As I was cleaning earlier this week, I realized that I have shown snippets of little man’s big boy bedroom in the new house, but I’ve never given you all a true tour! Time to correct that, y’all.
As I show off his big boy bedroom, I’m also going to point out some tips and tricks I’ve discovered to help me keep the space clean and to make it functional for a three-year-old.
Before I go through each area of the room, I wanted to give you an actual video tour. So here you go!
As the video shows, when you first enter, I have a sign with his initials and a fox to match his woodland bedroom theme. If you missed it, here’s the link to my tutorial for this easy DIY décor.
Then, immediately behind the bedroom door are two sliding doors to the closet. I typically keep these closed, but I did take an inside picture to show you all a storage hack I’ve been using. While I have a laundry basket full of extra linens on the left (and some stored in the upper left corner that aren’t spotted here) and your typical hangers (red to match, found at Walmart in baby/kid sizes), the hack that works best for me is the hanging organizer. I found this at Walmart for under like $5-7! Technically, I think this is for sweaters, but it works perfectly for seasonal stuff or occasional use stuff that I don’t want to take up dresser space with. In each space I have things like summer/beach hats, swimming items (ear plugs, baby sunscreen, trunks, and swimmer diapers), winter hats, mittens and gloves, bibs (we still wear the terry cloth ones on spaghetti night), and washcloths. By the way – these washcloths are the “growing” ones from Dollar Tree – they come wrapped in a small circle or square, you toss them in the tub, and they “grow” or expand into a character themed washcloth. These have been great potty-training prizes for little man, and I store them here on the bottom pocket of this organizer so he can easily grab one of his choice before bath time.
The dresser is filled with his clothes – and sometime in the future I’ll have to share my dresser organization tips – but the décor around the dresser is what I really wanted to show you all. The initials were a gift from my sister – when she and my mom’s best friends (loving dubbed my “extra mommas”) threw my baby shower, my artist sister painted these blue ombre initials. The Jeremiah verse hanging was from AJ’s nursery when he was first born – the J in his name stands for Jeremiah, and this is the verse I prayed over him during my pregnancy. When my divorce was finalized, I was adamant about getting these wall hangings because they were so sentimental to me. As a side note – and other divorced mommas will get this – splitting up households is NOT fun or easy, and it takes some bartering, but I’m such a sentimental person that I really tried to split up things that would have sentimental value to each parent – for example, my ex-husband’s aunt and uncle had built AJ a toy chest, so I made sure to communicate that the toy chest belonged to him since it came from his family and they would want to see AJ enjoy it when he was with his father.
The moose stuffed animal was a first Christmas gift from Santa, the light is a night sky rotating lamp from my parents on AJ’s third Christmas, and the photos are of AJ with me, my father, and Jake respectively. The basket contains some wipes and pull ups – we’re potty training and he’s doing GREAT through the day, but still needs pull ups at naptime and bedtime. I thought a basket made it look a little neater.
In the larger picture, you can see the laundry basket I picked for AJ. It features a pine tree pattern that I thought matched the woodland motif really well. You’ll see that design shared on his shoe basket and his stuffed animal basket too – I find that carrying a pattern in different spots of a room helps it feel really cohesive. Here’s the laundry basket I ordered on Amazon.
On the next wall, we have one of his two windows. I framed these in red for two reasons. #1: It’s his favorite color and he asked me for a red room at the new house when he learned that we were moving. I was NOT painting the room red – while it might work in some spaces, the house I bought in my first marriage had a red room and painting over it was ridiculously hard. I want to avoid that for the future if possible. #2: Remember how I said that I really fought for some nursery items that were sentimental to me? Well a very sweet woman at my church quilts – and she’s SO talented. She made my little man a quilt for my baby shower that had brightly colored forest animals on it, and I absolutely wanted that quilt in AJ’s future room. She’s a friend of my family from the church I grew up in, so I asked for that quilt. I am so grateful to have it for my kiddo in this room, and red matched it well.
