How to use navy blue for girls rooms and nurseries

When it comes to decorating a nursery for a girl, you have millions of options: peach, pinks, golds and yellows and teals. Not many moms choose navy blue for baby girls. Yes, it is an intense color ,traditionally associated with boys, and it's tricky to work with. But when done right , the results can be very rewarding. If you are up for a challenge to make your girl's nursery unique, bold and pinterest-worthy, here are some tips on how to make deep navy blue work for you. 

• PAIR NAVY BLUE WITH YELLOW/ MUSTARD

Brighten the navy area with fun contasting color, like yellow or golden mustard. Pay attention to the type of pattern too. Better to choose playful and whimsical to dillute all the seriousness of a navy blue.

• PAIR WITH WHITES

Another great color to combine navy blue with is white. Simple and dreamy navy/white combo will help you create a gender neutral nursery that can also be used as a guest room. Add variety of textures and patterns with different scales for a good balance.

• PAIR IT WITH CORAL / PEACH and GOLDS

Probably the most popular way to use navy for girls is to add a good amount of coral or peach to it.

Yes, this combo is lovely and it is also very useful when trying to transform a boy's nursery into a little girl's. No re-painting of the walls needed! Make sure to use some metallic gold accents for a bit of bling and reflection,  plus navy and gold is so classic.

• USE NAVY SPARINGLY

You don't need to paint a whole wall in navy or have a wall-to-wall navy blue carpeting.. Sometimes less is more! Pepper the navy color throughout the room in small accents. A lamp, artwork, pillow or delicate navy pattern in bedding. Load with white, greys and beige to offset the dark accents.

Gender Neutral Nurseries and Kids' Rooms

A themed nursery that would be fun for a boy or girl

Decorating nurseries as “gender neutral” has been a growing trend for a couple of years now, 

perhaps linked to more parents’ decision to wait until birth to find out the sex of the baby? This trend toward neutrality can also continue as the child grows, with gender neutral kid rooms, especially with shared spaces. When it comes to decorating for kids, what does gender neutral mean? What picture comes to mind when you think of that phrase? 

For some families, neutral is the keyword. With tone-on-tone whites or grays, for instance, the color scheme is distinctly neutral. These neutrals provide a soothing, calming space and work well for both sexes and varying ages, making it also a good fit for shared spaces.

 Simplicity in color palette

 

Sometimes, gender neutral means not focusing on traditional colors of blue for boys and pink for girls, but using other colors for either sex.

A blue with green undertones plays well with a bright yellow

 

You can also play with using traditional colors in nontraditional ways.

The navy add sophistication to this bubble gum pink

 

Green and orange add a new twist to the traditional baby blue

 Remember the shared spaces mentioned above? Certainly, having kids share a room is nothing new! There has been increased interest, though, in how to decorate those rooms to make them enjoyable for both kids, whether boys, girls or a mix. Usually when having a little boy and girl share a room, the palate centers on a neutral color, such as white, with small pops of color.

Having a neutral foundation with pops of color helps this room work for a little girl and her baby brother

 

 Another great way to decorate a gender neutral room is to base it around a theme, instead of a color. For kids, neutral themes such as safari, circus, chevron, woodland, or zoo would all work well, as would a favorite children’s story, such as The Very Hungry Caterpillar or Brown Bear, Brown Bear.

These beautiful murals carry the theme throughout the room and would transition well as the child grows

What is your favorite nursery style?

Painted Ceiling

My daughter's room desperately needs a makeover!
When we moved in into our freshly renovated house, she was a under 2 year old, and LOVED to draw.
So when I was too busy being pregnant, nesting and unpacking boxes and organizing our stuff, she would draw on walls with a ballpoint pen. She managed to be pretty sneaky about it, and i missed to noticed it for a while... Anyways, between her drawings and greasy fingerprints I decided it was best to leave the walls as is and some time later just paint the whole room again.

Now this time has come and I cannot take it anymore.

I NEED to paint her room. Hence the makeover.

