Just what is this room anyway???

When I designed the house I had a room designated as "pantry". It's a big room and has it's own closet so the architect chose to call it a bedroom - and who knows, if we're still in this house when we're 70 maybe we'll end up down here instead of climbing the stairs. But for now - it's supposed to be a pantry, or craft room, or office, or something. It seems to wear a lot of hats so finally I just decided to call it "My Room".

Not much has been done since we put up the freezer shelves, installed the door, and jammed it full of furniture. I've managed to make use of it but it frequently becomes the storage spot for whatever jobs are getting done in the house; which means it's frequently a pain in the rear to get in and out of it.

No more! I have reclaimed the room and it's going to be wonderful. First up was to find appropriate furniture for storage. I was going to have Chris build it - but that takes time and let's face it, he's got enough to do. Then I looked at IKEA and found lots of nifty stuff but that takes money and I really didn't want to spend it. Then I looked at Craig's List and found free stuff! And that made me look at my own house and I found stuff that I already owned! A big win all around.

Here's what I've got so far:

Craig's List dresser - free! (people are crazy)

Dad's no-longer-needed china hutch

Two good file cabinets made of wood, an antique Singer sewing table with drawers, two card catalog knock-offs that hold an amazing amount of small stuff, and this beauty - a massive entertainment armoire that Chris built many years ago when TV's needed a way to hide their huge backends. I was going to use it out on the Bridge but realized that it would work great in My Room instead. So we moved it downstairs (add "repair stairwell ceiling" to project list), removed the doors, back panel, and shelves, and I got to sanding and priming. Chris got to making a new back panel (so long TV air hole) and some extra shelves.

A hot mess

Priming is easier than sanding

Since this is a creative space I decided to use fun colors on the furniture (the walls will be kept neutral). Benjamin Moore to the rescue! Only in the sense that they have awesome colors in their Aura paint line, not that they gave me anything. Bummer - that stuff is expensive.

Here's a sneak peak at the first coat on the armoire. It's Fresh Cut Grass and it's awesome. Computer monitors are screwy for viewing colors so I can tell you that it's actually a very soft grellow type color. I also bought some Apple Green (same color card) to use as a door stencil. I'm not the most artistic of souls (accountant, remember? We're creative, just not that kind of creative) but I'm pretty confident I can use the wee sponge to good effect.

First coat

The fun part has been deciding where everything goes - what gets stored here versus there? And I'm still picking colors for the dresser and maybe the china hutch. I'm struggling with the hutch because the finish is gorgeous. Maybe I'll just do a pretty background cloth behind the shelves instead. Decisions, decisions, decisions. Let the fun begin!