Tying into the red accent color, I grabbed a red framed clock from Walmart and paired it with this adorable firefly growth chart that my parents bought for AJ from Mast General Store. If you’re not familiar with Mast General Store, you should be! Such a cool place.)
I oddly have a picture of a fan and a little burlap basket. But there’s a reason, my momma hen friends! This extra basket has been a really helpful hack for me! When little man brings his toys upstairs from the downstairs playroom, it is SO nice to have a basket in plain sight where he can gather everything together. This allows him to “pick up” his own room, which is a huge help and teaches him the importance of tidying his spaces.
Also, this fan is awesome because little fingers can’t get stuck in it. I think I got it at Walmart.com and it was fairly inexpensive.
The next thing in this corner of the room is my little man’s bookshelf. It’s a Better Homes & Garden’s cube shelf. I had these mainstays bins and added on wooden pre-painted animals. You can see the tutorial for this DIY here.
The brightly colored paintings on the wall were done by a friend – she was painting a lot as a hobby and stress reliever, and I bought these frames, showed her my kiddo’s quilt, and asked her to paint some animals for his room to match. These were also in his room at my rental before we bought this house, and they compliment the theme perfectly!
The fox and bear artwork on the shelves themselves came from Walmart. They also had a hedgehog and a rabbit, but I let AJ pick himself and he choose the bear and the fox.
The mini rocking chair was a Goodwill find that I got when we were living with my parents before I got my rental, and now that he fits it well, he loves sitting in it! He does have a “boy doll” – a soft cloth doll from Manhattan Toy that we adore. He’s a little fisherman that has his own stuffed bear! I love the idea of having gender neutral toys; I feel that it’s just as important for my son to learn to be tender and caring as it is for him to be strong and tough. Everyone needs a healthy dose of both, so I love gender neutral toys like soft dolls, stuffed animals, play kitchens and food, et cetera that helps kids identify the various facets of their personalities and callings.
On the final walls, you see the second window, a blanket ladder (which I score for $10 at my local Dollar General!), and bunk beds. The bunk beds were my sister’s when she was growing up and she and my parents decided to gift them to my son for his woodland room. I think they’re a perfect addition! And I love how they look with the quilt – which does have a matching crib-sized quilt that a work friend of my mom’s made for little man when I was expecting. When we moved in with my parents after I separated from my husband, my mom already had this at her house for AJ to use and now they match nearly perfectly!
I did get the red comforters from Walmart. They were the Mainstays brand and came with the gray sheet sets, and they were very affordable!
Jake helped me put up these new hooks – they have woodland animals wearing hats and accessories! They are too cute! A friend sent me a picture of these at a new local shop in Dandridge, Tennessee, because she knew that my son’s room matched the theme. I love these so much – and shopping local is so important to me. The brand is Primitives by Kathy, and I love a lot of their other stuff, too.
The final photograph in this section is his shoe bin (again, matches the stuffed animal bin and the laundry basket) and his large cuddly fox. The fox was a gift from a friend for AJ’s first Christmas – and he used to cuddle this so much! Now that he’s bigger, he doesn’t crawl on it and cuddle as much, but I think it’s still so sweet and adds to the room.
The shoe bin is so helpful to have. I can ask little man to pick out his shoes by himself or put them away by himself, and because the bin is noticeable as soon as he walks in the door and it’s on the floor, it’s easy for him to access. I love things that make it easy for him to learn to be independent in his space!
So that’s little man’s “big boy” room in the new house. What do you all think? What kid’s room motifs do you love or have in your home? I’d love to hear from you in the comments!
Kate with a Twang 
My daughter loves those little washcloths from Dollar Tree! Our store puts them in a bin right at her eye level and she loves digging through to look for “Anna”.
LikeLiked by 1 person
They really are so fun! 🙂
LikeLike