Baby nursery turned toddler's room

It's been quiet some time since I last posted here due to life being so crazy full with work, home, and a toddler to run after.

I've posted before about the design of my baby's , Farida, nursery which was featured on Apartment Therapy in multiple posts you can take a look at them here; Nursery, Take 2 Wall Decal, Nursery Tour, and Featured on Apartment Therapy

But what do you do when this teeny tiny little bundle of sweet joy

Turns into this cheeky run around 2 year old toddler

The transformation in just two years is crazy, right?! where did the years go!

So what happens when your child grow? optimally their nursery/room should be designed to grow with them, which is what I had in mind when I first designed Farida's nursery.

Her cot bed is from Mamas & Papas and it's designed to be used from birth until 3 years old. It has 3 different mattress levels for while your baby grow and then it completely transforms into a toddler's bed once your toddler can climb out of bed, which is why I had to transform it one day as I woke up to Farida walking into my room at 5am! I moved the foot stool poof and the sheepskin to her bed side so that I can read her a story while sitting on the poof and so that she has something soft to step on when she get out of bed.

The cotbed at the lowest mattress level

The cot bed once transformed into a toddler bed 

We made a big deal of how grown Farida is and that she got her own new big girl bed so that she wouldn't be scared of sleeping in it. Unfortunately the only problem now is that whenever Farida switches sleep cycles and finds herself awake she gets out of bed and wanders into my room...multiple times a night sometimes which is very exhausting...trying to find a solution for her waking up a lot and requesting milk to go back to bed. She has been a great sleeper since before she was 1 and even now when I put her down in bed at 8, I tuck her in with a bottle of milk and read her two sleep story books with the lights off and I simply kiss her goodnight and walk out of the room and she sleeps on her own- it sometimes takes her walking out of the room a few times requesting "more milk, potty, just walking out" and me getting her what she wants and then tucking her back in bed and then she is down for the night before she starts waking up.

I heard of a toddler's "ok to wake" clock but I don't know if it is worth a try, if you did try it I'd appreciate the insight.

The bookcase that I got for the room from IKEA is being put to great use, it stores her ever growing collection of books and toys.

The new purchases for the room are the following as shown below;

FLISAT kids table & Mammut children's stools where she can color (Farida loves coloring and crafting with all sorts of mediums, needless to say I keep all of her supplies and colors out of sight so that she doesn't color over all of the walls) or play with puzzles. The great thing about this table is that it has two tucked in baskets that you can use to store toys and colors.

Mala Easel which Farida loves to color all over with chalks and then enjoys wiping everything off just as much :) (yeay me!)

The DUKTIG kitchen set with all the trims which Farida absolutely LOVES and enjoys playing with (she loves it even more when I fill the little pots and pans with cocoa puffs and ask her to cook them and she starts transferring them from one pot to the other)

The beautiful thing about this kitchen that I need to add is the fact that it could be set to have 3 different heights depending on your child's height. If you do not add the plastic caps to the feet of the kitchen then it's at it's shortest. Then if you add the caps in a certain direction its a little higher, and if you flip the cap over and insert it the height is at it's highest. This is the middle height shown in the photo of  Farida's kitchen

Farida gets a lot of structured play at nursery so I wanted to make sure her room was setup to help her have free play and role play as much as she'd like.

Family Room/ Play Room/ Laundry Room, a project by me

I'd like to bring to you the latest project I've worked on. This was a challenging project as the client had a very short period of time to execute it (It was done in 10 days), The budget was very limited, and the room needed to function as a Laundry room, Play room, and a Family room due to a baby being born into the family about 2 years earlier- now a toddler who needs her own informal space to play and thrive in.

The design needed to be functional, kids friendly, spacious looking, and colorful while serving all purposes.

The family wanted to conceal all of the laundry appliances, baskets, ironing table, and drying rack when not used and thus I designed a custom aluminum closet with perforations to allow the humidity to escape. The closets were made to match the existing wall to wall, floor to ceiling aluminum closets used for storage along the wall.

The walls needed a lot of work as it had a lot of cracks, peeling plaster, and leakage marks so we had some plaster work to be done that was then followed by primer and a beautiful sky blue paint.

The dining table and chairs were already in the house, we just moved them over from another space in the villa so that they serve a better purpose in this room.

A TV is supposed to be hung on the wall above the white side-board.

Colored Initial Plan

Custom Aluminum Closet Design

Custom Aluminum Closet

Balcony Revival, a project by me

Hi Everyone, I'm finally getting to actually sharing my space with you guys. I know I promised to do that long time ago, but I'm getting too caught up in the little details to start sharing just yet. So I decided to share one space at a time!

We never used the little balcony which is in one of our 3 bedrooms ever since we moved into our first apartment in September after our wedding. It was so hot that we never actually even opened the sliding doors because the Air conditioners were on all the time. Once the winter in Doha started though, my husband started day dreaming about having a nice balcony and I was day dreaming about trying out my green thumb.

