Abby Kate's Stuff

   Hey y'all!  I almost forgot that I never finished giving you the tour of the new house.  I hit most of the major renovations, but we do have rooms that didn't get/need much work.  Our house has the master bedroom separate from the other bedrooms, which I didn't think I wanted at first.  "She's so little!  She'll be scared!  What if she needs me?!" But the more I thought about it, reason won out.  "She's asleep. You have a monitor. It's just a few more steps than in the apartment." Plus, good luck finding a house with the bedrooms all together.  Apparently that isn't "in" anymore. 

   Since our Peanut is an only Peanut, she gets the luxury of pretty much taking up an entire wing of the house.  There are two bedrooms and a bathroom on that side of the house.  One bedroom is bigger, with a bigger window, and is completely behind the fence with a view of the back yard.  The other bedroom is smaller, with a smaller window, is in front of the fence, and has a view of the side of the neighbors' house.  I debated for a long time which one should be her bedroom, but eventually decided to make the smaller room hers for sleeping, and use the larger one for the playroom.  

   With the smaller window, I can keep her room darker, which seems to be a big factor in her quality (and quantity) of sleep.  She is only in her bedroom for sleeping and diaper changes, so space isn't really a problem.  It's been wonderful to have a great sunny window in her play room, and the elbow room for a newly-two-year-old to play and be silly.  I also thought that if we decide to have another baby some day, we can leave the crib set up in the smaller room, and Abby Kate can move into the bigger room with her "big girl" furniture.  Less work is totally okay with me.  So here's a look at her rooms:

View from the door, a window and the "Storybook chair"

   

   We didn't make or buy anything new for her bedroom in this house.  Everything was from her original nursery, we just tweaked it a little.  The curtains were made for a larger window, but since I like to "hang 'em high and wide" anyway, they worked fine in here.  The flowers were original, as were all the textiles and decorations.

 

Diaper station! (and a look at how small this room really is)

   Here's where you may notice a change, if you have been reading since I posted photos of her original nursery. We previously used two sets of these cubbies side by side, using the other for storage.  Welp, no room for that in this room, so the other set went in the attic and we consolidated a bit.

Sweet little bed!

    One reason we were able to get rid of one set of cubbies is that she has her own closet now!  In our apartment, we had to use the closet in the nursery for storage. This chest of drawers was wedged into it (it was a HUGE closet) and used to hold other stuff that now has real homes.  Abby Kate's new closet is small, but my dad was able to add another hanging bar to make it more useful, and the chest got to come out of hiding.  It's a sweet little nursery, and I still love the soft but not nauseatingly girly colors and florals.  On to the playroom!

Tea party, anyone?

We wanted the playroom to be completely kid friendly, a bright, fun place for her to play and explore things.  This table and chairs was mine and my Seester's when we were kids.  I think my parents were overjoyed to get it out of their attic.  The dishes and play food were ours too (except the cups--those came from WalMart).  It's so fun to see Abby Kate enjoying the things that I loved as a kid too!

Reading room!

   I took the door off of the closet in this bedroom (it's in the attic) and turned it into a little "reading nook" like some I had seen on Pinterest.  I store some things up on the closet shelf that I don't really want Abby Kate to play with without me, and things I'm saving for later, so the little curtain keeps those things out of sight and out of (her) mind.

Rainbow chair!

   Chris's parents called us one day and said that they had found this little chair while out shopping, and wanted to know if we wanted them to pick it up for us.  They send us a photo and when I saw that it was covered in the EXACT same fabric we had already used in this room, we said YES YES YES YES!!!  Thank you, HomeGoods and Nana and Papa!!!  It's the perfect size for my silly girl and for this spot!  My mom had already crocheted her a sweet little afghan to go in her "nook" and if I ever can't find her, she's always snuggled up in here with a book.

Rain gutter book shelves

   

   This was another idea I had seen on Pinterest and my mom had seen in classrooms.  Easiest project ever.  We bought white vinyl rain guttering, cut it to the correct length, and screwed it to the wall.  The end.  They don't hold all of her books, so I rotate them in and out when I help her clean up now and then.

   We inherited these great Ikea bookcases from Chris's mom, who retired from teaching this year.  She asked if I thought we could use them, and after seeing them, I jumped on the chance.  The finish color is similar to the other things in here, and they're a great height for Abby Kate.  They're beastly heavy, but luckily she added casters to them, so they're really mobile.  We love the adjustable shelves too!

