Three Steps to convert a Walk in Closet into a Nursery
You know those people who have a large room just waiting for baby inside their huge house? Yeah. I love those people! But I am not one of them at this juncture.
My husband and I spent this past
My husband and I spent this past
summer moving all of our stuff out of our mid-size walk in closest, and converting it into a nursery for our little boy. Finished nursery viewable in my quick video below.
Excuse the video title- it is a little misleading. There is no "how-to" in there. Its just a one-minute walk through of our nursery, which we affectionately call The Clausee' (pronounced "clo-saye" with a French accent). So posh.
I know some of you want to put your baby in the closet, too! Or, you need to. Big difference between want and need, I know. It can be awesome though- let me show you how. Get excited.
Clearing out a large walk in closet means everything in there has to go somewhere else. And when you live in 1100 square feet, there's not a lot of other places for things to go. Everything in the house was considered carefully for keeping or discarding- not just what was in the closet.
Excuse the video title- it is a little misleading. There is no "how-to" in there. Its just a one-minute walk through of our nursery, which we affectionately call The Clausee' (pronounced "clo-saye" with a French accent). So posh.
I know some of you want to put your baby in the closet, too! Or, you need to. Big difference between want and need, I know. It can be awesome though- let me show you how. Get excited.
Without further ado, here is the step-by-step How-To closet your baby (did I say that right?):
1. Reduce inventory. Dramatically.
Get rid of everything in your house you don't need by gifting (giving to friends), donating (giving to charity), recycling (finding another use for), or selling.
We eliminated truckloads of items. It was hard. Sometimes it was heartbreaking. My grandpa's old green vinyl footstool which I remember him using towards the end of his life. Andy's Old X box console from his teens. Bins of art supplies. Collectors Pyrex dishes and English China. These items had to go because when we got really honest, we could live without them but couldn't live without space for baby.
1. Reduce inventory. Dramatically.
Get rid of everything in your house you don't need by gifting (giving to friends), donating (giving to charity), recycling (finding another use for), or selling.
We eliminated truckloads of items. It was hard. Sometimes it was heartbreaking. My grandpa's old green vinyl footstool which I remember him using towards the end of his life. Andy's Old X box console from his teens. Bins of art supplies. Collectors Pyrex dishes and English China. These items had to go because when we got really honest, we could live without them but couldn't live without space for baby.
Clearing out a large walk in closet means everything in there has to go somewhere else. And when you live in 1100 square feet, there's not a lot of other places for things to go. Everything in the house was considered carefully for keeping or discarding- not just what was in the closet.
We don't regret anything we got rid of. I walk into our storage area today and think, dang, I could have sold more of this stuff.
We held a pretty cool one-day yard sale that made it easier to get things out of the house. It was held on a Sunday in July. We put up a free Craigslist add for it and made $779 dollars in one day. Very little prep went into those earnings.
We used the money for a new rocker and ottoman and our our cloth diaper stash for the baby. More on why I chose that specific rocker/ottoman and why I love Thirsties diapers another day, but these are the items we bought with the garage sale cash:
I love this rocker because both my husband and I fit on it at once! Or me, baby and the dog. It's really that wide.
These diapers (Thirsties All-in-Ones) are easy to care for and are slimmer fitting and more affordable than Bum Genius, which was the first brand I bought.
It was a success - but I had help - I squeezed a lot of yard sale tips out of my best friend, Cherie, mom of four under the age of six, who authors the blog highslowsandhairbows.com
2. Locate a new space for your remaining stuff
This is where all the items in your current closet will now live. For us it was our bedroom and in storage. That's tiny living for you!
We went with an assortment of dressers and stand-alone closet systems, featured below. It took two days of visiting furniture stores with measurements to settle on these items but we finally agreed. :)
We also moved off-season items out of the house into storage, using these space bags.
3. Get your shelving, hooks, and bins game on point!
You can find wall shelving at any Ikea, Home Depot, and of course amazon and target.com. However, the perfect and affordable storage bin is harder to come by. We have a several different types of bins, but the ones I find most useful are linked below.
These are my fave for a few reasons: They are generous in size and fully collapsible when not in use. And they're neutral in color and go with any room. These are visible in the video of my nursery. Many of are folded and stored flat, out of sight, for use later when we need more bins. I bought two packs of this six-bin system.
And they take a chalkboard sticky label pretty nicely, which was my chosen labeling style.
Command hooks like this one are easy to use, don't damage walls and serve perfectly for hanging diaper bags, wet baby towels, dry bags, or hanging up baby's jacket or blankie while you are changing them.
And those are the hardest parts! After that, it was just organizing items into bins, labeling, hanging wall art (which I recommend Hercules hooks for, I will do a separate post about Hercules hooks, I love them so much), and putting in the furniture.
Enjoy our little slice of nursery, and please let me know what your doing with your nursery space!
We held a pretty cool one-day yard sale that made it easier to get things out of the house. It was held on a Sunday in July. We put up a free Craigslist add for it and made $779 dollars in one day. Very little prep went into those earnings.
We used the money for a new rocker and ottoman and our our cloth diaper stash for the baby. More on why I chose that specific rocker/ottoman and why I love Thirsties diapers another day, but these are the items we bought with the garage sale cash:
I love this rocker because both my husband and I fit on it at once! Or me, baby and the dog. It's really that wide.
These diapers (Thirsties All-in-Ones) are easy to care for and are slimmer fitting and more affordable than Bum Genius, which was the first brand I bought.
It was a success - but I had help - I squeezed a lot of yard sale tips out of my best friend, Cherie, mom of four under the age of six, who authors the blog highslowsandhairbows.com
2. Locate a new space for your remaining stuff
This is where all the items in your current closet will now live. For us it was our bedroom and in storage. That's tiny living for you!
We went with an assortment of dressers and stand-alone closet systems, featured below. It took two days of visiting furniture stores with measurements to settle on these items but we finally agreed. :)
We also moved off-season items out of the house into storage, using these space bags.
3. Get your shelving, hooks, and bins game on point!
You can find wall shelving at any Ikea, Home Depot, and of course amazon and target.com. However, the perfect and affordable storage bin is harder to come by. We have a several different types of bins, but the ones I find most useful are linked below.
These are my fave for a few reasons: They are generous in size and fully collapsible when not in use. And they're neutral in color and go with any room. These are visible in the video of my nursery. Many of are folded and stored flat, out of sight, for use later when we need more bins. I bought two packs of this six-bin system.
And they take a chalkboard sticky label pretty nicely, which was my chosen labeling style.
Command hooks like this one are easy to use, don't damage walls and serve perfectly for hanging diaper bags, wet baby towels, dry bags, or hanging up baby's jacket or blankie while you are changing them.
And those are the hardest parts! After that, it was just organizing items into bins, labeling, hanging wall art (which I recommend Hercules hooks for, I will do a separate post about Hercules hooks, I love them so much), and putting in the furniture.
Enjoy our little slice of nursery, and please let me know what your doing with your nursery space!
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