One of the things I was most looking forward to as I planned for expanding our family was painting yellow "ombre" stripes on the walls of the room that would become the nursery. I wanted to do five or six stripes (we decided on five), with the lightest yellow for the top stripe and a medium-dark yellow for the bottom stripe, and gradual shades of yellow slowly getting darker in between.
The room was originally being used as an extra storage room, so earlier in the summer my husband and I went through and moved everything out, throwing old useless items out (or recycling them when possible) and finding new places in the house to keep other items. We also took down the closet doors because I wanted to have an open closet for the nursery, and got rid of the old floorboards and closet door trim, which were falling apart and/or had paint drips all over them. I wasn't pregnant yet when we started our organization/remodeling project, but we were planning to start trying and were hoping I would be soon.
I was pregnant before the room was ready to paint. I'd been looking forward to painting it - but I was also concerned, now that I was in the first trimester of pregnancy, about inhaling paint fumes. I read probably a dozen articles online, most of which said the types of painting used for interior walls today is harmless and fine to use during pregnancy. But there were a few that cautioned against painting too much during the first trimester, when all of the baby's important organs were forming, and being overly cautious I decided to wait until I was past my twelfth week. We put our painting project on hold.
Then I had a miscarriage (which I discussed at length in this earlier post). I tried to "do everything right" and avoided inhaling paint fumes - but I still miscarried anyway. I didn't think much about that nursery for a couple weeks as I went through the initial emotions and stress and went forward with getting a D&C procedure. But once I was feeling physically recovered, I realized I still really wanted to paint that future nursery. It was late September. I wanted to paint it before the weather got too cold, so I could paint with the window open. I wanted to paint it before I got pregnant again, so I didn't have to worry again about inhaling the fumes during the first trimester. Most importantly though, I wanted to paint it as part of my healing process.
Maybe it seems weird to plan and paint a nursery when I wasn't pregnant anymore, but to me it felt meaningful. (And I only cried a little while I was doing it...) It was a conscious decision to look toward the future, to embrace my dreams of parenthood, and try to believe that I would get pregnant again and we would have children someday. I don't know when we'll have a baby sleeping in that room - but whenever it happens, the walls are already painted and ready.
My husband helped with the measurements. It turned out our floor wasn't totally level, so we made all the measurements from the same corner of the room, and then used a long level to draw straight lines out from there around the perimeter. I selected five colors of yellow - two from one swatch and three from another swatch. The names were (from lightest/top stripe to darkest/bottom stripe): Lemon White, Meringue, Storm Lightning, Solar Energy, and Radiant Sun. We bought a quart of each color.
I painted the top stripe first, followed by the middle stripe (which was closest in color to the yellow the walls were already painted), and then the bottom stripe. That was painting day #1.
Then next morning, I pulled off all the tape (except the ones covering the outlets, light switch, and window and door frames) and put up new tape. (My dog Ginny was upset to see that I was still working on this project instead of paying attention to her.)
This time the painters tape marked the top and bottom edges of the second and fourth stripes. I again put diagonal pieces on the stripes I was NOT going to paint that day (the three stripes I had already completed) so that I wouldn't accidentally start painting one of those instead. Because I was now painting against stripes I'd already finished, I also put two layers of painters tape up, so I would be less likely to accidentally spill paint over the tape and onto the finished stripes.
I painted the second stripe from the top, and then the fourth stripe from the top. That was painting day #2.
On painting day #3, I pulled all of the tape off and went around by hand making touch-ups in the few spots where a little bit of paint leaked through/under the tape and onto another stripe. (Ginny was once again upset to see that I was STILL painting instead of paying attention to her.)
When all the paint was dry, my husband installed a new light switch and light switch cover, and new outlets and baby-proof sliding outlet covers. (The old ones were all cream-colored, and I wanted white.) We also had new white baseboards and white trim around the closet doorway installed by a handyman.
Here's the finished product!
Obviously there's still a lot to do before it'll be a nursery (not least of which is - get pregnant again). Right now there's only an area rug and two wooden bookcases in there. But I love, love, LOVE how the yellow ombre stripes turned out. They're just what I wanted for our future nursery.
