Simple and Inexpensive Kids Monster Bathroom

Wow is my kids bathroom a difficult room to photograph!!!! (Maybe all bathrooms are tricky!!) It is a long bathroom with a pocket door between the sink area and the tub/toilet area. While I like this idea functionally, it makes photoing tricky. 

I spent a lot of time debating on if I should paint this room or not. I decided not to paint it and am very happy with my decision not to paint it. It just looks so bright and clean with the white painted walls!

I love the look of the bright and bold colored prints with the dark frames on the white walls. I love the little Monster artwork I purchased on Etsy!!! They turned out so cute and look awesome in the room! I got their initial letter hooks a year or so back and never had a place for them. So they work out great for hanging their towels!!

More monster artwork!

The inspiration on my monster themed bathroom! A Target shower curtain.

The best part of this bathroom is the extra storage!! There is enough room in the large bathroom vanity to hold all of their towels!! This was part of my spring organization on the 40 Bags in 40 Days!

Painting Stripes Quickly

This is my third time painting striped walls! And I liked how they turned out in Little Man's last bedroom I replicated them in his new bedroom. The difference this time I was I decided I wanted six big stripes instead of eight smaller ones. 

Before I started painting the stripes, I looked for tips to paint stripes quickly, because I needed to finish this project in as little time as possible. We were hosting a house warming party soon and I had a babysitter for my daughter. (She isn't the best helper with painting!) 

I used green frog painters tape and I read some tips that if I used this I could just trust that my lines would turn out crisp. Well since I had such a limited time and was using a dark color on a light wall, I didn't want to take the risk. So after I used a level to get my tape on the wall, I used my base paint (the light blue) and painted right over the tape to seal the tape. I only used this technique on the top two stripes, since the bottom stripe won't be seen with the bed and the shelf. 

After two coats of my dark navy paint (which is my absolute favorite!!!!!) I removed the tape while the top coat was still wet. Since I didn't do the extra bottom coat on the bottom stripe, that was the first one I removed the tape on, and it was horrible!!! The line looked horrible. It had bled so much under the tape I was so disappointed!! And so nervous about my other two stripes. Luckily you can't see the bottom stripe, so it is ok. See below for how much it bled! 

With my fingers crossed, I slowly removed the tape on the top two stripes and they were perfect!!!! So in the long run my extra step of painting the bottom coat did save me time, or I would have spent a lot of additional time fixing the bled. 

So save yourself some time in the long run and do the extra step of painting your base coat over your tape, even if you have the best tape out there! 

DIY Upholstered Headboard with Cardboard

I decided it was time to finally give Little Man a headboard! Besides the fabric this project was FREE!! Got to love that! I decided to give the cardboard backing headboard a go! Using cardboard has its pros and cons but for now it works! 

I used a big Pottery Barn box I had. My box had a fold in it. In the end it doesn't seem to matter but it would have been easier to assemble without the bend. I used two pieces of cardboard, which is why the entire thing is lined with duck tape!  Not shown, but I used two layers of the eggshell mattress pad cut to size, and then a layer of quilt batting. I stapled the quilt batting down before I added my final layer of fabric. As with any headboard I use a lot of staples!

 

My biggest concern with using cardboard as a backing was how would I actually attach the headboard to the wall. For my attempt I used string and put about 50 staples in to hold it in place. See below. This did hold it. And probably would have been fine, however, after I made the below changes, I decided to change how I hung it as well.

Once my headboard was hung, it drove me nuts how the fabric and the batting bowed out when you viewed it from the side - and this is your view when you enter the room. I should have glued the eggshell crate to the cardboard and to each layer before I added the quilt batting. This would have solved the problem from the start! 

However, I was not going to take the whole thing apart unless I had no other solutions! So I took the whole thing down and decided to add tufting!! This is one of the huge advantages of using cardboard instead of wood, this was SO easy to add. You need a long upholstery needle and embroidery thread. I made my buttons using extra fabric and a button kit. With a long needle this was SO easy! 

