Kids’ rooms makeover…by Mommy!
If you have three children under the age of five…you’d know it’s very expensive to clothe and raise them. So any way I can save a buck…you can count me in!
So when the time comes to decorate their rooms, I went searching for bargains and ideas. I get my “inspiration” from Pottery Barn Kids’ catalogs and HGTV (love this channel!!). I love everything they have in the catalogs but everything is WAAAAY too expensive.
If you’ve read my other entry, (Bargain shopping is an art form), you’d know that we don’t pay full price for almost anything, especially when it comes to kids. And why should anyone (unless you have the disposable income to do so) when kids grow out of things very fast, AND they get bored with things very easily!!
And if you have some decorating tips and ideas of your own…we would love to hear from you.
Here are some tips and ideas from MOI, the bargain decorator wannabe:
- Paint, paint, paint…this is an inexpensive way to dress up any room. Keep in mind that the paint will dry darker than the color samples. If you’re not sure you really want red for Johny’s room…Sherwin Williams sells little paint sample jars that’s around $3.50 each. I’ve bought some to use for Trent’s (our three years old son) room, specifically to do stenciling (not a really good choice…I’ll go into more details later, read on). But these sample jars are good for repainting frames. See the picture below for Tyler’s (our five years old son) room, I bought these inexpensive unpainted wood frames and the pictures separately at AC Moore and the final cost for the completed framed picture is about $10.00 each.
- There are many different types of paint finishes, and it’s really a matter of personal taste. For our kids’ rooms, we used Semi-gloss paints. They are recommended if you have young children because they offer good stain resistance and are easier to clean than the Flat paint, or Eggshell, or even Satin finishes.
- Do-It-Yourself stenciling…here’s another way to dress up the room. Find out what your child likes, be it butterflies, planets, stars…AC Moore is a good place to shop for anything that has to do with arts & crafts. They have a huge selection of stencils (I can spend days in there, I’m like a kid in a candy store!). They also have weekly coupon to use. Next you will need Stencil paints. AC Moore has a huge collection of paint colors. It can be as low as $.25 per small bottle when it’s on sale. Stock them up when it’s on sale because you can go through one bottle pretty quickly. And if you don’t see one particular color you like, you can always mix the stencil paints yourself. Do not use the regular wall paints for stenciling. The pictures won’t stand out.
- Use your imagination…a room is like a blank canvas and you are the artist. Get your child to help you do the stenciling (depending on the age of course). You can either do one straight line across or randomly throughout the room. Doing it in a straight line requires more work. You have to use one of those leveling tools to make sure the line is straight. But as for random design, you can let your or your child’s imagination goes wild. The final result will look like wallpapers (without the hassel). Make sure you don’t overdo it by putting too much stenciling in any one spot. If you make a mistake, you can wipe it off while it’s still wet only if you used semi-gloss paint finishes on the wall.
- Artworks…I will discuss this in another entry (Do-it-yourself artworks!).
- Curtains/Shades…I love the Pottery Barn Kids’ curtains but again they can be very pricey and sometimes they might not have the color you want. For Trent’s room, I found the perfect color scheme curtains at Pottery Barn Kids. It was on sale but it was a shower curtain (that’s only 70 inches long). I wanted to have the curtains drag on the floor so I added 20 inches to the bottom. So I bought a few yards of the same weight fabric, as the Pottery Barn shower curtain, at The Fabric Place but in a solid color and sew it onto the bottom (the picture might make the curtain looked crooked, the photographer didn’t tuck in the other bottom to straighten it out). You can see the result in the picture below. If you don’t know how to sew, there are products available at The Fabric Place just for ironing on, no sewing required.
- Kids’ furnitures and knick knacks…I found alot of these things at Homegoods, TJ Maxx, Marshall’s and IKEA to fill the rooms. Again, the idea is that kids will grow out of it sooner than we want, so you don’t want to spend too much on a chair, the cute little rug or the little knick knacks (they will be part of your yard sale soon enough).
I bought this bench at Homegoods for $25, it breaks up the pink in Sophia’s room and I have somewhere to sit when I feed her milk. And when she “outgrows” it or should I say, Mommy’s “decorating taste madness” has changed…then it will serve as a bench for the family room or for that “hopefully finished toy landfill” a.k.a. basement one day.
Have fun decorating, and let your imagination goes wild…but with style!
