Joseph's Big Boy Room

For Christmas, Joseph's Aunt Sarah found him a beautiful race car quilt at the Goodwill Outlet for a whopping $7. Which is AH-mazing since it's from Pottery Barn and was originally something ridiculous like $300. First, that's crazy! Who spends $300 on a quilt?? Second, it's adorable.

credit

You see, Joseph likes to watch the cars that drive by on the main road in front of our house. (Hopefully, he won't go all NASCAR on me when he turns 13. *shudder*) So, when Aunt Sarah found this beautiful quilt at Goodwill, she snatched it up, washed it thoroughly ;), and then sent me an email titled "Joseph likes cars" in which she asked me if he might want a big boy car quilt?

Duh. What kind of a silly question is that?? My only other free option was this Indian blanket that someone gave me at my wedding (I have a lot of relatives from out west).

It's nice, it's wool, it's good quality, but it's not my favorite. I'd probably use it in my decor if I lived in New Mexico... but I live in VIRGINIA. Besides, Joseph doesn't even know what an indian is right now, but he definitely likes cars. So we're going with that. Besides, I think the Indian blanket would be a great addition to my growing dress up box. Dress up sounds so girly, but really the box is full of manly things like SWAT costumes & foam muscles. Now we are adding in an Indian Chief's cloak.

Fortunately, the car quilt means that I have an actual starting point for Joseph's big boy room. THANK GOODNESS! Thank you, thank you, thank you, Aunt Sarah! When I plan out how to decorate a room, I really need a central piece (such as an awesome shower curtain or quilt) to work from. So, to get the decorating juices flowing, I've thrown Joseph's big boy quilt onto the bed in the room that will eventually be his (I think).

Of course, he won't be sleeping in that full sized bed. He'll be in a twin bed. Possibly surrounded by this race car bed frame...

credit

We found one for free, but I haven't made my mind up yet about whether or not I'm going to use it. It's not really my style... But I keep asking myself, if I were a 2 or 3 year old boy, wouldn't I go bananas for something like that? Um. YES!

Anyways, bed frame debates aside, I already had navy curtains that perfectly match the quilt's car wheels, so I'm using those.

Now to pick out some paint. I grew up in military houses with white walls. I'm rebelling. No wall in my home may go unpainted! Must have color.

Originally, I thought I would find a nice light gray with some blue undertones. Then I realized that I was only gravitating towards beige paint chips, so I eliminated everything else. I would seem that I am only comfortable with blues, greens, and beiges on my walls. Or a combination thereof.

Can you guess which of these I liked best and immediately picked out?

If you chose the middle beige in the bottom row with the green undertones, you are spot on. Anything else, and you are fired! Leave immediately!

Of course, the color isn't exactly right in that picture, but I like the lightest Olive White color the best. Which I find amusing, since my hallway is Olive Gray. Olive is very high up on my chart of acceptably nifty colors.

I stared at the green beige paint chip on the quilt for a while and then I had a sudden flash of the nursery & kid's bathroom walls - painted a lovely Willow green. I'm pretty sure that the light green car, the paint chip I just picked, and the walls are nearly the same color.

Did I just pick out a paint chip that almost exactly matched the color of the walls in the nursery?

I got pretty darn close. The Olive White has more beige in it, but it's very similar to the Willow color. I swear that this wall color isn't even my favorite color. Teal/turquoise is my favorite color. It's just that this is the color that best suits the decor that I'm working with. In my opinion.

Besides, I like blue and green together. So, should I just get another can of Willow paint or should I mix things up a bit and go with the Olive White? Both blend cohesively with the rest of the paint colors in my house. I really, really like the Olive White against the blanket because it ties in both the green and the beige blankets... but now I'm not sure. Thoughts?