My mom came to Austin 2 weekends ago to help me whip this DIY nursery into shape and celebrate her b-day! I shared the state of the nursery before mom here. It was a whirl wind weekend of shopping and returning, ha! We did do a single DIY project, shocker! Although we did get all of the supplies for Andy to start on one! Our big goal was to find a rug. Grrr. That was a quite a feat. Rug shopping is heavy and expensive. I don’t really like it. I wish I could pick out 8 rugs, have them all magically appear in my room, and then then have the rug fairy take away the other 7. Oh and if the rug was free, that would be even cooler. And shopping for rugs online is tricky too. Since you can’t actually see the colors or feel the sucker. Have you ever bought a rug online? Anyhow, here’s the nursery prior to my mom showing up…
And here ‘s the after:
Here’s the before of the long window wall:
And the after, or uhhh progress picture:
And here’s the story… The room clearly needed a rug. And while I do love the black and white IKEA rug, it’s too small for the room, and I stole it from under my dining room table. So mom, Andy, and I went out on the great rug hunt of 2013. We started at the Pottery Barn outlet. The downside to the outlet is that all rugs are final sale. I’m not good enough to only pick one rug without the option of bringing it back! There just wasn’t a perfect rug there. We were sad after 2 hours of yanking giant rugs off of the shelf and unfolding them on the ground, we went home empty handed. Thank goodness Andy was there to be our rug wrangler! Then we went to all the big stores: World Market, Target, and Pier One. Mind you, I’d already looked at 100’s of rugs online. I’m just to chicken to buy a rug online without seeing it first! We even went to a few rug only stores in Austin, and brought one home on approval. And then as we were returning a pack of pillows to a Home Goods store, we saw the the perfect rug in green. Boo. If only it was in black and white. And then, low and behold, as we dug a deeper into hanging rug heaven (seriously I love when rugs are displayed hanging!), we spotted the same rug in black and white. It was big and black and had a hand drawn doodle effect that sang to me and mom! We brought that one home along with another 8×10 from the same Home Goods. Seeing a rug in the space makes all the difference to me.
Here’s rug #1 from the Great Rug Co. She was soft and fluffy and fun, but more expensive than the winner and the octagons kind of fight with the triangles. We don’t need any shapes fighting in this room.
Rug #2 from Home Goods was fluffy and soft, but she was a 5 x7 and we ultimately decided she just wasn’t big enough.
And the rug winner was also from Home Goods! I like her because she reminds me of a kids doodle…
Another big break in the black and white nursery decor was finally deciding what exactly was going to go on the wall under the long skinny window. Here is the nursery planning post again. Long story short, I knew I wanted storage and some kind of book nook. I was telling my mom about the dilemma and how I’ve thought about making a single bench with the IKEA EXPEDIT shelving, and she suggested making the whole wall a bench which would also give me double the storage. Genius! And that’s what we did. At $59 bucks a pop, they’re affordable and functional!
As for the tape lines on the walls… those are going to be 3 in. deep books shelves that I’m going to paint the same color as the wall. Andy finished building all 7 shelves, but I still need to paint and hang ’em! It’s going to be awesome! Oh and we bought a space mobile from Pottery Barn Kids… it was just too fun to pass up. There is no way I could make that awesome of a mobile for $44 bucks! If you’re on instagram, that’s where the newest nursery pica are hiding… like this pic of the space mobile!
What else did Mama and I do?
- Found and hung a round black mirror from Hobby Lobby above the crib. My mom showed us an awesome way to hang a pic with 2 dumb hooks. I’ll share soon!
- Looked and looked for a reasonably priced glider/ rocker. They are so dang expensive! I’m searching craigslist like a fool for this West Elm Graham Glider in either dive grey or lagoon!
- Try and decide what to do about the un painted wall. We have lots of ideas, but the wall is currently still the original beige color. And those 3 wooden doors… ahhh!
- We looked for crib sheets, a short crib skirt, and pillows. Since I stole all of my living room pillows for this room for now.
- Oh and we added triangles up and down the sides of the wall. I still need more triangles under the windows.
And here is what I felt like at the end of the weekend… what I like to call a happy exhaustion. You can see a little baby bump action in this shot!
Pretty good progress for one weekend! Anyone else have major rug buying problems? Have you ever bought a rug online? Don’t you love my space mobile!
Psst… here’s the DIY nursery plan, painting the igloo, and the bambino gets a crib. Oh and I’ll be sharing the gender reveal deets tomorrow… it’s only a day away!
Comments & Reviews
Betsy says
Do they still make these bookshelves? I can’t find them ANYWHERE…
totally bummed
🙁
Jamie Dorobek says
no 🙁 I don’t think they make these exact bookshelves anymore.
DontBlameTheKids says
I am having huge issues with finding a rug for the kids’ bedroom. Everything is too expensive or too small.
Love, love, love the bench wall!
Jamie Dorobek says
Check home goods!
katie goldsworthy says
I love it! The entire nursery is awesome!
Miss Charming says
Love your new rug, Jamie! It’s perfect for the space. I’ve always been frustrated with rug shopping, also. (Too chicken to order online!)
Your little one’s room design is really coming together. And kudos to your mom for the long bench idea.
Laura @ The Experimental Home says
I love it how your nursery is coming together, and I love the Expedit bench! Random question… are you going to hang blackout curtains?
Kate says
The room looks so chic, but tell me you’re joking about hanging a huge mirror over a crib with 2 “dumb hooks”-
that seems like a tragedy just waiting to happen…
Becky B says
I was having the same rug drama! They are so hard to buy. But I found one I loved online, made by Surya. One of the websites I found it on agreed to send me a sample for $20 so I could at least see and feel it in real life. I took the sample in to West Elm to make sure the fabric we picked for the glider (we’re getting the Graham Glider, too!) would match the rug. PHEW, nursery design, it’s exhausting!
Marissa | Rae Gun Ramblings says
I’m you guys are amazing I love our and cant believe you did it so fast! So excited for tomorrow
Taylor says
Looks fab friend!!! And hello!! When do we get to find out the sex? I’m patiently waiting 🙂