Jack's Abode

 Janna, this one's for you;)!

I'm done-for-now in Jack's room so I thought I'd show it to you...

Turns out, most of our pictures of the house before we closed include little Miss Molly.  Here's Jack's room long before he was a twinkle in the ol' eye:

And here's another view.  It faces the front of the house.

Until we found out about our new little guy, this room housed some junk and the occasional guest.  After we knew he was coming, it still housed junk and the occasional guest.  We didn't get started until Mother's day weekend, the month before he was born.  Such a difference from Molly's room!  And by we, I mean Ryan got started.  Molly and I went to my aunt's house in Tennessee for a Mother's Day brunch and by the time we got home (the same day) Ryan had Jack and Molly's room painted!  And Ryan does not like to paint!  It was my Mother's Day surprise and it was great to kick things off in that room.

I finally went in there today while Jack was napping to grab some pictures of it now.  The lighting is a bit crazy (I am SO not a photographer!) but here it is.:  

 While his room does not have a "theme" per se it was inspired by one of my favorite books as a child, "Caps For Sale":

Mainly because the colors are awesome, right? (The colors above are a bit off actually.)  But I ended up not using the colors I thought I would initially--I naturally tend to gravitate toward mustard, chartreuse-y, and aqua shades but ended up using the gray-blue color of the cap way more, like, all over the walls.

We did use the chartreuse color in the closet (where you never see it) and I used it for a few of the frames on the wall too.  Speaking of the closet, you can't quite see the detail of the knobs in the picture below...

...so here's a close-up:

Yes, I know mustaches are a hugely overused trend at the moment but I don't care.  It ties into the book:

See there?  He has a great mustache.  Plus, we're kinda into mustaches around here.  And not just those on a stick, the real deal ones:

When Ryan shaves his beard he likes to take it off in stages.  Interesting side note, these were taken in our old house and do you see the colors on the walls behind him??  I guess Jack's color scheme is a nod to our old digs in a way.

And here's the inside of the closet with that green color (and a shelf full of diapers from our church choir and orchestra--amazing!):

Jack, my infant son, has the biggest closet in the house.  Not fair.  Molly enjoys playing in there.  I'm always finding the evidence she's left behind.

We reused all of Molly's furniture.  Same crib.  Same recliner--best nursing chair EVER!  Same dresser with miles of storage.  We did change out the knobs for the original ones that came with the dresser in the first place.  They're a little less girly than the knobs we put on it for Molly:

One of my favorite things in the room is the mirror, which we already had.  I painted it a tomato red color from the cover of the book.  It's a great color.  The safety pin was something I happened on at Hobby Lobby.  It didn't have a price and they couldn't find anymore so I named my own price and they took it.  I love it when stuff like that happens!  The lampshade was a Target clearance find from before Jack and I thought it fit the room well.  It's a tad feminine but we're okay with that... I hope Jack will be in touch with his feminine side for the ladies' sake:).

See the brown ceramic owl in the picture above?  Ryan's mom made that way back in the 80's.  And here's another sweet hand-me-down...

The wooden spool truck was Ryan's.  It has corresponding dots under the numbers that you match up.  So cute.

In fact, the only things we truly bought new just for his room are the rug and the curtains.  I couldn't find curtains I liked but I did find a super cool shower curtain on major discount from West Elm.  So I bought two, cut them in half, and stitch-witched those suckers into curtains for the two windows.

Okay, so I also bought this fun little airplane just for his room.  There was already a hook in the ceiling above the recliner and I was looking for just the thing to go there and found this at the Classy Flea:

He's so cute and just the right colors!  And when you pull on him all the springs start bouncing and the airplane looks like it's flying:)  It makes me happy.

As does this little wall:

The chair again is something we had already and is the perfect spot for someone to perch and chat while I'm feeding Jack.  And would you just look at the super cool wall art above it:

This custom subway art was a gift from my dear friend Jennifer.  She's a graphic designer and a super cool person whom I often hit up for decorating advice.  Thanks again for this, Jen.  I love it!  And next door I've hung this old paint-by-number that I picked up while cleaning out one of the classrooms my mom inherited in her last years of teaching.  I think it's from the 70's and I just took a shining to it.  It just so happens to use the same colors of the room and the subway art and my friend, Crystal, pointed out that he has a giant safety pin in his collar.  Score.

On the opposite wall is more artwork.

The blank frames are to-be-filled with photographs of Jack's namesakes and Jack himself but since I don't have those pictures yet I decided they'd look cute without the glass in them.  And then there's this:

A homemade gift from my uber creative, dear friend, Heather.  Yeah, I know I have awesome friends.  And then there's this gem:

 The monkey is an original oil painting that we received as a wedding gift from Ryan's (and my!) friend Zach. We've always loved it and in our first house he had a special place in the hallway but here he really seemed to match the vibe and quirk it up a bit (there are monkeys in the book and this is one gentleman of a monkey).

Heather also gave me the two prints in the thin black frames.  The bigger pictures are enlarged color photocopies from the book itself, matted with gray construction paper and white poster board (I want instant gratification so I have to work with what I have around the house) and framed in matching frames I already owned (they used to house Bach and Beethoven).  Heather and I didn't plan it but she gave me two different pictures than I had already copied so the four of them work perfectly together:)!

The most recent addition to the room is his name above the crib.  I new I wanted his name and I found some letters I loved, but at 25 bucks a pop it just wasn't practical.  Plus, they were metal so hanging them above a sleeping child sounded kinda dangerous.  So I decided to make some instead out of styrofoam that I already had.  So all 4 letters added up to....free AND they're light as a feather um, styrofoam so if they fall off the wall they won't do any damage.  I wanted them to look a bit distressed so all the scrapes and dents are purposeful.  You can also see a basket of baby toys to the left and a rocker for Molly to chill in while I'm nursing to the right

Here they are from the side:

And here they are labeling the crib contents:

Bonus:  we'll never forget his name.

Here's a close up of the crib sheet (and the sweetest little head you ever did see too!).  It's black gingham to tie back into "Caps For Sale"--his own cap and pants are black and white checks.  I found out with Molly there's no need for "bedding" plus I really like the clean simple look (and it's worlds easier to change the sheets!)

So there you have it folks!