the nursery: progress take 2

So about two weeks ago I posted before pictures of the nursery... you can check those out here. It's about time I updated you all on what it looks like in it's more current state. :) (Sorry for that dumb black speck in the corner of nearly all the pictures, it looks like I need to clean my camera!)

After going back and forth on what I wanted for this nursery, we decided to paint the walls initially with gray and white stripes... And then after talking to a decorator friend of mine she said it might look too... not girly and a little stale since this particular room is so tiny. She suggested yellow and gray stripes to make it a little more feminine but I wasn't a fan of those two colors right next to each other. So I had the idea to add a small white stripe in between the two.

 The colors we used were Daffodil by Sherwin Williams and Urban Sunrise by Valspar but both colors were matched to a no-VOC valspar paint, which is much more expensive per gallon but we had to just tell ourselves it was worth it. Very, very happy with the color! Basically we decided we wanted four yellow stripes and five gray ones with a two inch white stripe in between. The last gray stripe is 13 inches where all the other stripes are 8. The last stripe is a bit wider because we didn't want to measure everything to come out exactly because we would have ended up with some weird numbers... and neither of us like math that much. ;)

 Basically we measured the entire wall and marked off where each stripe would go with a pencil - we did this five different times at varying places on the wall and then we used painters tape and connected each of the pencil marks. That may or may not make sense... if you have any questions, let me know :) The tape we would highly, highly recommend for stripes is the green frog tape - not the blue painters tape. It's a little more expensive but worth it. For a few stripes at the end we ran out of the green tape and used the blue - and you can definitely tell.

Michael told me Monday night, "Don't come upstairs til I tell you" and my love set up the crib! I love it. Big brother also really loves it. Yesterday he carried every single book from his bedroom into sissy's room, wanted to lay in her bed while I sat on the floor and read to him. This is his favorite room in the whole house now!

The crib we bought is this one, from Target. It's not as eco-friendly as I wish it were - but it was the least expensive I found that I also loved. It is solid wood (from my search this is pretty rare - but something you want!) lead free and non-toxic... and at $129 I felt like we couldn't do much better! We also had to wait a really long time for them to bring it to us after they brought out a wrong one - so we also got it for 10% off. I love it when inconveniences save you some money. :) The crib mattress we were a little more particular on. It's this one, also from Target. It doesn't have any chemicals, is non-toxic and has an organic cotton cover. I wish we could have gotten a totally organic mattress, but unfortunately those are quite a bit out of our price range. Luckily, though, I feel really good with this option. This was one of my favorite posts to reference when looking for eco-friendly/safer options regarding cribs and mattresses.

We still have a few more things to do in here - but I'm very happy with the progress! This is Big brother's old dresser (which also happened to be my dad's and then mine!) But it is getting really old and just not as functional as it used to be, so we did find one on Craigslist that my dad is painting white for us - this one is just a placeholder until then. But most of her clothes are somewhat organized in there and also the closet which feels pretty good.

Next up on our list - I'm hoping to make a crib skirt and also a cornice for the window. Then just decide on a place for the furniture... the rocker from Brother's room is also going to be moved in here and we're going to give him a big, comfy reading corner instead. He does love the rocker but I'm hoping he'll love his corner even more :) Then hang some photos and find some art/mirror for above the crib and I think we're set! For now, of course... I'm sure I'll continue to tweak it after she's here but really happy to see we're making progress :) Next update will hopefully be of the nursery all finished up!