Room Makeover: the Nursery

This is an oldie but goodie...

I think anytime you move into a different house, unless it's a brand-spanking new house, there's always at least one very questionable decor element that has you wondering about the previous owners all, "What the heck were you thinking??"

Maybe it's an uncommon paint-colour choice. Maybe it's odd window treatment. Perhaps it's a DIY-job gone wrong. Perhaps it's all of the above.

When we moved into our house, I didn't like the dark brick-red walls in three rooms and the stairwell. I also didn't like the pee-yellow walls in the downstairs bedroom and bathroom. But the one thing that reaaally made me want to tear my hair out and made my eyes bleed, was the small room upstairs opposite the master bedroom with - wait for it - dark blue walls, even darker blue blinds that were broken (and had pet hair all over it - yummy) and a splotchy rag-paint job on top of the dark blue walls. And by the way, why are there tutorials online on how to do a rag-paint job??! Stahp it. Get out.

Unfortunately (or fortunately?) I don't really have any good photos of the horror that was my (then) dressing-room. The below photo is all I've got... forewarning, bad paint-job aside, it's messy; there's a random packet of 2-Minute Noodles, there's ugg boots... it's... it's bad...

Ready?

Gah!!!

I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Can I offer you some Dettol? Maybe a decontamination shower? Is that better? You're just lucky I don't have a macro-shot of how horrific that rag-paint job really was.

Moving along, EQC did their thing on our house in 2012 (for those unaware, our city suffered a massive earthquake in Feb 2011 and my house is one of the lucky 52,000 that has been repaired so far). For the painting, I chose very neutral whites and greys for the entire house because they only gave me a week to decide and I was overwhelmed and pregnant and moving out for 8 weeks so yup. I went with the super adventurous choice of grey. But hey, after enduring splotchy rag-painted blue walls for a year, I was quite happy to go for the cleanest slate possible.

The blinds were taken down, I kept the backing, fixed the broken parts, sewed on new fabric and hung it back up (along with some sheers - which, despite everything being on sale, still totaled around $140 for the rods, finials, brackets and the sheers. So flippin' expensive! C'mon New Zealand gaaaargh). 

And since I was pregnant, I had a whirlwind month of nesting and turned that previously splotchy steaming pile into a gloriously light, airy, fun, fresh nursery for Master V:

Much better.

Here are the tutorials I used for the floor pouf, bird mobile and Jonathan Adler-style play mat (but for a fraction of the cost! Ain't no way I'm gonna be able to buy a US$1,195 rug and ship it all the way over here. Thank you Etsy for the tutorial!).

This dude came out fatter than anticipated but that's ok, I think he's cute!

Used fishing wire to hang the branches off each other and a hot glue gun and same fishing wire to stick on the birds

I made the orange-print pillow case sitting on the womb chair and the small square elephant-print cushion out of Spotlight fabric (no pattern, just winged it). 

The crib skirt was made out of leftover fabric from the blinds. 

I drew the art on the wall with Crayola washable markers since someone (coughHUSBANDcough) was a little tooo paranoid about a pregnant lady painting with acrylics or water colour. 

The ottomans, baskets and wall decal were all from The Warehouse.  

Crib and change table are from Cariboo (made right here in New Zealand! Awesome!!). 

The bookshelf was from Mocka. 

That ram head was a fun lil afternoon project I did - no pattern again, just winged it. I was after a lumpy, cutesy, raggedy, fun looking thing (inspiration here and here). It was originally going to go over the crib but again, the hubs protested. Especially seeing as we still get some hefty aftershocks from time to time. I still argued Gordon the Ramsey's case though, seeing as he's soft and barely 200g of soft poly (therefore highly unlikely to fall and crush the master), but hubs put his foot down. Safety first. That's where the wall decal came in. By the way, why are these glorified-stickers so expensive?! I looked on Trademe and other home decor websites and they're anywhere from $60 to $190. Why?! WHY. They're stickers?? Anyway, the one I ended up using was from the Warehouse for $11 which is a much more agreeable price and perfect for the space - I like that it echoes the trees in the SkipHop crib sheet and orange pillow. Booya. I heart you Warehouse. 

Gordon the Ramsey hangin' out with Moose-tafa and Pete

Sure, after a good year of use, the room has gone back to being a bombsite, what with toys and books and blankets and clothes everywhere... but at least I had this fleeting moment of my kind of perfection. 

And now a final Before and After just to round this post off with a bow...

WEEEEEEEEEEEEeeeeeeee~

::bows::

A.V.