I’m so excited to finally share our circus-themed nursery! When we found out we were having a baby we couldn’t wait to put together a fun little room for her. We had actually been planning on doing a circus theme since we started trying so we’d picked up some items here and there before I even got pregnant.

This bedroom had previously been used for storing all of the vintage stuff we have for sale in our Etsy shop and was pretty much packed to the gills! Just getting that room cleared out was a feat in itself. However it was an opportunity to do a much needed edit of our inventory and to check to make sure everything was actually listed (you’d be surprised how much wasn’t!). We were lucky enough to be able to move everything to off-site storage which has been really nice.

We decided to give the room a fresh coat of paint- it was kind of a grey/green color before and hadn’t been painted in decades. I was leaning towards a light mint/aqua color (of course) but Phillip wanted to go with pink (might as well embrace the fact that it’s a baby girl’s room, right?). We learned our lesson years ago when we tried to paint the kitchen that a special oil-based primer is needed to bond with the original 1950’s-era paint (the paint we had spent all day applying was slowly peeling off the walls). It turned out that the fumes for this type of paint were absolutely horrific even with masks, so we decided to hire professionals. Oh, and it turns out there are actually water-based primers that bond with oil paints. Well you live and you learn! Anyway it turned out very nice in the end and I didn’t have to paint while 38 weeks pregnant.

Decorating the nursery was a great excuse for me to get some good practice in with my chainstitch embroidery machine. I chainstitched these little labels on the bins and added the swirls to the otherwise plain white curtains. I also made the little name banner hanging underneath the elephant.

We found this little light switch cover on Ebay, as well as the circus train wall decoration. It said “Tony” when we got it so we had to make new letters for it.

We got it all (mostly) done right in the nick of time and I actually added a few more things after she arrived- good thing she’s not too picky!

Here’s a list of sources for the main room elements:

Crib: Babyletto Lolly Convertible Crib

Changing table: Myllra Changing Table from Ikea

Bookcase: Kallax Shelving Unit from Ikea

Faux Taxidermy Elephant: Etsy

Rocking Chair: Delia Rocking Chair by Mistana on Wayfair

Quilt: Made by me from the Mod Diamond pattern by Pen and Paper Patterns

Circus Tent Closet Curtains: modified these curtains from Amazon

Window Curtains: Ritva Curtains from Ikea with chainstitch swirl embellishment added by me

Pendant Light Fixture: Trollbo by Ikea (doesn’t seem to be available anymore online)

Gold Rug: Langsted Rug by Ikea

Small Faux Sheepskin Rug: Toftlund Rug by Ikea

Couch: thrifted

Pretty much everything else you see was thrifted or purchased on Ebay or antique stores.

Thanks for stopping by!