The push before the big push, part 2

Downstairs Powder Room
From blank white, with a clamshell sink and the cheapest fixtures you can find, to kind of more inviting with a little color. Not a thing to do about the fixtures in a rental, but paint has always been my favorite answer to changing a room anyway:) We put all of our architecture and Chi-town related photos in the bathroom, which actually unified them in a nice, new way. It still needs something along the knee rail, but we're not going to do curtains, as it's already a dark room. I need to keep thinking...any suggestions would be appreciated!



Dane's Room
This room still kind of drives me nuts, as paneling is so dark. It's a basement bedroom, which makes it a little cave-like for my taste. Mark, on the other hand, loves it. I think he's hoping Dane will inherit his mole ways so they can sit in a dark living room and watch TV together:) We added bright bedding, a rug, all white furniture and frames and it's actually not so bad now.

We repainted a Goodwill corkboard and resale shopt photo of a pelican, repurposed some old cork flooring samples as the backdrop for some sailboat drawings and cut up some mock-ups of an author book from when I was at Tyndale to make the "Imagine" poster.
Drawings of the Cobra that Mark hopes to build with him someday, and then some other car I found online.
Freehand letters in orange and yellow scraps from my fabric closet.
These built-in shelves are one great quality of the room. Excellent for storing all the books and toys we're beginning to accumulate.
We went with a bright, yet masculine scheme of yellow, orange and blue, getting all of our bedding/rug/ etc from Crate and Barrel Outlet. Love that place!

Upstairs Hall
For our upstairs hallway, we wanted to cover the scuffed inconsistent "white" so we mixed up a lighter gray from the one we used in the baby room and primer. It's a soothing color that adds life to the hall without darkening it significantly.

Lastly, we finally hung the Bobbsey Twins books using sawtooth hangers nailed into the back covers. Two tiny holes in the back, and we can always pull them out once we're ready to read them together!