B-Bug’s got a brand new room…

constant ear fluid and pressure for over a year, hearing loss, 3 surgeries in one day followed by 12 LONG days of recovery…

… the poor kid deserved a little something.

 

Horsies are out.  She stills loves them… but with the help of Bindi Irwin… she has broadened her animal tastes to those that aren’t just found in a pasture behind our house.

Zebras are in... and leopards… and koalas.  Lily is excited about Heaven because somewhere she came to believe that Jesus will give her her very own zebra to ride there.  She loves all animals

… as long as they are babies

…. and wearing cute bows or tutus.

In efforts to make an animal bedroom for a very style conscious 4 year old…  we gave her what she calls a ‘Fashion-y  baby animal room’.

              

I HEART this ‘Paisley Pop’ bedding.  Although it was weird buying PB TEEN for my pre-schooler, it makes me happy every time I walk past the door and see it in an unmade, messy heap.  I also love these pillows that Maow sewed while she was here.  I can’t wait until life is not so hectic and I can make some fabric flowers for the pink one.

Note… even Lily’s American Girl doll is getting in on the action and  wearing a zebra shirt from Maow.

          

These are Lily’s 2 favorite animal t-shirts that I immortalized on canvas.  I wonder at what age she’ll stop thinking it is cool to have her mom make all of the art for her room…  not for a long time I hope.  I’ve decide that I love to paint.  I love it more than I loved making collage nursery art back when Laura and I were the only ones on Etsy selling it…. a lot more.

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  I love this little book nook that we created in lieu of a night stand with lamp.  

The only problem is that I want to keep this nice display of animal themed books untouched… she can retrieve the ones she actually wants to read from the bookshelf across the room. 

 

She hasn’t  stuck with this plan.

          

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I saw a similar quatrefoil painting while watching  ‘Goodluck Charlie’ with my niece two Christmases ago… and it inspired my desire to persuade B-Bug to want to redecorate her room.  Super easy to make…  using a little 7th grade math, a compass, and drawer full of acrylic paint colors… luckily I had all three.

               

We had to set a 2 gumballs per day limit… to ensure that she has some teeth left on her 5th birthday.

My heart is really in the details.  Lily was able to help with these… like placing all of her bows on a dress form and picking out her favorite animals from these baby animal sound flashcards.  Surely Eli won’t miss these 6.

               

 

What fashion-y baby animal room is complete without a pink leopard piggy bank?

It is hard to believe that this is the silhouette I painted  of my sweet little Bug…

… who looked like this the first time I made one.

 

I hope she looks back on each phase of her little oasis and sees the love that went into creating it for her.

     

I promised Olson when we got married that I wouldn’t do it.  But, who can resist when one’s favorite color becomes super popular and available everywhere?
I don’t think it was deliberate.  But one day, I looked up and it was everywhere.
It’s the color that makes me happy… and I’m here all day, every day… so I think ‘El Jefe’ can learn to accept it.


 
  
  

Naturally it would show up in our bedroom makeover.  I’ve said before that is the  most neglected room in the house.  Finally, after months of  begging to buy one and ‘accidentally’ leaving plans from this website up on the screen… and even printing them out, Jeff gave in.  No, he didn’t build me a farmhouse bed… but he actually made me something I love even more.  Antique door turned headboard.  Love, love, love it… almost as much as my handy, creative husband… who knows me better than I realize sometimes.

Much to his dismay, the new headboard required a drastic change in all décor.  As a stay at home mom, I hate for my hobbies to be a burden on the family resources… so my gracious, over-worked mother agreed to pay me to come and clean her house on a weekly basis.  20 by 20 I started saving enough for the pottery barn bedding I loved in the catalog.  After a tearful conversation with customer service, I was able to return it and get this instead.


Our sorry excuses for nightstands are still detested and embarrassing… but now…
at least they are my favorite color.

We’re officially ready…

Baby Eli can come whenever he wants. 

I always love to plan and shop for a new room.  I’m super ‘theme-y’.  This time it bikes.

Just like with Lily’s, the bedding I chose went to clearance right after I picked it.  I was able to find all of the pieces easily…  but nothing was over 15$.  I found the last bumper for $8… it was awesome. Let me clarify that I am ANTI-BUMPER for their link to SIDS… I’ll be trading it for a breathable bumper when he actually starts sleeping in there.  For Lily, that wasn’t until like 6 months after birth… so I figure I have some time to let it look cute.

My super- talented mother-in-law made a valance from a bed skirt.

The bedding is washed and ready… but I often find “Lulu” and various toys in there… which makes one wonder what else has been in there.

    

I fell in love with these vintage bike prints.  I felt that Jeff’s former status as a bike store employee and bike enthusiast might allow me to postpone the inevitable Minnesota Twins room for just a little while.

Although Twins stuff is still sprinkled around…

… pretty much everywhere.

For some reason, I love that gum chewing bobble head more than I should.  Jeff loves that I continue to call him ‘Meen-ka-witz’ when it is pronounced ‘Man-KAY-vich’. 

The book is true vintage Curious George and the little red tricycle was baby Jeffie’s.

Don’t tell Eli that the yellow bike is vintage BARBIE…. I painted the Barbie stickers green… he’ll never know.

  

I love me some BILL PEET

… even if did write Eli as a LAZY lion… instead of a really cool, brave one.

That bike pillow from The Land of Nod was my first discovery in boy’s bedding that actually made me excited to decorate a boy nursery…. thus, a bike room it was.

