Presto-chango.

About a month or two ago, we realized we needed to buy some new furniture. Okay, so we didn't need to buy it, but we had bought a few pieces for Jackson's room just before Cooper was born. Our plan was to, in the future, buy some other pieces so we could have a bedroom set for the two of them when they one day share a room. However, the furniture was discontinued and went on sale, so we watched it for several months, and called like crazy people once a week asking how many pieces were left in stock. Anyway, then we had to get rid of our guest room furniture. The problem is, I really like our guest room furniture. Well, I really like the fact that when I worked at Crate and Barrel, I bought it on my first day for $100. Yep, the perks of being an employee there were AMAZING. I have to say, I paid that store more way more than I made, but I got SO many great deals.
We sold the mattress, and stashed the end tables and bed around the house. The dresser is now in our master closet. I don't want to get rid of any of it, because I don't want to have to pay full price to replace it one day.
The worst part of switching the room over is losing a comfortable place for our guests to stay. We love having family (especially you, mom!) and friends come visit. But, the best part of switching the room is that I get to decorate it! I LOVE to paint. I LOVE color. Those of you who have been to our house know that it is a rainbow. Literally, we have brown, red, green, yellow, blue ...
We will NEVER sell our house. Oh well! I love the way the color makes me feel - it makes me happy to have happy colors on the walls. Maybe someone else will like it, too. We will cross that bridge when we get to it.
Back to the point of this blog - Now, if you come to stay, you get to pick top or bottom bunk! Here are some before and after pictures. We're pretty much done - but I am still trying to find the right stuff for the bathroom. I guess I will post that later :)
Normally, I would have made the curtains - or something in the room. I just happened to find bedding and curtains that really worked this time.
I do love the room, now. We use it as a play room, and there is a lot of floor space for the boys to play. The closet (which once held all of my gift-wrapping supplies and craft stuff) is now packed full of toys. Eventually, Jackson will move into it, and then Cooper will move to his room. But right now, everyone is sleeping through the night so well - I don't want to do anything to change it. Here is the before:
The curtains are probably my favorite in our house (that I made). I love the toile silk, and I actually made them relatively even (which is a rarity). I have these on a hanger in our closet - can't bear to get rid of them either. Maybe we will have a giant house one day with a room that just begs for these curtains. Right? Plus, they cost a lot. Fabric is expensive. Well, the fabric I tend to like is expensive. The dresser is from Ikea - we (meaning, colin) just added hardware. It matches perfectly with the bed/end tables.

Bedding is from Steinmart - like 5 years ago - I found it in the clearance bin. Made the toile pillows to match the curtains, and sewed the fringe on backward so looks a bit ridiculous (lesson learned). Lamps are cheap - bases from Target, and shades were from Walmart - just hot glued some black ribbon to the edges.

We picked up black frames we saw on sale for a long time after we moved in to the house. Then, we gathered lots of pictures of family and friends and had them turned into black and white and adjusted the sizes we needed. It took a bit of time to figure out which pictures were going in which frame - what size to make them, and then arrange the frames on the wall. I laid them out on the floor, and my genius husband figured out where to hang the nails and make it look nice.
Bye-bye old guest room. Hello, playroom. I'm too tired to upload more photos. I will post the after pictures tomorrow.