I added 8 buttons and it looks so much more finished than before! And it solved my bowing problem! I also decided to hot glue 3 D-rings to the back to hang.

I am much happier with how it turned out. I still wish I would have made it a little shorter, but again I am not going to go back and change it! I measured for a bed that wasn't against the wall. Being against the wall it should have been the exact size as the mattress, not any longer. Oh well, Little Man LOVES it! He even helped!

Industrial Restoration Hardware Playroom

One of the things that made us fall in love with our house was the large open basement!! We loved that it was a huge open space for the kids to play and run around. When we moved in, I went to work to make it a fun playroom for our son, with lots of bright primary colors. See the before!!!!  While it was a great design for kids, trying to sell your house, maybe not so much??

So I give you my industrial playroom, inspired by everything Restoration Hardware!

I repainted our table and chairs white and black! The table top is technically chalk board paint, but I have not let the kids in on this secret! More on the toy storage in a bit! I painted my book ledges gray! And added some large initials of the kids with an awesome star I found at Pottery Barn Kids. Also I added my "when you wish upon a star" artwork!

One of the first things I did, and you might notice in the before is paint some walls!!! The wall to the left in the below picture used to be a red chalk board wall. Once coat of primer and one coat of the wall color, I had a nice and boring (white) wall! The wall to the right, used to be an adorable house wall I painted, but now its a nice and solid black chalk wall (so we still have some fun here!!!)

 Do you not love the red firetruck in the above picture? It completes the room!

I attempted to make some DIY Industrial shelves using pipes! While they are not exactly what I wanted them to look like, they did the trick and I am very proud I tackled this project!!! I broke my ankle (un-related to this project) mid-project, so I never really got any pictures of the during, even though the during was a big process!

These shelves are the perfect perfect size for a car garage for my sons many many big trucks!!!

 Some industrial accessories! The boat was a win at a White Elephant party one year and my son loves this boat.... so it might be here to stay!!!

 I made a matching taller industrial pipe shelf for the non-playroom portion of the room. This side is supposed to be the adult side with the TV and seating area.... though toys ALWAYS find their way over to this side!

 I made all of the below artwork! I love making state nail air! So easy but such a fabulous look!!

 More of the massive firetruck and chalk wall as seen from the "adult" side!

 I would have redo this shelf if I had not broken my ankle. The top and bottom shelf have too much space between the shelves. These were a real learning process and they were so SO expensive to make!!!!

And a wide shot from the back of the room! This room sure is a huge improvement over the mess it was before!!! 

Thanks again to First Moments Photography for these pictures!

Blue and Orange Organized Science Playroom

When we originally bought this house, I struggled and I mean struggled with the front room of our house. It is the first room you see when you enter the house and it is directly attached to the family room. And we really didn't use it for the first year and a half we lived in our house. I blogged about this room in Fall of 2012 and you can see the before of this room we a pretty blank slate. 

Rewind a minute, when we moved into our house I decided that we would have a toy box in the family room and the rest of the toys would be in the basement. At the time my son was a little over a year and din't have all that many toys..... well fast forward 4 years and with a 5 year old boy and a 2 year old girl, my kids have WAY WAY WAY too many toys. Needless to say, the toys and kids have taken over the house..... So my naive thought on only having toys in the basement soon changed and over time, I am not sure how or when, but that front room slowly because a play room. About a year ago or so I finally embraced the fact that this room was indeed a play room and my life became much easier!  

So I give you our first floor play room, I wanted a somewhat simple and not so kid looking playroom, that is still fun for the kids! Since this is the first room when walking into the house, I didn't want it to scream playroom and I think I achieved that. 

A while back we got a new sectional for our family room, so I was able to move our little sofa into the play room, which is so nice to have in a playroom. The "coffee table" is actually our train table. This room has no over head lighting, so I added some fun orange hanging pendants and I started a globe collection! Simple Etsy artwork of constellations really complete the look of the room!

