I’ve had a lot of people asking what home improvements we’ve been doing and I have to be honest, they were at a standstill for a while. Between our Florida trip, kids in school, replacing the roof, enduring some long lasting morning sickness, and Jack’s multiple work trips, I haven’t been doing anything major (does anyone want to see pictures of some of the trim I painted…?). Now that I the timing is right, I decided we should finish the office.
Remember our Indiana home tour? The office is a quaint little space off the living area. It was dark, covered in scraps of wallpaper, with a rough, poorly done ceiling texture. I painted it pretty quickly to take care of any lingering smoke smell, then, it kind of became our black hole of clutter…
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| It’s easy to forget a mess when you’re not staring at it. |
The kick in the bum to get the office done came when a friend who was moving offered us some lovely office furniture to replace our hand-me-down, well-used office desk. We picked it up but I refused to put it in until everything else was done. Plus, they were really heavy and the thought of dragging huge, awkward things up the stairs always makes me procrastinate.
First, we took care of the ceiling. I smoothed out the roughest peaks with drywall putty, then we used the same planks that we’d put in our master bath (which also had the horrible ceiling texturing). It was slow going, as ceiling work is, but once it was done, it looked fantastic.
Then, it was time for the floor. The poor parquet flooring had been pretty worn down from about forty years of use. So, I rented a floor sander and–lucky me!–I ended up getting it for free because the person before didn’t clean it out and the store didn’t catch it, which they compensated me for monetarily. I am always up to saving money if all I need is a little elbow grease. Once the floor was a clean slate, I decided to stain it to give it a little color.
And voila! All I needed to do was the trim and some touch-up paint. Oh, and get that heavy furniture up the stairs. I solved that problem by feeding the missionaries from church some dinner and when they asked if we needed any help with anything, I casually mentioned the desk waiting downstairs. Five minutes later, it was up the steps. Win!
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| It’s more fun to dust when you can climb on stuff. |
I spent an hour cleaning out the old desk and putting it in the new. A lot of stuff got tossed, some treasures were found (like Dancer’s registration papers–YAY!), and now, everything looks a lot more organized.
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| Ah, creative space! |
