Our Little Girl's Nursery

It's a small space, but we managed to most fit everything we had from L plus a few extras.  The closet is devoted mostly to non baby stuff (most of our closets are not for the clothing of the person/people in that room, we have a teeny tiny linen closet and THATS IT, so all closets are filled to the brim with all sorts of stuff).  Don't under estimate going from 1700 sq. ft. to 1100 sq. ft. and adding a new baby....

Big Boy Room

L's big boy room is done- well as done as a room can be to me.

Rental Rescue: Mini House Tour

We have done quite a bit to our little rental house- and the reality is it will never be 100% what we love, but it's getting more and more comfortable.  Here are a few shots of our home- being used and lived in- having a toddler means never really having a tour quality looking home.

 

Rental: Kitchen Rescue

Yep- the kitchen is still being rescued.  Actually a lot of the house is being rescued- very slowly though.  Having a toddler, a husband that works out of town/long days (like he leaves at 4am and comes home after 10pm), and our owned home to ready for renters means we are slowly- oh so slowly- getting it together here.

But the kitchen is getting less golden/yellow/wood like.  It has a ways to go but I am giddy about the small rental appropriate changes we have been able to make.  If you look at the previous post about the kitchen you will notice the upper cabinet has doors- adding to the monochromatic butcher block/base cabinet mess.

So we can't paint the cabinets (well we could but it's not worth the headache or the possible loss of rental deposit) but something needed to change.  We decided to remove the doors and have more of an open shelving look.

But the cabinets are wood all around so even though dishes would be in front and distract a bit- we wanted to make more of a change.  I toyed with painting the inside- but again hassle and possible landlord issues.  Then I remembered something from pinterest- starching fabric to walls/backs of cabinets etc.  A perfect temporary fix.

I found some retro black and white fabric in town and followed this simple tutorial.

Here is the cabinet with the fabric pinned up just to see how it would look...

Here's the finished product...

Decorating with a toddler

We very little decorating this year- actually we have never been big with holiday decorations, but I anticipate as L gets older it will be enjoyable.  This year we ended up putting a small fake tree (from our days living in SF) on the kitchen counter.  It was the only spot that was high enough out of L's reach and still able to be enjoyed.  We then just hung some ornaments from the curtain rods.  We placed some lights and ornaments on the piano and credenza and called it a day.  I wanted to take pictures with a better camera- but time got away with me so here's some phone photos:

Credenza

Inspired by Anna's Fauxdenza- but wanting it to be freestanding, we added legs.  It's still lacking hardware- I am conflicted on what knobs or pulls would work and look best- though I am leaning towards something chunky brass and vintage to offset the streamlined modern look.  But L loves it despite it's incomplete state.  It was created using ikea kitchen cabinets and framed in plywood.  We then finished it with danish oil and poly for the nice walnut color.  The legs are those oh-so-affordable and versatile mid century tapered legs from Ace hardware.  I am having second thoughts about the location and size of the legs- maybe they should be taller, maybe more wide set.  It's a work in progress and fortunately those are easy fixes.  This project did get the wheels turning and boost my confidence that we can create other semi custom pieces....

Nursery Shared

A blog, Baby Space, that I visited regularly for ideas and inspiration while pregnant-and visit still because it features some of the cutest, innovative babies/kids spaces- is featuring L's nursery.  It's so exciting to see his little room on Baby Space.

Check it out!

Nursery Tour

Here is L's room today.  He doesn't sleep here yet (I could add a crib to the list of useless baby items right now), we do all diaper changes here, play, nurse, hang out....and eventually he will sleep in here. We only had to purchase 2 pieces of furniture- the currently useless crib and the glider, everything else was already owned.  We just tweaked the furniture we already had by either painting or adding baskets to create storage.

Although the style of this room doesn't necessarily reflect "our" style, this is one of my favorite rooms in our home because most of the decorations came from family and/or were crafted.  I reupholstered the glider, sewed the pillows, made the bird mobile, and the quilt on the footstool.  D's mom is a real quilter and made the amazing one hanging over the back of the glider (she also made one for our wedding which reminds me of the wedding every time I look at it).  The framed carriage images were my grandmothers, as was the red light (we painted it red- it was originally cream colored).  The framed fairy tale needle points above the changing station were made by my aunt from Slovakia.  They are pretty old as a remember them always being in my mom's home growing up.  My mom made the needle point birth announcement thats framed near the diaper station.  And D took these amazing pictures.  Love him.