine rack was handmade by my oh-so-talented brother (yes, the same one that has done the majority of the hard work on the house). It’s seriously the most beautiful wine rack I have ever seen. I’m telling you there’s no limit to what he can do.

I decided to display the remainder of the antique decanters from my mom’s side of the family because they were just too cool to leave in a box. I mean, the Van Gogh? The dog? How awesome are these? What’s even better is you can still smell the alcohol when you open the tops – you can’t taste it though which was kind of a bummer. The little antique bird bell had been my Grandmother’s and I thought it was too cute not to display, besides it has a bird on it and if you don’t know by now I kind of have a thing for birds.

The chandelier came from a house that my dad and brother flipped way back when. I honestly can’t even remember when it was, but I do know that I was pretty far away from having my own place at the time. That didn’t stop me from asking if I could keep the chandelier though (I’m not kidding when I say I’ve been designing rooms in my head since I was little). I knew someday it would look just right in my dining room. It was originally a not-so-pretty brassy color, so I lightly spray painted it with a layer of black spray paint and then did a layer of metallic bronze spray paint on top. I absolutely love the bubbled glass bulb covers.

I honestly didn’t have a lot of empty wall space left to fill, so it didn’t take much wall art to make the room complete. I had this fabric tapestry in my craft closet for the longest time because I had never found the right spot for it in our house, that is until the dining room got made over. I bought a cheap curtain rod and curtain rings and worked some magic with the spray paint to make everything match the chandelier.

The plaster birds were a gift from my mom. I knew instantly they would hang above the door frame between the dining room and kitchen, and what do you know … they happened to fit just right. I remember being paranoid for about a week after I hung them because man were they heavy! But no worries, no birds fell on any heads.

I just love the way this room turned out, all the way down to the very last detail. I adore the vintage farmhouse feel, especially with all the special antique touches that are thrown in. This is actually one room in the house that I never have the urge to redesign or redecorate, and that’s saying a lot for me. Just ask my husband 🙂

Searching for a china cabinet for our dining room was probably the quickest furniture search I’ve ever taken part in. I found several actual china cabinets that I loved immediately at Nadeau in Marietta GA, but none of them would fit in the small space I was dealing with. As soon as I laid my eyes on this piece at Queen of Hearts Antiques & Interiors however, I was sold. End of story. If you look closely you’ll see that the cabinet is actually made with an old screen door, minus the screen – you can see the details of the original screen door in the handle, scroll work and trim. Could there be anything more unique? The shabby chic finish didn’t hurt either. I knew it would be the perfect addition to our dining room.

The search for a china cabinet began when I realized I would need a place to display the antique china I inherited when my dad passed away. Yes, that’s right, I did not own china before that point so I had never run into this issue. Although I don’t know exactly how old the china is, I do remember my grandmother using it pretty regularly and I even remember admiring it when I was a little girl and wanting to play “house” with it but not being allowed to for some odd reason. Although I’ve never considered my husband or myself to be of the very fancy variety who prefers to eat off china for every meal, I did know that I wanted to display some of the beautiful pieces rather than have them all boxed up in the basement.

But I digress because you’ll notice from the pictures that the cabinet is not holding any china. By the time I got around to filling the shelves we had a little one on our hands and I felt that china sitting on open shelving was not the best idea. So I decided to display some china on the very top shelf only and then fill the other shelves with various knick-knacks; however I had so many various knick-knacks that before I knew it the entire cabinet was filled. One day I will find a place for that china though, and I will be sure to share what I find 🙂

I have to admit it was pretty fun filling the cabinet shelves with other goodies. I had a bunch of antique decanters and bottles from my mom’s side of the family, so I decided some of those should definitely make the cut. I never had a good place for my creamer, sugar & butter dishes other than the dining room table which felt cluttered, so those found a nice home on the top shelf. Antique colored mason jars (also from my mom’s side of the family) added another pop of color to the top shelf. There’s not much to say about the owl pitcher other than it was just too cute not to be displayed. Both pieces of wood-art were gifts, and I thought in between a framed picture of the beautiful Shenandoah Valley and the antique bottles, they were a perfect addition.

The second shelf was an issue due to its height until I came across this basket at A Classy Flea (also in Marietta), although lately I’ve been kind of wondering if a dough bowl from Painted Fox Treasures might fit in this space. They’re on sale right now too with the code SPINDLEANDRYE, so I may have to give it a shot …

The bottom two shelves might still be a work in progress. My newly purchased vintage milk bottle tray from Painted Fox Treasures (currently holding dried sunflowers) looks perfect next to my bird decor, but I’m not sure I’m loving the dried sunflowers. I do love the pop of color they add though …

I found a super cool painting (also at A Classy Flea), and although I planned to hang it in our hallway it found its way to the bottom shelf and hasn’t moved. My husband’s beer steins also found their way. Since my husband pretty much gives me free reign over all the decorating in the house (isn’t he great?), I do make sure to incorporate the few things he wants displayed – the beer steins are some of those few things.

