Nursery Makeover, Part 1

I wish that I could make all the right decisions in decorating but alas, that would be boring now wouldn't it? :) To start of 2010, I thought I would admit my blunders - and let you know that I've come to the realization that sometimes you need to just try things out to know that they don't work. A fresh start for the New Year!

So here an update on the spare bedroom - turned nursery - and why I've avoided any updates until now.

A recap from the summer - What I did to the room was the following

(1) I painted the walls in white - like super-dooper white with no tint. I had painted my basement office in this colour and LOVED it (and still do) and so I thought the same colour could be used upstairs. (I was wrong)

(2) I painted the old wooden floors white.


Above, The Nusery Before. It was a newly painted REALLY white room. This is taken right before I started to hate it.

So...what happened?
Try as I might to love the all white room, it was VERY white. I would walk into the room and feel uninspired. Then....I found out I was pregnant, and the uber-modern look I had previously been inspired by no longer seemed right to welcome a baby into. Not only did I feel uninspired, I felt sad walking into the room. Some nights I would lie in bed and tell Aubrey I hated the room - Absolutely hated it.

Jump ahead a bit and recently I repainted the room in Cloud White like the rest of our house. (I know you're thinking...wooooah, she's adventurous!) But the Cloud White in this room, doesn't show up as white.....



Above, New Wall Colour - Cloud White

In this room Cloud White appears more cream - showing you how paint can VERY much differ from room to room based on the lighting conditions. (Cloud white is everywhere else in our house, and reads as a warm white) I know that with the layering of fabrics, this wall colours provides a nice backdrop to allow any fabric colours to be integrated. So the new wall colour is staying. :)

An update also on our painting of the floors.
To quickly recap....The wood floors in this room weren't worth saving. So the painting of the floors, should they not work out, wasn't going to be catostrophic. Our next option, (should the painting not work out) would be to carpet the room. So it was an easy choice, no stress, to try the painting of the floor.

What went wrong?
I used a latex floor paint that was at the recommendation of my Benjamin Moore people. The problem....? My painted floor chips very, very easily. In retrospect, oil should have been used - It would be a lot more durable. Deb Nelson, a Toronto designer, did a floor painting project and I should have listened to her advice from her blog, which was to use oil. Since I'm pregnant, we can't repaint in oil because of the fumes, so attempting oil at this point is out of the question.

Sooo......we're going to carpet this room. I'm not upset - as I think with a baby carpet will be nicer for he/she to crawl around on, and it will make the room warmer.


Above, Checking out carpet samples

We're searching for the right carpet, perhaps with a little waffle detail...We went to Home Depot but I know that independant carpet stores are usually less expensive, so we're going to go tackle finding a carpet soon. (Any recommendations from Toronto people on where to go?)

So that brings you up to date on my mistakes, and what we're doing/have done to fix it. :)