baby girl nursery inspiration

My streak continues! This past weekend we headed to our friends' baby gender reveal party... And, once again, my guess was wrong... They will be welcoming a baby girl in July! I'm absolutely thrilled for them, and can't wait to add another little girl to our growing play group.

I actually pulled together these baby girl nursery ideas last week, but the days got away from me and I never posted it. So as part two of baby boy nursery inspiration, I'm back with two nursery ideas for baby girl W.

There are just so many options for little girls, and I was torn between this gray, lavender & white room with pops of coral pink:

1. White curtain panels with coral pink pom pom trim

2. Owl baby mobile for over the crib

3. Babyletto Mercer crib

4. Set of alphabet & number prints (with adorable owls for O's!)

5. Lilac & coral pink ikat fabric for crib skirt

6. Owl lamp

7. Stamped Scallop rug in gray

8. White & gold dipped leg side table or dresser

{DIY project inspiration here}

Background: Benjamin Moore misty lilac paint for walls

 

And this fun, bright pink & orange room with tons of DIY project ideas:

 

 

 1. White floating shelves
{DIY project inspiration here}

2. Pink ombre felt-wrapped letters for over the dresser

{DIY project inspiration here}

3. Jenny Lind crib

4. Pink & orange ikat fabric for crib skirt & roman shade

{even more budget-friendly chevron print here}

5. Off-white rocker/ glider, found on Craigslist

6. Pink chevron rug

{DIY project inspiration here & here}

7. Orange monogram throw pillow

{DIY monogram inspiration here}

8. Orange lamp

Background: Benjamin Moore Love & Happiness paint (in stripes) for walls

 

Which one gets your vote?

baby boy nursery inspiration

Dear friends of ours are expecting their first baby in July.  They find out this weekend whether their baby W will be a he or a she!  In the meantime, I couldn't resist pulling together a few nursery inspiration boards.

I have a feeling that they'll be welcoming a little bambino, so I'm starting off with a baby boy nursery board.  (Although in full disclosure, I've been wrong on my baby gender guesses about 90% of the time, including my own!)

Outside of the crib & rug, this entire board is thrifted or DIY... Proof that a chic nursery doesn't have to break the budget!

Here is baby boy W's vintage car inspired nursery...

1. Set of framed vintage car prints for over the crib

{found on Etsy for $75, but I scored a set of 6 prints without frames at a yard sale for $0.50!}

2. Baby Mod ParkLane crib

3. Navy buffalo check fabric for crib skirt & roman shade

{DIY projects from here & here} 

4. Peg board for over dresser to hold diapers, spraypainted a fun color

5. Area rug, found at Home Goods

6. Vintage car club throw pillow 

7. Benjamin Moore Sea Salt CSP-95 for the wall color

 8. Leather rocker/ glider, found on Craigslist



the nursery diaries: part 1

I loved reading Erika's nursery diaries series over on Urban Grace several years ago.  So I thought I'd do the same with our nursery decorating projects, except we'll just have to pretend like all of this wasn't going on a year ago, okay?

We knew the old office/ man room/ junk collection was going to be the baby's nursery.  I have a theory that all married couples have that ominous third bedroom that literally serves no purpose (except for parental comments on how "it should really be a nursery by now") until a baby comes along to fill it.  Our first order of business was to clean everything out and repaint the walls. 

I knew I wanted to incorporate fabric from Caitlin Wilson Textiles and immediately fell in love with the coral & mint chinoise pillow cover.  Honestly, I also knew this was going to be on our 'splurge' list.  But I felt like I could incorporate the pillow cover and a couple yards of the coordinating coral fretwork fabric and still stay within our budget.

I wanted to keep the walls relatively neutral and found the perfect shade of pink, with just a hint of yellow, in Benjamin Moore's Opal.  In some light, the walls don't even look pink but more of an off-white.

{via}

In one weekend (while I was out of town, I might add), my sweet husband took our walls from this:

To this:

We also quickly realized that the large doors on the closet took up valuable real estate, given the room they needed to swing open. So in that same weekend, off came the doors!

Jeff also added some new shelving and hanging rods, and he used a level to draw straight lines down the closet wall.  The next weekend, I covered the lines with Frog tape and painted bright blue/green stripes to match the mint color of the pillow. (Note: be sure to remove the tape while the paint is still wet to prevent any peeling!)  It was a small space to add stripes, and the little painting project was much easier than I anticipated.



