Young House Love

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A Dark Gray Nursery With A Tree Mural & Striped Curtains

This nursery that Dave and Carrie created for their daughter had us smiling from the second we saw the first picture. Not only is it bold and playful, it also has some sweet personal touches and a lot of handmade/DIYed goodness going on. Here’s their letter:

Hey S & J, We recently welcomed our first child into the world, Everly Harper. Before we even knew Ever (that’s what we will lovingly call her), we knew we didn’t want a typical nursery for her – and we definitely didn’t want anything close to what the room looked like when we bought the place.

Dave Carrie Before

My wife was inspired by a woodland themed nursery that we found through your site years ago, and the following is what we came up with. We knew we wanted to save money where we could, and we both love a good project, so we tackled whatever we could on our own over the last few months. 

  Dave Carrie Nursery After

We started by painting the walls with Behr Ultra Premium Plus Flat Enamel (color-matched to the Sherwin-Williams color Grizzle Gray ) and then hand painted the birch trees in some leftover trim paint (Behr matched to Sherwin-Williams Extra White). We covered the old half hardwood / half painted subfloor with carpet tiles and then layered the white shag area rug from Target over that. The curtains and hardware are from Ikea, but we ended up hand painting those yellow stripes (Yellow Gold in Behr U.P.P.) because we couldn’t find reasonable yellow curtains that we loved.

Dave Carrie Nusery Crib

The changing table/long dresser is a vintage dresser (thanks Craigslist!) that we sanded, and then stained, painted and polyurethaned. We added the changing pad frame and insert (Pottery Barn kids) which can later be removed so she can grow up with the dresser. The crib is new from Walmart.com.

Dave Carrie Nursery After Alt

The canvas on the wall is actually vinyl that we had our birth announcement photo printed on. I built a frame out of leftover lumber and stretched the vinyl like I would stretch a canvas.  The local company that printed it for us is PrintLeader, based in Buffalo, NY. The photo itself was taken as part of a “Trash the Dress” shoot we did with our favorite photographer Erin Oveis Brant. We found out a few weeks before we had planned to shoot a five year wedding anniversary gift to ourselves that we were pregnant, so we asked Erin if she could incorporate some pregnancy announcement photos into our day. She was actually the first person we told, and those boots were our first purchase for the baby! 

Dave Carrie Nursery Canvas Print

The Hunter boots are now a part of the décor until she herself can kick up a little mud of her own! Most of the other accessories have been collected over the last 10 months – like a fox and mushrooms from Target, a fabric wrapped tree from Anthropologie, and a diaper pail from Ikea. 

Dave Carrie Nursery Details

So thanks for inspiring us on a daily basis, and thanks for letting us share our room with you! We hope Ever knows how much love we put into it! Best regards, Dave & Carrie

We love not only how this room looks, but all of the awesome thought that went into it. Everly is a lucky lady. And if you want to see more, Dave and Carrie have a photo album that shows off more corners of this colorful “woodland” room. Thanks for sharing guys!

Comments

  4. Jess @ Little House. Big Heart. says

    Wow. Honestly, this has to be one of my favorite Reader Redesigns ever! I’m in love with the unexpected pops of pink that make an otherwise gender neutral nursery just a little girly!

    Thanks for the great inspiration! I’m pinning this for the future! ;)

    Reply

  8. Katie Rose says

    This redesign makes me want a baby. Ooo, did I really just type that?

    And that name: Everly…so beautiful!

    Reply

    • Carrie K says

      Thanks Kelly! We picked up that dresser and Dave told me that it was all me. It’s amazing what a hand sander, stain, and paint can do. We have refinished a bunch of Craigslist finds. The refinished projects are better quality and original.

  11. Kayla says

    I LOVE this nursery! And the name! My daughter has the same name only it’s spelled Everlee, we lovingly call her Evie :)

    Reply

  12. jamie says

    Aah! This nursery is absolutely adorable!! I love how they took a masculine-ish theme and made it girly! Probably my favorite reader redesign Ever (pun intended.) She is quite a lucky gal

    Reply

  13. Ashley A. says

    This nursery is absolutely adorable!!! :) I have been contemplating for weeks whether to paint the closet another color and remove the doors. Dave & Carrie have definitely inspired us to do it! :) Congratulations to the two of them!!!

    Reply

  14. Erin says

    Beautiful nursery!
    I do have a quick question. I always hear about people using the brand of paint they want and then “color matching” to a different brands color. How do you go about this? Do you have to bring in a paint chip? Or is it in their computer? I can just picture the “friendly” sales associate face where I go to ask them this question. ;)

    Reply

    • Dave says

      Hey Erin,
      Sherry is right, HD has most of the other brand’s colors in their computers already. I love SW’s fandeck and spec them for work, but will only use Behr Ultra Premium PLus for my own home. Thanks!

