Furniture Home Designs: Time Flies... Better Late Than Never!

Well, time's really flown since we moved into our new house. It's been 6 months! I've been pregnant the whole time & when we first moved (during my first trimester) I was pretty worthless with helping out. I fell asleep on the sofa almost every night around 7 & poor Dave got so much done.

Second trimester (and summer) just flew by with an insane amount of home improvement projects and travel plans....

And now, here I am with a baby due in a little over a month & I can't believe how quickly the time has flown!!! (haha and back on the couch again! - but not really ;)

First pregnancies & second pregnancies are VERY different. (at least for me.) For my first pregnancy with Christian (now 2) it was pretty much all we talked about for MONTHS. We had lots of name ideas & found out as soon as we could that we would be having a baby boy. (I really thought I was having a girl & wanted one badly!! haha) We talked to Christian the whole pregnancy long. The nursery planning & painting began in February & he wasn't due until July. It's really a magic time & there's nothing like it. (Christian's nursery below.)

Now for my second pregnancy... sometimes I forget I'm even pregnant! Christian takes up so much of my thoughts & energy that I just don't have as much mental room cleared out for this pregnancy as I did the first time. (I can only imagine how subsequent pregnancies go! :) We don't know if we're having a boy or a girl and decided that when Baby 2 gets here, he or she will be loved & coddled an insane amount so that for now (while he/ she is still "inside") we'll focus on Christian. But, when we sing & talk to Christian, this little baby is hearing it too so I'm okay with this.

Anyway, what this is all leading to is the fact that we've done NOTHING with the baby's nursery. eeeeeeeek It's definitely a lot harder to plan a nursery this time not knowing if we're having a boy or a girl. Of course we're keeping all of the same furniture, but I do want to do something a little different from Christian's nursery. (Hey, I'm a decorator! I live for this stuff! ;) And, let me be totally frank here: a nursery is for the parents. (in our case, for me.. Dave could really care less how cute it is ;) But no baby cares what his room looks like. They just don't. So when planning this nursery I'm under no illusions that this is going to make my baby happy or that the color of the walls will matter at all to him or her. It's for me. It will make me happy. Below is the seashell mobile my cousin & I made for Christian's nursery over 2 years ago... It really did make me smile...

Here's the chaise lounge that we're still using: (pictured in our old house/ nursery)...

And now sad & lonely in the new nursery:

Here's the new nursery... just waiting to be done!!! We're keeping all of the furniture you see along with the bumper & sheets. (We're doing a new blanket- the striped blue one I made for Christian & I'll do a new one for the new baby- and also new mobile, and crib skirt & pillows... don't worry the pillows won't go in the crib to suffocate the baby ;) And of course we need some paint!

So... I was thinking owls a bit back if you remember... and then I came across this awesome owl lamp from Gallery Designs: (top 2 pendants are from them as well.)

Finally when I saw this lamp, a vision started forming. (It took long enough! ;) Since we don't know the sex of the baby, I'm going to stay super-neutral: creams, browns, oatmeals, black and white... I can always add in color in accents once the little one arrives... (really more likely once the "3-6 month blur" passes over this house ;) But I just want it to be totally relaxing & subtle & textural with a little hit of fun. I loved the tone-on-tone stripes in Christian's nursery & want to do the same thing in cream in here. Since we sometimes call our house "the treehouse" I thought that owls & trees would be great for the nursery... So I want to make a huge tree growing on the wall behind the crib out of decoupaged newspaper... Then we can tape up photos and pictures & little notes & fun things all over it.... Sort of like this wallpaper tree from Romp but out of newspaper:And I'd love to add a sculptural natural chandelier similar to this one from Arteriors Home. (This one is unfortunately too big with only 8 foot ceilings.)

And for a fabric option, I love this: Does anyone know what it's called or where to get it?? I found it at southlandpology.com:

And I'd love to add a Dash & Albert rug:

Anyway, I'll be looking for some good artwork to hang above the toy/ book shelf and of course a bunch of fabrics, so if anyone has any ideas, I'd love to hear them!! For the windows I'm just doing Sears Roman shades in 'natural.' (I probably won't add any ebellishments to them because I want to keep the window treatment pretty blank for future room switches..) We plan on painting in the stripes (SO TEDIOUS!!) this weekend...

xoxo,

lauren

ps- for the full story & photos of Christian's nursery, click here

***UPDATE: Ok, I decided to go "cuter" than originally planned. After talking with family & thinking about how Christian will be in there enjoying it too, I'm going a little more "baby" than I wanted to go. It's still going to be really textural with some hits of color (and we're doing the newspaper tree) but it'll feel like a little more of a vintage-modern mix & maybe a little more "fun" than originally planned. I ordered the Dash & Albert pale blue rug above (boy or girl, I like it ;) and am sticking with the cream striped walls, but am using this colorful mobile made by a super-talented etsy -seller.

I found this vintage concert poster & will have it framed with oversized matting for one wall:

I'm loving this owl fabric. Such a pretty pale blue... I'm thinking either for a blanket or a pillow or bedskirt or even as banding on the roman shades... depends "how" cute I want to go ;)

And I'm crazy about this vintage crewel owl family (below). They look so lovingly-created! I plan on layering them above the shelves with the toy baskets along with a large mirror, lamp & some other things...