The Interior DIYer
DIY

One Room Challenge Spring 2022 – Week Seven!

For Week Seven of the One Room Challenge my main focus was to custom build a desk for our home office. I had an idea of what the desk was going to look like, but I was quite nervous about starting it so in typical fashion, I kept putting off starting it until this week.

I started by dismantling our old dining room table, which I had been using as a desk in our office for the past two years. I wanted to use a lot from the existing table, but I wanted to customise it to better suit the room. So I took it apart. I first took off all four legs, then the apron [and supporting hardware] along each side. I’ve always loved the shape of the legs and the apron detail, and I love reusing things I already have at hand, so this was the perfect project.

Hello, internet! Here’s a wildly unflattering photo of me hunched over our dining table. Enjoy!

I also had ordered two EKBACKEN white marble effect laminate countertops from IKEA [to be delivered! Did you know you can save your marriage by ordering IKEA to be delivered? It can cost between $39 – $49 depending on the items, but if you know exactly what you need and you value your sanity, you can easily order them for delivery]. These were going to be the desk tops to my Franken-desk.

I measured the right section of desk to 7 feet long, square it off and cut it at a 45 degree angle.

At the same time, I measured the height of the table legs and added wooden supports at the same height along the walls to rest the desk tops along as well as to secure the desk to the wall [I’ve included a photo at the end to show from underneath what the desk looks like secured to these].

I painted the legs and apron pieces in 2 – 3 coats of Coal Black paint by Fusion Mineral Paint. I love this paint so much and have used it on countless projects. I immediately knew I’d be painted the legs in this favourite paint of mine.

Once they were dry, I attached the legs and aprons to the underside of the desk top using a mix of brackets and existing hardware from the old dining table [seen below].

I then flipped the desk over and with help from Robert, got the desk in place. He held the desk still while I secured it to the wall using more of those metal brackets [while I was drilling in the screws the desk would resist and move up and down, so I definitely needed a second pair of hands holding the desk still and making sure it didn’t jump too much].

I’m ridiculously pleased with how it turned out. It doesn’t look too Frankenstein-ed and looks quite professional if I may say!

The Week-Seven-panic has set in and I’m in a mad dash to make it to the finish line. Luckily, I’m not alone as my fellow ORC Guest Participants get the last few projects done this week. I’ve chipped away at my to-do list, but I’ve come to terms with the fact that some aspects of my home office won’t be finished on time for the big reveal next week, and after a lot of panic, I’ve come to terms with the room not being completely ready and I’m okay with that.

What I did manage to achieve this week was pretty good, meaning I don’t have too much left:

ORC SPRING 2022 TO-DO LIST:
– Skim coat / patch ceiling
– Skim coat / patch walls
– Paint ceiling
– Paint walls
– Replace / upgrade banister at top of servants stairs
– Update and reinstall handrails
– Repaint stairs [not super necessary, but I might as well]
– Install desk system
– Update secondhand tufted office chair
– Source chandelier / remove the boob light
– Source storage cabinet[s] for office items
– Possibly source and hang curtains [not sure though for either window]
– Decorate / hang artwork / overkill the space

Week One – Week Two – Week Three – Week Four – Week Five
Week Six – Week Seven – Week Eight

DIY

One Room Challenge Spring 2022 – Week Three!

Week Three can be a fun week for many people undertaking the One Room Challenge. I say ‘fun’ in massive exaggerated italicized letters. It’s when little problems come sneaking out of the literal and figurative woodwork. Week Two lures you into a false sense of confidence. Week Three makes you question why you even decided to improve your home.

It wasn’t all bad though. I finally finished the ceiling! Considering the amount of work that went into updating the ceiling to make it look like a … ceiling … is very anti-climactic, but it’s finished!

The above photo is what the ceiling looked like when I was finished flattening [levelling? repairing?] the ceiling [you can see what I mean by flattening in my Week Two blog post].

I ended up doing three coats of paint and the ceiling looks miles better [below is showing only one coat]. I actually didn’t get the ceiling looking as perfect as I had wanted it to, but I could easily see myself spending all eight weeks of this just sanding small patches of ceiling and adding “just one more layer!” of pollyfilla. So I decided it’s an old house and has character, and accepted it’s little quirky bits. Because otherwise I would have driven myself insane.

