Cowboy Nursery

We never decorated our nursery with the first two kids.  With my oldest, we didn't find out his sex before he was born and to be honest, 'gender neutral' decor usually makes me cringe a little bit (though I've since been introduced to the world of grey & stripes & zigzags). So we just painted the walls beige & the ceiling robin's egg blue & called it good.

With our daughter, we knew she was a she but I don't know why I didn't go all out with the nursery. Truth be told, I was completely overwhelmed with the thought of 2 kids a year & a half a part & I just didn't really see "the point".  I had just started planning on doing a girly big girl room when we found out baby #3 was on his way...which meant the nursery would remain a nursery and our daughter would bunk up with our son for the time being.

So the nursery remained the same. I never even considered decorating it.  We never had & that was fine & dandy. Well. Then baby 3 arrived and I started itching to make his room "his". I think it has something to do with the fact that as our 2nd son (and the 4th boy cousin) he has a lot of hand me downs. 

So I did some thinking. And some shopping.  I've never been real big on "western" or "cowboy" (though we do live in a rural area & my family does raise beef...I started driving tractor when I was 11) but my oldest son, S, had gotten his first pair of cowboy boots last year (and our daughter, L, got her's soon after) and my sister in law had given us a quilt that she had made years ago...that was western themed.  Also, my DH's aunt had given us THE. CUTEST. little cow beanie hat. So I decided to build on that.

I scoured Pinterest for nursery tutorials and inspiration. I used this tutorial for the crib sheet. For fabric I used flannel; I love that it isn't 'cool' when I put the baby down on it.

The crib skirt is just 2 rectangles (since 2 of the crib sides are against the walls) that I hemmed & sewed some ribbon ties to the top. Easy peasy. They'll also adjust as we move the mattress down as baby grows. :)

 I really loved some of the striped curtains that I saw. I figured it'd be a good way to save on fabric. I took a flat white twin sheet from Target, cut it in half & sewed the strips on. It was actually a lot fussier than I had anticipated, since I needed the strips to be exactly even. I left the top strip of fabric free-hanging & that kind of gives it a "faux valance" look (if there is such a thing). The top strip & the crib sheet fabric are the same; but the curtain fabric is plain cotton. 

Since this room will someday be a "big girl" room, I wanted to keep everything temporary. No new paint.  I'd still like to get some more wall art, but I'm very pleased with how everything turned out. Actually, DH has since hung a big giant pair of horns above the window. I'm just thankful they aren't in my living room. 

I also decoupaged the light switch plate because the little purple butterfly one just clashed too much.

Now that I'm looking at the pictures, it seems that I ended up with a gender neutral nursery after all! Haha!