Mar
28
2013
Decorating a Babys Room on a budget
Posted at 10:30 PM by I am THAT Lady: Lauren
Mar 28th, 2013
I have baby on the brain lately, because I am about to have my Fourth Child! We found out we were expecting another baby the day after we moved into our new house. Thankfully we got a 4 bedroom house, but one of the bedrooms was unfinished.
I didn’t want to spend a fortune decorating her nursery, so here are some frugal tips that I have learned along the way when it comes to decorating a nursery.
- Paint the room a neutral color if you plan on using it for another purpose in the future. My husband and I had planned for this bedroom to be my office, but when we found out we were expecting we realized it would have to be a nursery. We plan on having our 2 girls share a bedroom when they are older, so it only made sense to paint it one time. We chose a neutral color, that way when it becomes an office we don’t have to repaint.
- Use stick on wall decals instead of painting murals. These are new to me, this is the first time I have used them in a room before.. Since we are planning on having our girls share a bedroom, these can easily be taken off the walls and put up in their new bedroom. Then I don’t have to paint the bedroom again
- I bought the I am a Child of God decal online for $12!
- I bought the brown and pink polka dots from Amazon for $10 (I used gift cards I earned from Swagbucks, so they were FREE!)
- Buy certain items from Craigslist or consignment sales. I purchased this crib from Craigslist for only $100, it came unassembled and even missing a few screws. My husband was able to find the missing screws at Lowe’s for only $3. If purchasing baby equipment from Craigslist, I recommend doing your research and making sure the item that you are purchasing has not been recalled. This crib was practically brand new, and for 1/3 of the price!
- When carpeting a small space, look at remnant carpeting sales. We went to a carpet store that specialized in Remnant carpet. You can choose from their remnants, which sometimes are WAY cheaper than installing an in-stock carpet at their store. We choose a higher quality grade of carpet that we would have normally chosen, because it was a cheaper price and there were no hidden fees. You have to watch out for those large box stores like Lowe’s and Home Depot, they will charge you for for small things like tack strips that can send you over your budget. We were going to have Lowe’s come and give us an estimate, but they wouldn’t even do that until we paid them $39 to come over and measure the room.
- Skip the changing table. Our nursery is very small, we did not have room for a separate changing table, so I am hunting down a changing table pad that I can stick on top of her dresser. I have found that I don’t use the changing table as much as I thought I would, so going without it has been an easy switch for me. Changing tables can cost almost as much as the crib, so skipping this option is definitely a frugal idea.
What are your frugal ideas for decorating a baby nursery? I would LOVE to hear them!!!
Comments:
We also skipped the changing table. We just bought a basket with a handle at Michael’s and used that with all of our changing gear and it is mobile so we can take it around the house and we don’t have to go all the way to her bedroom everytime we need to change her! I also suggest hanging as much clothes as possible to reduce the amount of drawer space you need so you don’t have to spend has much on those larger pieces of furniture right away when you are buying the crib/car seat/stroller, etc.
I also use a changing pad on top of a dresser and love it. Target has inexpensive pads, slap on a coordinating cover (or sew one) and it’s perfect for changing baby. I hung a shelf with cubies in it above the dresser… perfect for diapers and creams, etc.
Sewing simple curtains saves a ton, too.
I had my 3rd girl 5 months ago and all I bought new for her room was some sheets. I love how you decorated… I went ahead and painted my girls room just using some craft paint I already had. SO it was free but should they out grow we will have to repaint. But I like painting so no biggie. Here is the link to my cheaply decorated little girls’ room (hope it works!): http://yadayadayadamayhemmusings.blogspot.com/2010/04/progress-report.html
I splurged on one item for our new baby boy. Since we had the crib and dresser and many other things I purchased an all in one changing table. Its made by Kolcraft, all hard wood very nice piece of furniture. You can view it here, http://www.kolcraft.com 3-in-1-bassinet. Bassinet (removable) changing table and many other features. This is the best thing I have ever bought for any of my children. I also use it for giving sponge baths.
that looks awesome! I like the bassinet idea as a part of it! Thanks for
sharing.
Good job Lauren and Mark!
