On the cheap: Under Stair Closet to Playroom

Trey Reeme — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 15:57:26 +0000

Before our move to Austin last year, we spent a lot of effort decorating our nursery. In our new house, we decided to convert our under-stair closet into a playroom.

If you’ve got a stairwell with a sharply slanted ceiling, you know what I’m talking about when I say the space as storage is virtually useless. If an item goes in the back, it’s a pain to move everything out to access it.

It’s easily Ava’s favorite place in the world. At ten months now, she crawls in from our living room and makes all the self-contained mess she can. And when older kids visit, they want to spend all their time in there – it’s like a spacious indoor playhouse.

On the cheap: Nursery Tree edition

Trey Reeme — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 17:53:07 +0000

For the last four years I was an entrepreneur; the four before that: a student. Thus I am always looking for ~~cheap~~ cost effective ways to decorate/eat/entertain. It’s a habit that will surely drive my children mad.

Speaking of parenting, my wife and I have our first baby on the way. Last week we put the finishing touches on the nursery. We’d noticed a wall graphic in the Pottery Barn catalog, and I told my wife, “We could do that.” She held me to it.

Here are photos of the process behind the tree that now covers one of the nursery walls. Not counting the green paint underneath, we got this done for around $20 – it took less than a quart of off-white paint, a roll of painters tape, a 1″ brush, a fine brush, and time.

Now if we could find a cheap alternative to diapers, we’d be all set.

Thwart Mediocrity » On the cheap

On the cheap: Under Stair Closet to Playroom

On the cheap: Nursery Tree edition