my new 'office'

Last week, in a week of heavy writing deadlines and other such things, i got this wild and crazy idea that i needed an office.  right now.  let me back up--we've never had the space to dedicate to an offic or anything, so a desk has always been in our bedroom (didn't like) or in our dining room (didn't like that, either).

i decided that i would move the desk into what was Lily's room, and then Calvin's room (though it was still pink and purple) and that Calvin would be happy sleeping upstairs 'with the big kids.'  then we'd all be happy, right?  oh, i tried it almost a year ago! Fail!

i bought the paint the next day--picking colors that surprised me even (hello--brown??), and started painting.

in the midst of this i'm still working like crazy on writing deadlines and did i mention, we're switching from a pc to a mac?  i guess i know that i work better under pressure, so i was on fire.

today i got the finishing touch, a rug, so it's pretty much done aside from some finishing quarter round that may or may not get done this year.  here we go....

Before:

one end of the room

the other end.  what a mess!

getting prepped to paint

computer desk in the dining room

After:

the 'office' side

the playroom side

my music and files and some books, etc.

one of my favorite quotes, "here's to the crazy ones"

Yay, I feel like a pro now!

re-arranging

The other night it was just me and the little 2, and I got the urge to move our computer desk from the dining room into Lily's room, which is right off the dining room, and have a little craft/computer room.

I envisioned putting it here where the dresser is, and moving the dresser up to Grace's room.  Grace's room has 2 twins, one of which will be Lily's eventually.  Right now, though, Lily is sleeping in Eric's bottom bunk. 

I also thought I'd move this craft cabinet into Lil's room and make a space for doing art projects that don't involve the dining room table...

So the fun began.  I found that I couldn't fit the desk through the doorway, no matter how I turned it.  I ended up removing the door, which was tremendously HEAVY, being solid wood and 7 feet tall.

I got the desk into 'the spot.'  It looked awful there.  Funny how a good idea in my head can look soooo bad in real life.  I thought 'I have done all.that.work for nothing.'  But then, how would I have known had I not tried?  I did get a lot of dusting done.  Organizing, too, so that was very good.

And Lil and Calvin had the best time playing in/around the desk, when I wasn't moving it around.

I got the craft cabinet moved in.  It looks pretty good there, I think.

THEN, I decided to move Calvin's crib out from our room into the space where I had wanted to put the desk.  It fits!   And here's a quandary...I think I'll leave the lilac and white stripe on the walls, but I want to paint over the pink.  All I can come up with is some variation of green, but then I have a green bedroom, green kitchen, green garage, green bedroom (well, half green) for Grace, and I want to paint the dining room some shade of green potentially.  I think that's Too Much Green.  Maybe I'll do this room green and the dining room something else.  Something funky.  Hmmm.  Any thoughts are welcome!

I really like this area here.

And here's our coffee table turned art table (which WILL be painted I'm sure).  It wasn't as long as I hoped (craigslist buy) but I liked the bottom shelf and the drawer.

So now this is Calvin's room/craft room.  We'll see how this works out!