Big Boy Room Mood Board

I'm still hesitant to call Avery's new room a big boy room, since my baby is well a baby. But we figure when we move back in our home, the timeline still undecided (maybe December?) Avery will be a year and a half. So Hasani and I had to have the crib vs. the toddler bed vs. a twin bed discussion and what made most sense. In the end it really doesn't make sense to buy another crib or toddler bed, that he would soon out grow. Tabari was in a twin bed before the age of 3. 
So we have decided we'll buy a twin bed frame and use side rails on one side of the bed. The other side of the bed will be up against the wall. 

Even though we have no move back home timeline, I still thought it would be a good idea to put together some ideas for his new room. I'm really drawn to the colors of avacado pear, orange, pale blue and grey. I just love how those colors look in his room which gets lots of natural sunlight. I've also used the same colors for my baby shower invites & party (here), his first birthday invites & party (here) and his nursery (here) Yup those colors gets lots of love in our home when it comes to Avery. So it makes perfect sense to use them again, I'm already loving that the colors have grown with him thus far. For Avery's new room design, my goal is to add a play spot in his room, reading / coloring area and above all create a well organized happy room that he'll love & want to play in. I fully anticipate him playing all over the house, but creating his own spherical spot in his room makes me happy. Here's the mood board I put together for his room. 

1. A few days ago, I mentioned I was working on a gallery wall above his crib before the fire. I plan to create a new gallery wall is his room. So far I have the cute Alphabet print, which was a gift from Etsy seller Yulia of Giraffes and Stuff. She was sweet enough to send a print our way for Avery's nursery after she heard what happened, thank you again! I'm also digging this cute print from the Land of Nod. I think his gallery wall will be a mixture of artwork and my own little creations for him (framed gift wrap etc) I'm also loving this print, via Etsy sell Handz. I used to love my viewfinder when I was little, I'm sure my mom still has mine somewhere.

2. I want to add some bookcases to his room, for books, toys and baskets. Just the thought of making arranging a cute kids bookcases makes me smile. I'm on the fence, not sure if we'll get a pair of short bookcases of a pair of tall ones. Ideally I'd find a pair of bookcases with bottom cabinets on Craigslist that just need a little love. Cute bookends that can be played with will be a must for his bookcase, I anticipate lots of books and toys all over his floor. The Skip Hop Zoo Bookends, had me at hello and the colors are perfect for his room! I plan on using a few baskets for his stuffed animals and misc toys, I like these colorful ones from the Land of Nod. For his twin bed, I really like the modern clean lines of West Elm's bed frames, this one is my favorite. 

3. I love all things Melissa & Doug they have the cutest retro wood toys and huge plush animals, I'm leaning towards getting the Dalmatian or Giraffe for his room, big soft animals are must in his room (Don't be fooled by my picture, in real life the Dalmatian is huge) I love kids tables and chairs in bedrooms, they perfect spot to draw, play and 'read' books at. My mom has this little yellow pre-school chair and Avery loves to sit at when he's at her house. Adding chairs and a table will be perfect addition to his room. I really like these modern feeling dark walnut kids chairs I found on Target.com (they are almost twins of the pricey Land of Nod version) I loved the price $29.99 on clearance for two, so I bought them. I can't wait until they arrive!! I adore this Land of Nod table it fits so well in small spaces, and I love how the legs are off-set :)

4. Lastly one my favorites things to shop for fabric! I had Annia drapes in Avery's nursery from Ikea, but I they no longer sell that color Avocado Pear, boo! I'm considering sewing new drapes in the same color I used in his nursery or mixing it up sewing patterned drapes. I love both of the fabrics found on Tonic Living, just need to order swatches and see if they'll work. His bedding is still up in the air, but i'm in love with these sheets from the Land of Nod, love'em! Here's a closer look at the patterned fabric I'm considering for his drapes. If I don't use it as drapes, maybe I'll sew a throw out of it? Or sew a duvet? The possibilities are endless! This time around I plan on lining his drapes with blackout liner, this mom wants to sleep in just a little on weekends :)

It feels so good it get my ideas on paper, yeah know what I mean, lol. Nothing is set in stone except his chairs and the artwork we already have. I'm really looking forward to working on his room and my tweens room. What do you think of my ideas so far?

Are you working on any room update around your house? What's your favorite part bringing in cute accessories or fabric shopping? 