I had to get a maid to clean out the balcony, it was so dirty- I don't think anyone cleaned it ever since the building was built!- that I didn't even know what type of flooring laid underneath the layers of dust and dirt and then planning commenced!

These pictures were taken during mid cleaning, it was much much worse than that. I didn't know if I had terrazzo tiles or ceramic tiles laying under the dust, to my surprise it had ceramic tiles just like the ones inside the house! 

I took measurements and logged onto the best website ever, IKEA of course! and started shopping around for items that would work within my space, I knew I needed storage for all the plants care tools and items and outdoor equipment and that I wanted plants to be able to vertically grow (climbing plans and shelves for pots to go on) and that I had very limited space so furniture size mattered big time here. I chose the furniture and did the layout as per the furniture measurements.

My husband liked these floor decking tiles that we saw at IKEA once so I did a tile layout just to know how many tiles I needed.

I then went to IKEA for a shopping spree and got everything on my shopping list+some candles and garden lanterns and all the furniture pieces were assembled and in place! my husband and I spent the following days having every cup of coffee, breakfast, dinner there, we loved it. It had transformed so much although it was still pretty bare.

The next weekend my husband and I took off to the plants shop near the whole sale market and picked and choose plants and flowers to go in our balcony and had them arranged in the pots right there. I also picked up some seeds which I should get to planting right now so that I don't miss the season! I got cherry tomatoes and some herbs to try and see if I have a green thumb!

All the plants and lanterns went into place and the place turned into a mini oasis! we are absolutely smitten and in love with our little balcony/garden for two and we are keeping our plants company by being in that balcony on almost daily bases.

So what do you think? have you had any green thumb experiences lately? tried yourself at landscaping or got someone to redo your garden, balcony, outdoor space? share your ideas, comments, and photos with us!

The IKEA Malm Dresser Glam-a-fied

Hey Y'all,

This is my first ever DIY project, if it justifies as one in terms of size of the "project". I've always pondered while reading DIY blogs and pinned and saved projects that I wanted to do myself but it's always been a hard thing to achieve due to me living in Doha and believing I lack the craftsmanship.

The living in Doha part has to do with the fact that there aren't flea markets that sell used furniture that you can puff up, and even if you had something and wanted to work on it, a lot of the items that you need to re-upholster or re-finish a piece aren't necessarily available in Doha, Qatar to the comment customers, as oppose to contractors who buy them from outside of Qatar, and if they happen to be available in Doha the overhead cost just doesn't justify the project and you'r just better off buying a new piece all together which feeds the vicious cycle of high consumer-ship (is that ever a word?!) in Qatar.

Anywhooo, IKEA opened in Qatar, and I previously mentioned- I believe- how much I wanted to go there and check it out and buy things from IKEA because I LOVED it from other countries where I've visited it and couldn't wait for it to finally open and when it did the timing couldn't have been more perfect because I was getting married!

Getting married to me meant leaving my parents' home, my one and only home, and move out to a new flat that I rented with my husband in Doha. We shopped all around for our furniture and furnishings and as our living/ dining happen to be highly eclectic, our bedroom is very much "modern glam" if I may call it that.

I got my bed from Bombay at The Mall in Doha, an amazing tufted winged purple headboard+mattress&box for a great price- I will show case it properly in a later post I promise-, custom closets, custom curtains, parquet flooring, a venetian mirror from Life Style at City Center- it was on sale! :D- and the rest was all IKEA (MALM Dressers, MALM Dressing Table, MALM Night Stands, and IKEA Pendant light and table lamps).

I had sketched out a general layout of how I wanted my bedroom furniture to be distributed and then began a furniture hunt.

Before I began furniture hunting I looked at colors and finishes and decided to go with this color palette for the bedroom, I knew I wanted to add white to it though and brushed brass for accents and hardware

So I saw this piece

The Malm dresser at Ikea, and it was a good height (the AC would be right on top of it) but it was too narrow and lets face it, I wanted more drawers than just that so I bought two and pushed them together opposite to my bed. It was too bleh though and I wanted to add a spark to it. I thought adding handles would make it look busy and redundant so instead I decided to go with an alternative solution.

I decided to paint the gap lines between the drawers a matt brushed gold color to accentuate it's geometric design, for those who know me, you know how much I like straight lines in design. 

These are the items and tools I used (bought in Doha);

- tin disposable plates. (from the super market.)

- masking tape. (from Jarir but available elsewhere)

- 1/4" paint brush. (from Jarir but you can find it at an array of shops.)

- small paint roller. (I bought mine from Jarir but you can find it at other places.)

- sanding paper (from Jarir but you can buy it from carrefour and a lot of other places too.)

