Boys Room Design

Now that the Girls Room is done and the Laundry Room is done and the Kitchen is done I feel like I should give the Boys room a little TLC. They're destructive, rough and tumble boys-boys…so I'm a little leery to put anything too "nice" into their room just yet.

Right now they have NOTHING on their walls and the only things not locked in their closet is their beds and a tub of stuffed animals. We have their name letters that their Grammie gave them but they knocked those off the walls a few weeks ago. I guess the only thing I can really do is slap some paint on the walls and ask their Auntie to paint a mural or something.

Back when Jacobi was a BABY his Auntie Jamie painted a mural of fish and corals on the wall in his nursery! It was so cute!!

So far I'm thinking either Bible verses or a mural hand painted by their Auntie

OR stripes of blues, greens and browns. Their bed spreads are striped with the same colors so it would coordinate nicely. Or do I paint each wall a different color? Or accent with thin stripes of colors vs thick stripes? Or, or, or… I'm so lost! I have too many idea's floating around and not much time to get them done! I would love to have their room looking cuter before this Baby arrives which gives me about a month and a half…

Basically my only options are painting or wall-papering something on the walls. Nothing hanging on the walls, no shelves, no more toys, etc. HELP! I have no idea what to do!!!

Laundry Room is FINISHED!

Ahhh! My Laundry room is complete! I'm so excited the process is finally done with! I LOVE the wall color and I love how the red pops from the Expedit. I think the white baskets really tone down the red and make it a nice accent.

We organized our extra cleaning supplies, LOVE Melaleuca, in the top rows.

The bottom baskets have extra supplies such as pumps for soaps, carpet cleaning solution, and extra beach towels. The middle row holds Paper Towels, Toilet Paper and a water filter. The top is our Miche Purse Collection! We simply took a file organizer and lined the purse covers in that! It works perfectly!

Over in the corner is a mini fridge/freezer that holds creamer, meds and ice cream for easy access downstairs. My Mom, who lives in the basement, created a coffee station for herself.

We've got our downstairs vacuum and carpet cleaner tucked in this corner, as well as the ironing board.

Over here is the deep freezer and a drying rack. The deep freezer is the perfect height for folding laundry, which is an added bonus!

We've got the garbage can tucked next to the dryer for easy lint removal. Here's the stand my Hubs built me! We simply spray painted it grey. It could look nicer but it gets the job done - with three littles running around…that's all you can ask for!

We had some extra pictures laying around that fill the wall space nicely. Free artwork is the best artwork!

I actually enjoy going down to do laundry now! I love everything about this room!!!

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

*Side Note: we did have to turn the dryer door/handle around. Especially with this ever-expanding belly, it was such an annoyance to take a step back to get around the door. Now that it's turned and opens the other direction it's easy to transfer clothes straight from the washer to the dryer. It was a simple fix. Just keep that in mind if you have a stacked washer/dryer set that you decide to unstack.

Your turn - What's your Favorite room in your home?!? I would say the Laundry Room & Girls Room are tied! I love going into both of these rooms now!!!

Updated Laundry Room!

My Laundry Room is part laundry room, part utility room, part food storage - with a deep freezer and extra fridge and it currently houses my Sister's cats' litter box. The layout of the room is AWFUL!! The walls are a dirty white color, the floor is grey cement and everything is just thrown into the room. I HATE going down there to do laundry because it's kind of dingy looking. I couldn't wait to get started and ended up hiring movers to help! Take a look at the chaos that ensued as a result!

SO…Nesting has struck again and we're tackling the design! We purchased a RED Expedit Bookcase from Ikea

as well as these Baskets in White.

We'll store our extra cleaning supplies, and miscellaneous items that are being stored in this room, in these baskets. I LOVE the red!!! I know it's a bold color that not everyone will enjoy but I'm the one who has to do laundry in there everyday and I'm excited to see it!!

We got Cozumel Turquoise for the wall color!

Again, it's a bold color that not everyone will like but I am in LOVE with it! Hopefully it will look as nice on the walls as it does on the lid!

We also picked up this $20 rug from Ikea that I think will help tone down the turquoise and red.

We plan to paint the wash tub grey too so it will pull those two items together!

We'll be unstacking the washer and dryer and putting them onto a stand that my Husband said he'll build me! We plan to get these Baskets to sit underneath the stand that will hold our extra laundry supplies and extra beach towels!

The stand will reach from the wash tub to the other wall and will also hold our Reverse Osmosis Water reservoir. We removed the extra fridge and will rearrange the deep freezer to make better use of the space. We plan to put the Expedit where the fridge currently resides. We'll be able to remove a white two door cabinet, a plastic white tower and a two drawer plastic container!

I can't wait to see the finished product! Be sure to check back so you can see what it looks like completed!!! I'll have BEFORE & AFTER pictures in the final update!

Total Upset!

Once you get to know me you'll learn that I'm the type of person that, when I decide I want to do something - it MUST get done NOW! For example: When I decide I want to cut my hair I go out the same day and get it cut. When I want to redecorate a room I want to go buy the paint today and get the first coat on the wall immediately. Seriously, it's such a part of who I am that it has become a running joke in our family that when Mama wants it done it better be done now or she'll be up all night pouting. It's a terrible personality trait that I try so hard not to give into. Being pregnant and nesting makes it a million times worse!

So, I started out by organizing our bathroom, which I think works really well for our family! I should probably take some pictures and show you all how it's looking now…I'll work on that soon.