As much as I love how the cabinet looks in our dining room and as much as I love how everything looks on the shelves, I do still want to display the china. I imagine I’ll just have to buy a whole new piece for that though and unfortunately there’s really no more room in our dining room, so unless I want to display it in the den I’m going to have to wait. But the china will come out of the basement one day – probably the day that we have a larger dining room will be the someday 🙂

If you happen to be in or near the metro Atlanta area, be sure to check out the stores I mentioned – Nadeau, Queen of Hearts Antiques & Interiors, and A Classy Flea. You’ll be sure to find awesome stuff at each one!

And if you’re near internet access at all, check out Painted Fox treasures at the following link – you will find the most unique variety of vintage farmhouse home decor! Keep in mind the sale going on with the code SPINDLEANDRYE!

https://paintedfoxtreasures.refersion.com/c/a3599

Happy Sunday to you!

Buying a house seven years ago provided me with the sense of joy and freedom that I had been craving ever since my early days of being confined to the walls (and rules) of apartment-living. Hallelujah, I could do whatever I wished to the inside and outside of this place and nobody was going to try and stop me. I remember drawing pictures of houses as a kid and meticulously listing out how each room in the house was to be decorated – it was finally time to make those plans come to life. And yes, I do realize by now that I probably majored in the wrong field.

I remember the looks on some of my friend’s faces when I showed them pictures of the inside of the house that I was going to buy. You could tell that some of them had no clue what to even say – it was obvious their parents had taught them that if they didn’t have anything nice to say then they should just keep their mouths shut. Honestly, I didn’t blame them. It was quite a scary sight. I should mention that the house was bought as a foreclosure, the previous owners obviously didn’t give a you-know-what as to what the house looked like, smelled like, etc. … and I’ll just leave it at that. Remember the lovely red carpet I mentioned in an earlier post? You can just let that vision guide your imagination …

I saw right past all the ugly and scary though. I envisioned a charming house and knew that my handy brother could help accomplish just that. Thank God for not only my handy brother, but my amazingly helpful boyfriend at the time (now husband) and amazingly helpful parents – there was more work to do than I could have ever dreamed – in my nightmares. Needless to say every single room in the house needed to be painted (that is after all the adorable wallpaper borders were torn down). Ducks, bows, flowers – you name it and it was plastered across those walls. I vowed to never pick up another paintbrush after all that painting was done. I broke that vow quickly because due to my ridiculous love for color, pretty much every room in the house has already been repainted – I got tired of beige really quickly.

I don’t know why I originally decided on a dark beige for the dining room. I always knew I wanted a blue dining room (not your typical blue, but more of a teal). I have no idea why, I just think teal is one of the most beautiful colors that exists. Period. I think in the haste of all the other decision-making that had to be done, I originally picked ‘safe’ colors for all the walls. How boring. So when it came time to re-do the dining room a few years ago, I found myself debating between Sherwin Williams Gulf Stream and Sherwin Williams Maxi Teal. I was a little scared that I would find myself drowning in a sea of turquoise rather than teal if I went with Gulfstream, but due to the lighting in the dining room (which isn’t great), the Maxi Teal was almost too dark and the Gulfstream appeared to be the perfect shade of teal.

Changing the wall color immediately transformed the room, but I needed a little bit more. It was time to rid the room of all the red and gold tones, add some curtains, find some new dining rooms chairs, search for a shelving unit, find a new rug and hang some new stuff on the walls (boy had my taste changed since my apartment days). I wanted the room to have a vintage, farmhouse, shabby chic feel to it, and it was kind of throwing out some mid-eastern style vibes at the time (largely in part due to my obsession with Cost Plus World Market and their inventory at the time), so I had a long way to go.

I finally got there, and the dining room is by far my favorite room in the house. I just love the way I feel when I’m in there. Of course we don’t use it on a daily basis, because who uses their dining room that often? But when we do use it, I get happy. I love hosting dinner parties, casual get-togethers, you name it – any excuse to use our dining room and I will. It helps that our kitchen table sits exactly two people, so anytime anybody comes over and there’s food involved, the dining room’s getting used. And I’m proud to say that I actually did a good bit myself when it came time to redo the dining room. I still purchased a lot of fun things of course, but my hands did do some of the work and I have some DIY projects to share in future posts, so be on the lookout 🙂

I still cringe a little when I realize that I really can’t take credit for making most of the super cute things I see when I look around Austin’s room. Things I can take credit for: knowing awesome people who made or gifted us with some of these super cute things, and memorizing my debit card number so that it was a breeze to buy stuff online without even having to get up and get my wallet. As for the creative side of it though, shame on me. All I could take credit for was making some of the hoop art creations (see earlier post), painting some furniture, framing some pictures, buying random foxes and other fun things at every store I entered as well as from every website I could think of, and finally putting it all together.