- Folk Art acrylic paint bottles suitable for all purposes in Gold, it didn't need a primer nor a finishing layer from any other products. (from Jarir bookstore)

- foam sheets for protection (I used the ones which came in the packaging from IKEA, you can use newspapers or anything else that you have handy)

So, first thing to do was for me to remove all of the drawers (If I'm you I'd choose to do this in a place where you haven't just installed parquet flooring and had other furniture around, choose an empty place and do it there.

second thing to do was to decide which areas I wanted to paint I was initially thinking of painting all the way to the edge of the dressers but then figured out the outer frame protrudes beyond the dresser and it would have made it look weird so I stuck to the gaps between the drawers.

then I dusted the dressers, they were straight out of the box so really they were clean, if it's an old piece that you have I'd do more cleaning.

and then I started sanding, yeap sanding, the paint off. 

taking into consideration that I wanted to paint a white dresser a darker tone I didn't have to get rid of the underneath color completely I just wanted to roughen the surface enough for the paint to adhere to it and get rid of any dirt (if you are painting over old paint or a dark color you do need to sand it completely off)

keep in mind that sanding produces a lot of dust, thats why you need to do it in a well ventilated preferably exterior area.

once done with the sanding you need to wipe the entire dresser clean again and make sure there aren't any little pieces or chips of the sanded paint sticking out.

then you start taping everything and anything that is close to what you are painting but will not be painted with masking tape making sure to have straight clean edges for the area that you are going to paint.

then, you should really do this step first, my mind was all scrambled when I was working on this project, I had workers in the flat assembling things and delivering things and it was Ramadan so doing this between (wedding planning- home furnishing- fasting-iftar-and a full time job) is a huge accomplishment, do I hear a woot woot?

ps: put down as much protective coverage as you can not as you think you need because believe me, the paint will get to the weirdest of areas.

ok so this is what you should have before you start painting+ extra floor protective coverage

1 problem I faced and will soon undo- I should have known better!- is, paint peeling off of the kick plate.

The Kick Plate - Before Painting

Never ever try to paint any piece of furniture or part of a piece that is covered with laminate. Ikea are perfect when it comes to this they tell you exactly what parts are painted and what parts are fiber board with a laminate cover on such as the kick plate.

Acrylic paint doesn't normally stick to laminates, it needs special preparation for it to do that and it's highly unrecommended but I insisted and tried and the result was that the golden paint pealed off like a sticker at the corners of the kick-plate.

so now comes the cool and messy part The Painting. I poured a good amount to cover the bottom of the disposable plate, not too much. I used two so that if I had excess paint on the roller I can roll it off in the other one.

and then I started painting, the color was perfect for me when I saw it in Jarir, it's got a golden leaf kind of feel, antique-ish brushed brass sort of.

I have a few don'ts for you here;Do not put too much paint on the rollerDo not expect the first coat to be perfectDo not press too hard on the roller or paint will ooze out and you will have runs

just keep on painting until you have covered all the areas you wanted and use the 1/4" paint brush to get paint into the little corners.

adjust the protection lay down as you go

After the first coat you should get something that looks like this.

paint will not be even in the first coat, I did about 3 coats until I was happy and as paint dries it will dry unevenly and you will see some areas darker than the others. leave the dresser alone and check on it again in a day once it's all dried out and then you can put your second coat and so on.

ps: see how the masking tape is protecting the edges of each dresser? aren't you happy you took the time and taped all that off.

Send us pictures of DIY paint projects that you've worked on and we will share them on our page, show us what you've learned and what you've used and give us any tips that you've learned in the process.

one thing that you must do between coats and at the end is clean your brush and roller otherwise once the paint dries in it's going to be a hard task to get it all off.

once the paint dried out 1 day after I've painted my last coat I removed the masking tape and sled the drawers back into place and ta da.

It wasn't a huge transformation but for me it was just what I needed to customize the dressers and make them mine rather than "Ikea's"

I painted an IKEA dresser because it was cheap and if I had any problems with it, in other words completely trashed it for some reason, I can buy a new one. Please do not try to personally paint a Baker dresser unless you are a trained professional confident craftsman who have done this kind of work for years. 

Thanks for tuning in! I will show you what other little changes I applied to create a difference in my apartment and I promise I will do a house tour of my place once I'm finally settled down from the Wedding/Honeymoon/Back to reality Marathon.

If you ever do and photograph a DIY project that you did, send it to me and I will share it here and on my facebook page. 

See you in another DIY post! 

IKEA Opening in Doha Soon!

For a person like me who's engaged to get married, the opening of IKEA in Doha can't come soon enough!

I'll be starting a family; getting my own place and furnishing it as a bride-to-be and an interior designer. If you thought it was hard for you, think again! it's super hard when a designer is designing for themselves...on a budget.

IKEA is opening on the 11th of March in Doha as the first shop to open in the Doha Festival City project on North Road.

For all of you planning to remodel or furnish a new home, you should wait until IKEA opens and definitely check it out.

IKEA is well known for its affordable prices, beautiful designs which are highly customizable, and brilliant services.

Also a really nice in-house restaurant which serves mouth watering dishes.

I will leave you with the link of the IKEA current catalog and the announcement of the opening as it showed on Doha News.

Ikea Catalog Page

Doha News, IKEA Opening 11th March in Qatar