Logan's Monster Nursery!

Long before I knew my sweet baby was a boy, I started dreaming up how I would decorate a little boy's nursery. I knew I didn't want the typical baby blue room with sweet teddy bears, monkeys, or you name it- animals. I came across this blanket from Bed, Bath, & Beyond online and instantly was in love! I never know exactly what I am looking for until I see my first piece of inspiration, and for Logan's nursery this was it! I am a little bummed I didn't buy this blanket when I saw it, so unfortunately we don't even have it! But it was the inspiration piece none the less! When I found out we were having a boy, I was so excited to get started on his nursery! I knew I wanted it to be an extremely bright and fun room, and I think that was accomplished. :) I decided to do happy monsters, not scary ones! I still have people look at me funny when I say that Logan's nursery theme is monsters! Hasn't anyone seen Monsters Inc? They can be friendly! :)

Took me a little while, but I found a bedding set that I fell in love with and ordered it right away. I ordered several extra crib sheets too so I could make many of the things in his room to match his bedding. Here is his bedding, thank you Target! We decided not to use bumpers this time around based on the new recommendations for SIDS safety by the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Time to pick out paint colors! Remember I said I wanted it to be bright? I was not kidding, I really meant BRIGHT! I know there are some people who based on color theory research say it is not good to paint a childs room orange, but I went ahead and did it anyhow! (I even wrote an 8 page paper on this subject in high school!) I will let you know how Logan turns out! Haha :)

Once the bedding arrived I got to work on deigning the accent wall. Here is the design I came up with!

Time to get started! This wall took me about 5 days to do. I was pregnant while I painted it so I chose to take my time and only paint one color a day. With my doctor's permission, wearing a mask & with the windows wide open I was only in the room for 5 minutes, 3x a day. :) My sweet husband always measures out the accent walls for me, otherwise these never would have turned out looking like squares!

I added one color of squares each day!

I looked around for a mobile but could not find one I liked, so I decided I could just make one! This was a really time consuming project, but I am really happy with how it turned out. I sewed fabric around embroidery hoops and scrunched the fabric to get the look I was going for.

I cut out all the monsters out of felt and got started stuffing & hand stitching them all together. I used some ribbon to put the whole mobile together and we hung it from the ceiling over his crib. He really loves it!

Here they are finished!

A friend was giving this chair away on Facebook (thanks Jamie!) and I quickly asked if I could have it! I have always wanted this chair from Ikea, but had completely forgotten that I now have the perfect room for it to live in! I was so tickled with how well it matched Logan's room! I made a little cushion for it because it just looked like it needed one! I took scrape pieces of fabric I had leftover from sewing the curtains, and sewed them all together with ribbon in between. It was a quick and easy project that makes it look like the chair was made for Logan's room, I love it! Plus now its a little more comfy for the kids to sit in, and they love to sit and spin in it!

The part I was most excited about was the artwork for the room! My Husband said he would paint the pictures and I couldn't wait! It was the main way I had planned to incorporate the monster theme into his room. We did all the artwork to match the mobile monsters I had created, I love that they match!

Here is how they turned out! I painted the two small ones and William painted the two big ones! :)

I found this idea on Pinterest, my favorite place to waste just about all of my time! ;) I bought the letters at Michaels on sale and painted them with the leftover paint from the accent wall, so they would match exactly. The shelves are actually spice racks from Ikea for only $3 each. They came in a neutral color so I just spray painted them black to go with everything else in the room. I did a DIY blog post on this project already, you can see it here. Fun random note, that Tickle Monster book is my very favorite book ever I think! Love how it portrays monsters in a friendly manner rather than all the things out there that make monsters seem scary! We love monsters here in our home! :)

Are you ready to finally see how it all looks together? Take a peek!

I sewed these curtains out of the extra crib sheets I had ordered, and used red ribbon for the edging. They are backed with the blackout fabric so when they are closed it is nice and dark for naps & bedtime.

I made this changing table pad cover out of a soft fleece, I would have loved to have just bought one but they didn't have any color that looked good in the room. Turns out I was happy to not have bought one because these are the easiest things ever to make and I did it for so much cheaper!

