Project Two: Zach's Bedroom Update

Well I haven't got as far as I had hoped by now! Painting white over a dark grey wall is not a quick and easy job! After two coats of paint around most of the room it still could do with another one or two. I have managed to paper the room though which was the bit I was worried about most. I had my Grandma come to 'help' as I had never tried before and she is the family expert but in the end I did the majority of it myself! I was very proud of myself for getting it done and am happy to now know I can do papering myself. 

It is definitely looking a lot brighter already! Over the next few weeks as soon as I can get a few hours child free I'll be painting another coat of paint and will see how it looks then. I currently have most of his furniture and toys spread across mine and Gracie's bedrooms and will be glad to get back to normality.

Hopefully I'll have a finished picture soon to show you all.

Have a Happy New Year all! Here's to 2014!

Project Two: Zach's Train Bedroom

I chose the Train theme before Zach was even born. I had been looking at exciting ways to decorate a boys nursery and it was one theme that I really fell in love with! I started to decorate his room at our old house whilst pregnant and had a few disasters when it came to colours I was so upset (pregnancy hormones) that my lovely Nan paid a decorator to fix it up for me and just days before he was born his room was finally painted. The room was Dark Blue and I ordered a personalised train sticker in red to go over the cot. I found some lovely Train toddler bedding in Next and bought it there and then incase it was discontinued before I needed it and also bought the matching rug and some lovely bookends to go with it. I wanted some pictures to go on the walls but couldn't find any nice ones anywhere so decided to make my own, this was so easy and I was so pleased with them. You can see his old room pictured below; 

Well anyway since we had to move out of the house and now have our lovely new house, I decided I wanted the same theme in his new room. Only I have a slight problem, The placement of the window in his new room means there is not much light in the room at all. This means it probably isn't a good idea to go with dark colours in his bedroom. So I have had to come up with a way to still incorporate the theme but with lighter colours to brighten up the room. At the minute it has grey walls and a dark New York themed wallpaper and although not to my taste, the room is in a much better condition than all the others in the house so there won't be many big changes thankfully. Here are some pictures of it the day we moved in;

I have gone for a wallpaper on the feature wall which has a white background and red and blue stripes. I will then paint the other walls plain white. This is where my plans have got so far and instead of planning each and every detail this time, I'm going to see how it goes and once I've painted and papered I will then think about finishing touches. I must be mad attempting to do a room makeover so close to Christmas but I am determined to get it done to tick another project off my list!

Project One: Almost Complete!

I've been wanting to share with you our progress so far and can't wait until it's finished as there are a few jobs that will have to wait until after Christmas now. I need to put in a panel under her window to paint or paper and add blinds/curtains. I also have plans to paint her wardrobe door next summer. I guess we can never be truly finished with a project can we?

Anyway so far it is all painted and most of the furnishings and accessories are in (of course until I find more!) I added the bed canopy which was £7.50 from IKEA to make the bed a bit more exciting. The bed itself was a bargain a few months back, just £10 from a charity shop so we just had to buy a mattress. The bedding I reviewed on my other blog a few months back from BabyFace UK (You can read the review here). I bought the Toadstool Cushion from Asda for just £6. I also bought the hanging to tidy for £3 from IKEA again along with the pretty paper ceiling decorations which were £10 each. I have found them much cheaper online since! The Expedit shelving unit is another old buy. We've been using it to store toys since Gracie was a baby, they hold so much and look great too with a large range of coloured boxes. The shelving unit in white is just £20 and the boxes are £2.50 each. The Wigwam is another review item this time from Garden Games Ltd and it costs just £48.95, the review will be available shortly. Oh and the cute fairy lights were a bargain from B&M reduced to £2.99! (Please ignore the window area! It is in the process of being done).

I have a few plans for some fun crafts to make some nice accessories for her bedroom which we will be making sometime in the new year, including some handmade fairies to hang from the ceilings and a knitted patchwork blanket which I have already started knitting squares for! Also the Bench pictured (in front of window) is going to be upcycled, it is currently being used as a dressin up box and just needs prettying up!

So the room is very almost finished! What do you think?

Project One: Painting

We spent the whole of last week painting Gracie's bedroom. I've painted the two larger walls in Pixie Green and the two smaller walls in Berry Smoothie. I love the colours they are even better than I hoped they would be. I spent a grand total of £54 on just Dulux paint from Homebase. It took just two days of painting. Using masking tape on the skirting boards, ceiling and in the corners of the room to separate where the pink and green would go really helped get the job done quick with no mess.

We've also had a green carpet fitted to give it a grassy feel perfectly fitting for the fairy theme. The carpet including fitting costed £88.

Now that the two major jobs are done I get to do the fun bits. Over the next week or so I'm hoping to get all the accessories and finishing touches done as well as finally unpacking the boxes of toys and clothes. 

I can't wait to show you the finished project!

Project One: Gracie's fairy bedroom

The first project in the house is probably the most exciting for me. I decided straight away that I would do Gracie's room first as she has been the most affected by all the upheaval and I wanted to do something special for her.

Anyway after spending probably too much time on pinterest. I decided on a fairy theme so she can have a really magical room. We are painting two walls green and two walls pink, replacing the very old tatty carpet and accessorising to make the room look like a fairy wonderland. I won't say too much now as my plans may change slightly as I get further into it. But here are the pictures of the room the day we moved in: 

The paint work has started this week so I will hopefully have an update soon. In the meantime you can see where I got inspiration from on my Pinterest board here: http://www.pinterest.com/mummyandchunks/gracies-new-bedroom-ideas/

Welcome To The Forever House Charm

Welcome to my blog. I am Carly, I live at home in Coventry with my partner Andy and our children Gracie, 2 and Zach, 1. I currently blog at Mummy and the chunks about our adventures as a family. I decided I wanted to start this blog when we started on a completely new adventure and made the big leap and bought our first house. After years of renting and being sick of the sight of magnolia walls, worn out carpets and moving every 6-12 months for one reason or another. We are so excited now we are safe in the knowlegde that we have a house that belongs to us with no worry about where we will be in six months time. I am also overly excited about decorating and giving our new house a bit of charm. That is why I chose to call this blog 'The Forever House Charm' it means so much to us to have our forever house and can't wait to put our own personalities into it.

The house is currently in the need of lots of work with every room being outdated and in need of some TLC. I'll be writing about our progress as we go through them all one by one and will write about any upcycling projects or handmade crafts we do in the process.

Anyway that is all for now but I will be back very very soon with our first project! Thank you for reading!