Im not sure if I've ever mentioned it here, but last October I got a random email from a publisher from about.com in the nursery/kid portion of the site. I thought it was some kind of mistake when I first saw it on my inbox. Kathryn said she saw our blog on the sneak peek of our nursery and was drawn to it. So she emailed our business email, luckily we had a link to our business website on the blog. She said she couldnt find an email address to contact me so she searched around the links and was happy to have found our website. At first we were apprehensive about sharing our story with her because we werent sure if she was real or not. So, after mentioning it to John that day, we did a little research on her. She's a nice lady and patient at that. We were suppose to get the full interview and pictures done and sent to her after Thanksgiving. Well, life happens and we didnt get a chance to completely finish it by the first deadline. Before we knew it, Tristan was born and life after that was just too chaotic, especially with family flying in and out for a good 6 weeks. We took the nursery pictures back in December, but we never got a chance to sit and edit them til the end of January. We finally sent her the finished interview along with the photos just 2 weeks ago. Yikes! A whole 5 months later! She was very nice about it and understood because she had kids of her own.

We have been wanting to blog the full nursery reveal for a while but wanted to wait 'til Kathryn got the article out 'cuz we promised we'd let her feature it first! So, here it is! We certainly put a lot of thought and creativity into his nursery and we are more than happy with the turn out. A lot of it didn't go according to plan, but we love how everything fell into place at the end.

The theme was a given already. Before we even found out we were pregnant, we already knew we were gonna center it around adventure and travel. I even incorporated some things from one of our favorite animated movies: UP! My birth announcement to John was even adventure related (watch the reveal here!) The day I told John we were expecting, one of the firs things he did after the news sunk in was go on Pinterest to pull up inspirations. I already had a hidden board full of ideas. Well, the bad thing about that is we didnt know where to start. We still ended up with a blank drawing board. We threw ideas at each other and agreed on a lot of things, but we also disagreed on some. It was to the point where we no longer looked at our Pinterest boards and just let it flow as the months went by.

Why did we choose neutral instead of gender color specific? Well, we wanted to keep it clean and simple. We didnt want his entire room to be painted blue just because he's a boy! With this, we figured it'd be a nice space he can grow in to. Its also easy to change out accent colors. We wanted to keep his furnitures white with a mix of rustic and wood to stick to the outdoorsy/woodland part of the theme. 

John got the mural inspiration after our trip to Sutro Baths/Lands End and he noticed the mountain silhouettes in the background on one of the images he took from the trip. That is his favorite thing in the nursery. A lot of things are DIY-ed, thrifted then repurposed, or something we already had. Other things were bought from Homegoods, Ikea, or Amazon. We set a budget for this nursery and waned to make sure we stuck to it. We were fortunate enough to have had my parents offer to buy the crib and mattress! You can find some of the diy stuff we did under the Projects/DIY tab on top of the page! 

My graphic designer sister, Jane (find her shop here), did most of the framed wall art, so we saved a ton of money from that alone, and then John did the wooden and flag signs. This side of his nursery is definitely the woodlands and outdoorsy part. I love the little details here; from that vintage lantern to the woodland stuffed animals. The dresser/changing station was thrifted and repurposed! I totally scored on that because I was starting to fall in-love with the mid-century type. At first I wasn't sure what I was looking for, but when it popped up on Offer Up! I knew I had to have it! I think it blended perfectly, especially how it matches the crib!

That stump table was the last piece we needed to do to complete the nursery. I was so adamant about having one that I searched high and low to find a place that was giving away or selling stumps. I remember seeing a couple houses with stumps and firewood for sale whenever I drove towards the freeway. Lo and behold, there it was. For 5 days we stopped by this house that had a bunch of them on their yard, no one answered. I was almost going to give up until we finally got a hold of them! I was so excited. It was only $5! John got to sanding it, cleaning and then stained it and tada! The perfect side table! This kind of piece would have cost us $180-$300 everywhere else I looked! The vintage luggages was one of the first things I bought for his nursery. This was a part of the original idea we had, so we stuck with it. Which works out because its his little 'travel' area which holds the vintage plane, pilots hat and goggles and the globe! Told ya everything fell into place at the end! :)

Our main purpose for choosing the theme was to hopefully ignite some interest for travel and adventure within him. That no matter where he ends up in life, he should never stop exploring, in any aspect of his life. We want to teach him that experience is just as important as being well-educated. The world is his playground, and he should play in it. The possibilities are endless, as long as he seeks it and goes after it!

It was definitely a work in progress. I spent a lot of time, late nights even, getting things done for the nursery. Overall, we love how it turned out and is proud of the amazing collaboration we had, cuz despite some of the disagreements, we found ways to compromise and make it work where both of us were happy. Alright, lets be real, Im sure he just let me win most of the time! Haha! I remember sitting there after he put the stump side table and just admired the room. It still felt surreal. Its definitely not as clean now as it is in those pictures, but its still my favorite room in the entire house. 

Xx,

Jenn