  15. julie g. says

    My constant hitting of the refresh button really paid off today! Such an amazing room for a lucky little lady.

    Reply

  16. Mandi says

    Great job!
    Do you have any details on that mirror? Did they paint it or buy it like that? If painted, what’s the color?

    Reply

  19. Theresa Sea says

    That nursery is so darling! I love the pops of yellow, teal, and pink against the gray backdrop and wood tones. Nicely done!

    Reply

  20. Constance says

    Um, can they please come decorate my entire house? I greedily scanned for a, “and here is their blog (i.e., house tour gateway) link”. Very well done.

    Reply

  23. keisha says

    OHMYGOSHILOVEIT. The painted curtains, how they *click* with the wall color, the vinyl photo, the little green gnomes, the pops of pink… one of my favorite reader redesigns!

    Reply

  24. caroline nolazco [thediynurse] says

    I love everything about this room! The pail is so cute- and so are the wrapped trees. I love all the pops of color but i am SHOCKED that that crib is from walmart!! They’re stepping it up. And now I want to hoard one in my garage until I have bambinos!

    Reply

  25. MJR says

    I love every single thing! Absolute perfection. It’s refreshing to see something besides pink or blue for a baby room.

    Reply

  28. MichelleR says

    I’d like to know more about using wall paint on the fabric. Such a great idea, but does it crack? Did it dry all hard? Did they just roll it on and call it a day (i.e. no other steps involved)?
    Super cute nursery!!!

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      We have a tutorial about that in our book! If you use an additive from the craft store (called “conditioner”) it allows the paint to go on smoothly when you roll on thin and even coats – and you can use painter’s tape to make the stripes :)

      xo
      s

    • MichelleR says

      Thanks, Sherry! I guess I just inadvertently admitted that I don’t have your book…YET! haha. Sorry. :)

    • YoungHouseLove says

      Haha, no worries at all! It’s actually a really easy project! Takes some time to roll all the stripes, but it’s not mentally taxing so you can blast some tunes :)

      xo
      s

    • Dave says

      Hey Michelle, we didn’t even use the “conditioner” and they turned out great. They are a little stiff at first, but it makes them hang a little bit better to get that nice “wave” in them. All we did was measure, tape, paint, and peel. We were impressed at how the paint didn’t bleed. Thanks!

  33. Courtney Madden says

    I love this!! And I’m normally not a fan of the trees/etc painted on the walls, but I LOVE this! Bonus points that they’re hand-painted. I love everything about this nursery!

    Reply

  36. Ashley says

    The most adorable room ‘EVER’! I never would have thought of adding the pops of pink and mint here and there with a base of grey and yellow. It’s perfect! I’m so glad they shared this.

    Reply

  41. Katie says

    I Love the room! i just wanted to say we have the same crib, and LOVE it! I am not normally a Walmart shopper but after the crib we originally picked out was back ordered past my due date I was desperate to find something affordable that I liked the look of. It looks great in person, we’ve been using it for almost a year, and it has held up really well! Even with mommy climbing in sometimes to try to convince the baby it’s a cool place to be. I don’t know how many other cribs come with the toddler conversion at an under $200 price point but I feel like we got a steal.

    Reply

    • Dave says

      Katie, totally agree with you. We couldn’t believe what a great find this was! Walmart normally isn’t our go to place for furniture, but we found this crib through another design site and it got great reviews! Thanks!

  43. Gwen says

    I admit that when I first started reading this I was thinking, “geesh, yet another woodland-themed nursery…”
    But this is so awesome! Not at all what I was expecting. Love the color scheme! And those handpainted curtains!

    Nice job!

    Reply

  47. Mallory says

    I LOVE the yellow and pink together. I would have never done that myself, but it looks great. Our daughter’s room has a lot of yellow and greys like this – maybe I’ll need to start adding some splashes of pink!

    Reply

  48. esther says

    Wheres the S & J’s favorite parts of the redesign?? I always love that bit :) I think this nursery is so awesome, it has all these soft magical elements perfect for a growing baby, but also cool and elegant ones for an older child. I like how they are already exposing her to more mature taste!
    beeeeaaaauuutiful!

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      We love it allll! Hahah! I think the meaningful birth announcement photo and those awesome striped curtains are mine. John has two words: giant bear. Also he’s in love with that dresser! As am I! I can’t pick. Haha!

      xo
      s

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