"Room" to Bloom

  This post has been a long time coming...I mentioned in an earlier post about GT's room. It is absolutely magical! I can say this because I take absolutely no credit for it. :) My precious friend, Whitney, is the mastermind behind putting together a cute and fun place for our sweet little boy to play and rest. She and her husband, Kyle, are dear friends of ours and some of the most generous people in the world. They even have a business, Whyle Frames, that benefits an orphanage in Haiti that is special to all of us! They, along with several other people that we love so much, did such an incredible thing for us!
  Whitney and I have been talking about little Braddy and planning for all of the fun things that come with your first child for a LONG time...like 2+ years. When Josh and I moved we were starting from scratch with our whole house, so we have been trying to "nest" within the rest of our house rather than worrying with our little's room. Then...boom...referral! What?!!?!? We were SO, so, so shocked! We received our travel dates so quickly, but we were hesitant to nest after our lost referral for our girl, E. Knowing there would be a while between trips, we decided to wait and nest in between trips...plus of course the fact that we were both still getting acclimated to new jobs and trying to get the rest of the house ready for Mr. T!

This is the drab room that we had for T before our 1st trip!

  Let me go ahead and warn you...I'm about to go "girly." Like we're talkin' HGTV, girly. I'm going to take this moment to turn this into a DIY, bargain shopping, old-house makeover blog, mmm-kay?! If you've ever met my husband, you know that he is an extrovert...he loves bright colors. I have to tell him all the time that we cannot paint our living room neon yellow. I, on the other hand, am a chicken. Especially when it comes to paint. We finally managed to paint our room (a lovely shade of gray) and I decided to try and achieve some bright colors via fabric and furniture. I had 2 main inspirations...orange and gray. I just wanted that color combo for some strange reason! That's where cutie-pa-tootie, wonderful at all things Whitney came in the picture! One day she sent me this fun little picture:

 Mmmm, yes! Mama love! 

  So...we decided since GT had an obsession with cars that we would take that adorable car/motorcycle print and run with it! Then, I stepped out of the picture! Whitney and a sweet lady I love named Mrs. Cathy Brown made magic happen with fabric and I had no idea what it would look like! All of a sudden, we got our Embassy date...what?!?!? We had SO much to do (but who cares...our son was coming home!!! Wahoo!)!

  Next thing on our list was to get our paint on! Some precious ladies from our church came one day while we were working and painted T's room for us! Amazing! And I got to painting on a dresser that Josh was not too excited about. I believe his words were..."why are you putting girl furniture in our boy's room?" But I made a believer out of him...you'll see! Here's the before:

 This dresser was in my old room at my parents' house.

   I felt a little guilty for painting this beautiful dresser, but I really love how it turned out, so no regrets here. A few days later I received a wonderful package with some fabric and instructions to look at a tutorial for an upholstered headboard from Whit. It was so much fun, so easy, and seriously...so cheap! Much better than having to buy a bed! And the best part is that it is easy to change the fabric for a whole new look. Here's the run down on the easy - a piece of MDF board, 2 foam egg crates, quilter's batting, fabric, and a staple gun. Boom. You've got yourself a headboard.

 My fabric ended up being a bit too short, so I had to figure out a little sewing fix to stretch it:

 Brainstorming before the sewing...

 All ready to go!

And all done!

  As we prepared to go to Ethiopia to pick up GT, this is what his room looked like:

A bit of a mess!

  And when we arrived home, we knew that little angels (Whitney and the crew...) had been in our house making sure everything was ready! Gideon Tamirat, Josh, and I were all equally surprised and overwhelmed! Our friends went above and beyond what we ever would have imagined! It is my favorite room in the whole house. These pictures hardly do it justice...the colors are vibrant...and the walls are actually gray (not some strange khaki-gray). :) It's simply wonderful.

 Little guy in the corner says, "well-com" to his room!

 Another pic from the entryway

 One of our closets transformed into a "nook" to read and play!

 Yes, Mommy needs to paint those closet doors :)

 We love our glider-rocker for family reading time!

 Mechinas!!! (cars) and toys!

 A beautiful vintage map from my mom, our finished dresser, and an elephan-tay from Ethiopia!

 Finished bed...with pics from our first trip above...

 We love our gator sitting in the corner - we practically live in a swamp!

 More "nook" fun...

 Mommy and Daddy threw together some frames

 

This is the face of a boy who loves his room!!!

  Like I said...we are so overwhelmed at how incredible our friends, family, church(es), etc. are to us! While we were away, our friends/faith family from our former church had a "gift drop" for us and right before we left for Ethiopia, our wonderful faith family at our current church had a "shower" for us. GT is one loved little boy and we are so thankful for all of the love and support we daily receive from all of you family and friends! We LOVE you! You are truly a blessing from God!

Katie

"I thank my God in all my remembrance of you..." Phillipians 1:3