nursery series | inspiration

I didn't want to really start planning the nursery until after my first trimester. And considering how tired I was it wasn't all that hard to resist the urge to decorate. But I did know from the start a few key things:

1. The room shouldn't necessarily look like a "nursery". Knowing how much it can cost to redecorate a room from scratch, I wanted a room that would grow with our baby into childhood. This meant investing in furniture that would last and picking colors that were not all of the pastel variety. It also meant nothing very cutesy. 
2. The base pieces and colors should be gender neutral. At the beginning of my pregnancy, we were unsure if we were going to find out the sex of the baby so not too boy and not too girl was important. Also because we are planning on having more than one child, I wanted the flexibility to switch rooms or even have them share.
3. There should be a designated spot for Mom and Dad. I wanted the baby's room to be a place where the whole family would be able to hang out i.e. a comfortable spot for both Jeff and I. In our case, the baby's room is quite large so we were able to keep a full size bed, get a comfortable chair and have a crib and dresser. We also wanted to keep the option of the baby's room transitioning to a second guest bedroom.
4. Maximizing storage is key. When we were first planning the nursery, we didn't know we would be creating a playroom on the first floor (more on this later). So I figured the bedroom would be where we would need to keep the majority of all the baby's stuff. And it seems even if you try to do it as simply as possible, babies come with a lot of things. I also didn't want our whole house to become over run with baby/kid things so having "put away spaces" was important to me. 

In addition to forming my general design criteria, I also just looked for images of nurseries/kids rooms I really liked. Favorites included...

via Lonny | THE PLACE HOME

home of Molly Sims via Pop Sugar | THE PLACE HOME

home of Lulu DK via Lonny | THE PLACE HOME

by Animal Print Shop via Lonny | THE PLACE HOME

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big news

Its been roughly three weeks since my last blog post and wow how the time has just disappeared. Because.....SURPRISE we welcomed our little girl Jane Elizabeth into the world on May 4th! She came just 24 minutes before her Cinco de Mayo due date and we have been in baby bliss mode every since. I had grand intentions of getting this post out at least a week ago but between being on the newborn time warp machine and Jeff getting appendicitis its been quite a busy May.

Leading up to Jane's arrival, I had been working on preparing a back log of posts to share while I slowly return to our new normal. About half of the posts center on the design of Jane's nursery which is just about finished. The other half of the posts detail my SECOND SURPRISE - our first floor renovation! That's right we actually did it and it turned out even better than I had hoped. I will be sharing the play by play phases of our renovation - demo, framing, paint etc. - concluding with a grand reveal! It might still be a little slow around here for the next couple weeks but hopefully you all will enjoy these two special series I have planned. 

Happy May!

via THE PLACE HOME

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spring gardening thus far

This spring has been rather mild and excitingly we have had time at home to enjoy it! Last year, our spring was spent inside as Jeff prepared to take his licensing exam and I rushed to finish painting our hallway and stairs before our carpet runner was installed. It also was a record year for rainfall and our yard was a jungle so having a manageable yard and cooperating weather has been a dramatic improvement. 

So for the past couple weekends, we have gotten outside and started our spring clean up and planting.  It has been mostly weeding with some new planting but we are both really enjoying it. We have even instituted "Green Thumb Thursdays" in which we plan to garden for an hour or so in the evening and then enjoy an outdoor meal. 

In the front, we started working on our main bed that was quickly being overtaken by day lilies. We pulled out a bunch and created a border along the driveway. Ideally, we would have dug out all of them as I don't like them very much. But, we don't yet have a plan for what to replace them with so we opted to wait. We also weeded (still a bit left to do), transplanted a few hostas and brainstormed what to plant in the bed. 

In the back, we put in a climbing hydrangea in what is set to become our herb garden. My hope is that it will wrap the rather unattractive lattice work and add some "green" interest to an unsightly corner of our porch.

Adjacent to the herb garden is a small bed that has our hellebore which is continuing to do great - ya! And a bunch of lily of the valley that I successfully transplanted last year! So just a bit of weeding effort in that particular bed. 

Finally, we expanded a bed along our driveway and planted two lilacs (the old-fashion kind), a bridal veil spirea, two little henries and transplanted some form of a monkey grass and two patches of irises. I am super excited about this planting effort as 1.) I finally have my lilacs! 2.) the bed went to bare to almost filled out and 3.) the little henries and irises should help with our water problem. 

Tomorrow, we plan on hitting the first Saturday farmers market of the year and picking up our herbs to plant! I hope everyone has a lovely weekend.

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