baby N's nursery

The nursery is finally "complete" with 3 days to spare! With everything in this room being DIY it felt like I was never going to get it done, but it's about as done as it will be before the baby comes.  There are still a few things here and there I want to add and make but I'm exhausted, so this is as good as it gets!

With this nursery I wanted more of an eclectic, rustic, modern feel.  Unfortunately, the whole eclectic style isn't my strength and my instincts tend to gravitate towards more matchy-matchy...so this room is a little more "matchy-matchy", a little more orange and blue than I'd like but overall I'm pretty pleased.  Not exactly what I envisioned but most of my projects rarely are.

Initial Board: made from fence posts that I stained, N is from Michael's painted white
Crib bedding: handmade by me-fabric from fabric.com
Dresser: 2 IKEA RAST dressers stained, painted and added new hardware
Rocker: garage sale find and I recovered cushions with gray fabric from Joann's
Awesome Chevron Quilt: handmade by my mother-in-law (it's one of my favorite pieces in the room!)
Rug: Urban Outfitters, this was the inspiration for the whole room
Roman Shades: Lowes

Deer Head: Amazon, then painted white & orange (Blaine hates him, but I LOVE him...even if the trend is so last year)
I Am A Child of God Print: inspired by here but I created my own because I can do that for free :)
Arrow Print: created by me
Orange Geometric Print: actually just scrap fabric
Alphabet Print: created by me
Fox Canvas Painting: His Darlin Wife Etsy Shop (custom made just for our little babe!!!)
3 Window Picture Frame: IKEA...soon to be filled with newborn pictures
Clock: Target...had plans to refinish but that's on the "after-baby-comes-to-do-list"

Mobiles: made from embroidery hoops that I stained and strips of card stock sewn together
Ceramic Feathers: Target, I painted them white
Owl: made by my mother-in-law to match the quilt
Fox: IKEA
Lamp: Target (not exactly the right blue but my DIY on this one failed!)

I know this post is already long enough but I wanted to highlight two of my favorite items in the room.  First being the amazing chevron quilt my mother-in-law made.  I bought the fabric and gave her some ideas of what I would like but really didn't give her too much direction.  But she ran with what I gave her and made this awesome quilt.  It means a lot to me to have something handmade by a family member in this nursery!  Thank you so much Marilyn, you are the best sewer I know!!!

And then there's this adorable little fox canvas my sweet friend Brooke made for me.  When she contacted me and asked me if she could make something for baby N's nursery I was so excited!!!!  We collaborated on what it should be and when she dropped this little guy at my house I couldn't believe how cute he was!  I think it's Kash's favorite part of the room too!  He always walks in and talks about how the fox has a bird on his tail ha ha.  Check out Brooke's etsy shop!

featured!

UPDATE: This Dwell Studio Bedding is now for sale.  Check out the post here. 

So, I'm pretty pumped that Kash's room has been featured by Design Dazzle, a design blog. Go check it out!

I've actually been following this blog, ironically, to get ideas for Kash's room ever since I found out I was pregnant over two years ago so I thought it was pretty cool that Toni asked me if she could feature this room.  

Live it up little nursery because soon you will turn into a big boy room!

pinterest: pumpkin moss wreath

Pinterest has changed my life.  Okay so maybe that's not true, but it has enhanced it.  I've been so inspired on how to decorate my house, how to dress better, cute ideas for Kash, etc.  The latest "pin" that I've been obsessed with is a pumpkin moss wreath.  I already have a fall wreath but I couldn't stop thinking about this one and how much I would love it on my front door.  So I made it.  There was no tutorial attached to the pin but it looked easy enough.  And it was pretty simple, minus the fact that moss is the messiest thing in the world.  Good thing I did this craft while Blaine was away!

original pinterest pin

I was actually surprised at how well mine turned out.  Of course it's not AS cute as the Pinterest version (her bow is cuter, better pumpkins [I couldn't find ones as cute as hers and I thought it looked better with less--maybe I'm wrong on that one] and her moss looks a little better), but if you aren't comparing them side by side the Turnbow version can hold it's own.  It actually makes me pretty happy to drive up to our house and see that cute little wreath hanging up.