   Here's yet another Pinterest project.  This is the theme of my house, apparently.  I saw a similar piece of art on Pinterest that I just loved, but was discontinued, so I attempted to recreate it.  It was the "inspiration" for the whole playroom.  It's not perfect, but it's cute and works great in here. (On that note, anybody know how to get pencil lines off of canvas?  I've tried three kinds of erasers with no luck.)

   Here you can see the other side of the room.  The door is just out of the frame to the right, on the adjacent wall.  The storage thing came from Target, as did the clock.  I took the clock apart and painted the numbers myself.  Don't worry, the playroom is NEVER this neat if my child is awake and home.  I think she was at Grandma's house the day I took photos.  I love that she has a place to keep her things so they aren't strewn all over the house, and I love that it's a space that is completely hers.  She can touch everything in here, she can do what she wants (within reason) in here, she can be loud and be silly, or hide in the closet, and it's okay.  It's a luxury that I am grateful for every single day.  

   As I said, these rooms didn't get much renovation.  New carpet, and a coat of paint.  It's hard to tell, but both rooms are painted a very pale blue-grey (Night Frost by Olympic) with off-white trim (Off White by Olympic).  It's the same color as we used in the master bathroom.  I also painted one side of the fan blades in here each in a different rainbow color.  I didn't get a picture of that, but it's pretty cute.  And if we change the decor in here, they're white on the other side and I know how to flip them over.  

   This concludes today's portion of The 717 Home Tour.  I hope you enjoyed a peek into the spots that my daughter holds dear.  She loves knowing where her things are, and I am overjoyed that we were able to find a house that allows her to have this kind of space.  Are kid spaces on your radar yet?  Where do your kids keep their stuff?  Why do tiny people have so much stuff anyway? (Oh, because they have grandparents....)

Nursery Revealed!

As I mentioned in my last post, our families spent their Spring Break with us. However, don't be fooled. This was not a sightseeing, relaxing, refreshing vacation for them. They all very graciously volunteered to be my slave labor for a week to help us with nursery projects.  They arrived Saturday afternoon, Saturday evening was our Gender Reveal Party, and Saturday night began the work.  No rest for the weary.  All day Sunday and Monday were work days, Tuesday we took a short break to visit downtown, but Tuesday night and Wednesday night they were right back at the grind.  They were ironing, sewing, fixing, building, and primping things practically until they got back on the plane on Thursday afternoon.  I couldn't believe how much we (they) got done in such a short time, but I am forever grateful to this faithful bunch.  Our sweet Peanut has an equally sweet nursery to come home to that turned out even better than I could have imagined!  See for yourself!

Sweet little crib! When we decide on a name, there will be some sort of wall hanging over the crib. In the crib are the peanut doll from my mom and a little music box lamb that was mine.

Close-up of the recovered chaise, which is now my "Mommy Chair!"

Watering can decoration that my sister made!

Close-up of the yo-yo flowers on the walls

Window wall!  We plan to put our changing pad on the left side of the countertop.

Close-up of the lamp, which we found for a good price and "jazzed up" with yo-yos and trim.

Bulletin board on the back of the closet door.

Close-up of storage baskets under window.

 So there you have it, folks!  I love our little garden-themed nursery so much!  The colors are bright enough to make it feel happy, but soft enough that I don't feel overwhelmed in there!  As you can see, I could never thank our tireless helpers enough.  This totally would have never happened if it was up to me!

I know this post is getting long, but here's a quick list of resources that we used for our nursery:
-Fabric: The floral and stripe are part of the "Oh Baby" collection at Joann Fabrics. The yellow fabric has tiny white polka dots on it (that don't show up on camera), and is part of the nursery prints carried at Joann as well. My mom is amazing and did most of the crib bedding and curtain without a pattern. 
-The only furniture we purchased new was the crib, which I already posted on, and it came from Target.
-The lamp came from Home Goods, and then was accessorized by me.  :)
-I bought the storage baskets from Michael's. They were originally brown with a blue gingham liner.  My mom made new liners and my grandma spray painted them yellow.
-I've had the bulletin board since college. It too got painted yellow, then recovered and yo-yo'd.
-I should have taken more pictures "in the process" but I'll post a tutorial for the big yo-yo flowers on the walls soon.  

New Look!

How do you like my new header?  Chris made it for me last night after I was complaining that I didn't think my blog was very cute!  We brainstormed for a few minutes, then he just whipped it up in about an hour.  Handy to have a graphic artist around the house I guess.  We've also been talking about way I could increase my readership around here, since I'm fairly certain there's about three people who read my blog, and two of them live in my house.  Chris suggested I go into a little more detail about some of our choices and decisions for the nursery, my pregnancy, and anything interesting that comes up along the way.  To avoid starting with an internet overshare on my philosophy of pregnancy, I think I'll start with the nursery.  That seems safe, don't you think?

