Ideas for Mom's Room

My mom agreed to let me re-design her room this summer, but on her last visit to Salt Lake, she expressed some concerns.  My mom and I have very different styles, and she needs her spaces to feel personalized, unlike me. I like very geometric patterns and modern designs.  She told me she doesn't want any art work that isn't meaningful.  She used to have a whole wall of her room dedicated to our school art work!  My dad hated it, but I think if I could format it right, I could create something along those lines that both my parents would love.  Gallery wall, anyone?  So here are some ideas to sell my parents on the idea:

I love the pops of yellow in this design.  My mom's room is going to be light blue and white, so I wonder what color I could pop in there that she wouldn't object to!

Source: girlintheredshoes.com via Amy on Pinterest

I love the stripes behind this collection.  I would really love to do some light blue and white stripes behind the gallery collection in my mom's room.

Source: google.com via Allison on Pinterest

Of all the gallery walls I'm posting, this one feels the most personal to me.  Do you think its the variety of styles being shown?  It feels like its taken years to collect these pieces.

Source: nattybydesign.blogspot.com via Alana on Pinterest

And then if I have time, I want to do something like this down my mom's stair case.  Seriously, the woman cannot get enough picture frames in her life, so I'm thinking gallery walls are the way to go for her!

Source: iammommahearmeroar.blogspot.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

Another one of my mom's loves is thrift store shopping, so I'm going to start collecting frames that I find there and probably spray paint them all to match the room and let her fill them with whatever she wants!  That will keep her busy while I'm painting her head board hot pink!  (Totally kidding, mom, totally kidding.)

Source: alittlesassybutohsoclassy.tumblr.com via Linsey on Pinterest

Its like everything I've ever wanted to be all rolled into one. . .

Yesterday at the end of my interior design class, two of my students presented me with a special portfolio page.  I have been teaching my students how to make professional portfolio pages for five years and so its a huge representation of who I am.  To have them make me my own portfolio page to keep was so awesome!  No one has ever done that for me before!

And it was a picture of Architect Barbie!  I didn't even know they made one of those.  To say this is really special feels like a big understatement!!

And on the back of every portfolio page is a description, so here is what they wrote for this one:

 There are no words.

Nursery Changing Table

Have you ever noticed how ugly things tend to collect junk?  Its true.  I submit the following for evidence:

It not that this changing table was ugly, but it didn't match the rest of Olivia's room and I knew I was going to paint it so. . .  we just sort of threw everything on it.  The only solution was to make it pretty so that the temptation for junk collection would be gone.

I started by sanding it just a little to rough it up.  In the past, I've been way too uptight about this step.  I wouldn't prime it until it was really really sanded and it took forever.  Not this time.  I spent maybe ten minutes scuffing it up and then wiped all the dust off.  Oh, I also removed the drawer and the hardware.  I decided to keep the drawer off, I liked the look better without it and it wasn't the smoothest gliding drawer.

 I used painters tape to cover the hardware.  I used a little exacto knife to cut the extra tape off.  Here's a tip: Make sure your blade is sharp of this will be the most frustrating step of the project.

And I also covered the wheel.  Next time I would wrap them in plastic bags and tape them down.  The wheels got some paint on them.  No biggie, really.

Primed, painted and drying:

 

And then it sat in Olivia's room (after sitting in the hallway for a week.  Spray paint fumes don't go down without a fight!!) and started collecting junk again!  Oh no!  So I knew I had to get some storage and soon.  My mom and I searched a few places and then we went to IKEA to get some simple brown baskets.  I was going to get four of them.  I liked them, but they just seemed too boring.  And then, wah lah!  IKEA also had these blue pails that matched Olivia's bedding almost exactly!  So I got two of each. 

I'm still trying how to arrange them.  I did one on each shelf, kitty corner.

Or both baskets on top, and the blue pails on bottom.  I'm kind of leaning towards this. . .                        

Now, we don't actually change Olivia on this changing table.  Someday I'll get the changing pad I want from Oilo, but lets be honest, it will probably for another baby by the time I get around to it!  So in the mean time, I set it up with one of my Oilo pillows and a duck Olivia got from her great-grandpa in the hospital.

So the room obviously needs some art work now. . . but what do you think?