The room was originally being used as an extra storage room, so earlier in the summer my husband and I went through and moved everything out, throwing old useless items out (or recycling them when possible) and finding new places in the house to keep other items. We also took down the closet doors because I wanted to have an open closet for the nursery, and got rid of the old floorboards and closet door trim, which were falling apart and/or had paint drips all over them. I wasn't pregnant yet when we started our organization/remodeling project, but we were planning to start trying and were hoping I would be soon.
I was pregnant before the room was ready to paint. I'd been looking forward to painting it - but I was also concerned, now that I was in the first trimester of pregnancy, about inhaling paint fumes. I read probably a dozen articles online, most of which said the types of painting used for interior walls today is harmless and fine to use during pregnancy. But there were a few that cautioned against painting too much during the first trimester, when all of the baby's important organs were forming, and being overly cautious I decided to wait until I was past my twelfth week. We put our painting project on hold.
Then I had a miscarriage (which I discussed at length in this earlier post). I tried to "do everything right" and avoided inhaling paint fumes - but I still miscarried anyway. I didn't think much about that nursery for a couple weeks as I went through the initial emotions and stress and went forward with getting a D&C procedure. But once I was feeling physically recovered, I realized I still really wanted to paint that future nursery. It was late September. I wanted to paint it before the weather got too cold, so I could paint with the window open. I wanted to paint it before I got pregnant again, so I didn't have to worry again about inhaling the fumes during the first trimester. Most importantly though, I wanted to paint it as part of my healing process.
Maybe it seems weird to plan and paint a nursery when I wasn't pregnant anymore, but to me it felt meaningful. (And I only cried a little while I was doing it...) It was a conscious decision to look toward the future, to embrace my dreams of parenthood, and try to believe that I would get pregnant again and we would have children someday. I don't know when we'll have a baby sleeping in that room - but whenever it happens, the walls are already painted and ready.
My husband helped with the measurements. It turned out our floor wasn't totally level, so we made all the measurements from the same corner of the room, and then used a long level to draw straight lines out from there around the perimeter. I selected five colors of yellow - two from one swatch and three from another swatch. The names were (from lightest/top stripe to darkest/bottom stripe): Lemon White, Meringue, Storm Lightning, Solar Energy, and Radiant Sun. We bought a quart of each color.
Once we had our stripes measured and marked in pencil, we used painter's tape to get straight lines. I planned to paint the top, middle, and bottom stripes first.
We had already painted the ceiling white and had a ceiling fan/light installed several weeks earlier. We put a line of tape on the edge of the ceiling, and then on the bottom of the topmost pencil line. For the middle stripe, the painters tape went above the higher stripe outline and below the lower stripe outline. For the bottom stripe, the tape went above the stripe outline. We also covered the outlets, light switch, and the edges of the door and window frames with tape. Finally, I threw diagonal strips of tape up on the second and fourth stripes - the stripes I was NOT painting during this first step, so that I wouldn't accidentally start painting those and waste paint on the wrong stripe.
I painted the top stripe first, followed by the middle stripe (which was closest in color to the yellow the walls were already painted), and then the bottom stripe. That was painting day #1.
Then next morning, I pulled off all the tape (except the ones covering the outlets, light switch, and window and door frames) and put up new tape. (My dog Ginny was upset to see that I was still working on this project instead of paying attention to her.)
This time the painters tape marked the top and bottom edges of the second and fourth stripes. I again put diagonal pieces on the stripes I was NOT going to paint that day (the three stripes I had already completed) so that I wouldn't accidentally start painting one of those instead. Because I was now painting against stripes I'd already finished, I also put two layers of painters tape up, so I would be less likely to accidentally spill paint over the tape and onto the finished stripes.
I painted the second stripe from the top, and then the fourth stripe from the top. That was painting day #2.
On painting day #3, I pulled all of the tape off and went around by hand making touch-ups in the few spots where a little bit of paint leaked through/under the tape and onto another stripe. (Ginny was once again upset to see that I was STILL painting instead of paying attention to her.)
When all the paint was dry, my husband installed a new light switch and light switch cover, and new outlets and baby-proof sliding outlet covers. (The old ones were all cream-colored, and I wanted white.) We also had new white baseboards and white trim around the closet doorway installed by a handyman.
Here's the finished product!
Obviously there's still a lot to do before it'll be a nursery (not least of which is - get pregnant again). Right now there's only an area rug and two wooden bookcases in there. But I love, love, LOVE how the yellow ombre stripes turned out. They're just what I wanted for our future nursery.
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