Oh and did you notice that black door my wreath is hanging on?  For those of you who are my Facebook friends know that I kind of went out on a whim and just decided one afternoon that I would paint my door black.  I was a little nervous but it turned out awesome and I love it!  It's little things like being able to paint my front door whatever color I want makes me so happy to be a homeowner!

First Pinterest inspired project turned out pretty well, many more to come I'm sure!

lantern makeover

Piece by piece my living room is coming together.  Normally I'm not this slow about decorating, but I want to make sure I love every element in this room.  Sometimes this means making an item over or waiting until I have enough money to buy what I really want.

Going through our spare bedroom which is filled with all my home decor that had more red, brown and tan undertones I saw my old lanterns that sat on our kitchen table in our old apartment.  These were a wedding gift and I've always loved them but the style just didn't fit in any room of the house anymore.  But I thought if I brightened them up they might work in our living room.

don't mind this ugly fireplace...it too will get it's own makeover one day!

So I went to Lowe's (we only go to Lowe's because it's down the street from our house, really we prefer Home Depot) and bought some silver metallic spraypaint.  I was a little skeptical of painting these old lanterns.  I wasn't sure if the paint was going to come out more gray than metallic or if it would stick and how I was going to work around all the glass.  I taped all of the glass off and just started spraying, right away I loved it.  I couldn't believe how shinny and pretty the paint looked.

I decided not to put the candles back in because they are really yellow looking, so I'm on the hunt for actual white candles.  But overall I think they turned out pretty well and look a lot lighter and more fresh!  Just don't look too close, I'm really impatient and can't wait for paint to dry and always take the tape off too early and muck things up.

Amazing what a little spray paint can do!

and finally....

...IKEA opened here in Denver!!!  I've waited a long time (almost 4 years) for this store to open and it did not disappoint.  I grew up with IKEA so it's not like this is a new and exciting store to me.  But lately I've been seeing cute/cheap design ideas on blogs and it killed me that I didn't have the same inexpensive options that my fellow bloggers had.  Well not anymore!

I wasn't brave enough to go opening day but I did go 2 days later.  I prepped myself for the Disneyland-like madness but it actually wasn't that bad.  Sure there were a TON of people but there were also a lot of parking lot attendants and police and I was really surprised at how fast everything moved.  In fact I was able to park right next to the elevator and there was only one person in front of me in the check out.

Kash also enjoyed himself.  At first he was in awe of the hundreds of people.  And then he was in awe of this train.  We spent 15 minutes at this table while Kash just said "choo choo" over and over again.  Needless to say that one came home with us!

A sucker did come in handy when the store seemed to never end.  But I was surprised at how good he was during our TWO HOUR trip!

We ended up with some good stuff.  Now I just need to save my pennies so I can afford to go back.  Welcome to Colorado, IKEA!  It's good to have ya!

stripes & smiles

UPDATE: This Dwell Studio Bedding is now for sale.  Check out the post here. 

I finally got my act together and made the giant wall art for Kash's room that I've been thinking about for the past four months.  This was a hard decision for me, as most of my home decorating decisions are, I thought maybe I would do a gallery wall or a giant quote and had a million ideas from blogs running through my head.  But I finally settled on this:

Not the best quality picture, for some reason I can't take very good pictures of rooms!

It took me awhile to come up with the quote that fit Kash, but when I read this one I couldn't get it out of my head.  Kash hasn't stopped bringing smiles to my face since the day I found out I was pregnant.  And he himself was such a happy smiley baby from the beginning.  This quote made sense for his room.

Obviously I missed the mark a little bit and this one is 10x better...but I tried!

My inspiration was this "Sunshine" wall hanging and I went from there.  I bought a 4x4 ft board at Lowe's and had them cut it to 3x4.  I then painted the first coat white.  Then I cut large letters out of contact paper with my Cricut.  The "you" was too big so sadly I had to freehand that one...so it didn't turn out as well as the rest of the words.  I measured and stuck my letters on top of the white paint and spray painted the board with 2 coats of green spray paint.  Then I sanded it a little bit to give it an aged look.  This is the step I regret.  I liked it a lot better before, now it just looks streaky and not aged at all.  I should probably sand it a little more and maybe stain it but then I don't think that goes with the rest of the look of the room.  So anyway, you probably didn't want to know all those steps but there they are.  It was actually pretty easy, just a lot of steps and waiting for the paint to dry.

