Junk Room to Toy Room

Once upon a time, we had a guest bedroom upstairs. We rarely have guests, so the room somehow morphed into a junk/catch all type of room. And. It. Was. Bad. The picture below was taken after we removed a queen bed out and did some cleaning. So you can imagine how much worse it was before.

In our current house, the master bedroom is in the basement. When we found out we were pregnant, I knew that we would have to move Blake out of the second bedroom downstairs so the new baby could be close to us. The big question was whether to move Blake into the spare room, or move her into Will's room. On a whim one day, I decided to move her into Will's room.

I knew as a parent that it would be easier to keep them in separate rooms. They both don't seem to sleep very well unless they are in their own rooms. However, I felt it would be good for them to share for a little while. Plus, if I put them in the same room, then it left the spare room to turn into a toy room. This idea really appealed to me because I wanted their bedrooms to be the place where the sleep and get dressed. And hopefully (crossing my fingers) having a toy room will keep the toys a little more contained and not have them constantly scattered throughout several rooms.

Sharing a bedroom has been quite an adjustment. Instead of both kids quiet and asleep between 8pm-8:30pm, there is talking, screaming, crying, things being thrown, running around, etc. It is quite a circus once the parents retire downstairs. They have been sharing a room for a few months, and it hasn't gotten much better. It was also Blake's first time in a toddler bed, so that was kind of a double transition for her. Even though it has been difficult, I am happy with the arrangement and think it is good for the kids.

Several weeks after we moved Blake upstairs, I decided it was time to get started on the toy room. I'm talking full room overhaul.

I started by emptying the room and ripping out all of the old baseboards. These baseboards weren't quite as difficult as our pantry ones, but it wasn't an easy job. They were wedged in pretty tight and it was hard to get them away from the carpet.

After a couple of hours with a hammer and pry bar, all of the baseboards were gone and I was ready to paint. Choosing paint colors was the hardest part of the entire job. I couldn't decide what I wanted. First I thought I would make it more girly and it could eventually be the girls' room. But then I ended up doing what I had planned for Will's room. I think we will use it as a toy room for a few years, then Will can move over and it can be his room.

While the paint was drying, I updated all of the old tan electrical outlets with new white ones, and I updated our light switch.

Then I started working on the baseboards and trim. I had learned a lot from Lance while doing our living room and I felt pretty confident that I could do it alone. So one day while Lance was at work, I did the baseboards. And so you can fully appreciate what that entails:

     -First I have to prime all of the wood. 

     -After it dries for several hours, I have to paint the boards. 

     -Once that is dry, I have to carefully cut each board so that it fits perfectly.

     -Then I nail them into the wall.

     -After the entire room was finished, I have to go back and spackle/putty all of the nail holes.

     -Once the putty is dry, I sand it down so that it is smooth and blends in.

     -Then I touch up the paint around every nail hole.

     -Then I caulk the edges. 

     -The caulk smears quite a bit, so once the caulk is dry, I had to repaint all the edges.

It isn't difficult, but it is definitely a process and time consuming. And because of all the waiting for different parts to dry, it takes several days/weeks.

Here is what our door looked like before.

Here is the door after I ripped out trim, painted, and replaced the light switch.

And to complete the look, I added trim, replaced the door with a newer style, and added new hardware. What a difference!

Similar with the closet. Here is the before.

I trimmed out the entire closet, put a fresh coat of paint on the doors, and added new hardware. I love the difference a little bit of trim makes.

I also wanted to add trim to the windows and get rid of the tile along the bottom.

I watched a few tutorials on YouTube and learned the most effective way to get the tile out.

So here is the window before. Plain, boring, nothing special. 

And this is what it looks like now. It makes such a statement, and I love how it turned out. 

Here is a closer view. 

Once the entire room was finished with baseboards, trim, paint, etc. it was time to work on some decorations. 

I went to Lowe's and found some cheap scraps of wood and made this railroad track to go across the bottom of one of the walls. I bought some wood for the sign, painted it, and had some vinyl cut to make the "railroad crossing" sign. 

I designed the room to have one of the walls be an "art station". I wanted a large chalkboard. They can be pretty pricey, so I decided to make one myself. I also wanted it to be magnetic, so I bought a large sheet of metal, painted it with chalk board paint, attached it to a board, then made a frame to go around the edges. 

