Baby Room Reveal Part 2

As promised, here is the next round of project nursery going on in our house to get ready for baby Reveille!

We decided before we moved to North Carolina that we were not going to buy until we knew exactly where we wanted to be in this very spread out and diverse area. This includes a variety of factors like: where he is working out of, schools, sense of community, land taxes...all things that could not be established within a few days of moving here. So, we are renting for the time being. We probably ARE allowed to paint...we are just choosing not to for obvious reasons. Does that mean that my baby's room had to be vanilla? Absolutely not! Especially not with a little creative thinking and a very patient man!

We wanted a "football field" look behind his crib so the first step was figuring out how to make it look legit while still being fun. We opted for those wall decals that everyone is going crazy for these days and simply chose a stripe pattern in order to use it in a completely different way. I found an Etsy site that gave me 12 4" stripes for around $40.00...and...in the THE perfect green color! SCORE!

Measuring and re-measuring and measuring again we found the middle of the room, figured out how spaced out we wanted these and (sans a laser level) started slapping these removable wonders up on the wall.

I feel that this actually went very smoothly (Chad may disagree..don't let his smile fool you) especially once we got the hang of it. About 30 minutes later we had a green striped wall!

Our idea was that the two big white spaces at the end were the "endzones" that we were going to place words in to represent where a team name normally would go. But first we needed number markers so that it looked more like a football field and less like a striped wall. Ever tried to search for 2" or 3" inch removable numbers? Yeah, good luck! We tried foam, wood, paper, felt, wall decals, fabric, stickers....they either only had letters, they were way to small, grossly more than I wanted to spend or just were not going to work. After hours at Hobby Lobby we finally found paper options at Michaels for $15.00. They were paper, black, perfect size and exactly what we needed!

Originally we were going to put "Hitchcock", to match the "H" in the middle of the field, on either endzone. After pricing that out via wall decals on Etsy we decided to for wooden letters. To save money we opted for a motivational message for our little guy instead and placed these on the wall using command strips. We paid about $30.00 for the whole endzone project..including the paint for the letters!

I am absolutely in love with the whimsy, the colors, the guy feel and the modern look of this wall!

Stay tuned for bench/shelf that we put in his room for additional seating (under $100) and the changing table wall...one of my favorites! Plus a sweet gift that my husband created for the room.

Do you have a nursery or other room in your house that you DIY'ed your little heart out? I'd love to see it and hear about it!

Baby Room Reveal Part 1

Good afternoon everyone!

You know when you have this idea in your head about how something is going to look and it turns out exactly like how you pictured? Yeah, that usually doesn't happen to me....

However, this time it did and I am so thrilled to share the results with you!

When we first set out to design Reveille's Nursery we knew we didn't want something that was overtly baby. There is nothing wrong with baby baby nurseries....just not our taste and would not jive with the rest of our house for sure. We decided a long time ago that, if we had a boy, it would be a football nursery. Not a monkey's playing football nursery, but a modern, bright and cool football nursery. My husband is a HUGE football fan. He was the quarterback for his High School, played in college and is obsessed with making training athletes his career. I love his passion for it, and I want my son to be all boy and share that love with his Daddy so, a football nursery it is!

This past week we started with the staple of any nursery, the crib! I'm a bargain baby hunter so I was beyond excited to find a crib / mattress on Craigslist for $150 (I talked her down to $100)..SCORE! We had talked all along about getting sort of a rustic / beach / driftwood looking crib but when I found out those ran for upwards of $700, we decided to get all DIY and re-stain one ourselves. I've never re-stained anything, I've never even really painted a piece of furniture, unless you count spray painting. He had some experience with staining, so I felt comfortable going this route. Did not know what I was getting myself into by any means!

Here's what we started with. Looks a lot less yellow than it actually is. In reality it was this butter yellow color that was not going to go into my son's room. 

At first, we tried sanding it....nothing was coming off. Whatever stain / varnish / paint was on here was not going to go quietly. So we started stripping the paint off. This was the longest and probably most tedious part of the whole ordeal. Painting, waiting, waiting some more, stripping, painting it on again, waiting, stripping....over and over and over again. The process took a couple of days to say the least...So. Many. Slats....

After all that, we still couldn't get all of that butteriness off. So we did what any DIY'ers would do....we shrugged our shoulders and said "maybe it won't matter"

After a good sanding and wipe down we got to work staining. We started with a Kona base which was this beautiful rich brown. The places where we couldn't get all the paint off? Well, it didn't take quite as well in those spots, but, we were going for rustic not perfect luckily. So we forged on and stained every piece. We then gave each one a light sanding to remove some of the stain further and we were left with this streaky sort of effect. Keep in mind, everything we did was with the grain...so it looked very natural. After that we took Driftwood stain to it. He rubbed it on and I immediately went over it with a rag to rub it in / off. After all the pieces were done, the effect almost brought tears to my eyes. It was beachy, it was cool, it was rustic. It was our son's crib exactly how I had imagined it! Turns out that the butter color we couldn't get off in all the spaces...helped us tremendously in the end. Gotta love that!

