When I found out I was pregnant with baby #2, I started to think about how we could make the best of our space. I love to be resourceful, but I’m also really particular with home decor and the way I want things to look.
We have 3 bedrooms in our home. Rich and I are obviously in the master bedroom, and Alana, up until last month, was in the nursery where she’d been since birth. The nursery has a crib, a changing table/dresser, and a glider (awesome for nursing). It’s perfectly conducive for a baby.
The third bedroom has always been used for a guest room because when my family comes in town for the week (from Florida), we love to have a space for them to stay so that we can all be here at the house together.
So, while the nursery is perfect for the new baby, it does not have enough space to add a toddler bed to have the two kids share a room. So basically, that was not really an option for me…there is nowhere to add ANY furniture and allow Alana to stay in that room. I thought long and hard about the guest room and whether I was willing to forfeit that space to use as a toddler room for Alana. We would have to sell the queen bedroom suite (bed, dresser, and night stands) and buy a toddler bed and other toddler furniture. But what about my parents? I could not even think about the possibility of having zero space/furniture for them. A predicament, for sure.
But one day (while I was hanging out with Kellie) it hit me: I could keep the queen bedroom suite AND allow Alana to have her own room! It would be her very own “big girl room.” I could do a makeover and paint the walls, get new bedding, and new decorations. We could place pillows along the edge of the bed to prevent her from rolling off the bed. Then, when my family is in town, they can stay in Alana’s room and she can sleep somewhere else…on a comfy bed of blankets on our floor in the master bedroom, etc. The rest of the year (when we don’t have guests), the room could be hers – and be in use! And the baby will have his/her own nursery to wake up and cry in the middle of the night (oh, joy)!
I was really excited about my brilliant conclusion, and set to work right away, because really, how can these exciting things wait? I am SO motivated to “nest” when I am pregnant, it’s ridiculous
First order of business: to choose a bedding set that Alana would like but wasn’t too kid-like so that adult guests would still enjoy it (you know, without having to sleep on Dora sheets)Alana and I found the most wonderful 100% organic cotton bedding from Bed Bath & Beyond from Amy Butler’s new bedding line and built the room around that. The one we chose is called “Full Bloom,” but her entire line is AMAZING – check it out! Ours is a cheery bright pinkish-orange color. Not coral, not salmon. I really don’t know how to define it.
Much like the wonderful nursery makeover we did last year, Kellie helped me to choose the color palette for the room. She’s an INCREDIBLE paint color resource! I wanted an airy, clean, modern look, so she suggested the most wonderful shade of white (called “Creamy” by Sherwin-Williams). Then I chose white frames with white mattes from Target…and used them to frame black & white images of Alana as a baby (by the wonderful Amber Holritz, of course). I love the pop of color that the bedding provides and the way it works so well with the clean white look of the rest of the room.
Alana LOVES her new room and sleeps extremely well in her new bed. And one of my favorite parts? We are using the chest at the foot of the bed for storing all of Alana’s toys, so there is no clutter when we clean up – it’s all concealed! This makes mommy happy
My only regret is that I completely FAILED to take photos of the “before” and only have the “after” pictures. I really can’t believe I forgot to document the room prior to working on it, but I guess that’s how impatient I was to get started. It was the ONLY room left in the house that I had not yet painted in our six years of living here and it really needed a facelift. I was so excited for a perfect and logical reason to complete another makeover
Here are a few of the “after” images!
This is an overview of Alana’s new room. In addition to painting and buying new wall decor, we took down the ugly old fan and replaced it with a new, white Hunter fan that works brilliantly and keeps Alana cool when our air conditioning unit can’t manage to cool the house any lower than 78 degrees! This summer has been so brutal!
We’ve had this Queen guest bedroom suite since we have been married, because this is what Rich used as a bachelor. It’s what he was using when I met him. When we got engaged and registered for gifts, we decided we wanted a King bedroom suite for our master. So, this set has come in handy for guests these past six years and now sleeps our two year old. Who knew? It’s definitely not what I’d choose if I was picking out new furniture, but it’s a good feeling to utilize what we have and make it work as well as possible.
I love this bedding so much! I love the color, the patterns, and the quality! There are a ton of decorative pillows that coordinate with this set, but I just wanted the standard pillow cases that came with the sheet set, the shams that came with the comforter set, and this little spurge; the “breakfast pillow.” Any more pillows would have been too many for a two-year-old to deal with.
This is the frame collage that I put together, and all the frames are from Target. I love the way it turned out!
Also from Target I found these wonderful transparent bubble lamps and chose some white shades for them. They are exactly what I wanted, and the perfect amount of light for nighttime reading on her new bed
And here is happy Alana on her new bed
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