About a month ago we were walking in the park and Clara pointed to a dogwood and said, “Wow, that’s a big big tree in a big big world.” John and I laughed — now when I think of Clara’s playroom (aka her future big-girl room) I also picture that big tree and our big world. Anyway, back to the room we’ve affectionately called the playroom. Remember how it looked when we first moved in?
Then it filled up with stuff and looked like this for a while.
With my mom’s help we organized it and it looked much better for a time.
But a year later it was messy again after months of book-related chaos.
We finally had a big clean-up, held a yard sale, auctioned off some book projects for charity, and were left with this much clearer space.
I may have done a tiny victory dance around the daybed. It felt great to reclaim a room that had been a storage spot for the past three Christmases. As we’ve said, this will be Clara’s playroom for now and eventually her big-girl room when she transitions out of her crib.
Why switch rooms? The nursery is small and adding a daybed takes up most of the floor. Moving Clara to the larger spare room and keeping the nursery available for a future sibling made the most sense to us. We can always adapt the nursery later if we have another baby — redesigning kids’ rooms is one of our favorite things. Here’s an old mood board showing how Clara’s space could be adapted for a little boy someday.
After clearing everything and pushing the remaining items to the center, it was time to paint. The room had served as a backdrop for book photography, so it had been painted many different times — trim one color, a stencil on another wall — nothing was spared from the book-shoot madness.
Here are a couple of the other oddly painted angles we discovered.
First step: repaint the window trim that had been turned gray back to glossy white.
Before choosing a wall color we considered the furnishings and accents we wanted in the room. We even asked Clara what she wanted — not surprisingly she said “pink and red!” (her favorites had recently shifted from pink and orange to pink and red).
We like having at least one room with warmer tones, since green and blue appear throughout the rest of the house. John was on board too — his comment was, “As long as we’re not painting hot pink all over the living room, I’m fine with Clara picking her room colors.” He’s a good sport: he can build a deck and he’s cool with pink.
To visualize how the reds and pinks will fit in without overwhelming the space, we gathered a few items on the floor. Using neutrals like white and navy plus small pops of yellow and teal will help the room feel layered, not matchy-matchy.
Because kids change their favorite colors quickly, we didn’t want walls locked into a bold red or pink. Instead of a gray neutral (which we’ve used elsewhere), we chose a warmer soft tan — like tea with a bit too much milk. It still fits our overall house palette but reads a touch warmer than gray.
We narrowed it to two similar shades and picked the one with the better name: Alaskan Skies by Benjamin Moore. We used a gallon of their no-VOC Natura paint in an eggshell finish. The name felt right — we honeymooned in Alaska and took a ton of sky photos there. Fun coincidence: the paint in Clara’s nursery is called Proposal, also by Benjamin Moore, so apparently we’re drawn to wedding- and honeymoon-related names.
In our painting process John handled the rollers and I did the cutting in along baseboards and trim. Watching him roll over the patchwork of previous paint colors felt satisfyingly transformative.
We left the ceiling white for now, though we’re debating adding a subtle tone there later once the room is more furnished.
We’re really happy with the wall color — not too pink, gray, or tan. It’s warm enough to let the white trim and molding pop, which will be helpful when we add more details like crown molding in the future.
Now we’re letting the paint dry so we can move furniture back into their spots and start arranging the room. Once everything’s put back and the room comes together, we’ll share more photos and details. Clara’s first nursery evolved over many posts and months, and we’re excited to watch this space develop into her next favorite room.
That’s what we’ve been up to — how was your weekend?