Here is my little cutie enjoying his room! It is time to move the mattress down now, its amazing how fast he is growing up!

Hope you enjoyed seeing his nursery, so much love went into making this room! I spend a lot of time in Logan's nursery, and it makes all the hard work seem worth it! I hope Logan loves it as he grows up!

Please leave a comment and let me know what you think! :)

Lola Goes to the Movies!

Last week William & I took Lola to see her very first movie in the theatre! We had been talking about taking her for a while now, life has just been so crazy lately that it was hard to settle on a day that would work, but we finally did it!

We have been reading the book "Curious George Goes to the Movies" for months now and she always has the same response at the end, (and you need to say this quote in your saddest 3 year old voice possible...) "I wish I could go to the movies and eat lots of popcorn... :( " I told her the night before we went that we had a surprise for her the next day and she was so excited- my girl loves surprises! The next day we got all ready to go and when William got home from work we loaded up and took Logan over to my Mom's house. Lola of course asked what her surprise was and I took out the Curious George book and gave it to her, she knew right away we were going to see a movie! She then proclaimed all the way to the theatre that this was the best surprise ever! : ) It was fun to see her so super happy! Now that we have two kids it was special to be able to spend some one on one time again with Lola, she sure is growing up! We took her to see The Lorax, such a good movie! It was not scary which made it the perfect first movie choice! Here are some pictures from our night, we had such a great time!

She walked right up and handed him her ticket!

Normally we do not buy snacks at the theatre, but Lola was so excited about the ginormous bucket of popcorn that there was really no way around it :)

Her favorite, she calls them M's :)

It's official, she loves popcorn!

Such a fun Daddy, Mommy, & Lola date! I think she has asked me every single day since when we can go again, and also for more popcorn! Her mind will be blown the day she finds out I can make popcorn here at home! : )

The Non Clutter Lover Mom

It has been a while since my last post again hasn't it! When you have kids, time seems to just evaporate! I finished this project (#5) quite a while ago, just haven't managed to find the time to sit and blog about it. But here I am, and here you go! :)

While wandering around Hobby Lobby a while back, I saw these cute bulletin boards. I have seen them at a lot of different stores but until recently never really had any use for one in my home.

Let me start by saying I adore my daughter to pieces! I love every single piece of artwork that she does, and I love even more how proud of it she is. She always lights up after showing me her latest creation and I give her the reaction of "lets hang it on the fridge!" Okay, now all the warm fuzzies aside, I do not like anything hanging on my refrigerator! I do cherish her work, so whats a non clutter lover mom to do? Here was my solution! Make her a special board all for her, where we can hang pictures of her friends, the never ending amount of artwork, church projects and so on.

My husband went to Home Depot and bought me a huge piece of sturdy wood and cut it down to the size I wanted and then even routered the edges to make it look great! Using my staple gun I wrapped the board in some quilt batting and stapled it tight. Then I did the exact same thing with the fabric.

I chose some blue ribbon that I thought would look good with the kitchen wall. Pulling it tight and stapling it, I was almost finished! At all the intersecting ribbons I simply hot glued some buttons.

Now I know most people may not mind the unfinished back to this, (who will ever see it right?) but I like to have my projects looking as complete as possible. (You don't buy it in the store with an unfinished back right?) That being said, I bought a sheet of black felt and cut it to fit the back and hot glued it in place. I think it looks better, dont you?

In our kitchen we have these photos of the kids hanging up with ribbon. I thought it would be nice to keep it consistant, so I also hung her board up with the same ribbon.

Here is the final product! Lola has her own table in the kitchen, so now with her new bulletin board it is just a little more defined as her space! She loves it, and I love it because my refrigerator is neat and tidy, and I still get to enjoy my girls masterpieces! : )

Total this project cost around $15. I used mostly stuff I already had around the house. When I look at all the tiny boards they are selling in stores they are priced around $28 and they are barely a third of the size. This was a super quick and easy project, it literally took me longer to figure out how to reload the staple gun than it took me to actually make the whole board! :)

Sneak Peek at Logan's Nursery!

