Nursery Reveal - BabyGroupie

The nursery was a long work in progress but we managed to finish it before Owen was 2 weeks old - with many thanks to my mom who came down to help with Owen, and ended up helping huge with the nursery! We had a lot of DIY projects in the nursery - namely the artwork and mirror, the fabric circles, the roman shade, and the chair cover. Here it is in full:

 

The chair was a Craigslist steal – it is a Dutalier glider, and is SO comfortable. I initially wondered whether I needed a chair for the nursery and was told by friends that Yes, I definitely needed one. I can now confirm for anyone wondering – YES YOU DEFINITELY NEED ONE! A chair with a high back so you can rest your head during late night feeding/rocking/comforting is an absolute must. I generally think gliders are ugly, and this one was no exception with cream microsuede cushions when I bought it. My mom is a great sewer so I knew I could ask her to make a cover, but I couldn’t find any fabric that I liked. Instead I headed to Target and bought 2 drapery panels that worked perfectly for the chair! The fabric is heavy enough that it will wear well, and I liked the subtle ikat pattern. My mom used this tutorial for the project and I think it turned out amazing!

 

The bookshelves are an Ikea hack of Bekvam spice racks – perfect size to put low to the ground for a child to have their own library. We’re in the works of building up Owen’s library – any favourite children’s books that you think are a must?

I shared a mini tutorial for the porthole mirror, and more details on this art in my previous post.

I think I came pretty close to my initial moodboards (still on the hunt for an area rug and a footstool for the space!), and I am loving the space. Owen is loving looking around and seeing all the different elements of his room!

 

DIY No Sew Roman Shade

I hope you all had a good weekend - weekends have taken on a new form since the little guy showed up - gone are the weekends of epic errands/running around and projects, and now we have leisurely, relaxing, weekends with walks, playing, and cooing. Kind of cool :)

I do have another DIY project from the nursery to feature - my no sew Roman shade!

The roman shade was meant to be a simple DIY no sew project…I started it before Owen was born and my mom had to finish it! It was still pretty much no sew, but took a while to figure out the placement of the pleats and how to maneuvre the whole blind.  I wanted the shade to be functional to offer light control, but a lot of the tutorials I found involved mini blinds on the back and to be honest it was all just a bit too involved. I finally found what I wanted andused this Thrifty Décor Chick tutorial as our main guide. 

Since this window is right next to our neighbour’s window, I wanted to keep the slat blinds for privacy while still letting light in. This meant that I couldn't mount the roman shade within the casing, which would have been easy peasy. Instead we added a small block of wood to the top of the window frame and used a tension rod between that and the wall to hold the roman shade.

I wanted the shade to be blackout to darken the room for Owen’s naps and (hopefully) early bedtime when he’s a bit older. I didn't have the patience to wade through a bunch of fabric looking for the right price so I bought a white table cloth at Homesense, and some navy ribbon from Fabricland to get the look I wanted. I cut the fabric to size and added blackout lining with hemming tape. This was the part that I did...

Then the challenge of how to make the shade WORK. The tutorial uses eye hooks for ribbon, but I wanted everything on the blind itself. To allow the blind to be raised and lowered easily, my mom sewed 1 button on each side of the back of the blind, and then added ribbon (ribbon lengths get longer as you go down the blind) at three points to be our gathers.

 

When the ribbons are hooked over the button, you get the casual roman shade pleats, and it makes it easy to put the shade up and down. And finally, my mom added the lengths of ribbon using heming tape to adhere to the shade.

I’m really happy with how it turned out, but I definitely couldn’t have done it on my own (preggo brain / new mom brain did not make it an easy project! Aren't mom's the best??). Stay tuned for a full nursery reveal later this week...

DIY porthole mirror and nursery art

You know my baby's growing up little by little when I actually have a few moments here and there to blog :)

Here are another few touches from the nursery - full reveal coming next week! I wanted some art over the change table, and had 2 gold frames that I wanted to use. I also had the idea to do a round industrial looking mirror...I looked everywhere for one but I couldn't find one (that was less than $100), so I took matters into my own hands and made one.

 

What kicked off the whole DIY idea was that I found the perfect round mirror at an antique store on Queen St East after a glorious pre-baby massage.  There is no doubt in my mind that it is not an antique given it had a made in China sticker on the back :) 

 Thus, no guilt in spray painting over the tortoise shell finish!

I taped it up and the Mr spray painted it for me since I was pregnant.Once it was painted, I got my glue gun and some large twine, knotted it and got to work.

 I wanted it to look like it was hanging from a knob but knew my glue wasn't that strong (or the plaster walls for that matter). So, I hung it using the notch on the back of the mirror, and then spray painted an extra cabinet knob I had from our old kitchen cabinets. I put the knob on the wall hanging on a nail to use as the fake hanger, then I laid the rope over top (hang the knob first so you know how much twine you will need when attaching to the mirror). Faking this is a reeeeaaalllyyy important step for it to stay on the wall and not crash on the change table :)

The gold frame closest to the mirror is Ikea and has card stock and a heart I cut out from a paint chip (I did the art once Owen was born so I went with blue). The top mirror was a Goodwill find, as was the bottom one.  I did simple blue and coral paint chip art in the bottom frame to finish it all off.

