Nursery Planning

In case you missed it, Chris and I made a little announcement earlier this month:

That's right - Baby Jones is scheduled to arrive around Thanksgiving of this year, which means we're busy planning for a lot of changes in our lives, one if which is . . . our nursery! I've been slowly collecting ideas over the last few months, and have recently begun purchasing a few of the staple items that will set the tone for our room.

A quick note - we decided before even becoming pregnant that we want to wait to find out the gender until the baby arrives. We think this is a really personal choice for each expecting parent, but to us it meant a fun surprise after a long wait and the labor process, and we really like that idea. So, this means a gender-neutral nursery (which I am pretty sure we would have opted for anyway).

So, the first step for me was choosing our colors. Fortunately, falling in love with this fabric made it easy for me:

I bought several yards a few weeks ago, and hope to begin making lined curtains out of it very soon. The windows are on the far wall in the room (directly across from the door) so you will see it immediately when you walk in. I love the nice aqua, dark orange, light green, gray and white, as well as the nice long, curvy vertical lines the birch trees on it will make up the wall.

I then chose this fabric to cover our old chaise lounge, which we moved into the room (more information on its replacement in the living room coming soon), and I hope to not completely screw up plan to tackle my first major furniture reupholstering project this summer, covering it with this fabric:

If any of you out there have done reupholstering - feel free to send tips my way! 

We're thinking gray walls and white painted furniture (more on that to come as well), but we probably won't get to that for several months, as Chris is still pretty tied up in his current painting job, and his help will be required since I'm no longer able to sand old trim or use oil-based paints, which we use on all of our trim. In the meantime, though, we've had fun collecting some other items to get us started:

Paper crane mobile made from driftwood and old maps, from Etsy.
 

  Orange and white changing pad cover, from Land of Nod.

 

Porcelain hedgehog nightlight, from Land of Nod.
  

  National parks poster, from Etsy.

Stuffed squirrel from Anthropologie, courtesy of Aunt Steph.
 

And there are still lots of other ideas I find every day that I think will help us keep adding the little touches we want to make this room feel like the cozy, comfortable space we want to create. We'll keep you updated as we go! 

Wall Decor - Kitchen Style

Here are a few additions to the blank walls we're left with in the kitchen.

Pots and pans were a must for B. I wanted a cool way to store wine on the walls. Personally, I'll take a cool wine rack over artwork any day of the week.

Deck the Walls

I took a bit of a blogging break last week, not due to any lack of progress but simply because it was progress that's just not blog-worthy.  It was drywall mudding. Very important and fun to see in person, but not so photogenic. Today should (hopefully) be the last day of drywall work, and then it's hardwoods and bathroom tile for the rest of the week. Yay!

In the meantime, Chris showed you how we spent our weekend, and I've done a bit of shopping today. During this year's Plaza Art Fair, we met local artist Angie Pickman from Lawrence (where Chris and I met at KU), who makes beautiful wall art out of cut paper. We instantly fell in love with the bold lines and whimsical themes of her work, and decided it was just what we need on the walls in our little "toilette" half bath.

While her cut paper originals are a bit out of our price range (and understandably so - she hand cuts each detail!), she sells high quality prints and greeting cards of the originals for very reasonable prices on Etsy, so we decided this was the way for us to go. I ordered an 8x10 of the top print, as well as these four cards. Once everything arrives we'll play with different arrangements to see what looks best in our little room, and any of the cards I don't hang on the wall will be great to use as, well, cards!