PS: Don't forget to enter the Home Depot Gift Card Giveaway!! 

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A huge Thank you to everyone who entered! 

I Didn't Get to Blog About (Nursery)

Before the whole stupid fire at our home and we moved out temporary while our home gets re-built (read more about it here) I was working on several projects around our house, the kitchen and and making tweaks in the Nursery. 

Now that our Avery is a year old, well 14months to be exact { where the heck did the past year go! } I planned on making a few simple updates in his nursery. The first update I wanted to make was to add a more art prints in his room. I was growing tired of the three prints in a row above his crib, and thought creating a small gallery wall above his crib would be cute and add extra personalty to his nursery. I only snapped one picture of the gallery wall, that I working on with my phone. It was looking so sweet, here's a reminder of how this wall in his nursery once looked, thank goodness for my blog! I'm grateful I have lots of pictures I can reference of our home before the fire. 

I was loving how the gallery wall was coming together!! I really wanted all the prints to be colorful and tell a story of whimsy and love. I used a mixture of small and large frames, I love how well the various sizes worked together. I also hung a couple of shelves my girlfriend gave me, yep one was crooked, I was playing around with where to place them. 

I kept the two large frames that were already on the wall and replaced the giraffe and baby cut out, with a sweet wrapping paper sheet I saw at Cost Plus. I also used wrapping paper on the top right hand square frame. It's such cute paper!! Below is a better picture of the paper, I got this paper on a trip to Paper Source a few months back. I love how pretty wrapping paper can be transformed into art once its framed!! Its also a non-budget breaker :) On Avery's Gallery wall I was working on, I also added metal Letter 'A' I bought from the Anthro, I like how it added another layer of texture on the wall. I also included a print, I just bought from an Etsy seller Mira Donson, the print says 'You Are My Sunshine' I love the the whimsical wording and the color of the print. 

When we move back in our home, I plan on creating a new gallery wall for his nursery. I've been doing a crazy amount of thinking on Avery's nursery, and as of right now I think his nursery will be a nursery - toddler room. Not quite a big boy toddler room, but not a nursery with a crib, but it will still feel like a nursery geared toward our growing baby pre-toddler, lol. 

I'll share more of the details on the plan for his nursery - toddler room once I know the direction its going in! 

What do you think of the gallery wall, was I heading the right direction with the placement of the art prints?? 

Our New Normal

A HUGE thank you and HUGE hug to each and every person that left a comment on my blog, I've read every comment, emailed me and just sent good vibes to my family. Your words of kindness and love really helped and is helping me get though rough days. Another big hug to Summer & Brandi, who wrote the sweetest blog posts about my family, just because they cares about us. Thank you Summer & Brandi love you!! In the end, I feel blessed that my family is all good! That is the hugest blessing of all, that we are all a family together still. We are hanging in there and adjusting to our new normal, and I think once we progress begins on re-building our house I'll feel good and once we get though all the insurance mumbo jumbo I'll feel calm again. 

I wanted to say my many thank yous much earlier, but I just haven't had the words, which is odd for me, because if you've been reading my blog for a while you know I'm a wordy girl, lol. It feels good to type and write this post. Finally writing it all down is helping me, I've said before I love blogging and sharing and getting my thoughts & ideas out there. I guess I've needed time to compose my thoughts and it helped that we've settled into a temporary home, instead of bouncing around from hotel to hotel.

That day I was having lunch with one of my good girlfriends when I received a phone call from an unknown number, I normally never answer those. On the other end of the line was Hasani calling me out of breathe with panic in his voice, saying our fence was on fire. I wasn't freaked, I figured everything would be fine and it must be a little fire. Seconds later he called again, saying our garage was on fire, then the phone went dead. By this time I was almost to my car, when he called again saying the fire truck was there and it doesn't look to good. My body almost melted into the asphalt near my car, but I knew I couldn't have a breakdown in the parking lot, after-all Avery was with me and I needed to drive 30 mins back to our house, I knew our older son and my nephew who was over where fine, thank god, but I didn't know about Mojo. As I was driving I all I could think about were the words our house is on fire, and then I would think of Mojo and wonder if he was ok? What if he was in his crate and they forgot him inside our dining room, or what if he was in our backyard and couldn't escape the fire? Too many thoughts going on in my head. 

