Big Girl Room

A few weeks ago, Chris and I started moving Gracie from her nursery into her big girl room.  It’s been a process.  We bought her a toddler bed that we initially intended to give her at Christmas, but we weren’t quite sure she was ready for that when Christmas came around.  So, we held on to the bed and thought we’d give it to her for her 2nd birthday, but then we decided that a) that would be a pretty sucky present and b) she was ready now and so why wait?  Before we could move her into her new bed, though, we had to get the room ready.

We actually moved Grace into a whole new room.  We switched her into our guest bedroom because her nursery gets direct sunlight all day long and ends up being really hot at night.  This was very helpful when it came time to change her room because we could work on it without having to work around her things.

I’ve mentioned before that the inspiration for Gracie’s big girl room came from two prints I found on Etsy.  I loved what these said and I loved how they looked, so I decided to decorate Gracie’s room in a garden theme.

We decided to paint her room green and accent with bright floral colors. We thought about pastels, but Gracie just isn’t a pastel personality. Girlfriend is bold, and her room should be, too. But I didn’t want to use colors that were TOO bright. She is still a little girl, after all. We ended up choosing the color, “Celery Bunch,” by Behr.

In order to keep the room from having plain, flat painted walls, Chris had this great idea to raise a chair rail to about three feet from the ceiling. And then I thought maybe we should paint stripes in the top portion of the room, just to give it some zip. It ended up being really cute!

First, Chris measured the stripes out using a level and a tape measure. Then he marked it all out with painter’s tape.

Next, he painted the green stripes and let that dry before pulling the painters tape off. Once he pulled the tape off, he went back and hung it again on the other side of each stripe so that he could put a coat of white paint on the white sections. This gave it a really fresh, clean look. (NOTE: If you’re going to attempt stripes, be sure that you mark which boxes you are going to paint different colors with a pencil ahead of time. Otherwise, you might end up with stripes that don’t line up at the end.)

After we pulled the paint tape off the second time, I was so excited! It looked beautiful!

Chris did all the painting in one weekend, which was amazing. I can’t believe he got that all up at once. Later that week, he hung a new white fan in her room. The old one was… old. And ugly. So, we got her a small little white fan to complete the fresh look.

Fun fact: Chris can install or change out a ceiling fan faster than anyone on earth. It’s a fact.

On a different night, Chris hung a new door on her room. We are in the very slow and expensive process of switching all the doors in our house over to white doors, instead of the dark brown that they were when we bought it. Each time we make over a room, we change the door, including adding new matte silver hardware. You wouldn’t believe what a difference that can make in updating a room.

Our last step was hanging the chair railing. Chris measured it and cut it on an angle (apparently a hard thing to do? I don’t know of these things, but he was pretty proud…) with this new saw he got for Christmas. He was really excited to use the saw. I was really excited to finish Gracie’s walls. We call that a win/win in marriage.

With the chair rail hung and painted, the room finally came together. We are still waiting for the curtains and duvet cover that my mom is making. The fabric for that is a tiny pink and green roses print. It is really, really pretty. Both the curtains and the duvet are lined in a matching pink and white striped fabric, which looks adorable in the green room. I can’t wait to get that last piece in. I think it is really going to make the room pop.

In addition to that, I am still searching for the perfect thing to hang above Gracie’s bed. Right now, I’ve moved some fairy prints from her nursery that sort of match, but are too small for that big wall. My mom and I have tossed around the idea of a huge fabric colored bulletin board to hang artwork, photos, and keepsakes on. We’re thinking about maybe covering it in that same pink and white stripe that is the lining of her duvet and curtains. I’ve also thought about some kind of mini picket fence back there, but I’m not quite sure how that will work with her headboard. I could also go back and get a much larger print from the same artist as her other prints. I think that might be beautiful and so very in theme. So, we’re going to keep thinking about that big wall space for now.

There will be a few more additions to the room as we have time to add them. Underneath the window we are putting a padded bench seat with toy storage. The seat will be padded in that same pink and white striped fabric from the duvet and curtains.

Also, as soon as Gracie is potty trained (hopefully over spring break in a couple weeks??? Fingers crossed!), we will take her changing table out and move her little table and chairs to that corner of her room to make space for the bench seat. Once the table and chairs are there, we will turn this little corner into a reading nook with better shelving for her. Still working on that.

Overall, I love her new room, but more importantly, Gracie loves her new room! She and Bean play in there all the time now. Just like his room, I love that she can reach everything in there. Nothing is off limits for her, which I really love because it’s HER room. As we make more changes, I’ll be sure to update here so you all can follow along. I can’t believe she’s big enough for a big girl room! Stop growing, little wildflower!