I was considering the new color, but after a while I realized, I am really drawn to white-walls- nurseries and kids rooms. Still I wanted a punch of color somewhere, and yesterday while browsing Pinterest I saw this:

Source: artisticdesignsforliving.com via NewMomDesigns- unique textiles on Pinterest

I just loved the simplicity and neatness of this room. But notice how the walls are pretty quiet, while the CEILING gives the color punch. This is what I want now: white walls & colored ceiling.

My daughter requested color yellow for her room walls, but I am sure she will love seeing it up there instead.
It will look something like this:

Source: escapadeblog.com via NewMomDesigns- unique textiles on Pinterest

Here are some more cool spaces where ceiling brings the A game:

Source: gorgeousshinythings.blogspot.com via Sandra on Pinterest

( Love the colors and modern, Scandinavian inspired pattern)

Source: houseofturquoise.com via Emily on Pinterest

( Very elegant and classic)

Source: mentalfloss.com via Olivia on Pinterest

( How cool is that?!! Ceiling in the smoking area)

Source: vtinteriors.blogspot.com via Angel on Pinterest

( Soft and barely there...but it does the trick)

Source: houzz.com via Shannon on Pinterest

( Black is not easy to pull off and it scares many people with its boldness, but when done right, can be quite dramatic and exquisite)

Would you paint your ceiling some color other than white?

Reclaim

Reclaim - a: to rescue from an undesirable state,

also: to restore to natural state.

"Reclaim my house" is new series I want to launch on this blog. I am sure everyone who has small kids will understand when I say " I want to reclaim my house from the kids chaos!"

Of course, there are those who somehow manage to keep their house tidy and organized, and moreover, DESIGNED to their liking even after they have kids! I salute you, those brave moms, who are not afraid of displaying decorative glass vases and picture frames on their side tables, and upholstering fine furniture in designer fabrics and using beautiful wallpaper in their guest bathrooms. Unfortunately, I am not one of them. From the moment I had my first baby, I put all my design desires and dreams to the side. On hold.

Somehow crawling babies and a coffee table with a pile of Interior Design magazines on top, and a small square vase with a pretty bouquet of flowers in it ( you know what I am talking about, this is a typical photo shoot prop used in those Interior Design magazines to make the rooms look pretty and fresh and wonderful) did not work out for me! LOL!

Other item that were banned from my house were live plants, fake plants, candles, books, decorative objects, etc. Because everything within their little hands reach were instantly destroyed and/or increased the risk of injury.

So we lived in a boring, bare-walled, un-accessorized house for almost 3 years. And now that my kids are almost 3 and 4 years old, I think it is possible to give my house a design makeover it deserves.

Of course, it is not going to be one of those miraculous makeovers they show on TV, but rather a step-by-step, room-by-room update/upgrade and renovation to fix up all those "design gaps and holes" left behind.

So I plan to post every Thursday on the progress of a certain room.

The first room to receive an upgrade is the LIVING ROOM

Here what it looks like now,

Things that are new, and to be included in the new design:

-Drapes

-Mirror

-Console Table below

-Sectional

Besides the EMPTY BORING WALL and the old, stained, temporary RUG that is just really wrong for this room, there are a few things I want to achieve:

- Add color/pattern to the room

- Add wall treatment on the boring wall - perhaps, a collage of framed photos/artwork, maybe a ledge to fit small decorative objects, maybe even a stencil. 

-Change the rug ( I covered that one in the post here)

-Add new pillows for the sectional

- Possibly repaint the walls due to numerous fingerprints of smaller size, and occasional doodles with crayons, pens, plus some scratched made by the same hands that produced fingerprints ;) Also, I would really like to change the color to a more cooler shade, like light grey.

-Add another piece of furniture, either a small chair or an ottoman. We really like the openness of the living/seating area, but the professional interior designer in me craves the balance that another chair would provide, plus an extra seating is always a bonus. Will have to think about it..

- Possibly paint the console below the mirror different color, some FUN color! I realized all the furniture pieces in our home are dark chocolate ( yea, I remember that phase...)

Here are some examples of what I mean:

Overstock

Source: Unknown

House Beautiful

Ok, so for right now I will wait for the arrival of my new rug, and if it works in a room, we'll take it from there. I will update on the progress  next week. I you have any suggestions on how to improve my living room, I would LOVE to hear it!