So, here's what we started with....

And here is the end result.  

So in love with it! Stay tuned for Part 2 where I show you a super cheap (and damage free) way we created a football field on the main wall behind the crib!

I'd love to know your DIY baby adventures! Anything turn out like you pictured it? Comment below and don't forget to follow our blog!

My Problems Are Solved!!!...OH WAIT....

Ahhh, buyer's remorse. It's such a familiar friend....I'm notorious for returning things after I buy them (nowhere near as bad as my mother, however, let the record show). But I'm getting ahead of myself....

See, the way we design is generally that Chad will draw something up in pencil and then we will scan it, put it through Illustrator LiveTrace and spend an hour fixing the lines. Lately we've been working on some BIG projects that the idea of doing this process to, was less than appealing. Enter the WACOM INKLING!!!!

This pen (in case you're not familiar) is supposed to record your lines as you draw them on a regular piece of paper... essentially creating vectors in one simple step! Genius! I had seen this little bit o' magic pen about a year ago on the WACOM website and wanted it then. However, I don't just throw money around for the business, so I held off. Chad, the ever spontaneous half, decided we were going to bite the bullet and purchase this little wonder about a month ago. It came in snazzy packaging, looking all sleek and glorious. Plugged it in and started drawing.

Lately we've been working on some superhero baby images for our Etsy Shop (check them out in a couple of weeks right back here) and we figured they would be the perfect first image to test out our timesaving little miracle worker. So he traced very carefully and we plugged that bad boy in....I'll just let the pictures do the talking.

First is the picture that he drew of baby Flash (I know, he's good).... 

                                                            Second is what the Inkling captured.

I know what you're thinking...WHAT THE?!?! Yeah, our feelings exactly.  Not only was pretty much every line so far off base, it also didn't create a single smooth line and there were about a million anchor points. I figured we would have to touch up some lines here and there...but come on. Live Trace does a better job than this! I understand that this tool is supposed to be a "starting point" for design work and record sketches..but the fact that it couldn't even record a single smooth line was just to much for me. I'm done with it....unless WACOM fixes it, I'm Live Tracing till the cows come home.

Essentially, SweetBirch Designs will sum up our WACOM Inkling experience with an expert graphic that we designed.

Sorry WACOM, so not impressed!

Anyone else tried this thing? Better results than us? Comment Below!

BIG NEWS!!!!

Some big, and I mean BIG things have happened in the last several months.

We found out we were pregnant with our first little Hitchcock in October right after Chad's 31st birthday! Our baby boy is due in June 2014. We are so excited and feel incredibly blessed to get this opportunity to raise a child together. June cannot come soon enough!

Blog world, meet our little (but probably not so little) baby boy!

Reveille Marschall Hitchcock

We've gotten quite a few questions about the name. The "Reveille" (which you may or may not know) is the wake up call (google it, you know it). To us it symbolizes a call to wake up and strap up...get ready for battle. Chad and I love this mentality and we want to raise our children to embody it. Reveille, or Reve / Rev, as we'll call him is a physical representation of just how far Chad and I have come in our lives. Both broken beyond recognition at one point and now doing more everyday than just surviving. This child is such a blessing because of what we've been through! Plus what a great football name!

Marschall is a family name. Chad adores his Grandma Pat who helped raise him. We both wanted to name our first child after her in some way. We decided to go with her maiden name, Marschall, as an excellent choice.

As if that isn't news enough ( I mean I'm growing a human for crying out loud!) We decided that 2014 would be the perfect time to move our growing family all the way across the country. On December 28th we packed up our Jeep and the three of us (plus our pups) headed east from California to North Carolina.  We chose this area for several reasons. Where we were living in Ventura, CA I wasn't close enough to any major cities to get that sort of business I was looking for. Charlotte, NC was consistently on a list of a great place for an artist to make a living. It also is on many lists (along with it's bedroom communities) of one of the best places in the US to raise a family. Great schools, friendly people, 4 solid seasons, trees galore, close to all the east coast has to offer...need I go on?

Trying to launch in a new place is terrifying. Trying to do it when you're 5 months pregnant is crazy and terrifying. But, nobody ever got anywhere by being timid and not taking chances. Huge leap of faith, but so far we are absolutely loving it. Just trying to get the business rolling now!

If you're in the Charlotte area we would love to meet up with any local designers! If you need any design work don't hesitate to ask!

More in the next post about our current projects! Stay tuned friends!