Growing Up Girly

JD and I were one of "those" couples, the ones who don't find out if it is a boy or a girl when they are pregnant. We picked out a neutral crib bedding and also two paint colors, one boy and one girl, to paint the room after the baby was born. LilE's room is purple.


For the past 9 months or so, she has been sleeping in her crib turned toddler bed waiting for us to paint furniture for her to have a "big girl room."

When designing your child's room, there are so many options. What size of bed? What type of storage? Toys? Reading corner? Dress up area? Desk? TV? The possibilities are endless. You have to pick what works best for your child (and you too, of course) and the living space you have to work with. For us, I found three things that our little girl needed to place in her 10x10 space.

1. Sleeping space.
We took down her crib and replaced it with a daybed that was in the office. I thought about taking the sides off her crib and using the full size headboard it was designed to become. But then she would have ZERO play space in her room. And I wanted to girl her room up a bit with the white furniture.


2. Storage space.
Closet space is less than desired at our house. All closets are bi-fold, her room included. We do have an extra chest of drawers that was moved into her closet to have more organization in there. We ended up painting the one in the closet and swapping it with the one in her room. A little paint, decorative trim, and hardware make a world of difference on a piece of furniture. The chest in the closet is for storage as well as games, toys, and dress up clothes. It is easily accessible for her, but not in baskets cluttering her room. She does have a book basket on the floor, but we plan to get this book shelf cubical (the 6 cube one) to better organize the books she has.


3. Decorations.
LilE's room has been neutral since day one. I wanted to make this big girl space a space that is unique to her. As stated before, we used the wall color as an inspiration. I love her new bedding. Matching the bedding were some great wall decals. JD, being the artistic one in the family, took the blank canvas and transformed it into a butterfly garden. Love it! Not sure if you can tell from the pictures, but he striped the wall behind her bed after she was born. Love that too! In the near future I plan to add more frames to show off family and friends.