Up next?  Some Craigslist furniture finds and thrifty decorating!

featured

I am beyond excited to start out my weekend being featured as part of 'before & after' on Matters of Style today!  It has long been one of my favorite blogs, and I'm thrilled that our skirted console table project made their list!

Be sure to go over and check us out, along with all the other incredible before & after's featured... Because who doesn't like a good makeover?

We're picking up a bookcase from Craigslist this weekend (in need of a little love), and hopefully starting a few more projects to share soon...

Happy Weekend!

repurposing frames

Over a year ago, I picked up this set of two botanical prints for a whopping $7 at a local estate sale.  I knew immediately that I wasn't going to keep these prints (although, in general, I do love botanicals), but the  frames had great shape & detail.

They took their place in my guest room closet, full of 'potential DIY' projects... For slightly longer than I'd like to admit.  After we completed our sunroom, I realized that our desk area could use some practical improvements.

Enter the frames... I decided to turn them into a chalkboard and bulletin board set.  The project was very much Jeff-approved (aka cheap), coming in at around $20 total, including the original cost of the frames.

I pulled off the backing and took out the artwork and glass.  Then lightly sanded the frames and spray painted them gray.

We purchased an Ikea bulletin board for $4.99, then Jeff used the old glass as a template to measure and cut the piece to fit in the frame.

For the chalkboard, I took the glass and very lightly sanded it, just enough to give it a rough texture.  Then I painted it with chalkboard spray paint (you can find it at Lowe's in the spray paint aisle)  It took about 3 coats, with plenty of drying time in between, to get it completely covered.

We lined the inside lip of both frames generously with superglue, then dropped in the bulletin board and chalkboard pieces.  After letting them dry (frame-side down) overnight, they were ready to hang!

Quick tip:  Per the instructions on the chalkboard spray can, I rubbed a layer of chalk over the entire surface before writing anything on it.  So far, it's held up very well.

This was a quick, cheap and easy project... Not to mention it pulled one more item out of my guest closet.  Doesn't get much better than that!

Recovering Kitchen Chairs

I debated recovering our kitchen chairs for a while... On one hand, I loved that the upholstery appeared to be original to the 1970s Henredon chairs (snagged for a major deal at Sleepy Poet about two years ago).  On the other hand, they were really starting to show their age.

The construction zone that was our house for 5 months, during the sunroom addition, answered the question for me.  All of the dust certainly did no favors for the wear & tear of the chairs... So recovering was a go!

I hit up Mary Jo's (one of my favorite weekend spots) and found this perfect-shade-of-gray linen fabric for the chairs.

I also picked up some batting to fill out the seats.  The original plan was to remove the entire old fabric, add batting, and recover.  A few too many original staples sent me the easy way out...

We unscrewed the base of the seat from the frame, cut pieces of batting to the same size as the seat, and cut the fabric a few extra inches wider than the seat (allowing for enough extra fabric to staple down).

Then we laid the batting over the top of each seat, covered with the fabric, and stapled to the bottom with a staple gun (with one of us pulling the fabric tightly and the other stapling down).  We stapled once around the seat, then went back and stapled even closer together.

For the corners, we folded the edges (like wrapping a present) so that the front would appear flat and the only folded edge would be off to the side.

Then we cut away any excess fabric and re-attached the seats.  For a refreshed final result...

It was so much easier than I thought!  One Friday night (I know, we're so fun) and the project was done!  Have you ever done a DIY reupholstery project?  How did it turn out?

No Sew Skirted Console Table

I struggled with what furniture to put on the back wall in our living room.  It couldn't take up too much space, needed to serve as part of our entryway, and provide some much-needed storage.  In the end, I settled on a skirted console table.

I originally planned to use the console table that my parents gave us.  However, I knew it would be a no-sew project, which means lots of staples into a nice piece of furniture (not ideal).  Additionally, I wanted the table to be taller, so I'd need to raise it with bed risers (also not ideal). 

{entryway & table before}

Jeff wasn't a fan of this plan either, and in about 30 minutes built me a console table with scrap wood from our shed!  He also added a shelf, so that we'd have the additional storage needed.  So for $0 we had a custom console table, ready for a skirt!

