Part of the reason for doing their rooms first was to help them with the move...help them feel settled after living in 3 homes in a 9 month period. In reality, they probably didn't even care or notice.
The other BIG reason, is because although my oldest is 4 years old, I have Never gotten to decorate a nursery. Sad. Parker had a closet in our first apartment in NY, and then in our second apartment, he did have a tiny room, but we just had a mini crib and his room was also the toy room and general storage room.
So decorated a room for my baby even though he is already 2 and will probably be out of a crib sooner than later. (that's why I didn't do any "real" furniture....we had the glider and the dresser came painted like that from a yard sell for $20).
I need to find a true "before" picture, but you can see some of the process here and here. I LOVE how the white wood floors turned out and the wainscoting made it feel like a completely different room. One of the many things I learned doing this room was that wood is really expensive.
One alternative I have seen for the beadboard, is this textured wall paper. I've never used it, but it seems awesome and it's on sale (I've also seen it on amazon and Lowe's website).
I'm just happy every time I walk in his room because it's nice and bright and it feels "finished"...though I'm sure I'll still make changes here and there forever.