Let's start from the beginning. Our goals for the nursery were few and (sorta) simple: First, it had to be easily undo-able, since we're renters.  We don't know how long we'll live here, and I don't want to invest time or money in things that we can't take with us, or that we'll have to undo when we leave, like a crazy awesome paint job.  Second, it had to be frugal.  We know that nurseries don't stay that way forever, and since we're hardly rolling in dough, we wanted to invest our money as wisely as possible.  ($800 crib?  No thanks.)  Third, we'd like it to be as eco-friendly as possible while still fitting within our other goals.  I'll probably come across on the blog as a tree-hugging hippie earth-mother, but that's only partly true.  I'll sacrifice a tree now and then for frugality and convenience.  Sorry.  With these things in mind, here's a few of our nursery choices thus far:

The Crib:  
We chose the Delta 3-in-1 Winter Park Convertible Crib from Target.  Originally we had our eye on a very similar looking crib from Burlington Coat Factory (yes, they have baby stuff--who knew??) for a fairly similar price.  We needed something that would be gender neutral (no canopy beds or racecar beds yet), and something that came in a medium warm finish to match the existing furniture in the room, that being the armoire and the cubbie shelves.  There we go being frugal again.  No sense buying a whole room full of furniture when we only need a crib.  The Winter Park crib seemed to be generic in style and correct in finish.  It was one of the less expensive cribs we found that wasn't also ugly like a butt.  Then Target went and put it on sale for $100 a month or so ago, and I couldn't help myself.  It was a done deal. 

The Paint:
This was an area where we opted for the "green" choice, not the frugal choice.  We decided on the Olympic Premium paint in Stonington. We wanted a no VOC paint, which means no weird chemicals off-gassed by the paint, and no paint-induced fume highs, and the Olympic paint was our best (if not only) choice.  It wasn't the cheapest paint we could find, but overall, it didn't break the bank.  (Here's where I have to make a little confession.  The paint wasn't entirely a nursery-based decision.  We had previously painted most of the apartment in the same paint and color, and had some left over so that's what went in the nursery.  The VOC reasoning still stands, but there's nothing magically "baby" about Stonington.  It was the best taupe for the rest of the place, so it went in the nursery too. )  Back to the paint.  As far as quality goes, it seemed to go on easily and cover fairly well.  We did have to do two coats, but I'm not going to blame the paint on that because we are certainly novice painters.  My artistically inclined husband decided a flat finish would look best, so I rolled with it.  In other parts of the house, a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser seems to take off any smudges just fine.  And it was a nice neutral color that was pre-approved by the landlords. Yay paint.

I think that's a good stopping point for today, don't you?  I don't want to spill all my secrets at once, and besides, that's about all the decisions we've made for the nursery.  Wouldn't want to get too carried away with progress, would we?  More decisions will be made in the near future, since we find out Monday what the gender of our little Peanut is!  Counting down the minutes!  Until then, are any of you planning a nursery?  Painting walls?  Trying to live cheap and green?  Let me know!

Nursery Progress!

This has been a way busy week and a half for us. Our second bedroom previously functioned as Chris's office and my crafting room, as well as a catch-all for everything else we own. Well, that is now Peanut's room, so we've having to do a lot of shuffling around. Last weekend Chris's dad Woody came and helped us put a fresh coat of paint on the walls. Since we're renting, we went with the same generic taupe that's in the rest of the apartment, but it's clean and fresh and better than the dirty smudgy white that was in there. Here's some photos of the empty room, with its brand new paint and freshly cleaned carpets:


The room seemed so big when it was completely empty! I just knew I would have way more space than we needed for a tiny baby. I mean, how much stuff could they need, right? :) We started putting the furniture back in once the paint and carpets were all dry. I can actually start to picture it now!

This chair has been in my family since I was a kid. It's moved to a few different states with me, and now I can't wait to cuddle my Peanut in it!

We're planning to use these cubbies for storage, and we're also going to put a changing pad on top instead of buying a separate changer. What do you do with those after you're out of diapers anyway?View of the "front door." This little armoire will be full of tiny little clothes before I know it!Obviously the crib isn't assembled yet. I haven't even bought a mattress for it. But it's going to be on that wall where it's leaning when all is said and done.Mom, Peanut, and Violet relaxing and taking in the view of the "new" nursery!