{Jeff demonstrating the new table's sturdiness}

{view of final table... excuse the unfinished floors!}

I based our skirt off of instructions from Camila at Effortless Style and Jennifer at Newlywed Diaries.  To start with the bottom: Camila used various panels to create a faux pleat in her skirted table.  I took this idea and simplified it for our smaller one.  Instead of 5 panels, we only needed 3.

I cut 2 panels to wrap around the corners and 1 small strip to go down the middle of the table to create a center 'pleat.'  Since I knew the console table would be against the wall, I just wrapped the corner panel a few inches around the back (that's all you would be able to see anyway).

Then I used Stitch Witchery iron-on hem tape to finish the edges (only the ones that would be exposed eventually).  This could not have been easier, and so far the iron-on tape has held really well!

{finished corner}

I also used Stitch Witchery to iron-on the Greek Key trim around the bottom of all the panels.  I just used double rows of tape to make sure the bottom and top of the wide trim was secure.

Jeff was sweet enough to help me with the staple gun.  We stapled the middle section first then layered the 2 corner panels on top to create our pleat.

{shelves already filling up}

For the top, we followed Jennifer's instructions, measuring our fabric and leaving a little overhang on the sides.  We stapled the top piece along the front edge first, with the bulk of the fabric hanging off the front of the table.  So we were actually stapling the underside of the fabric down to the table (sorry we forgot to take pictures here).  Then we folded the top back over itself to create a clean edge.

Next we folded under the sides and placed a little strip of Stitch Witchery underneath and ironed down those edges (and a little over the stapled front pleat to finish it off more)  Lastly, we stapled the back edge of the top panel to the back edge of the table (we stapled down on the underside to make sure no staples were visible from the top of the table)

And here is our finished skirted console table...

The no-sew skirt has been on my list for awhile, and I have to admit being pleasantly surprised with our finished table!  I couldn't be happier with how it came out!

Marbled Paper

Happy Monday!  I finished a quick project this weekend, and I promise to post the full details later this week (along with tons of other projects that we've been knocking off the list)

I was inspired by Kristen's living room artwork...

And Bryn's secretary update...

Marbled paper is such a fun way to create artwork on the cheap.  For those of you in Charlotte, check out the selection at Paper Source or Binders Art Supply & Frame...

I love the turquoise and gray in this paper from Binders...

Or, the ever-popular, Pirouette marbled paper from Paper Mojo.  Love the gray and apricot combination...

Stay tuned for our quick marbled paper art project, bathroom updates, and a few others.  I'll be making up for our recent lack of blogging, starting this week!

Pure Goodness

It was like a Valentine's Day gift from the blog universe... I literally just posted my rant & rave about coming up short in my search for a campaign chest.  Then I hit the thrift stores this weekend and...

Hello gorgeous!  Well, actually not so gorgeous now... But just oozing with potential!  Currently living in our kitchen, the hubby said to me at dinner last night:  "You do such a good job making the house look nice, but can you remind me why you bought that ugly dresser?"  Clearly, he is asking for a post on campaign dresser inspiration...

This piece was actually being used to store items in a thrift shop and didn't even have a price on it... So I asked the owner if she would consider selling it, then talked her down $15 from the original price!

I also picked up this lamp at the Sleepy Poet, on sale for $30!

I originally planned to paint it a fun color, but I am completely re-thinking that now.  I kind of like the gold and aqua accents... What do you think?

Definitely a fun weekend for finds!  Cannot wait to get started on that campaign chest...

Thoughts?

My mind has been going non-stop on home projects lately... Add to that my recent find of Effortless Style, and... well, you can just feel sorry for my hubby.  A definite add to your blog roll, with tons of inspiration images & great DIY projects!

I saw this duvet with a Greek key border and immediately feel in love...

A quick Google search later and I found this beauty...

But the price tag of $358 for full/queen and $388 for king duvet left me a little a lot less giddy.  So I started thinking, could I get the same look with a solid white duvet and a little Greek key trim?

A 530 thread count plain white duvet from Overstock for $65 and Greek Key trim for $12 per yard.  Definitely much more cost effective, but would the look hold up?

I'm really tempted to try this out... Any thoughts?