Peter Rabbit's out... Aeroplanes, Bees, Boats, Helicopters & Whales are in!!!

Despite being dead-set on doing a 'Peter Rabbit' themed nursery as per my earlier post, I have done an about-turn and gone in a totally different direction!

The reason being that Peter Rabbit is not all that common out here so it was proving difficult to find anything to build my theme with - i.e. cot bedding, wall decalls, mobiles etc - without having to ship them from overseas and/or them costing MEGA bucks. For example... the Peter Rabbit cot mobile I had once coveted was on sale in Myer for $89.95 which I just can't justify - how ridiculous?!

Our furniture choice also played a major part in us changing direction. We're trying to kit out the nursery within a reasonable budget - seems crazy to spend almost the same amount on a cot etc as we did on our own bedroom furniture - especially given the short time it will be used for and so we had been looking in IKEA at their baby range for some time as it is pretty reasonably priced. The wooden range I previously posted is being discontinued and when we went in to look at what they did have left it was pretty flimsy and didn't look as though it would last very long.

Before we knew we were having a boy I had fallen in love with this PINK cot - would look fab in a little girl's room - although being slightly crazy and not your conventional type of nursery furniture!



I wasn't completely sold on the boy's version in blue to begin with but Adam seemed to really like it and it's such good quality - really sturdy - so in the end we bought the cot, chest of drawers, wardrobe & bookshelf in this bright blue and hoped and prayed that it wouldn't look too comical in our very plain & boring beige & brown nursery....! Here are the pieces we've bought:-

Yes - they're bright - yes - they're a bit mad - but I've grown to love them and I think you will too once you see how fab they actually look in 'real life'! They don't really lend themselves to a Peter Rabbit theme - they're too cartoon-y - so instead I started scouring the internet once more for a theme that we would all love and would match these vibrant colours. At first I thought about an ocean-theme now we're back on the Northern Beaches and found a fab range called 'Bubbles' which featured a whale and an octopus, a crab and a lobster, but unfortunately it is another line that has been discontinued so my search started again.

In the end I landed on a range called 'Casey's ABC' by a company called Living Textiles. I wasn't completely sure at first - the combination of a whale & an aeroplane seemed a bit odd - and I also worried that there might just be TOO much blue going on with our IKEA furniture but it does have touches of green, brown, beige & red to balance it out a bit.

We happened to go into a shop called Babyography at Warringah Mall the weekend we bought the furniture and they very conveniently had the whole range in stock so we bit the bullet & bought the five-piece cot set which includes a flat sheet, fitted sheet, quilt, pillow & wall decals, as follows:-

We also got some of the matching accessories - the nappy stacker, the mobile, the cot blanket & the pram blanket & some lovely wooden wall hangings of the whale & aeroplane:-

The other bits we've bought to finish the whole thing off are a comfy feeding chair & footstool - which I am already enjoying sitting in - and a change table - both from IKEA - bargain!!!

Now I know these last two items don't strictly match but I challenge you to find a change table and chair in shocking blue! I think they break the room up quite nicely actually and the blinds/carpet are very neutral shades of beige and brown so not tooooo much of a clash!

Final bits... light fittings - and how cute is this lampshade & bedside lamp - matches the clouds on the bedding & wall decals...

This may all look like a bit of a crazy mish-mash of colours, textures & styles but trust me - it works - and I CAN'T WAIT to show you pics of the finished room within the next week or so - just waiting for my lovely hubby to build the wardrobe & put up the light fitting then we're good to start snapping some pics to share with you.

I can't wait for Master Read to be at home in his fab nursery (although I will add that we plan to have him in our room in a bassinette for a few months) - only 43 days to go!!!