A Sweet, Modern, Owl Themed Nursery with Handcrafted Touches in Shades of Lavender and Sage

Before I start this post, I need to say that this room wouldn't be as special as it is to K. and me without Sunshine and all her crafting skillz and the always astounding generosity of my dear family and friends who gave many of the items in the room, from video monitors to toys to books to gear to clothes. I am eternally humbled and grateful for the support of all our family and friends: thank you all so much.

I'm really happy with how the nursery turned out; it's always been my favorite room in the house with the high ceilings, balcony and view of the pine trees, and now it's really the one room that I feel is complete, down to every last detail. As babies are expensive, I tried to work with what I already had in terms of furniture and color scheme. The bed and nightstand are from my parent's place (we swapped our spare queen size bed for their full size bed), we've had the ABC Home purple geometric deco area rug for several years now; it was previously in the master bedroom, and the West Elm curtains were already in the room. We've had the white organic West Elm pintuck duvet cover and shams for awhile now, as they were previously used in the guest room. We actually aren't using the duvet cover right now because the pintucks are really delicate and rip easily. Because we already had the sage curtains and purple area rug, I decided to go with a lavender and sage color theme for the room. I didn't want the room to be overly saccharine so I thought the sage was a nice contrast. Plus lavender / purple was one of my wedding colors and I had plenty of leftover lavender ribbon from the wedding almost four years ago. We were going to leave the room white, which was the original color, but we noticed small scuffs everywhere, so we painted it using Benjamin Moore's Natura non-VOC paint line in Violet Pearl. It's a nice gray / purple contrast to the mostly white furniture. Not cheap at over $54 a gallon, but worth it for the lack of fumes, especially for a little one.

I made fabric covered letters spelling out her name using mod podge and cheap wooden letters from Joann's (~$1 each), but I've blurred them out in the photos as small fry told me she wants to remain anonymous

Munire Urban Crib from USA Baby San Dimas, handmade giraffe and elephant mobile and bunting flags, sleepytime giraffe, pottery barn kids' Hayley organic cotton owl sheets, Dwellstudio for Target Menagerie crib skirt, old ABC Home area rug, owl blanket from JK

Ikea Expedit bookcase, lavender bins from amazon.com, lots of book and toys. Never too early for storytime!

Room & Board Carter swivel chair (the Carter chair currently online also rocks back and forth in addition to swiveling side to side, but this one was a custom order that was returned, hence the 50% off back in December). Ikea lamp and shade, Etsy "What a Wonderful World" print from rawartletterpress, and lavender, gray and sage paper lanterns from Paper Lantern Store.

West Elm white organic pin tuck bedding (shams here, duvet cover not used because too delicate for a high traffic area), pottery barn kids harper personalized sham, colorful stuffed cat from Main Street (formerly known as "A.") and stuffed bunny blanket from Ah ma (grandma). Ikea white ceramic table lamp in corner

To save money and just because it's fun, Sunshine and I crafted pretty much all the little finishing touches, including the two animal mobiles, various owl pillows, the bunting, modge podge letters for small fry's name, and the arm sleeves for the Room & Board swivel chair. We probably spent about $50 or so (using lots of coupons) at Joann's on all the crafting supplies and were able to use all the materials and scraps for all our little projects. It's nice, because we were able to customize the exact color scheme we wanted, and everything matches! I'll be updating the blog with instructions for some of these projects, although at least for the ones that I was involved with, they were quite simple, which is good, because I have no crafting skills. Sunshine actually taught me how to sew a button, that's how elementary my skills were / are. The owl inspiration came from this Jonathan Adler-esque Owl Lamp from Target, that A., Sunshine and I all bought on sale a few months ago. The only purchased decorations was the "Wonderful World" print from etsy (one of my all-time fave songs, plus I like the lyrics re: babies crying) and the paper lanterns which are a super cheap way to add a little color and hanging interest in the room at ~ $1 a piece.

Target Owl Lamp. Cheap sage basket for diapering from clearance section of Bed Bath& Beyond

Bonavita Peyton Dresser from USA Baby, Naturepedic organic changing pad and changing pad cover from Amazon.com. Handmade fabric bunting, owl mobile and mod podge fabric covered wooden letters.

Our first craft project, the owl mobile. Tutorials for all the craft projects to come on the blog.

Handmade Giraffe and Elephant felt mobile. I made this one all by myself! I'm proud because I literally did not know how to sew a button before making the owl mobile, which was our first project.

Sunshine's sleepy owl pillow (matching pair with the awake owl pillow on the Room & Board chair)

As for the other pieces, the only major purchases were the Munire Urban Crib and the Bonavita Peyton dresser. I did a lot of research to triangulate on the pieces with the most real hardwood (Munire is solid wood), best value for the money, while remaining aesthetically pleasing. I like clean modern lines for the larger pieces of furniture, using accessories and toys for a pop of color and excitement. The white Ikea bookcase is also new (we bought it after a lot of hesitation since it wasn't real wood obviously, but it was hard to find a similar alternative for so cheap. We tried to mitigate the fumes by airing it out in another room for several months), and the Room & Board Carter Swivel Chair was a gift from my parents from the annual Room & Board clearance sale; a great deal at almost 50% off especially since it's a style and fabric that is currently still full price in the stores (staying up past midnight on Christmas Eve always pays off!). All the lighting, closet storage units, hangars, even wall bracket for the giraffe and elephant mobile are from Target / Ikea. We tried to go with organic materials when possible; in addition to the organic West Elm bedding, we have a Naturepedic organic changing pad and changing pad cover, a natural nook pebble mattress from Gilt, pottery barn kids organic crib sheets (only $19 each in cute patterns, a bargain compared with most the other often overpriced pottery barn kids items) and personalized white and lavender embroidered sham. I'm definitely an over-researcher and bargain hunter and spent a ton of time researching, deciding on an item and searching around for the best price. Getting the best deal is pretty much the most satisfying part of the whole process  In the case of the crib and dresser, the big ticket items, I played several retailers off of each other, going back and forth on haggling for the best price (I did this with car shopping as well). USA Baby San Dimas was able to price match my best offer and also throw in a free toddler bed conversion rail, so they won. We ordered the crib and dresser in January, which is a popular month for twice yearly furniture sales (other being ~ June / July).

Sunshine's handmade owl pillow, 1 week stuffed balloon and armchair covers, West Elm purple pillow and organic white throw, Pump Station lavender back support feeding pillow, Luna Lullaby Bosom Buddy sage nursing pillow. I spent A LOT of time in this chair so comfort and support is paramount

Pretty much everything else was shower gifts from friends and family. At least so far, the room and configuration has been perfect for a newborn. Everything is functional and well-organized, I find the room calm and relaxing and small fry seems quite happy! I'll be updating this post with more specific links and descriptions of the various items, but just wanted to get some pics and background up.

So fashionable! Little Marc Jacobs mouse shoes from Claire in Seattle (see here for more pics) and lavender rhinestone sunglasses from Ryan of Malibu.

All the classic books.

Carter elephant hamper from Amazon.com (thanks to my shopping buddy N!) and Ikea antonius wire basket storage system. We have at least half dozen of these storage systems in closets around the house. We are too cheap for a custom solution or even containerstore.com solution, this works great.

She is definitely her mother's daughter although in terms of fashion / clothes, although even I don't have as many leggings as her. Love the DVF for babygap ones as well as the ruffly butt Carter ones (thanks Main Street!)