Since I left my job in May, I have been spending more time actually IN our house since we moved in a little over a year ago. Some of the rooms frustrate me, because all I see are un-decorated walls or the piles of crap in the corners. But Ben’s room is the happiest room in the house, and not just because it’s the only room I’d say was actually finished.

I wrote about the before way back in February when I was pregnant, and we had just started painting. From the very start, I had very clear ideas about what I wanted the baby’s room to look like, boy or girl. Gray walls, white furniture, pops of bright, bold colors. It took time to collect and make and decide on all of the various pieces, but oh! am I happy with how it turned out. And even better? As Ben grows, I can tell he’s noticing things like the bold art and bright mobile (and, okay, I have to also say that the freaking ceiling fan is his favorite thing EVER) and that makes me so happy.

Ben’s room gets great light, which helps the bright colors really stand out. We started with gray paint, white trim, and a bright yellow closet. The crib was the first thing we had in the room (other than the beloved red desk), and I like how simple it is. (I made the crib skirt out of pillowcases.) We ended up finding the dresser and night table at Target of all places, and they are made of actual wood (which is a lot harder to find – at an affordable price – than you’d think). We’re really hoping they last a long time. The glider is a bonus because it looks modern and cool but Dan and I BOTH think it’s comfortable. That orange ottoman was a last minute addition once the glider’s matching ottoman was out of stock, and I like the extra color it adds. My mom painted that tall bookcase white, and I can already tell we’ll appreciate having some extra storage. (Ben doesn’t even know toys exist yet, and they’re accumulating pretty quickly.) I spent a LOT of time trying to find the perfect rug… and this one is exactly what I wanted. (We’ve since bought two more in other colors/sizes for other rooms in our house-and so has my sister, because the price is insane for such a nice-looking, SOFT rug).

I made the mobile using this tutorial, which I found on Pinterest. Hanging that mobile was by far the most difficult and frustrating part of this entire project, holy hell. It’ll be a looooong time before I attempt a project with fishing line again, and even longer before I’ll be able to convince Dan to help. But it looks great, and Ben loves it, which is so awesome.

One of my favorite aspects of Ben’s room is the closet. We took the doors off and painted the inside of the closet bright yellow. (I was really nervous at first that the shade we picked was WAY TOO INSANELY yellow… but in daylight it is just right.) I think the lack of doors and the yellow make the room feel a lot bigger. The two little Expedit-like bookshelves are meant to be closet organizers, which meant they were cheap (and it’ll be easy to buy new canvas boxes to hide stuff away if we want to do that). For a long time, I was trying to convince Dan that we should hang a second rod for hanging clothes. I don’t know if it’s because we had a boy (maybe girls need more hanging storage for all their tiny dresses?) but that hasn’t seemed important since we’ve been using the room.

I think I spent the most mental energy on the art wall, if I’m being honest. Countless hours on Pinterest bookmarking artwork, DIYs, gallery walls in other rooms. And I’m SO happy with how it turned out. The big poster print is a Conan O’Brien quote that I matted with bulletin board paper. I painted the four little canvases using washi tape and blue painter’s tape to achieve stripes (what else, I mean, really?). The balloon photo is one I took for a daily photo a few years ago, the letter b is from Anthropologie, and the whale print is from an etsy shop that I think has since closed.

I like how the little square mirror echoes the black and white of the big poster, and Ben’s initials are painted in the same colors as the little canvases. I also covered his light switch cover in washi tape, because another little pop of color can never hurt.

And in a way, the whole thing started with this blanket, which I began crocheting a month or so after I found out I was pregnant. I knew all along that I’d make my baby a blanket (it’s what I had in mind when I added “crochet a blanket I get to keep” on my 33 before 33 list, actually). I bookmarked pattern after pattern, and none of them felt good enough for my first baby, somehow. But I kept coming back to this pattern, and knew it would be a way to add lots of bright colors in a non-circusy way. Ben hasn’t needed it yet, but I’m hoping he’ll love it some day.

Putting Ben’s room together was really fun, and now that we spend so much time in there with him, it feels so perfect… not just because it feels complete, but because all the color is cheerful, and the gray and white are calming. It came together better than I could have pictured, and that makes me pretty damn happy.