Carla used the rest of that bed skirt from the curtain to make a skirt around the glider ottoman. So perfect! 

We re-finished Jeff’s grandma’s glider that had been in Lily’s room… and was the hardest project EVER.  To those that think the white crib is girly and should have been refinished dark as well… I would say to ‘bite me’.  I will never sand and stain another piece of furniture… if I can at all help it.  Even though Jeff did 96% of the work…. my 4% time spent sanding was TORTUROUS

… but still a labor of love trying to make everything perfect for our first little boy.

February update…

I turned 27 on Super Bowl Sunday this year.  Lucky me… a day filled with football… my favorite.

Suz and I finally got a pregnancy picture together at our birthday dinner.  She turned 31 the day after me. 

My dad’s birthday is 4 days earlier.  When taking this picture of the birthday family, my dad  (in true ‘my dad’ fashion) remarked, ‘Taking a picture with my two fat girls.”

Love him so… but even after 32 years of living with women… I guess he’ll never learn.

I got an ipod touch from Jeff and Carla. Lily is getting more use out of my birthday present than I am. Maybe she can teach me how to use it. I’m still using my UT graduation present from Mark, Suz and David – a first generation pink ipod mini with no backlight and real buttons to listen to music in the car.  27… and I’m already like an elderly woman.

 

In my intense desire to get crackin’… we (meaning Jeff) got Eli’s room painted and some of the pictures hung. (a special birthday/valentine’s day present for me)

  His room theme is going to be bicycles.    I’ve decided to spare my son the walls  full of  handmade art.   Basically, only because birdies and horses are way easier to cut out of paper than bikes.  Also, because I found some vintage bike posters online that I fell in love with… and couldn’t possibly have recreated.  I did make one little thing to fill a small frame. I’ll stop at that.

I think there is going to be some real disappointment when Lily realizes that Eli’s room will soon be filled with ELI’s stuff.  For now, she’s loving her very own playroom. She and I had a blast turning it into a grocery store this morning.

I can’t express how cute it is to hear her say, “Hello Ma’am. Thank you for coming to my grocery store. Can I help you with anything?”  The absolute best though, is the names she comes up with.  Her pet store is called, “Lily’s Pet- Anarea”  and the office supplies store (located in her bathroom) is called “Lily’s Alli-nacious Store".  Today, I was assigned to  shop with her Christmas baby “Xelcis-Deo”.  

She is seriously my favorite little girl in the whole world.

Home Improvement…

mmmwuh…

I’ve just attempted to spell the guttural noise that Tim Allen used to make on that show because it seemed fitting to follow the given title.

Anyway… Jeff has finished his new office.   I have been beyond impressed by my husband’s construction skills.  I once dated a guy who couldn’t change his own tire… enough said.  It really looks so great… and I am in love with my new PANTRY!!!  The builders not putting one in… was the oversight of the century.  

Jeff’s dad was an invaluable resource when they came for a week in October.  After that, Jeff can’t truthfully say he didn’t have any professional help with the room.

Here are the office before photos…. when it was just extra garage space.

Now it just continues off of the laundry room like it was always meant to be there.

 

His mom was gracious enough to help me re- paint our living room and kitchen, that I’ve been dying to do.  Jeff has been hoping I would just forget about it.  Our living room went from celery root (light green) to macadamia (taupe) and our kitchen from garden dusk (dark green) to composed (turquoise).  It makes me happy to look at my turquoise wall and I LOVE that it feels like a new house.

I made and distressed this sign to hang with some scrap board from Jeff’s project.  I put one of my favorite verses that Jesus said and I have to remind myself of daily all the things that I was given freely and am expected to give freely to EVERYONE. (grace, mercy, kindness, forgiveness, acceptance… etc.)

 

Lily’s baby room to big girl room conversion hasn’t come together quite the way I envisioned it… but I officially have baby boy nursery on the brain.  Therefore, I think I’m done messing with it for a while. So I will share it.

  

I found this cowgirl/horsie bedding.

I made a throw pillow from a pink bandana.

I found some vintage horse/western books and held them up with Jeff’s tiny boots.  They make me happy just to imagine his size 12 feet ever fitting in those little things.

I painted a tin barn star pink and  incorporated art from the VanillaBean Graveyard (my craft closet).

I made new art…. that is now listed in my etsy store.  I’m just not feeling it with the green on the blue walls.  I think I might try to do something like spelling out her name in rope instead. We’ll see.

 

It hangs over her new ‘dress up nook’ with mirror.

I made this collage:

a vintage “western girl apples” ad… that I painted over with pink

a black and white art.com photo  print find

a homemade rodeo sign (I made in photoshop)

used horseshoe with scrapbook paper matte

horse sillouhette (I made this after our computer crashed… without photoshop… freehand with scissors… don’t judge too harshly.)

hat creek cattle co. sign… Jeff made me do this! I was going to make it say GOD BLESS TEXAS, but he insisted on this allusion to Lonesome Dove, my dad’s all-time favorite book/movie.  It means nothing to Lily.

Here are two items that were supposed to be Christmas presents… but just couldn’t stay out of this room.

a stained glass horse nightlight

a Giddy Up, Cowgirl book

And of course… there is the ultimate Cowgirl bedroom accessory…. Nubbin.  Who can be seen donning a bandana and bow as he gazes out the window and imagines a world where children actually like him and want to play with him.