As you all know, I have yet to do my major blog post on Logan's nursery. I can assure you I am not just being lazy on my posting, the problem is that his nursery is still missing two key elements before I can post it! When you have a vision of how you want a room to look, its hard to post it when it is only partially completed. I am hopeful that in the next few weeks those last two projects will be finished!

To hold you over, here is a small sneak peek into his nursery! I saw this idea on Pinterest, (inspiration photo is on the left) and knew we have the perfect wall in Logan's bedroom to do it on! My friend Kate picked up these spice racks for me from Ikea. (Thank you Kate!) I think they were $3 dollars each? I like them in their natural color but decided they would match Logan's room better if I painted them black. So away spray painting I went! Some easy cheesy assembly was required and then they were ready to go!

I found these letters on sale at Michaels. Using a gift card and coupons, I was able to get them for super cheap! I came home and went digging through my painting cupboard and found the sample colos I used on Logan's accent wall. I decided it would look great if I painted these letters to match. Lola picked out which letter would be what color, I think she chose great!

Here they are all painted!

My trial run on the floor to see how I wanted to hang them.

Here it is! Thanks to my Husband for hanging them all for me! : ) They would be falling off the wall and completely crooked if I had tried to hang them myself!

Project 3 (Read) & 4 (Bookshelves) complete! Stay tuned for one more.... : )

Lola's Bow Organizer

All my life I have NEVER been a fan of thrift stores. Usually I think they stink, the stuff is dirty, and I always thought everything was just junk! Well, recently my opinions on thrift stores has drastically changed, I almost *gasp* think they are fun! My husband has taught me how to look past the junk and find potential in the items! All my projects these last few days have come from 2nd hand stores. I have really come to enjoy looking at old stinky dirty stuff and dreaming about what I could turn it into! And of course I love the next to nothing prices these projects are costing me!

So, here is project #2 for the week. I found this cheap and relatively unattractive painting and instantly knew that it would be perfect! I made Lola's headband holders, and now I just had to do something about organizing all her bows!

I brought it home and was so excited to get started! I pulled the picture apart, and went to town with my new found love of spray painting! The frame has potential don't you think?

Armed with my hot glue gun I began working with this polka dot fabric. (This was leftover from making Lola's bedroom curtains.) Once I had the fabric pulled tight and glued on, I simply glued on the two pink ribbons.



I thought the back looked rather atrocious, so I glued a nice piece of felt to the back to make it look more finished, you know for all those times people will look at the back. ;) My husband bought me some tiny nails to nail into the wooden frame and hold the picture portion in place.

Here is it! I love adding practical things to my home that aid in organization! Now hopefully I wont have to run around crazy looking for matching bows anymore! : )

And lastly, here it is in Lola's room!

Two projects down, three to go! Stay tuned! : )

Lola's Headband Holders

I dont know what has gotten in to me these last few days but I think I have officially been bit by the crafting bug! Let me start first by saying, I LOVE pinterest! I have pinned so many fun and practical ideas that I want to make for my home. So about a month ago I decided I was no longer going to go waste time pinning more stuff on pinterest until I started checking off the 5 or so projects I really wanted to make first. It has taken me a month, but boy am I going to town checking them off my list now! Feels so good!

So I saw this project and I knew would be so perfect for Lola's bedroom. My girl has more hair accessories than one would probably ever need! :) In case you are wondering, I am making two adorable headband holders!

I quickly gathered up a few supplies from around the house, talked my hubby into a quick Goodwill run and I was all set!

I went looking at Goodwill for two matching candle holders. I did not have any luck. I did however come across these two that I decided would look plenty similar once I painted them both pink!

This was my first time using spray paint, and it was fun! I think there will be many more spray painting projects in my future : )

So I know I am quite a rookie when it comes to spray painting, but I couldn't believe how fast these dried! It made it so easy to complete this project in one evening. Here they are all pretty in pink!

In between coats of paint, I hot glued fabric (which matches Lola's curtains I made for her room) to the two oatmeal cans. I decided to add some pink ribbon at the top to make it look a little more complete.

I then simply hot glued the oatmeal cans to the candle holders and they were done! *Tada!*

Here they are being used to hold all of Lola's headbands in her room! :)

One project down, four to go! Stay tuned! :)