Boy Room Redo

With our oldest's birthday approaching I wanted to do something fun and there are only so many possessions that seem exciting.....so we went for the surprise factor.

My sister and brother-in-law wanted to take the boys to an amusement park one Friday...and that gave me an idea....an extreme make-over!  Well extreme in the time frame....not million dollar by any means!

Now decorating may not seem like a big thing to do for a boy.....but you have to know that we've been here 6 months and it was really bugging my oldest that his room wasn't put together.
In our last house the boys had a surf themed room and I just didn't want to put a bunch of holes in the wall to put up their old decor.  So we had been trying to work out a plan they both agreed on.

And recently, we found this duvet cover at CB2.  Ian loved it...he said it reminded him of a favorite game, Pictureka.  I went to the CB2 store in Berkeley and checked it out in person to make sure there weren't any inappropriate pictures in there.....and it checked out.

 So even though Merrick hasn't found his duvet/comforter yet....he had a hand in the color scheme.

So take a look at the before pics.

I didn't think to grab the camera until I had stripped the beds....so it looks especially sad.

Another factor in the color scheme was this chair.

We love it...It's kinda like Ian's reading corner.

So I looked into chair covers and thought about reupholstering it...but that was NOT going to happen on my one day redo budget. So I just went with it.

Here you can see why my son was so distressed.  He would say things like..."Mom, I feel like our room is missing something."  or "Can I just have a Giant's poster mom?"

So after 6 months of plain....here is what I came up with.

I figured grey was the best compliment for the black and white....and then I added a blue highlight wall.

I originally wanted to paint a black skyline on this wall...with a grey shadow.

But when Thursday finally rolled around I had been to a Math class with Ian, taken the kids to Berkeley to build in a salvage yard, delivered Talia to and from Cheer Camp, cooked dinner....then finally dropped them off at Marmar's for a sleepover by 7pm.  When it was all said and done, I didn't get the room prepped and taped off until 10pm.  Two coats later.....I was in NO mood to fill in those buildings.  

Instead, I painted a grey SF skyline with a glow in the dark highlight....It is now Ian's favorite part of this room.  Mission accomplished :)

The orange and grey highlights were requested originally by Merrick.   That boy wanted color and I was happy to oblige.  I also figured that the orange would allow for a bit of their team spirit to show through.

Don't tell them...but I would SO rather not have a completely sports themed room....so I gently steered them otherwise.  Thankfully they are amazed by it all and there is plenty of room for another Giants poster or two ;)  

Here are a couple of personal touches I threw in.... 

We already had these hat hangers...so I kept them to go behind the door.  

Yeah, they're dog butts.  Gotta represent when you're a Weinerdog. ;) 

That bike wheel is another touch I didn't quite finish.

I ripped it off a bike that just lost it's chain, and I sprayed it up to add another orange highlight.

It will be mounted over their closet...either plain or I might turn it into a clock. 

 It's just a quirky thing either way.  

Back to the beds....

I'm realizing that I don't have a good picture of  Ian's bunk. 

It's basically the duvet with orange and grey pillowcases.

Merrick sleeps on the bottom and it already had a black cover so I just added some color for now.  Green to match the chair...and the pillowcases that match Ian's duvet.

The pillows in this room were another miracle of sorts.

Pillows are such an affordable and useful way to add color so I bought the two pillowcases that matched the duvet, a pair of orange, and a pair of grey at Walmart.  And I found those other black and white slipcases as well as the green one at CB2.  Altogether I had 9, count them NINE pillows to fill...and somehow between my house and my mom's we had exactly enough!  I didn't buy a single extra pillow. Hallelujah!

I also had these two posters from Christmas that we had never opened.  So I painted some frames I had on hand.  Merrick's says, "Jesus...the Calm in the Chaos." So I put it above his bed.

Those posters were an adventure in and of themselves....Two of them were plexi and the other glass....and I managed to damage each of them in the decorating process.  

My solution?  I just spray mounted them to the cardboard backing and framed 'em up.  Done.

My favorite one ended up So crooked....but I'm just going to pretend I MEANT to do that!

It is perfect for the doodled feel of the room.  

It has a shaker and a bulb on it....and it says "Be These."

Love it!

Considering that I got this idea on Monday and executed it on Friday...I'm totally happy with the results.

I did have so much help...Friends hosting playdates while I picked out paint, Papi mounting curtains, my hubby making last minute runs to the store for painter's tape, and even a friend's projector to help me get my skyline sketch up on the wall.