Oh and did you notice those awesome stripes?  That's my favorite part of my house right now!  I've been obsessed with stripes in home decor and was pretty proud of my self for being brave enough to put them on my wall.

Kash's room is almost complete now (minus the fact that his curtains still aren't up and I need to decorate the top of his dresser more oh and I want to make a new lampshade...okay so not almost done but getting there).  Until he moves into a big bed and then I'm sure I'll have an itch to redecorate the entire room!

dear ikea,

IKEA I-25 & County Line Rd. Denver, CO

I was wondering if you would be willing to open a little sooner than this fall.  Don't get me wrong I'm very excited about your arrival to Denver...but I just wish your grand opening was a little sooner.  You see we just bought our first home and there's lots of new space that needs your touch and your ginormous sign is kind of a tease!

For example I have big plans for this rug in my living room.  Think something like this rug.


ERSLEV Rug, flatwoven


And this rug would look pretty cute in our basesment. 

GISLEV Rug, low pile

It would have been nice to have had you around last weekend when we bought our new couch, because this one looks a lot more comfortable than the one we got...


KARLSTAD Sofa

Oh and I need about a million of your frames for a gallery wall up my stairs. 

RIBBA Frame

So if there's any chance that your grand opening could move to June 1st I would be one happy customer.

Sincerely,
Desperate new home owner who wants her house to become a home

nursery tour

When we found out we were pregnant, living in our little apartment, we had two options on where to put our baby. One being our enormous closet under the stairs or our office. We decided to go with our office to try and avoid people calling social services on us.

This room makeover has seemed to consume our weekends for the last six months. Hours of searching the internet, DIY projects, shopping, garage sales, etc. I made all my friends and family do all of the above as well (thanks guys!). Sad thing is I feel like it's still not 100% complete and I have a few more projects to finish, but since our little boy doesn't seem to be in any kind of rush to make his big debut I might just get it all done before he arrives.

So here's our office before it was transformed into a nursery.
And the after. Don't mind the poor lighting. Obviously the pictures would look better if taken during the day but I'm never home when the sun is out!

Don't mind the lamp cord, we plan to hide that...just another one of those things we haven't quite gotten to yet!
But I hope we get to that project soon because looking at it in these pictures it is sure bugging me!

So that's it. Simple. Clean. Nice. I like it. It's not exactly what I had envisioned (the blue in the bedding was hard to match and I ended up going with brighter blue accessories than I wanted) but I think it turned out pretty cute in the end. Now all that we need is a baby to go in it!

joy to the world

I was inspired this last Halloween to get my craft on when I saw this project on the Shanty 2 Chic blog. Of course I bought all the supplies in October, but never got around to making it till now...typical!

But after finally making these cute little apothecary jars I realized they were too cute to put away, and I needed to find some way to incorporate them into my Christmas decor. Well here's what I came up with. My finals are a little smaller (and yes one is a little crooked-adds character right?!?!), I didn't use twine and I chose not to distress the wood. But I still think they turned out alright.

This craft is super easy and you can buy all of the supplies needed at Hobby Lobby. Check out the tutorial on Shanty 2 Chic and the blog in general. They have lots of cute and inexpensive project ideas.

guess what came last night...

Baby Turnbow's bedding! I was so excited I squealed and then called my mom. Can't wait to get working on the nursery now!!!

dream closet

It's Friday, which equals no on comes to work which equals a day of surfing the world wide web for me.

Today I stumbled upon my dream closet. I love a good walk-in closet, but I really love the idea of that vanity in the actual closet. I wish I had somewhere darling to sit and put on my makeup in the morning instead of on the floor in front of a cheap full length mirror from Wal-mart (which is getting harder the bigger my belly gets by the way). Another plus about this closet is the fact that they actually took time to decorate it with that super cute wallpaper. I know that it's probably just a waist of money because who sees your closet right!? But it would make me happy to start my day off with this gem of a space!

Happy Friday!

i want one

I'm obsessed with these chairs from target. Any one of them would look good in our office/craftroom. If anyone feels like giving me $300 target gift card I totally wouldn't stop you!