- A Project For: Ellie
- Age: Newborn
- Location: Iowa
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Description:
For our first born, we wanted a room that would grow with our daughter. We wanted the room to be bright and cheery that would be as appropriate for a newborn as it would a 4 year old.
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Design Inspiration:
We were well on our way to planning a fox themed room when we saw The Lorax movie in the theaters. We instantly fell in love the with characters, the colors, and the theme. Originally, we thought we would follow the book theme a bit more, but we felt it was a bit too heavy and deep for a childrens room. So we drew from the movie, looking to a brighter future
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Decorating Style:
We look for lots of color, contrast, and clean lines whenever we can. We like unique handcrafted items, and timeless high quality furniture.
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Project Details:
The centerpieces for this room were the custom made furniture. All of the furniture was made by an Amish craftsman from Wisconsin. It was built to our specifications with solid, natural finished hickory. There is no plywood, pressboard, or other composite woods in this furniture. The crib is convertible to a toddler bed and full size bed. The changing table top can be removed and wall mounted as a shelf, leaving a dresser for Ellie to grow with. The drawers and doors were fitted with slow close hardware to avoid pinched fingers.
We ordered the bedding through a local store, which had it custom made by Luvstuffbaby.com. The blanket and rail covers reverse to aqua minky, giving another color option. We also have an extra matching pink crib sheet.
The book shelves are simple vinyl rain gutters screwed to the wall. We wanted her to be able to see the covers to the books, which is supposed to help promote reading.
The shelf was built by Dad and painted by mom. It was designed to match the casing on the window and give Ellie a place for some of her things. The Thneed was crocheted by Mom based on pictures in the book.
The mobile hanging over the changing table was made by mom. The truffula branches are made from debarked and sanded willow sticks and painted to match. The truffula tops are made from simple pompoms.
The walls are painted in Valspar colors from Lowes. The blue base coat under the mural is "Ocean Sigh, #5002-10A". The purple is "Sonic Plum #4002-10C"
The crown moulding is made by Dakota Moulding. I built the corner blocks from scratch to add a little flair to the room, and also to ease the installation of the crown moulding on the vaulted ceilings in the nursery.
The mural was painted to mimic the one Audrey painted on the side of the house in the Lorax movie. It was painted using Liquitex artist paints.
The curtains are made by Eclipse and are light blocking and should help with energy efficiency as the window is west facing. The curtain tie-back ribbons were purchased from Etsy.
The truffula tree lamp was made from an upcycled lamp from goodwill. A fun-noodle was used to thicken the "trunk" of the lamp and painted with the artist acrylics used on the mural. The shade was made by gluing a flokati fur rug to the existing shade using a spray adhesive.
The ceiling light was purchased at a Habitat for Humanity Re-Store and cleaned up. We replaced the existing light switch with a digital dimmer.
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Favorite Items:
The Thneed shelf. Originally we had planned on putting up a 27x40 "Lorax" movie posted in this space, but it looked wrong. So I built the thneed shelf to fill up the space, and give a little extra cute storage in the room. The labels are in picture frames and could be changed to suit any need as she grows up. It also gave us a chance to add a little extra personal touch as both Mom and Dad worked on it. We also had fun coming up with things to put on it, such as her Thneed.
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Advice:
Start with bedding. It is easier to match the room to the bedding than the other way around. We found this out the hard way. While it worked out in the end, we could have made life easier. Designing your own bedding is fun, but it is challenging.
Give yourself time. Start to finish was 4 months, 1 day. While 90 percent of the work was done within 6 weeks, it took time to find, order, and receive the remaining items. Order custom products extra early, as delivery times may be longer than planned.
Don't be afraid to take on DIY projects. While our DIY experience was relatively low, we gutted this room, and it was worth it. New floors, new insulation, new drywall, new trim, plus new window casings, light fixtures, and shelving were all part of this project. We found a lot of help through youtube, google, and pinterest. Use those resources.
Buy quality furniture if you can. Solid wood will last generations, not years. The extra investment may not be as much as you would think, and will stay with your family far beyond your childs first years.
Don't be afraid to return items that won't work. We tried a few different rugs, a few prints, and some other items before we found what we liked.
Be prepared to be flexible. Even the best ideas can change once you see them in place.