Next up was our (My Husband and I's) bedroom. I went through both of our nightstands and cleaned them out. My Husband tends to hoard receipts like nobody's business. I also got a charging station for my Husband's electronics because I HATE seeing all the cords draped everywhere. Next up was purging clothes from our closet. Can I just say it's nearly impossible to purge anything when pregnant? I'm not sure how anything is going to fit me in two months. So, needless to say, not much was actually taken out. Following the closet, I cleared out our dresser. I only use four of the eight drawers for clothes, the rest are "stuff" drawers, a printer drawer and then I turned one into a "Baby Girl" drawer that houses diapers, sleepers/swaddlers and burp cloths. We co-sleep our Babes in our room and thus it's much easier to have their necessities in our room. I'm hoping having this drawer will help me keep the Baby clothes chaos to a minimum. Anyway, I digress…

Next up was the Girls Room! I LOVE their room more than words can say. It's truly embarrassing how giddy I get whenever I think of their design! I keep saying I wish I could spend all day in that room…cheesy, I know!

Now I'm left with our Laundry Room and the Boys Room. Our Living Room/Toy Room is always a work in progress so I've pretty much given up on doing anything with that room until the kids are MUCH older!

Well, we decided to start in on the laundry room today. Unfortunately, it's a HUGE mess. It's become a store-all for junk. We had everything from fish supplies to beach towels, cleaning supplies to a litter box. It really was a hodgepodge and I hated going into that room. The biggest problem is that to give us a well-functioning room we had to remove three heavy pieces of furniture. So what did I do because of my "must get it done now" attitude? Yep, I hired movers to get it moved for us. I'm 8 months pregnant, my Mom is "weak" (don't take offense Mom, you said yourself you're getting weaker) and my Husband has chronic back issues. So I took it upon myself to get it moved…by someone else!

Another problem is that we moved the fridge that was in the laundry room to our kitchen to replace the older and smaller fridge we had been using. Can I just say that adding three inches to the fridge size made a HUGE difference. Our previous fridge was stuffed to the gills and this one looks so empty! Since we moved such big furniture we had to shift other things so it now looks like a bomb went off! We have a shoe rack in our hallway, miscellaneous food stuffs that need thrown out sitting on our counter, the basement is a disaster. It's really quite overwhelming at the moment.

Next up we'll get to painting and organizing! It is sick how excited I am to get this room finished! Seriously! Embarrassing! Our Plan of design attack!

Make it Work with Marbles!

Today's Make it Work is with Marbles! Beyond the obvious games you can play with Marbles there are quite a few other things you can do with them! You can use Marbles to:

*Foot Spa
Put some Marbles in a large bowl or tub, fill with hot water and/or essential oils and you've got your own foot spa! Roll your feet on top of the marbles for a massage!

*Painting
Drop Marbles into paint and then roll them around on paper! Fun artwork the kids will love to create!

*Vase Base
Fill the bottom of a vase/planter with Marbles to hold up flowers/bamboo/small plants/etc! Looks great and keeps the flowers standing upright!

*Fish Fun
Put Marbles in the bottom of a fish bowl/aquarium to give a fun flashy look to the tank! Plus, Marbles are typically cheaper than beads specifically made for tanks!

*Frame it
Glue Marbles onto a basic frame for a flash of color!

*Sparkle
Glue Marbles onto any dish, bowl, glass, etc to use as a candle holder. The candle light will make the Marbles sparkle!

Photo Credit

What's your Double Duty Tip for Marbles?!?

Shaelyn's Name Art!

I've had some questions on how I made Shaelyn's name art for her wall so here is a brief overview of how I made it!

I was in a rush to get it done because it was the last thing on my to do list before I could move Shaelyn into her room! I don't have any pictures of the progress/process but I'll try to explain it as best as I can.


I bought the green ribbon from Michael's but you can find ribbon at any craft or fabric store and even Walmart and Target sell ribbons. Choose whatever color you like best.

I also bought the flower poof's from Michael's but you can probably find those at other major stores as well.

My Mother-in-Law bought the letters that spell out SHAELYN. My MIL has actually purchased letter for all of our kids names! It's become a tradition!

I cut out the ribbon into varying lengths, although for our next Baby I'm thinking I'll do it more symmetrically. Choose a length that works and then cut the ribbon at that point.

Next I glued the flowers to the tops using super glue because I don't have a hot glue gun. Hot glue guns would definitely work too.

I finished up by gluing the letters onto the ribbon, again using super glue. This part I kind of regret because I wish they had been spaced differently. I wish there was a little more sense to how the letters hang but I was doing it quickly. Next time I'll measure where I want the letters instead of just haphazardly gluing!

After that I simply hung them on the wall! I did measure how far apart they were.

It was really simple! Just make sure you put something like cardboard or a paper bag under the ribbon before gluing so you don't get any glue on the surface your working on. Also, lift up on the ribbon after gluing the letters/flowers so it doesn't stick.

If something doesn't make sense feel free to comment and I'll try to explain it better. Once we come up with a name for this Baby I'll make another name display and be sure to photograph the process!!

Girl's Room is DONE!

I got the Girl's room finished! Here are some pictures of the finished product!!!

This is the view from their doorway!

This will be Shaelyn's Big Girl Bed!

Their closet is fairly small so we got this Closetmaid Storage System with Bins to store onesies, pants, sleepers, etc.

Baby Girl's animal is an Owl so here is a cute picture of owls!

Shaelyn's animal is a ladybug so here a cute picture of ladybugs!

Shaelyn's Name Art!

*Update! We added this new area rug and I love how the brown tones down the pink. The flowers are adorable!!!!


*Instructions on how to name Name Art like Shaelyn's!