We’ve made a few small updates to the office / bonus room over the last while and I realized I hadn’t really blogged about them, so this post is a bit of a mish-mash to bring you up to speed!
We’ve made some big changes since I last shared the progress on our office/bonus room space .
Mainly this – the addition of a murphy bed!
Back in the Fall I shared our vision for the large bonus room located on our top floor. Our plan was to transform it into an office/guest room. We also wanted space for a craft table and room to set up a games table if needed.
Here is the mood board from that post.
I’ve posted a few updates of how our double desk is evolving (here and here) and we’ve done a few more things in there too which I will post about soon, BUT back to the murphy bed.
Earlier this week I shared our guest room makeover. We had guests from England staying with us in April and needed two sleeping quarters. So, the murphy bed addition became a priority for the first part of this year.
Here is the room sketch (shared here) that shows our layout plan for the room.
And here is a pic of the room from way back in the early Fall shortly after we moved in. Basically boxes and storage at that point but with a wall ‘bump out’ that had major murphy bed potential. I will pause for a moment to see if you can guess which space I am talking about.
Okay, so now that we have that sorted, we chose our murphy bed. We did a lot of research but kept coming back to styles that Costco sold. All of the reviews were good and the price seemed pretty decent for what was available. After measuring our wall, we decided to go for this configuration.
One of the main reasons we chose this option was that the shelving portion came with a cord/wire grommet. Our main phone jack is on this wall so this allowed us to keep it there and saved the trouble of rerouting it to another location. We liked the idea of the extra storage as well and the open shelving to break up what could be a dense wall of ‘closets’ otherwise. When closed, the bed looks like a large armoire or cabinet and runs along the same wall as our existing double closet in the office.
Of course I was itching to make the shelves look pretty.
I styled them pretty simply using most of what I had on hand.
Does this photo give away the fact that I am short-ish? 5′ 3″ problems Y’all. Look up, way up.
Anywho, The top shelf has some faux grass and little tin pot from Ikea. I used the same one in our guest room. Beside that is a bamboo-ish box that I’ve had for years.
The next shelf holds other items I already had, a green candle, tin pot, pear tea light holder, owl paper weight (which I think is older than I am since I’ve had it for as long as I can remember – seriously, I had it in my childhood. I wonder if my parents even know I have it. I think it’s theirs.) and a photo that I took when we visited England in 2008. Ah, such good memories. This was a pub we stopped to have a drink at after going for a walk through a really cool nature reserve called Burnham Beeches (say that five times fast).
But, I digress.
Looking at the shelves that are more my, um, stature, we have this.
A stack of books topped with a decorative plate/platter…
… and a Wifi sign for guests.
I’ve made this a free printable download if you’d like one as well.
Simply click here to access it.
On the bottom shelf we have our phone, another faux ikea plant and pot, another little tray and some random green ‘ball’. I have no idea where I got it but I’ve found a surprising number of uses for it. (weird).
There is also another England photo tucked back there. This one was from our lunch stop after touring Windsor Castle. Memoriiiieees…
The hanging sign reads “Dedicated To Life, Liberty, Food, Drink and Other Less Serious Matters”. Amazeballs.
(I added that last word. It was my reaction to the awesomeness).
BUT, I digress again.
The bedding was a birthday present. It is this one here (Bjornloka from Ikea).
And, like I mentioned in the guest room post, I like to have fresh towels and a guest basket out to make our visitors feel extra special… and welcome.
I always like to customize the gift basket (versus having just a generic one) for who is staying. I put two waters out if it is more than one person, kids toothpaste and toothbrushes if there are kids etc. It’s the little things that make guests feel like you are really glad they are staying with you (I think).
So, there we are! And how does the bed work? Well, take a peek…
(note: the .gif is absent of guest because apparently having a tripod with a camera on it in the corner of the ‘bedroom’ is frowned upon when entertaining. Ask me how I know.)
I joke. I joke.
Stay in touch and follow along…
Happy Monday! I hope you all had a great weekend. Ours was nice – full of running errands, play dates and visits. Just the way I like it 🙂
You may recall from my “settling in” update a few months after we moved, that our spare room was this hot mess.
Well, I’m happy to report that… well, it still looks like this. Okay, so maybe I’m not so happy to report that…
BUT – we have a plan! Or (more accurately), it’s a “we-have-family-coming-from-England-this-Spring-and-I-will-not-subject-them-to-the-room-in-this-state-so-did-something-about-it-PLAN”.
After some thinking and browsing I came up with a direction for our guest room. I wanted it to be calming and inviting. I also wanted to use our existing dressers and bed since we already own those. Â So, I set off in search of things that could make my vision happen.
