Budget Friendly Nursery Design

When we found out that we were going to have a baby, my husband made me promise that I wouldn't find out the gender. Despite the overwhelming urge to ask the ultrasound technician when I was alone in the room with her, I complied, and we were both shocked to hear "it's a boy" when the time finally came.

I won't lie...the anticipation of not knowing is pretty cool, but it made designing the nursery more of a challenge. We wanted something gender neutral, budget friendly, and nothing too 'baby-ish'! Also, larger elements, like paint colour, carpet and furniture had to go the distance and last well past the infant years.

I was first inspired by a wall decal I'd seen in a high-end kids boutique downtown. It was a small tree with a mix of patterned papers making up the leaves. It was very unique, but couldn't have been more than a couple feet high and way more money than I wanted to spend. I wanted a big feature wall in the nursery, so I thought of creating something similar myself but on a larger scale. 

This was one of the simplest projects I've ever done, and it has huge impact. I found a wallpaper at Home Depot that had good texture and could easily mimic the bark of a tree. I cut out a large piece that runs from floor to ceiling to act as the main trunk, then smaller pieces as large branches. Following the instructions for wallpapering, I put the body of the tree up in no time (I was also 8 months pregnant, so it definitely wasn't that hard). The leaves were made using scraps of wrapping paper that I found in colours I liked. I just cut what looked to be a leaf, and stuck it on the wall using white school glue. So simple.

It was a fun project, and now that it's finished, the wheels are turning in my head for what we'll do for a nursery if and when the next baby comes along!

Here are a few more snaps of the nursery.