Green(ish) Baby: Nursery Inspiration pt 1 – The Room

I know, I know, I’m not even pregnant yet and I’m already “nesting”…but I love a good home decorating project!  When you first walk upstairs at the Five Birch Perch, there’s a large open space which leads to a walk-in closet and a large bedroom (I’ll post updated photos of the bedroom soon). This open space has been perfect as my crafty area, but I’ve come to realize that it will also be perfect as the nursery – so I’ve been busy cleaning, clearing and organizing to create a dual purpose space. There is a second bedroom, downstairs, but that location will be more appropriate once the kid is a little older. So without further ado, the future crafty-nursery:

This shot was taken as I walked up the ladder-like precipice that is currently our stairs. Luckily, Butch is already planning the stair construction re-do to happen in the next few months (the incline will be lessened and a landing will be added). Grim-cat, the love-bug, will be our tour guide this morning…

The view straight-ahead as I stood a few stairs down. As you can see, the space also serves as my “yoga” studio (air-quotes implying that not too much yoga has actually happened here).

This corner will probably stay as-is for the most part. The chair, which will be perfect for comfy nursing, was bought for $5 from a local motel that was going out of business. The lampshade is Ikea (more about my love of Ikea in a later post), the painting of the purple man was made by my mom during her hippie art-school days, as were the huge knitted flower-pillows. Let’s zoom in…

I actually found these flowers in the family attic when I was younger. Why someone shoved them up there instead of proudly displaying them is beyond me! The owl doll was recently bought at Kohls and the lovely embroidered owl pillow was made by yours truly, but since it’s wrinkled and covered in cat-hair I won’t be zooming in any closer. And we are also close enough to clearly see the dated blue vinyl that is currently covering the chair.

…But soon I’ll be re-upholstering it with the above fabric, bought from Joann’s.

I recently used other Joann’s fabric to re-cover the pillows on the living room couch, and will be using the remains from that project to make curtains for the one window, above.

See what I’m saying about the stairs? I may as well slide down on a fire-pole.

Hello, ridiculous collection of art, design, craft and gardening books…with crafty supplies “hidden” by fabric down below! I have a much more organized, and less precarious, solution in mind for this wall – stay tuned for that post (hint, it has to do with Ikea).

The other end of the room houses my crafty desk/the rest of the mess that I’ve been going through. Right now the desk is a rickety, Frankenstein-esque creation of an old coffee table with extended peg-legs. The top is nice and substantial, however, so we plan on building some sturdy legs to go with it and, voila – a crafty desk/changing table! And don’t worry, Doomsday Mothers: I will be removing all the choking-hazard doohickeys and deadly pushpins and the shrine to Leo Dicaprio before the baby comes.

I don’t think I’d be so attached to this table if I hadn’t decoupaged it with mini tarot cards. Witchy!

When we first moved in, the master bedroom was completely renovated by Butch – including the addition of a nice wood ceiling and widened door frame (the bedroom was originally split into two awkward rooms, don’t ask). Now that someone other than me will be using the space, the ceiling re-do will be extended to include the nursery. This gaping hole is obviously where spiders and boogey-men get in, so I couldn’t be happier.

And here’s the area where the crib will go! Other important renovations for this space include putting in real flooring (it’s currently nothing but a single layer of boards with gaps in between just large enough to make vacuuming/sweeping impossible, again, don’t ask) and adding a baseboard of sorts to the bottom. I know it doesn’t look like a baseboard is necessary, but I swear on my Girl Scout honor that I once witnessed Grim-cat reach into the crack between wall and floor and pull a live mouse into the room.

I know this corner has already been photographed, but this shot really shows the odd angles of the walls upstairs – another fun challenge to work with!

In closing, I had to share the newest addition to the room – my Christmas present from Butch. I colored the picture (from a vintage coloring book) and Butch snuck it to his woodshop and built a frame for it. Needless to say – I luurve it.

Seems like a lot to do…but I have BINDERS of nursery inspiration already and will be sharing it in the next few weeks. Sources for inspiration have come from Apartment Therapy, Design*Sponge, Pinterest, Offbeat Family, Ikea and Moonrise Kingdom. Stay tuned!