It was one of the longest drives of my life and I felt sick to my stomach, and dizzy. As I neared our street, I saw a massive fire hose in the middle of the street a street up from our home. I wasn't able to pull down our street, there were four of five fire trucks blocking our street. I went around the corner and parked at the very end of our street, I looked back and saw that Avery was asleep. I called Hasani and it went straight to voice mail. I got out of my car to see our neighbors staring at our house and the fire trucks. By the time I got their the fire was already out, and our home was still standing. But the whole thing was surreal, seeing the Fire Fighters hose down our home, it was crazy. I'm so thankful for the Fire Fighters for saving our home, as they told me it couldn't have been much worse, thinking of the much worse brings me to tears. I thank God every day for the blessings I have in my life. Though all of this, Hasani has been my Rock, the shoulder I've been able to cry on, lean on, complain to he's just an amazing person and father and I'm so luck to have (still) him in my life. 

As for what caused the fire, we have no clue, just that it started outside. They are investigating the origin of cause. Our Neighbors actually saw the fire and called 911 and Hasani heard the fire. I know that sounds strange, but he heard the crackling noise, which sounded like running water. When he realized it was a fire, he screamed for Tabari and my nephew to run out of the house. The fire quickly speared from our fence, to our garage then into our kitchen / dining room and into the living room. The whole house has smoke, and water damage. It spread super fast inside house because our AC Unit was running while the house was on fire. Fire smoke it the worst smell, it gets into every fiber and I do mean every fiber. 

A few days after our fire, our insurance company  had our home was tested for Lead and Asbestos { due to its age } Our home was positive for Asbestos in the linoleum which our faux wood floors were floating on and in the drywall (mud and tape). The Abatement company will be at our home this week, to remove the Asbestos. We are still in the early stages of putting our home back together, we've heard it may take three months which would be wonderful. Last week was a rough week for me, 97% of our personal belongings are gone either damaged by the fire or smoke and asbestos damaged. I know its just 'stuff.' but I love my stuff, I was telling my girlfriend its likes like 80% of our houses 'stuff' tells a story, our story. Then there's stuff we can never get back like pictures and my husbands wedding ring. He was doing dishes and took it off in the kitchen that morning, we still have found it. Plain and simple it just sucks. 

So I look into the future, that makes me smile. I look forward to filling our small home with lots of love again, and can't wait to hear the sound of laughter in our house. My family loves to laugh! I know it sounds strange, but I love my home even more now. Its filled with so many happy memories in the 3.5 years we've lived here. We had our Wedding Reception in the backyard, celebrated the Holidays here, and just last June brought home Avery and just recently celebrated his birthday in the backyard. Not to mention all the DIY Projects we've done, makes me love our little house even more. 

I hope to be back blogging 2-3 days a week, maybe starting this week? :) We have no Internet access at our home right now, boo! Hopefully we will find a new provider, its been tricky in our temporary apartment  they use fiber optics at home its DSL! So its hard to find one that can just move with us, back home :) Anyways, I'll get all that sorted it out soon. I'm able to use the Internet at the apartment office :)  Pretty soon, I hope to be blogging about the construction, picking out paint colors, fabric, looking at furniture and playing around with a few ideas and finally getting a pretty kitchen. We were so close, sigh.

Don't forget to follow me on Pinterest (thank goodness for smart phones, lol I can pin on mine!) I'm also on Instagram @mrsclh 

Here are a few of my recent Instagram pictures. Avery playing with his mail box! I found this little wood mail box on Amazon. He loves it :) It even came with wood mail: post cards, and stamps. 

Avery inspecting his homemade yogurt Popsicle. I'll share my little recipe I used soon. He loved his Popsicle, perfect healthy treat for summertime, heck anytime. In the background Hasani and Tabari are playing Nintendo. Notice the cords? They are playing old school Nintendo, for my childhood. My mom let us borrow it. I've had so much fun playing games I loved as a child with Tabari. Him and I love playing Mario Brothers 2 - I'm loving the retro graphics.

Thank you all again!! Your support really means the so much to me. Everything I hold dear to my heart it in the picture above, my boys, LOVE THEM

Update: I forgot to mention our little dog, is safe and sound! Tabari grabbed him when he ran out the door. Quick thinking on Tabari's part saved our beloved family member. He's adjusting really well to our new temporary spot!