Joshua's Nursery

It's finished! Finally. Ten days before his scheduled arrival. Walking past his nursery and catching a glimpse of his stenciled book ledges from the living room makes me feel so happy. I can't believe the journey this pregnancy has been, but I am so grateful to be ten days from my due date with a healthy and developed baby incubating.

Upon entering the nursery. His room is part of a jack and jill suite that shares a bathroom with our guest bedroom. One day I will decorate it for both boys to share, but for now it is still just for guests. 

 This room is fairly small, but has plenty of room for what we need. Those black french doors lead to the guest room.

This room is blindingly bright for portions of the day, and the crib really glows like that in the early afternoon. I love it, but we'll definitely be closing the blinds for Joshua's naps.

 Ledge bookshelves built by Don's dad, who is such a talented carpenter. I painted them white and stenciled little owls and woodland creatures on one end of each shelf.

 I love this little changing table from Walmart. I bought it because it was cheap and the perfect size, but once it was assembled (thank you, Dad!), it was a little lackluster. I painted the knobs with blue acrylic paint and added white polkadots before sealing them with a very thin coat of polyurethane, made covered storage bins to hold diapers, wipes, and swaddlers, and added a hand painted woodland scene.

My father-in-law cut a 1/8 inch piece of scrap wood to fit the ledge around the top of the changing table, and I added layers of turquoise and blue paint before stenciling and sketching owls, trees, mushrooms, and a couple of love birds and squirrels onto the wood. Once everything dried, I dipped a wadded up paper towel into brown acrylic paint and dragged and dabbed it over the painting, wiping it every few seconds with a wet rag. This made it look distressed and gave it a bit more dimension. 

 I sewed a little pillow for William to snuggle up with and read. The books on the bottom two shelves are all of his favorites and we read in Joshua's room at least twice a day now.

 I bought a $5 frame from Goodwill, removed the glass (and the scary Dubuque poster circa 1982 from it), and made a new background from craft paper. I glued lengths of twine, anchored with whatchamacallits (wow, I'm too lazy to look the name up even though I'm already online...sad), and used tiny white clothespins to display sweet notes from friends and family written for Joshua as part of his baby blessing. 

 Nothing in his nursery is fancy, but everything was made with love. Just some pom pom trim to edge the lamp shade.

 His crib, the same crib my sisters and I slept in as babies 30 years ago. See those storage boxes to the right of his crib? I bought a ton on clearance at Joann's and they house clothes that Joshua won't need for months. The boxes look so sweet stacked in a tower, but since William's favorite game is dumping things out of boxes and reorganizing them, I had to move the rest of the boxes into the closet.

 His verse, pinned inside a handmade frame I bought when Ginger's was closing down. 

 These bunny slippers were the very first thing I bought for William before he was born, but he was such a whopper of a baby that his feet were never small enough to wear these sweet little booties. I wanted to display them in Joshua's room because this room really is a space for me to cherish both boys.

More framed prints from Ginger's that I purchased when they closed down. And the middle frame is my all-time favorite photo of my mom, older sister, and me.

 I ruffled teal ribbon and glued it to a white frame.

 I really love the old-fashioned alphabet cross stitch samplers. 

Now all we need is Joshua. His new Moses basket awaits.