If you have three children under the age of five…you’d know it’s very expensive to clothe and raise them. So any way I can save a buck…you can count me in!
So when the time comes to decorate their rooms, I went searching for bargains and ideas. I get my “inspiration” from Pottery Barn Kids’ catalogs and HGTV (love this channel!!). I love everything they have in the catalogs but everything is WAAAAY too expensive.
If you’ve read my other entry, (Bargain shopping is an art form), you’d know that we don’t pay full price for almost anything, especially when it comes to kids. And why should anyone (unless you have the disposable income to do so) when kids grow out of things very fast, AND they get bored with things very easily!!
And if you have some decorating tips and ideas of your own…we would love to hear from you.
Here are some tips and ideas from MOI, the bargain decorator wannabe:
- Paint, paint, paint…this is an inexpensive way to dress up any room. Keep in mind that the paint will dry darker than the color samples. If you’re not sure you really want red for Johny’s room…Sherwin Williams sells little paint sample jars that’s around $3.50 each. I’ve bought some to use for Trent’s (our three years old son) room, specifically to do stenciling (not a really good choice…I’ll go into more details later, read on). But these sample jars are good for repainting frames. See the picture below for Tyler’s (our five years old son) room, I bought these inexpensive unpainted wood frames and the pictures separately at AC Moore and the final cost for the completed framed picture is about $10.00 each.
- There are many different types of paint finishes, and it’s really a matter of personal taste. For our kids’ rooms, we used Semi-gloss paints. They are recommended if you have young children because they offer good stain resistance and are easier to clean than the Flat paint, or Eggshell, or even Satin finishes.
- Do-It-Yourself stenciling…here’s another way to dress up the room. Find out what your child likes, be it butterflies, planets, stars…AC Moore is a good place to shop for anything that has to do with arts & crafts. They have a huge selection of stencils (I can spend days in there, I’m like a kid in a candy store!). They also have weekly coupon to use. Next you will need Stencil paints. AC Moore has a huge collection of paint colors. It can be as low as $.25 per small bottle when it’s on sale. Stock them up when it’s on sale because you can go through one bottle pretty quickly. And if you don’t see one particular color you like, you can always mix the stencil paints yourself. Do not use the regular wall paints for stenciling. The pictures won’t stand out.
- Use your imagination…a room is like a blank canvas and you are the artist. Get your child to help you do the stenciling (depending on the age of course). You can either do one straight line across or randomly throughout the room. Doing it in a straight line requires more work. You have to use one of those leveling tools to make sure the line is straight. But as for random design, you can let your or your child’s imagination goes wild. The final result will look like wallpapers (without the hassel). Make sure you don’t overdo it by putting too much stenciling in any one spot. If you make a mistake, you can wipe it off while it’s still wet only if you used semi-gloss paint finishes on the wall.
- Artworks…I will discuss this in another entry (Do-it-yourself artworks!).
- Curtains/Shades…I love the Pottery Barn Kids’ curtains but again they can be very pricey and sometimes they might not have the color you want. For Trent’s room, I found the perfect color scheme curtains at Pottery Barn Kids. It was on sale but it was a shower curtain (that’s only 70 inches long). I wanted to have the curtains drag on the floor so I added 20 inches to the bottom. So I bought a few yards of the same weight fabric, as the Pottery Barn shower curtain, at The Fabric Place but in a solid color and sew it onto the bottom (the picture might make the curtain looked crooked, the photographer didn’t tuck in the other bottom to straighten it out). You can see the result in the picture below. If you don’t know how to sew, there are products available at The Fabric Place just for ironing on, no sewing required.
- Kids’ furnitures and knick knacks…I found alot of these things at Homegoods, TJ Maxx, Marshall’s and IKEA to fill the rooms. Again, the idea is that kids will grow out of it sooner than we want, so you don’t want to spend too much on a chair, the cute little rug or the little knick knacks (they will be part of your yard sale soon enough).
I bought this bench at Homegoods for $25, it breaks up the pink in Sophia’s room and I have somewhere to sit when I feed her milk. And when she “outgrows” it or should I say, Mommy’s “decorating taste madness” has changed…then it will serve as a bench for the family room or for that “hopefully finished toy landfill” a.k.a. basement one day.
Have fun decorating, and let your imagination goes wild…but with style!
I love your ideas - I have heard of people using calendar pictures and putting them up as framed pictures…
Very creative ideas!
Great ideas !! You have saved some money for kids’ education indeed !