A Room Of My Own

We all know that for a woman's well-being and mental maintenance it is important she have a room of her own (see Virginia Woolf). I might be slightly antagonizing the underlying feminist idea by having my room be a craft haven, but I don't care! Over the last few weeks, the little box room in my house has been cleared and completely renovated!

I had been looking forward to this, but after an initial bout of DIY madness when we first moved into our home 5 years ago, Marco and I had grown tired of spending our weekends at the home improvement store or wielding tools, so this room ended up the last largely unfinished area and was abused as storage. I did have a desk in there, but because I did not feel a lot of love for this space yet, it was always really, really untidy. I do not know how I deserve Marco's generosity, because unlike me and my domain, he will not have a boys' room. But I guess because I will spend so much time in the craft room once it is finished, the rest of the house will pretty much be his!

So the first daunting task was to establish whether or not the floor was still there, and clearing out the mess. I salvaged anything that was useful and stored it in the guest room (I know I just shifted the problem to another space, but it will be dealt with once the craft room is ready for me to move in!). Anything else filled one big garbage bag.

It was an amazing improvement already to be able to move around freely without stepping on stuff or boxes collapsing on top of you!

The cupboard in this room used to hold the massive pleistocene boiler before we replaced it with a newer model when our kitchen and bathroom were being done. Behind the boiler was this amazing vintage kids' wallpaper with bunnies and ducks partaking in all kinds of pastimes. The wallpaper looks like it was handprinted. Even though I stripped the rest of the room of its textured vinyl, this remnant of another time will stay!

Mae is not yet sure what she thinks of the renos, but Missy quickly discovered that she can jump out the open window onto the roof over our front door, from where she can watch the going-ons in our street. It took her slightly longer to figure out how to get back in, but she has mastered that move too now. But there may have been an attempted rescue mission involving a ladder before she finally switched her brain on....

It did not take very long to strip the walls, mostly due to the fantastic steamer we have. And in addition to getting rid of the textured paper on the walls, it felt like spending a few hours in a Turkish bath!

After the walls were bare, I sanded and painted all the wooden surfaces, including the window, the skirting boards and the built-in cupboards. It was ever so gratifying to look at all the pristine white after the job was done.

Then we put wallpaper on again. I picked a really lush design of branches and cherry blossoms on a black background. It's very boudoir, but looks amazing. I bought the wallpaper a long while back when it was on sale, because I just loved the pattern, and that caused a bit of a panic when we realized that we were about half a length short on the final piece! Predictably, the shop I had bought it at did not carry it anymore, but I found a few websites that were still selling the design. Never mind that that one additional roll cost as much as the three other ones together. Lesson learned: never buy wallpaper on a whim when you only have a guesstimate of the actual room size!

While I love a bit of DIY (when it does not drag on for months and months and months). my husband can only cope with it with the help of many a swear word and the occasional sip from a beer bottle! I am so grateful that he was willing to help with everything, though! Yesterday he spent his entire day off work sanding the floorboards after replacing a few faulty ones in my room and our upstairs hallway. Today he will do the same again, the magnificent man! He even cancelled drinks with his friend tonight to make sure he gets the job done. LOVE YOU!!!!

Apart from with my husband, I am also so in love with this room! I cannot wait to move all my things back in there and have a place for my laptop and my sewing machine and all my projects and ideas! I will keep you updated on the progress.

© Text & Photos - Annika - All The Live Long Day (unless otherwise stated).