Nursery Ideas

Before I was pregnant I spent some time looking at nurseries, thinking about what kind of crib I'd like, and how I would decorate things. When I finally became pregnant I didn't think about it. People would ask what I was going to do for the baby's room, and I had no idea. I think I ultimately felt like I couldn't decide on anything until I knew what I was having. There were a few days I would look at some websites that allowed regular people to upload their nurseries. After looking at several pictures I noticed that grey walls were appearing all over the place. People were typically using grey and yellow together, for either a boy or a girl. I was surprised at how much I liked it. I knew I didn't want a pink or a blue room, based on the gender of our child, but I definitely wanted something more than just tan, or green frogs and yellow duckies.
Here are some of the rooms I was really liking:
http://theb-line.blogspot.com/2010/05/baby-ready-nursery-reveal.html
http://bacacreative.blogspot.com/2010/07/zions-room.html
http://gallery.projectnursery.com/projects/743-Hello-Little-One
http://gallery.projectnursery.com/projects/722-Cameron-s-Nursery
http://gallery.projectnursery.com/projects/689-Modern-Gray-Nursery-for-800
http://gallery.projectnursery.com/projects/685-Malone-s-Quirky-Nursery
http://gallery.projectnursery.com/projects/675-Grace-s-Modern-Owl-Nursery
http://gallery.projectnursery.com/projects/658-Nursery-for-Adelaide
I was feeling good about the grey walls, but didn't know what other accent colors I would incorporate.



Then, over my birthday weekend, I had President's day and my birthday off, I had gone to lunch with Joe and a friend on Monday, and didn't really feel like going straight home. Instead, I drove to a few antique shops, just to see what was out there. I didn't go with a plan, but after going to several shops and not seeing much, I went toward Winder, and stopped at Mud Puppy Antiques. I lucked out though, the shop isn't open on Monday's but when I pulled in one of the dealers was there putting some of the items in the yard inside because of the potential rain. She let me walk through the shop while she was working. When I walked in I realized it was a totally different shop than the others. It was fun and full of colorful "antiques". Like all antique shops there were different sections that were stocked by different dealers, but the owner of this shop also painted and decorated her own items. They were all so fun, and I knew I would fall in love with something. I noticed several awesome dressers and immediately though that I could use them as a changing table. I had decided I wanted a changing table, but I didn't want a piece of furniture that its only purpose was a changing table. I also remembered that my sisters had used dressers as changing tables, and thought it was a great idea, since the dresser can transition with the child. Since the store wasn't actually open, Jennifer (the nice lady that let me in anyway), suggested that I come back the next day and talk with Carol the owner, and the person who painted the dressers I liked, and talk to her about them.
I snapped a few photos before leaving because I knew I needed to get my husbands opinion on these things. We looked over the pictures and settled on a greenish/blue colored dresser. It was big, seemed tall enough to use as a changing table, and was super cute! While I was at the shop on Tuesday (my birthday!) I also decided to get a few other things. I asked Carol if she would make some shelves for me, basically just paint some. There is a dealer in the shop that salvages wood from old barns, so she will make two shelves out of that and paint it white, and then use some iron corbels, also painted white, as the brackets for putting it on the wall. The iron dealer also had these amazing barrel of monkey shaped iron items, and I needed those! I walked around the shop some more and settled on an old wood tool box as being a toy box and a wood framed mirror, both of which Carol said she would paint to match the dresser. We worked out that she lived so close to us that if we helped her get the items in her truck she would just take them to our house later that night. It was awesome! I'm really excited about how the toy box and mirror turned out. I also picked up some windows from another antique shop that I just need to put a polyurethane coat on to prevent the paint from pealing more.

We are currently in transition, and aren't in our own place right now. I can't paint the walls, but I did hang a few pictures, which I'll post the details of how I did it soon. Here is the dresser that I loved, but I'll post the details of what I'm planning for our permanent place soon. It's perfect for a changing table.

Unfortunately I didn't seal the dresser before we moved and now it's started chipping!