Simple, cheery, and cheap!

DIY Nursery Fabric Art

I'm finally getting around to posting about nursery projects! I completed a few while I was off before Owen arrived, and my mom was a huge help with a number of projects (to be revealed)...

With the nursery we decided to keep the paint colour that we had on the walls - it's a gray-sage green (I could look up the Benjamin Moore colour...but I'm not...), and we thought it would work for a boy or a girl (babygroupie was a surprise for us!). That cut down on some of the baby room prep, and to keep it gender neutral, I decided on a navy and coral colour scheme. To add some interest to the walls I did a simple DIY art project - it's all over pinterest / blog land and is the easiest craft ever.

Start with wooden rings that you can get at any fabric store - i lucked into a buy one get one 50% off at Fabricland, so I picked up a number of rings in different sizes.

From there, cut your fabric to size for the loop you are filling. Tighten the wooden loop over the fabric, and trim the excess fabric.

To lay the art out on the wall, I cut out circles in newsprint and taped them up until I was happy with the arrangement.

And voila! DIY nursery art that adds a pop of colour (and catches the little guy's eye!)

Project Baby Room - Moodboard

I have a lot of ideas floating around in my head of what I want the nursery to look like...I'm getting to a point where I really should get going on some of these ideas, so to help me visualize it better, I created a couple of mood boards.

 

Since we don't know whether this little baby is a boy or a girl, I want to do a gender neutral nursery without doing green & yellow or gray & yellow. I like a lot of nurseries in those tones, but I want something a bit different so I am thinking navy, gray and coral. The current walls are a green-gray and we won't be painting (there are enough other projects going on around here!), so I also wanted something that would coordinate with that.

We have all of the pieces of furniture - crib, dresser/change table, and a glider. I was debating getting a really nice glider / rocker, but I just can't picture it in an area of my house after the baby grows up. So instead, I got a great deal on a glider from craigslist and will be recovering the cushions to zhush it up.

The plans above are me playing around on the internet, so who knows what we will end up with but what do you think?

Project Baby Room - before

Alirght...now that the flooring is done it's time to get moving on Project Baby Room! I intended to post this post a million years ago...before the flooring project...but then life (and flooring) got in the way so here we are (our progress on the baby's room in those million years has been null). Like many other people, this project could easily be named Project-get-rid-of-all-of-our-junk.

The baby will be taking over the room that we used to use as our office. To be honest, the only time we used it as an office was when we were working from home (and not working at the dining table). Overall it provides extra storage for my clothes and shoes, some books, university textbooks (ha!) and an old computer (we both have laptops that we use day to day).

Here's a picture in all its beauty:

In a word: Messy.

This is not how it was day to day when we had it as an office, but more of a transition photo where we are getting ready to get rid of stuff.

The Mr. sold the desk and the chair via Craigslist in less than 24 hours. He has a real knack for posting things at the right price and the right time (sort of like when he sold our window A/C unit last year in the height of a heat wave...Sales 101).

Now we need to figure out what goes IN here. And there comes the fun, and the challenge. We will be leaving the wall colour as is, which is a greeny-gray colour, and we have some unique challenges along that back wall with the radiator, the window with no room for curtains on either side, and the angled closet. At least it's all on one wall so we can make full use of the other walls. And, as a reminder, we don't know whether this little human is a boy or a girl, so gender neutral territory is where we're heading.

We currently have a dresser/change table, crib, and glider (to be made over...) Do you have any "must haves" or key tips for the baby room (or babies in general...let's get serious I'll take all I can get!)

Nursery (not mine) reveal!

I am back home from a lovely visit to Vancouver, where I got to meet one of my bestie's 8-week old daughter!! She is just beautiful...I kind of thought babies under 6 months weren't all that exciting, but honestly after spending 5 days with this cutie I see how exciting it is to see them change and grow EVERY day.

I also saw just how much work goes into raising a child. A big THANK YOU to my parents, and all the parents out there for everything they do - day in, day out.

Now, onto the not-so-mushy stuff. My friend had tons of good ideas for her nursery, and had all the basics including beautiful Dwell Studio bedding that led to a lot of inspiration for the room. However, since her daughter decided to arrive a couple of weeks early, some finishing touches were missing. While I was there we made a mobile, chose prints for an art wall, and put up a shelf for lovely wooden animals that another good friend gave the new mom at her shower.

Here's where we ended up:

*PS - if you like the print in the bottom left of this photo, you can see the artist's Etsy shop here: Amor | designpassion

*PPS - I planned on taking photos in perfect lighting with my friend's fancy camera in place of my point and shoot...I learned that with babies, you often put aside your own needs for theirs! In this case the little one needed some rest in her nursery, so I snapped a few quick shots before I left for the airport!