Here is a picture of the first half of the room.

For the other half of the room, I wanted to build a little grocery store for the kids. I saw this link on Pinterest and knew it was something I could handle. 

The kids were so excited about The Market and could not wait until I finished so they could play. They immediately got some grocery bags and started filling their carts with their toy food and pretending to shop. 

Lastly came organizing the closet. Before, it was my craft area and spot to put anything I didn't want out. It wasn't exactly the easiest spot to sew or do any real "crafting". 

I moved all of my junk out and gathered all of our toys throughout the house and tried to find a place for them in the closet. 

We spent the day organizing and finishing up some last minute details. Here is the completed room.



We got some chalk and let the kids loose on their new toy room. 

So far, they are loving it. (Notice the awesome train that Will drew.)

American Fork Canyon

Last weekend, Cindy invited us to go camping. I really wanted to go, but a few days before we found out that Lance had to work on Saturday, and I didn't really want to go alone. By Friday, I wasn't looking forward to sitting home all weekend so I made a last minute decision to go with Cindy.

I spent the morning packing and getting ready, then right after lunch we made out way to Utah County. Cindy asked if I could give her a ride up to the camp site so Josh could go up earlier. When I was almost to Cindy's, I suddenly hit something ginormous in the middle of the road. My entire car shook and I heard metal crunching. I have no idea what I hit, somehow I didn't see it. After driving for a moment, I realized I should probably pull over to check out my tire.

It was completely flat. Fortunately I was less than half a mile from a Walmart and a tire shop. Not seeing many options, I slowly made my way to Walmart. Initially the guy told me that he could do a simple flat repair for $10, and I would be on my way in 20 minutes. Shortly after we started roaming the store, the guy came and found me and told me that I needed to see something. He took me back to my car and showed me my rim, which now had a huge crack in it. He told me he could put the spare on to get me to wherever I need to go get a new rim. The only place he knew that would carry that rim was a Mazda dealership.

I made my way to pick up Cindy while trying to figure out what to do. Lance called a Mazda dealership in Orem to see how much it would be to fix it. They said they didn't have any in stock and that it was about $500 for the single rim. My spare is pretty crummy and it made me really  nervous to drive very far on it. We called my brother Jimmy to see what he thought. He said I would be fine driving on it, as long as I didn't go too fast. And he thought he could find a used rim for a much cheaper price.

I decided to try not to worry about it and just enjoy a night in the mountains. We went up American Fork Canyon, up past the reservoir. We found a great spot right next to the river. The kids were quick to start exploring and playing in the dirt and water.

I didn't bring the right attachment to blow up my air mattress, so I ended up sleeping on the ground. A very rocky, uneven, ground. Plus I had two kids that wanted to sleep by me that move constantly all night. Let's be honest, it was quite miserable. My hip hurt so bad, I ended up stealing Will's pillow to try to relieve some pressure on my side. But even though I was so uncomfortable and wasn't sure I'd ever get some sleep, the night went fairly quickly and I was up and ready to be out and about. It rained a bit during the night so that morning was fairy chilly.

Shockingly, my kids slept in and were the last ones to wake up.

We sat around the fire for a little bit, letting everyone fully wake up. Then we had some breakfast and once again, the kids were off playing.

There were some large logs going across the river and the kids had fun going back and forth. Will said that his favorite thing about camping was crossing the river.

He was a little timid at first, but eventually he got the hang of it and was crossing without any problem.

Cindy also brought her four-wheeler and the kids all took turns getting rides. Blake kept asking for another ride.

If you ever need a chuckle, just ask Will to do his "chicken dance". I have no idea where he came up with it, but it's pretty awesome.

Blake was seriously a little magnet for dirt. She was covered in it. These pictures really don't do her any justice. I mean, sure, all of the kids were dirty; however, Blake was in a league of her own.

Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture before I washed her face. She had dark mud all over her face, it looked like she had a beard or something.

Normally when we hang out, Zack and Cory play together, Will and Lexi play together, and Blake just does whatever she wants. This trip, however, Will hardly ever played with Lexi and spent the whole time playing with the boys. It was really nice to see them all playing together and to finally see the girls spend some time playing.

Even thought the situation with the car put a bit of a damper on the weekend, we had a good time and are excited for our next camping adventure. The kids had so much fun and were talking about it for days.