Plans for the Nursery

As I showed you yesterday, we've decided on a basic colour palette and the bedding set for our summer bundle of joy.

Some of the images in the polyvore above are actual items we're picking for the nursery, and others are just similar to the look I'm going for.

Paint: Sherwin Williams had their Harmony (VOC free) paint on sale during the month of February for around $38 per can, so we decided to go with them. I love the Benjamin Moore VOC free paint, but it's just too price (around $50 on sale!). I loved the SW Rice Grain colour, so we decided that it was a suitable neutral. It matches nicely with pretty much all colours except for a light pink (in my opinion).

Crib: We've basically decided on the StorkCraft Tuscany 4-in-1 crib. We love the sleighbed look, so it was pretty easy to single it down. The Tuscany crib is available at both Sears ($359) and Walmart ($249) so we'll probably go with the one at walmart, as its not only cheaper, but there's one right in town, so its easier to do a return if something is wrong with it. We're buying it in the Espresso colour. It's a dark brown stain.

Dresser/change table: I love the IKEA one shown above, but we don't have the extra money to spend on a new dresser, and we have a perfectly good 6 drawer dresser that we no longer use in our bedroom that I can paint white and put some black knobs on it. I'm hoping to get that done in the next few weeks, and I'll try and remember to document the progress.

Bedding: We had decided on a specific bedding if the babe was a boy, but we had yet to decide on a bedding for a girl. Yesterday we decided that we both liked the Fisher-Price Zen collection bedding. It's considered a neutral bedding, and a lot of reviews I've seen on both Sears and Amazon have said that it's great for either a boy or girl, but I think it's a little more feminine. Our runner up was the Kidsline Willow bedding, but it`s a little more expensive ($229 at Sears) so I don`t think we`ll go that way.

Curtains: I'm still working on a couple of different options. It'll depend on how deep the colour is once we get it on the wall, and how different patterns work with the bedding. I'm either going to go with a layered look like Layla and Kevin did on the Lettered Cottage. They layered the IKEA Alvine Trad curtain with some drop cloth curtains. I love that look, but I'm not sure how it'll look with the bedding. Otherwise, I'm going to do some straight panel curtains in white, and do a strip of cranberry ribbon on the inside edges to match the bedding. Regardless, there will be a 'cocoa' coloured roll up blind behind the curtains to block out the light when it's time to nap! I purchased them on clearance at Lowe's, and they're similar to this one.

Rugs: I'm going for a very textural feeling in the room (why I originally wanted to do the drop cloth curtains), so I'm hoping to find a flat woven one like the one I showed at IKEA. On top of that, I have a small sheepskin carpet go either in front of the crib or in front of the chair for breastfeeding.

Lighting: This one isn't actually decided at all. I really like the light I included in the polyvore, but none of our bedrooms have overhead lighting, so it would probably be a little difficult. They all have a wall outlet connected to the switch, so I would have to run a cord up the wall and across the ceiling to pull it off, and I think that would look sloppy. We'll have to see! Any suggestions for lighting are welcomed.

That's the nursery so far. I'm sure it'll change and evolve as we go along, but we really like the look we've achieved so far, and we're excited to get it all put together.