Friday I 'woke up' after getting about 4 hours sleep, swapped the boys with my sister, and finished decorating the room with Marmar in between baby Josiah's naps.  Then we attended Natalia's cheer performance, grabbed dinner and headed to the Drive-in.  Would you believe that I fell asleep during Cars 2? Darn it!

But it was worth every second when we brought home the boys and told Ian one of his first birthday gifts was 'on' his bed.

I can't believe we  pulled it off RIGHT in front of him!

Even Natalia managed to keep his duvet a secret...amazing :D

He'll have a couple of small things to open on Monday, but he was amazingly content with his bedspread, and his poster. 

Sigh....that was fun!

Happy Birthday to our Favorite Ian....and bonus surprise for Merrick (who is eager to add more glow in the dark paint to that mural.  Heaven help the control freak in me!)

Love those boys...

A New Type of Opening Day in 2011

Today started off bright an early in a high school gym surrounded by hundreds of uniform clad kids.

Their bright colors were accented with props and banners each being waved in the air as they circled the interior of our crowd.  

Though the rain kept us inside, our spirits were high as this was the start to our Baseball season!

And what a season it has turned out to be.  

Our first year being responsible for the organization of a team...which, with Jarrod being out of town almost every week, has proved to fall quite a bit in my court. 

Not that I mind.....I do Major in the Bossiness Business....but I know NOTHING about actually making better players out of these little guys!  Pay that no mind, we've been blessed with two other coaches that have MORE than pulled their weight.

But enough about us......all my joy lies in our little players.

Which Natalia and I decided to support with our fashion sense.

As I was saying.....This year has provided so many milestones already:

1) Ian moving up a division and being on a separate team from his brother

2) Jarrod managing a team as I already stated

3) Jarrod voted onto the Board for this League

4) Merrick walking

Oh yeah, that's no minor detail.

During today's parade, I remembered how last year we cajoled Merrick into participating.  He was barely 3 months post-op, and mostly hobbling with the help of a walker.

He couldn't support his weight alone.

In fact, here is a blurb I wrote a month prior to Opening Day 2010:

Merrick shuffle/walked for most of today.  I dared myself not to get over excited.  But with each halting step he proved his bravery.  Tomorrow we go back to Physical Therapy to check out his 'form.'  It's no longer an IF he will walk again....it has progressed to a WHEN will  he walk smoothly again, and how can I help him?  From here improvements may be slow and laborious...Six more weeks the Dr. said, and of those two weeks need to be low stress...so no running.   

So last year, as we approached that huge high school track he acted like we were going to torture him,

Check out his sad face:

Go ahead, be sad with him.  I know I was.  But we had to keep setting up goals for him to achieve!

For challenging him I will never apologize.  I'll cry with him when it hurts.  But I won't back down

  (God balances us out though, Jarrod eventually pushed him part of the way around that track

 since the walker had wheels on it ;)

As for this year,

It's a night and day difference.

He is ready to go. In fact, he is far more excited about playing than Ian is this year. 

Which might be hard to believe:

Speaking of Ian, he missed out on today's festivities due to a sore throat.

He really tried to push through it this morning, even waking up and dressing in his uniform.

But then the thought of walking around in the parade exhausted him.

So I promised to take pictures of his team while he rested with Marmar.

Go River Bandits!

(Talia and I have black and white bandanas to match their theme.  Eeeee, how I love themes!

More on those at his first game :)

As a whole, Opening Day provided a celebration of strength and joy.

How could we not praise the Creator of such magnificent bodies? 

Bodies which are able to mend and grow and change virtually overnight? 

I'll give him three cheers....and add a few more for good measure!

Wanna join me?

Now let's do the WAVE~~~~~~~

It's going to be a great year in baseball folks.

YAY God!

It's that time of year again....

...time for the animals to come out!

This year we have Cubs and Racoons...aka River Bandits.

We've been busy handing out uniforms, ordering banners, and coordinating snacks for the games that start next week.  

Tonight was more of a dress rehearsal.

Thankfully we got ALL the pieces for their uniforms....you never know what kind of scramble you might have to do before Opening Day.  But not THIS year!

Woo to the hoo! 

They boys are stoked and if I go by my old stand by of rooting for my favorite uniforms, I'd have to say we a couple of winners here!

I couldn't get a closeup of Merrick....but man they both look SO cute...

er, sweet....um, slick?

Judge for yourself:

I can't wait for the first games.

Stay tuned.

Man, I love these boys!