One savings tip I used was to buy only 2 covers for my changing pad, a green one and a yellow one. I got mine used from ebay. I then use the many small blankets we have on top of the pad. If the blanket is soiled, I can change it very easily and not have to take off/on the covers, which can be a pain.
One area we do not try to economize on is carseats. I know, they are not technically part of the nursery, but something I felt strongly about researching and buying quality.
Sarah,
I totally agree about the car seats thing. We do not buy used carseats,
only new ones that we have researched.
I also skipped the changing table. I PT cloth diaper, for a while all cloth, so it made sense to change my son right in the laundry room. I have his changing pad on the dryer, with all of his clothes and diaper needs on wire shelving above the changing area. This also ensures that folded laundry gets put away promplty, instead of covering the dryer. vb;.
We skipped the majority of the decorations, we did use some vinyl wall clings for our daughter’s room. She outgrew it so quickly, I’m glad that we didn’t go overboard with a baby theme. We painted our own wooden letters and hung them from ribbons. I’ve also seen people paint mis-matched picture frames and hang them from ribbons, very cute!
I am in Syr and have about 100 items for the sweet repeats sale just at this time! ALL LITTLE GIRL STUFF!!!!!
ooh yay! I can’t wait to look!!! Anything 18month-2 T?
I got our crib for $10 at a rescue mission in Syracuse. It’s real wood which makes it heavy but it’s in great shape. We’ve used it for 3 different kids. I had to purchase a crib mattress at Baby’s R Us because it didn’t come with one. I also bought our changing table and my son’s dresser at a Salvation Army store. Changing table was $10 and the dresser was $50 but I got it cheaper using a $7 off coupon. I have a million coupons that say $7 off when you spend $25 at the Salvation Army. Wednesdays are 1/2 off clothes, books and shoes (as long as they have the correct color tag) and the cashiers are willing to ring up different transactions of $25 each to allow you to use several coupons. To paint my son’s jungle-themed room we just used paints from different rooms in the house.
I have 3 children and by the time my son came along I had young daughters that got into EVERYTHING. It was impossible to keep them from using wet wipes and baby powder as toys. So, got some milk-crates and screwed them to the wall above the changing area as shelves that only I could reach. I used some solid brown ones that were given to me when I worked at a daycare and they actually ended up matching the all wood furniture in my son’s room. But, they can be easily spray painted to match any color scheme. I ended up keeping a ton of stuff on those crate shelves and most everyone that saw my son’s room copied it… which really helped alleviate those worries that I was going to look like some slum mom by screwing milk-crates into my wall as shelving.
I too found out we were expecting at an unexpected time, and like you it was our 3 rd child. So we had to do the nursery on a SERIOUS budget. We found a dresser that there was nothing wrong with, but needed some TLC, I took it home stripped it (cost $6) painted it to match my colors (cost $18) and bought new knobs for the drawers ($6). Then i did exactly what you did and found a changing pad on Ebay for $15, I placed a changing pad sheet over it ($5) and it matched and looked really well. We repainted a couple of shelves we already had to match the dresser/changing table, bought crib bedding at Bed, Bath and Linens with a huge sale, and we were fortunate to already have the crib from our last child. we added a few finishing touches (roughly $30) and voila- we had a really cute nursery for less that $75 total, and it was just as nice as some of the ritzy ones you see in magazines!!!! Thanks for posting this, I thought I was the only one who even gets frugal on things like this.
Just saw this post, love it! We already do a lot of the things you suggested, but I am just getting into swagbucks and other sites like that. Also, really agree on the changing table. We had a hand me down gifted to us, and we used it for like two weeks with our first baby. Then it starts that you change them on the floor, the bed, where ever…never the table!
Is this an old post? You say 3rd amazing child on way in less than 4 weeks. LOL
I think it’s mommy brain late at night
I also skipped the changing table this time around. Wall clings are my friend too. Luckily we only needed to buy a crib, which we got on sale. Consignment sales are starting here, so that’s where I’m headed!
We also skipped the uber expensive baby bedding! We bought plain crib sheets and a ‘last years’ crib bumper at Marshalls for like $15! no quilt and we never missed it! We also made our mobile – we had a birdy theme and it was super cute!