Deciding on colors for the nursery was a somewhat painstaking process in itself, and once I finally made that decision I had yet another decision ahead of me – what color was I going to paint all the random furniture I had accumulated? I should mention here that I’m personally not a big fan of matchy-matchy – you won’t find any matching bedroom “sets” in our house. I think a good mix of this and that when it comes to furniture really makes a room shine. Austin’s room was no different.

I knew what crib I wanted because it was the only vintage-looking crib I could find, probably because the style (Jenny Lind) has been around since forever. Finding the perfect crib sheet was proving to be the ultimate headache until I stumbled upon PeasnCarrotsBaby on Etsy. Cutest. Sheets. Ever. https://www.etsy.com/shop/PeasnCarrotsBaby

 

My mom found the changing table at the local Goodwill (that’s right). It was in perfect condition and just needed a light sanding and a couple coats of paint. I love it because it’s not the typical changing table that I was seeing in all the stores – the design is so unique. My son 100% agrees. I finally settled on Sherwin Williams Gulfstream for this piece.

The rocking chair had been in my husband’s family for a while. I loved the idea of an actual rocker versus one of the newer plush chairs you see in every baby store these days. Not quite as comfy, but who doesn’t put aside comfort for coolness every now and then? I decided to keep it simple for this piece and use Rustoleum Dark Brown (yes people, that’s a spray paint – another obsession of mine). A good sanding job and a couple coats later … so long flowers (it was actually a nice-looking chair but I didn’t think Austin would appreciate the flowers).

I pulled the small side table and footstool from other rooms in the house and sprayed them with the Rustoleum Dark Brown as well. I’m failing to mention here that I went through 2 other colors on the side table before settling on the simple brown. Paint’s not permanent, thank God. I’d be in big trouble if it was. I lightly sanded the top of the table (which happens to be wicker) and just sprayed a couple coats. The footstool had to be sanded a good bit due to wear and tear, largely in part due to a beloved dog I had in college.

My mom (once again to the rescue) made the adorably short curtains. She also made a chair pad for the antique rocker and a cushion for the footstool using curtains from Target! We scoured places for fabric, but finding a pattern with the right shade of orange was not an easy task.

The dresser and the bookcase were from my husband’s younger days. I went with Sherwin Williams Gulf Stream for the bookcase. I should add that this is not the first color I tried for the bookcase. See a pattern here? I actually decided to leave the dresser as it was. I liked the contrast of the lighter brown dresser with the darker brown crib.

The shelves of the bookcase were filled with books, foxes (can you believe it?), and vintage toys that had been my dad’s when he was a child. The metal bicycle came from an antique shop – whether or not it’s actually an antique remains a question. For the top of the bookshelf, I framed some cute quotes in a variety of wooden frames, along with a picture of my sweet child. A polar bear my husband made out of clay when he was a child also sits on the very top. It’s not a fox, but I told him it would do 🙂

His toys are contained in the adorable fox canvas tote that my friend, Emily, bought, and his little reading corner consists of one of those old school bedrest pillows adorned with some stuffed animals. It’s definitely a space I can see him spending lots of time in (as well as my husband, who I’ve caught looking quite comfy while he’s supposedly playing with Austin). Can you blame him?

As you can probably gather, I don’t like getting rid of a decent piece of furniture because you never know when you might need it … and it really doesn’t matter what color it’s painted or if it’s got a water stain on top of it – you can change all that. You can even change the knobs if changing the color’s just not enough to make you happy.

There are a couple other small “crafts” I did get around to doing for Austin’s room. Soon before my dad passed away in 2013, he had given me a lamp he had as a child when he was cleaning out his house. I’m pretty sure he intended for it to go in his grandchild’s room that I had not yet blessed him with. I decided to do just that; however, because the lamp was painted in all the colors that did not make an appearance in Austin’s room, I painted over it with acrylic paints and sponge brushes. I’m not partial to any brand of acrylic paint – you’ll find Craft Smart, Apple Barrel & Folk Art in my craft closet. I decided to go with acrylics for one main reason – if I ever regret covering over the original paint job, I can easily remove the acrylic paint from the lamp. I found a small burlap shade at Target and put my husband to work fixing the plug parts.

