How I Decorated a Cozy and Lovely Nursery on a Budget

When I became pregnant with my son I was determined to have a nice nursery for him and myself. My husband and I were on a very tight budget, and I wasn't certain how I was going to be able to fix up a nice room for my new little baby. We already had an extra room that I had cleared out and cleaned to put the nursery in. I had worked odd jobs throughout my pregnancy and saved the money to buy the necessary furniture I needed. But, I wanted this little room to be a sanctuary. I wanted it to be cozy, comfortable, and safe.

I went to the library and looked through several books on interior decorating, design ideas, and so on. I looked not just at nursery rooms, but all the pictures, getting ideas. I also looked at craft books and even art books for interesting patterns and such. I wrote down the ideas I had, and photocopied the pictures of the rooms that were my favorites.

Then, I got busy.

The first thing I did, was finding the bedding. I went to several stores pricing items and looking at the sets I liked the best. I came across a set that included a comforter, a crib sheet, dust ruffle, and bumper pads in a light brown with red trim. Because the colors were neutral, I figured that I could put this with any arrangement I chose and it would look great. The bedding set was Noah's ark, so the patterns on the animals also gave me a lot of designs and textures to work with when decorating other areas of the room.

I wanted to make the crib area extra special, but did not want it to look too feminine since this was for a baby boy. I also wanted to keep it to use again when I had another baby, and just in case that second baby was a girl (which she turned out to be), I wanted it to work for either a girl or a boy. I measured the crib from front to back and from side to side, and bought some mosquito netting in dark red from the fabric store. The netting was inexpensive, so I was able to buy enough to make a canopy. I took a long, thin, straight board and used it to define on the ceiling where the crib's outline would be. I added two inches, and thumb tacked the mosquito netting to the ceiling in the four corners. I pulled the netting taught between the tacks so that there would be excess netting at the four corners. I reinforced the netting on each side in between the corners to make sure it wouldn't come down on my baby.

I found some ribbon in a plaid pattern that was close to a similar pattern on the comforter and used it to tie ribbons around the netting that fell at the four corners of the canopy. Before I tied the ribbon, I found the middle of it and tacked it into position on the ceiling so that it would hold. I then tied the bow, and left enough ribbon to hang down about a foot from the ceiling. This was long enough to be aesthetic, but not so low that the baby could reach it when he was standing up.

The crib was finished.

My next thought was pictures. I went to the thrift store and found several picture frames for very inexpensive price (below $1.00 each). I brought these home, cleaned them up, and spray painted the frames. At the thrift store, I also looked through many of their children's books, and found several with pictures in them that I liked, some of them being the covers of the books themselves. I bought some more ribbon, large buttons and some poster board at Wal-Mart the same day. Using the glass in the picture frames as a template, I cut out the poster board to fit into each frame. Then, I took the pictures out of the books, cleaned up the edges, and glued them to the center of the poster board. I then glued the ribbon in strips around the picture. I added the large buttons to the four corners where the ribbons met to hide the edges. The pictures were finished.

I wanted some unique curtains for that room as well, so I I bought some off white material on sale (for $1 a yard). I made sure to buy enough fabric to make two panels for each window so I could tie them back. I measured the distance from the curtain rod to where I wanted my curtain to hang to (in my case it was the to the floor) and added four inches for the seams. Once I had my fabric, I checked to see how much material I would need to fold over and sew for it to fit over the rod, and pinned it. I then sewed that material, and hemmed the bottom. I took the same kind of ribbon I used on the canopy and sewed a strip of it on the top just under where the rod went, and again just above the hem. I also used the ribbon as tie backs, making sure to cut the edges at slant. Some Elmer's glue at the edges kept the ribbon from fraying.

Once the curtains were made and hung up, I then kept my eye out for items on sale that I thought would look nice in my new nursery. I found carved wooden animals at a flea market, and a clock at the thrift store that just needed some touch up work. I found some small boxes on sale at a department store that I used to keep things like cotton balls and such in. And, I used a large plastic clothes hamper with no lid as a toy box.

Once the nursery was finished, and my son was born, our nursery turned out to be exactly what I had wanted it to be. It was a quite haven for both of us to go. It was comfortable and I loved every minute I spent in it. When my daughter was born we used the same nursery, and it worked great for both children.