It's the one without the tutu

The other day we were out for a family dinner and Brett took Urban to wash up.  Urban marched straight to the men's room and pushed the door open.  Brett looked at him and said, "How do you know that's the boys' bathroom?"  "Because of the picture," he answered.  "But how do you know that one is the boy?" Brett pressed.  "Because it's the one without the tutu."

Obviously.

As I sit and try to plan out my interior designs, I'm struggling with the room for my boys. We have made the decision to have them share a room because it seems to help both of them sleep through the night. It does not necessarily help them GET to sleep, I will point out, but as long as we stagger their bedtimes, it's working out pretty well.

So, now I am faced with the design problem of a somewhat-developed little man with lots of ideas, opinions and pizzazz (read: obsessed with monsters, super heroes and 80's rock) rooming with a toddler who is still developing his tastes (currently he likes food and any music with a strong beat).  I know that I don't want a theme room in the Cars/Superman/Pooh kind of way.  But I do want a fun, cool room for them.

As a family, we tend to decorate with a mish-mash of IKEA and Target finds coupled with antiques and vintage gems.  So, I think I want to have the boys' room stylistically similar.  Where do I go from here?

While researching I came across this great post from OhDeeDoh called Two's Company: Twenty Shared Kids' Rooms.

Lots of great idea here.  So, now I'm thinking maybe I focus on vintage games.  I like that it's neutral territory.  They both love games, and Daddy's an avid "Gaming Geek".  It seems perfect.  If I paint the walls a neutral light grey we can use old game boards as art and pick up lots of wonderful colors in the illustrations.  I think I'll also do a giant cropped silhouette of a spinner with big numbers in a grey 2 shades darker.  We currently have a 1963 version of CLUE, a Raggedy Ann and Andy game, Parcheesi and Candyland.  It's a nice start.

I also like the look of this bedding from IKEA. (We will have a twin-over-twin bunk on one side of the room and a twin daybed on the other.  Gotta be prepared for sleepovers, right?)  This has kind of a cool style that reminds me of game boards and hits our three top accent colors (per Urban) - green, blue and orange.

I will be refreshing my old double dresser from my high school years.  (Somehow I think my teenage creativity that translated this piece into black with teal, baby blue and white splatter paint has gone a bit too retro.)  I'm thinking of doing it white with a big silhouette of a pawn on it.

The big project will be the rug.  I plan to make a felt rug out of thick grey felt and somehow put a hopscotch grid on it in white.  Paint?  Appliqué?  Time will tell.

I hope it all comes together and the boys dig it.   It would be so easy if I could just slap up a little graphic on the door (the one without the tutu), print "BOYS" in big block letters and call it good.