When you turn the corner into the play room is where you see the toys!

A play kitchen and some more shelves with bins easily hide the mess!

I love this view! I love the planets, since we made them, and I love the colors on my periodic table. I searched for a long time for the perfect periodic table and ended up finding this one from the Land of Nod. I love the colors with the pop of orange!

Some more Etsy artwork!

Do you not love these hanging lamps? I love the pop of orange! And of course my globe collection. One globe we "borrowed" from my parents, another from my husbands parents, one my sister gave us and the 4th was from Target.

This shelf and the matching self on the other side of the couch hide so many of their toys. A ton!

I knew I wanted to find some sort of science artwork for the room since I already had the periodic table and the plants, so I searched for a while and was finally really happy when I found these great prints on Etsy!

Don't you just want to grab a toy and play?? And yes, our toy room ALWAYS looks like this!! I have my kids so well trained they put their toys away immediately.... (ok, maybe we are still working on this....)

This orange gear was a great find from Pottery Barn Kids! I love it!

My son and I had a great time painting and hanging the planets. We used a simple kit I found on Amazon and these are my absolute favorite part of this room!!

So it took a while but I am finally very happy with this room. What have you done to embrace the toys in your life?

DIY Railroad Crossing Sign

Last week I revealed my son's train bedroom. If I did't say it enough in my reveal post, I LOVE this room. Love it!!!! I would not change a thing (ok I would add a headboard..... which I never got around too... )

One of my favorite pieces in his room is this large railroad crossing sign.

When I started planning for his room I knew I wanted this sign to be a feature. I just was not sure how I was going to create or find it!

After a lot of thought on how to cheaply get a big circle piece of wood, I decided to search for one of those 3 legged wooden round decorative side tables! I asked around with family because someone had to have one of these tables laying around!!! My aunt did and the legs were broken so it was a great free win for me!!!!

A little bit of painting tape, some "R" stencils (I made mine with my Silhouette) and some yellow and black paint and I had a free large railroad crossing sign!!

If you need more information on stenciling, visit my other stencil projects!

Train Bedroom Reveal

My son's train room has technically been complete for about 2 years or so. There have been slight changes along the way, mostly in my son's bed. (He had a plastic Thomas bed for a while!! And yes this completely goes against what I say next!!!)

This room was my absolute favorite room in our house. I spent so much time on this room. Obviously my son loves trains and I wanted him to have a non-kiddy train room. I still love this room!!!

I had so much fun with the details in this room!!

DIY pendant banner and rail road crossing sign!

This is a shadow box from Pottery Barn kids filled with a train car from both of my son's grandpas and one great grandpa!! (He is so lucky both of his grandpas love trains as much as he does!!!) I love the meaning behind this shadow box!!

I loved this Pottery Barn Kids lamp for so long. I thought and thought about how I could DIY a much cheaper version. In the end I caved and bought the expensive real version and I am so glad I did. I love it so much!!


Some fabulous ledge shelves my dad made for us. I painted them to match the stripes on the opposite wall!

The long frame next to the curtains is very hard to see, but it's copies of pencil drawings that we got on a family vacation. They were drawn by a local 85 year old man. I love these!!

I love repurposing shelves. I bought these awesome cube shelves at Target maybe 9 years ago. A new coat of paint and they look great in his room!!

The street sign and map were decor used at his 2nd birthday party!!
Two years later and I still love this room!!!! His new room in our new house will look very very similar to this!!! I just love it do much!! And I probably only have a couple years left where I have a say in how his room looks!!

Bedding: Land of Nod (no longer available)
Lamp: Pottery Barn Kids
Red Shelves: Land of Nod
Curtains: DIY
Train Artwork and Blue Shelves: DIY
Rail Road Crossing Sign: DIY

A special thanks to First Moments Photography for taking all of these fabulous pictures!! She took all of these fabulous pictures plus our listing pictures!!