Apartment Progress: Julian's Room

When we moved, I was really excited to try something new with Julian's room. The colors in his room at our previous place were the same as when we lived with my dad, and I get sick of seeing the same stuff for a long time. Plus, I figured that I would want to do something different when he gets out of his crib, so I might as well start it now.

It's definitely a work in progress and I plan on making changes along the way. I'm excited to see what this room evolves into as he grows, since we plan on staying here for a long time.

This is the wall that his crib is on. The color is Valspar Luscious Green, and the letters and crib were both in his room before. I love the way the white pops against the green.

This wall is the biggest work in progress, and it's looking sort of sad right now. I hope to expand it into a gallery wall of pictures and things that take up the entire wall. I want to fill it with a mixture of pictures, drawings, illustrations and prints, and also 3D objects. The door on this wall goes to his closet, and the paint color for the rest of his room is Valspar Possabilities.

Here is a close-up of what I have so far.

I spent some time yesterday creating this fox painting out of construction paper and acrylic paint. I'm really proud of the way it turned out! I plan on framing it in a big frame that I have on hand. I want to spray paint it gold, so now it's just a matter of getting that done. I think it will end up being the focal point of the whole wall, even when the whole wall is filled.

I happen to have a really old Aesop's Fables book that has some amazing illustrations to go along with the stories. Many of them happen to feature a fox, which is sort of the underlying theme for the room so far. I really loved this one (and it wasn't as greusome as some of the others) so I framed it! You gotta love free artwork!

 This was another free artwork solution that will probably be temporary. The designer in me saw "Pantone" and almost screamed. (I even posted about it on Instagram.) I like the idea of the paint swatches, but it takes up a large part of the wall right now and it's not my favorite. I might keep two swatches and put them in a smaller frame or make something more creative out of them. I'll keep you posted!

Julian's crib is oppose from his changing table and the gallery wall and closet door are opposite from this bookshelf and the door leading to the hallway. These paintings used to hang in our bedroom, but I would like to change the colors in there too, and they happened to work perfectly in here! They're probably temporary, too, but they make the walls more colorful. When I have the extra time and money, I would love to hang some book/picture ledges from the floor to the ceiling so that all of his books can be on display. He has so many and some of them were even mine and my sister's when we were little, so being able to see them would be so cool! Plus it would be easier to put them all away on a ledge than sliding them into the shelf.

Here are some more pictures of the room so you can get an idea of how it all comes together.

I love having his little table in there for us to play on, read on, and of course hve snacks on.

This is the view from the rocking chair next to his bed. He rarely lets me sit in it peacefully, but I love being a fly on the wall and watching him do his little boy thing.

His closet is huge and so functional. I put his clothes dresser in there, hung up some things and then put blankets and unused things on the shelves. Not the prettiest placem, but it is really handy to have such an organized spot for clothes and extras.

And, of course the obligatory "real life" shot of what the room looks like on a good day. This picture was taken 6 minutes after the ones above, when I finally let him take toys and books out.

So that's his room! I haven't really thought of the "theme" that would describe it yet because it's definitely still evolving. Eventually I would like to say that it has a storybook adventure feel to it, complete with lots of books and forest animals.

My original vision for his room involved green, black, grey and white, but when our upstairs got carpeted they put in this blue carpet and it really threw me off, and I was dissapointed at first. I wanted it to be sophisticated and modern. But once I got over it, I realized that it's going to work out really well in the end. The blue looks great with the green and white walls! This way the room will stay "little boy-ish", whereas I think it could have felt too grown up had I gone with my original plan.

One of the things I love most about the room is that I'm using things that I already had, which makes the cost of recreating his bedroom super low. With some new paint colors you can transform the look and feel of a space into whatever you want! I also love that all the artwork has been free, besides what I initially paid for supplies. It's so fun to use what you have to make something completely new.

Also, I want to take this opportunity to say how much I love 3M hanging strips. I think I've hung everything in this room withone of those things, and they work like a dream for the most part. The walls in our place are painted paneling so they it can be hard to drive nails into the wall, and plus since we're renting I would rather keep the walls as clean as possible.

Thanks for stopping by to see Julian's room! I hope to post more pictures of it as it evolves and progresses. I don't think it will ever be "finished", because I'm never satisfied!

I hope to be back tomorrow to show you some of the things I've been working on design-wise!

Apartment Progress: My Desk and a Peek into the Kitchen

So things are coming along here in our new apartment. We're still figuring out our routines and finding places for both everyday items and the less-used items in our lives. So it's looking pretty average here, and decorating has been difficult because there is more wall space and just more walls in general. In our old apartment the walls weren't as big/long, and here there are about the same amount of different walls, but they're so much longer and taller, especially downstairs. We probably have 12 foot ceilings downstairs, so finding artwork and wall hangings that feel balanced and large enough is going to be a challenge. The other problem is that, pretty much in every room, there are little pieces of trim just about every yard. We aren't sure why, but it really makes it difficult to hang big things on the wall. I'm interested to see why they're there. A project for another weekend!

So, because our place feels really incomplete and somewhat unorganized, I have taken pictures of the two spots that feel "finished" and are pretty to me. One is my desk/work area, and the other is one side of the kitchen that was sort of a happy accident.

The wall behind my desk stumps me, because there are two light switches and the thermostat, so the artwork that I hung on the wall has to be really high, and the space between my desktop and that artwork drives me nuts. For now I put two body length mirrors behind it to take up the space, but it isn't my favorite soution. If you have any ideas, let me know! Maybe some layering of frames on top of the mirrors?

This is that wall without the mirrors.

I got this desk from Target, and I absolutely LOVE it. It's so functional. When I open the big drawer I can see all of the tools I use most often for drawing, crafts, and writing. It's not really organized in any particular way right now.

My sister and I found this chair at the local thrift store for $12. It's definitely pretty worn and had a really gross seat on it when we bought it. It looked like someone had an accident at the dinner table on this chair or something...

I happened to have this fabric on hand from AC Moore, so we unstapled and stapled and voila! The contrast of colors are fabulous! I love all of the different materials and textures in and around my desk area. There are lots of colors in the books, but I feel like they all tie into eachother and the chair being this pretty blue color brings all of the colors together.

My desk area doesn't really "go" with the color scheme of the rest of the downstairs but it's my "place", and all of the colors make me feel happy and productive.

Onto my little spot in the kitchen...

This area was an accident because I had no place to put my really big wine glasses and my favorite glass pitcher. I also wanted to keep my cookbooks in a place where they were easily accessable so that I could look at the more often. I think this is a cute little display within the kitchen. When the rest of it is sort of messy and there are dishes in the sink it's nice to have this little area.

Far away, the counter isn't the prettiest, but close up I love the pattern! I'm planning on using it as inspiration for a design at some point.

Thanks for seeing my favorite parts of our apartment so far! Hopefully it will come together more so I can share it with you!

Have a great rest of your Saturday!

PS: My desk and the glass lamp on it is from target, my computer is an HP from Best Buy last year, the artwork above my desk was a DIY, and most of the books I have were gifts. My pink planner is from Sugar and Paper for Target. My chair was thrifted and the fabric on the seat is from AC Moore.