The Girls’ Room Reveal

Welcome to the girls’ room!

Remember how it used to look like this?

And now it looks like this?

Good times. Clearly this before + after is looooong overdue.

(If you really want, you can check out an entire post of what it looked like when we moved in. Three words for you: bloody baby hands.)

Now that I think about it, I’m not sure I’ve ever done a full before + after of any room in the house. At least not one once I’ve considered the room “done.” It’s not perfect by any stretch. I’ve been waiting to share all kinds of house photos until the place is spotless and there are no outstanding project to wrap up…but that’s not likely. We live here, y’all.

And anyway, isn’t this blog supposed to be about REAL LIFE? Why do we all get sucked into that idea that our homes have to be perfect to be shared? That’s hardly realistic.

So this is what the girls’ room looks like on a good day. It’s mostly picked up, their beds are made, things are crooked and crowded, and it’s perfectly imperfect.

(Don’t mind Ryan photobombing several of these shots. He likes to hang out in there whenever he can. Dang little brothers…)

One of our more recent projects was replacing the carpet in the girls’ room. It was old, stained, and not a color I would’ve chosen. To keep things cohesive, we decided to do the same wood floor in all three bedrooms.

Unfortunately, the wood we’d used in the master bedroom way back in 2012 was no longer available. A similar option—same stain, longer thinner planks—was, though, so that’s what we used. And this time we planned ahead and bought enough for both remaining bedrooms.

Have we even started on the third one yet? No. We’ll get there eventually. Progress is slow but it’s happening.

After tearing up the carpet, we scraped the popcorn off the ceiling and painted it flat white and replaced the old boob light with a ceiling fan fixture. Then we installed the wood floor, replaced and painted baseboards, and brought in a new “bunk bed.”

Technically it’s just a loft bed with a mattress on the floor underneath. The kids LOVE it, though, and I’m not as nervous about them all playing up there as I would be if it were a full sized bunk. Less distance to fall when it inevitably happens, right?

One of these days all three kids will have matching quilts. I finished Mila’s quilt top ages ago and have fabric for the other two. I just haven’t made time to put them together. Maybe I should do that before they all graduate high school?

The bookshelves used to the be in the corner of the living room. When I put together my little work nook last year, I moved them out. Turns out they’re just the right size to flank the tall window in there.

And no, they do not always look like this. Only when I get tired of the mess and go a little crazy cleaning + organizing in there.

It’s a small space and kind of an awkward one. With the big window at one end and the closets at the other, there’s only so many furniture layouts possible. However, there’s more than enough room for what they need. A place to store dress-ups. Corners to read in. Shelves to keep LEGO creations.

Plus plenty of details that make my heart happy.

What am I going to do when they start having opinions and won’t let me decorate their room how I want?

What if they want hideous posters and obnoxious colors and think their old mobile is babyish and stupid?

I guess we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.

There are worse things than kids with opinions, even if they are terrible ones.

Sources:

Loft bed: this loft bed and these mattresses from Amazon

Dresser: Walmart (I’d link to it but I hate it and can’t in good conscience recommend it to anyone. Someday I’ll upgrade it to something that doesn’t try to fall apart every time you touch it.)

Rug: this rug in 6’7″ by 9′ and a non-slip rug pad from Wayfair

Bookshelves: Billy series from IKEA

Curtains: no longer available (but these are similar) and these liners from IKEA, plus pompoms I hot glued to the edges

Literary art: Alice in Wonderland, cut from this coloring book / Wizard of Oz / Neverland / The Little Prince, cut from a thrifted copy of the book / Narnia

Travel embroidery: The Kitschy Stitcher

Let me know if there are other things you want sources on. Lots is homemade or old, so I may not have info but can try to help you find similar pieces.

All photos by Kylie Pond Photography