I whipped up a mood board this weekend and thought I’d share!
1 – curtains: I loved these ones for their calming grey and blue pattern. I also thought these colours complimented the birch toned Ikea dressers that we already own. A dark curtain rod will play nicely (good curtain rod) with our existing headboard and the light fixture hardware/details.
2 – light fixture: so much prettier than our 1990’s boob light. Just so much prettier… And softer. And prettier. And nicer. And prettier.
3 – Art: not this one necessarily but something photographic, abstract or painted that has colours tying the room elements together.
4 – bedding: Yes please! This was the first thing I chose  for the room and then picked the others items to compliment. I loved the pattern, the colour and the price. Score.
5 – our existing Ikea Malm dressers. We have two back from the days of Chace’s nursery (sniff). I’d like to update the dresser by doing little leather pulls in white (similar to the inspiration photo in the circle)
6 – bedside table: something like this one perhaps?
7 – paint. I plan on painting a light grey or blue shade.
I haven’t purchased any of these items yet but this is my plan! And in the wise words of Mike Tyson (according to my google search) “Everyone has a plan ’till they get punched in the mouth.” So, let’s hope I don’t get punched in the mouth. At least not before I can make this happen. And then after that too. Why would anyone want to get punched in the mouth?
Have a punch-free Monday everyone.
Stay in touch and follow along…
bathrooms, bedrooms, dining room, entryway, Family Room, Garden, guest room, Home & Garden, kitchen, Living Room, office, playroom, rec room
Settling in
bathrooms, bedrooms, dining room, entryway, Family Room, Garden, guest room, Home & Garden, kitchen, Living Room, office, playroom, rec room
So this happened
We bought a house. Specifically, this one.
Backing up a bit, we really enjoyed our townhome but it was time for a change. More space, more privacy and NO strata. We wanted to move before Chace got older as we didn’t want to change his little world mid-grade three (he just finished Kindergarten). So, we made the leap and listed our townhome.
The good news is that it sold in a day – with three offers which created a bidding war. The bad news, we didn’t have anywhere to move to! The market in our area dictated this plan of attack as places for sale were going into multiplle offers and if you had “subject to sale of our place” in your offer, you might as well not even bother.
Long story short after a few panic attacks from me and some serious market stalking, we purchased the above home which met most things on our wish list. We did have to compromise on a few things but we ended up with a few bonus things that more than made up for it.
We take possession this Saturday! I couldn’t wait to share with you all though so here are the photos from the listing (as we saw it). I also put together a little floor plan of each level. They won’t be completely accurate as I was going off memory and the specs on the listing sheet, but you will get the idea I’m sure!
Main level:
entry
living room
dining/living room
dining room
kitchen – what will Chef Kev dream up here?
kitchen/family room
family room
(future) playroom!
powder room
laundry
Here is the main floor layout to give you an idea of where these spaces are in relation to one another…
top level:
looking down towards the front entry
master bedroom
master bathroom
the other two bedrooms (Chace’s and a spare – TBD which is which!). We’re going to let Chace choose on moving day.
“Bonus room” – future craft room/office area
top floor bathroom
top floor floorplan…
basement/lower level
Down here is where we encountered one of the ‘compromises’ as mentioned above. Part of the basement is a suite which we were not looking for. However, we decided since we have more than enough space at the moment, we will leave it ‘as is’ for now and renovate in the future to make it our dream recreation room space – complete with wet bar and a bedroom/bathroom on that level. The income from the suite will allow us to do some of the updates a little sooner than we otherwise would have been able to.
First up, the current recreation room (on our side)…
And here is the suite which consists of a living space, kitchen, bedroom and bathroom (I don’t have a photo of the kitchen though).
Here is the baseement floor plan to help you visualize how it all works together…
Last but not least, our backyard. This was another area where we had to compromise. We had dreams of a large backyard but reality told us that the house we wanted, with a big yard, was not in our budget. The fact that this particular house had been nicely updated, was in a great neighbourhood, backed onto a greenbelt and (total bonus) was only a few houses away from the elementary school that Chace will attend made us decide this was the one.
Oh, and did I mentinon that the school is adjacent to a huge park which has an awesome playground and walking trails. We figured our ‘yard’ was steps away so we were covered.
We have big plans for this small space. For the whole house actually. But, we will save and tackle each project as our budget permits and I will happily post about the journey here if you’d like to follow along 🙂
the backyard…
Hello
I'm Elaine. A graphic designer, mommy, wife and blogger. I have trouble sitting still and am always looking for a project. Follow along as I post about life – in a pretty and creative way of course.