My mom found an adorable owl container at Pottery Barn right after Halloween. She picked it up since Austin’s nursery was adorned with forest creatures and told me I could probably paint over it so it didn’t look so Halloween-y. It was black and orange so it was pretty Halloween-y. I whipped out my acrylics once again and sponged my way to an owl that matched the rest of the room.

And now for some more credits …

Props go out to my friend, Emily, for making this awesome piñata. Yes, this is the same Emily who bought the adorable fox canvas tote (isn’t she great?). I mean, seriously, what’s a nursery without one of these? I will never be able to bring myself to actually use this for its intended purpose. It is way too perfect.

My mother-in-law made the cutest board to hang pictures on – I could not have found a cuter one if I tried. I absolutely love changing out the pictures from time to time to see how much Austin’s grown. Of course I’m usually about 6 months behind on that, but who’s counting?

The mobile and canvas were both Etsy purchases (thank you OllieandPenny and Houseof3 for your wonderful creations). I originally thought I would get a mobile that played music, but as soon as I saw this one on Etsy, shopping was done. It was the perfect fit.

https://www.etsy.com/shop/OllieandPenny

I thought a night-time prayer on canvas would be a sweet addition above the crib as well. Luckily I stumbled upon Houseof3 on Etsy and was able to get custom wording and colors on canvas.

https://www.etsy.com/shop/Houseof3

As for the foxes … all the way from the stuffed animals, figurines and ornaments, to the music players and light machines, many people blessed us with those. Moms, aunts, friends, mom’s friends, sister-in-laws, my bank account … Did I really say I didn’t want a fox-themed nursery?

I’m proud of the way Austin’s room turned out, even if he was 3 months old when it was finally complete, and even if I didn’t do as much as I one day dreamed I would, a long, long, long time ago, when I had a tad bit more free time 🙂

Finding out I was pregnant definitely ranks very, very high on my list of most exciting moments ever. The feeling was a mixture of surprise, disbelief, fear, wonderment, and best of all, true and pure joy. Along with all the thoughts and dreams of what this little baby was going to bring to our lives and how this little baby was going to change our lives for the better, came the thoughts and dreams of how I now had an excuse to design a room! Which room would it be though … that hideous room with the red carpet and the huge bleach stain that I did my best to cover up? That gross room with the blue bi-fold closet door and blue trim that housed all of our mismatched furniture? That room that I “designated” as a guest room but would have been utterly embarrassed had anyone actually wanted to stay in there? Yes, that room was to become our little baby’s room. How dare we. But we did.

It was finally time to re-do the portion of the house that we ran out of money to re-do in the first place, when we re-did the rest of our house. I was thrilled. And I’m kicking myself right now for not taking “before” pictures. I think I was too ashamed. Kidding, I’m just really bad about taking “before” pictures. I should have about 200 of the entire house, considering the entire house has basically been redone, and I think I have maybe 10. But unfortunately none are of the “red room” as I used to call it, courtesy of someone’s awful choice of carpeting. You’ll just have to trust me when I say it was really, really bad.

I perused Pinterest almost daily and because something told me I was having a girl, 98.9% of the pictures I pinned were for baby girl nurseries. So I had to change that line of thinking when we found out that “it” was a boy. Oh happy day! There were actually really cute ideas for baby boy nurseries! I am a very picky person when it comes to design. I can’t describe what I like, I just know it when I see it. When it came to the nursery, I was no different. The only things I did know were that I didn’t want all blue, I didn’t want a sports theme, and really I didn’t want any “theme” at all. After much thought, I decided to go with gray, burnt orange & turquoise as my main colors. I decided I wanted there to be foxes, but not too many foxes, and no foxes wallpapered or stenciled on the wall, because then it would be too theme-like. I also decided I wanted the room to have a vintage feel to it – none of this cutie patootie stuff for our little boy.

I planned on doing all these crafts and DIY projects for his room, but since I’m super indecisive and since Austin decided to make his debut 5 weeks early, I didn’t quite get around to everything. Thanks to my talented brother and awesome husband, the red carpet was gone and new flooring had been laid. Thank God! The walls were painted Sherwin Williams Aloof Gray and the Jenny Lind style crib was put together, and I think that was about it. I had a bookshelf, changing table, rocking chair, footstool, side table and dresser in the basement that needed to be refinished somehow, but I hadn’t decided exactly how yet. Needless to say his room was nowhere near ready, nor were we, but it’s amazing how quickly that was forgotten when we saw Austin for the first time. Immediate love.

Thank God for my Mom, online shopping (especially Etsy), and wonderful family & friends, because without them his room would still not be ready. He would be so upset.

In my next post I’ll give some tips on one of the projects that I did end up completing, so be on the lookout!