I haven’t finished flattening [again, levelling? I’m unsure of the correct terminology here] all the walls in the office just yet [by using the same treatment as the ceiling, but I have finished repairing the tape on two walls, so I jumped in and started to paint.

PLOT TWIST: I bought the wrong paint finish. Welp. Don’t ask me why, but I bought eggshell finish paint instead of matte paint, so all the tiny imperfections I’ve been working so hard to hide are now essentially in 3D thanks to the eggshell finish. But all is not lost. I’m going to continue painting the room [as I bought 3.75L of eggshell paint] in two coats of paint, I’ll lightly sand the walls, wipe it down, then paint one coat of matte paint of the same colour on top [I’ll detail this further in next week’s blog post, as I will have hopefully finished the steps by then].

I’m not the only one running into difficulty when it comes to Week Three, as you can see by all the other Guest Participants here. It’s a good week to check out if you find you have some time to browse everyone’s progress as there are big changes across the board. I’m also slowly making my way through my to-do list. I’m hoping to have at least two more items crossed off my list by Week Four:

ORC SPRING 2022 TO-DO LIST:
– Skim coat / patch ceiling
– Skim coat / patch walls
– Paint ceiling
– Paint walls
– Replace / upgrade banister at top of servants stairs
– Update and reinstall handrails
– Repaint stairs [not super necessary, but I might as well]
– Install desk system
– Update secondhand tufted office chair
– Source chandelier / remove the boob light
– Source storage cabinet[s] for office items
– Possibly source and hang curtains [not sure though for either window]
– Decorate / hang artwork / overkill the space

Week One – Week Two – Week Three – Week Four – Week Five
Week Six – Week Seven – Week Eight

Bedroom

Cora’s Big Girl Bedroom™ makeover – moodboard and layout

I’m quite excited to share my moodboard and layout plans for Cora’s Big Girl Bedroom™ makeover. It took me about 6 months to get my head around a colour scheme, theme, and design for her room, not to mention working around the physical limitations that came with her dormer sloped ceiling [see what I mean in the before photo’s of Cora’s room here].

I took a huge amount of inspiration for Cora’s room from the dollhouse I updated and gave Cora for Christmas 2018. Mainly, the shade of green paint I used [pictured above] set the tone of her bedroom makeover.

I matched the green craft paint to the shade “Agaves Green” by Sico Paint via Rona hardware store [I feel I have to write hardware store as poor Rona has the misfortune of also being a slang term for the ongoing global pandemic. In case you needed clarification, I am not painting COVID-19 throughout Cora’s bedroom].

I decided early on that her room wouldn’t be entirely green, but half of it, similar to the little hallway I designed and coffee-stick-bead-boarded for Cora’s dollhouse [above].

Once I had the basic design figured out, it was time for the layout.

Cora’s bedroom is tiny. Like, hugely tiny. And it has the added obstacle of a dormered ceiling, plus no built-in storage, so I had to be creative [and cut-throat] with what furniture I added to her room. I measured her room and created a layout in Google SketchUp. Since there was little-to-no wiggle room when it came to space, I had to be certain the pieces of furniture fit and worked. Oh, and did I mention I sourced the furniture secondhand? If you’re new here, you may not know that I like to give myself a challenge.

So here is the basic layout I decided upon for Cora’s Big Girl Bedroom™ makeover, using an armoir and bed I sourced from Kijiji:

There was very limited options for furniture placement, so unless Cora was prepared to sleep in a bean bag or stand in the corner like a vampire, there was only the above layout option.

I also took a great amount of pleasure getting the perfect armoire for Cora’s room; I looked online for a few weeks and the armoires I found were either too wide, too deep, or too tall, which were immediately ruled out because of the dormered roof. I took my time and found the perfect armoire for $50. It fit perfectly, and I actually love the shade of wood it is, so I won’t be painting it. Just updating the hardware.

This actually won’t be Cora’s room long-term. Once Cora’s 5th birthday rolls around, baby will be 6 months old and it’ll be time for her to move into this room. Cora will be moving into our spare bedroom later this year, and just wait until you see what I have planned for that room. It will essentially be my dream childhood bedroom. No spoilers.

SOURCE LIST
– Walls “Agaves Green” by Sico Paint
– Isild female bird tray by ibride
– Needle felted pig by Felt Fauna by AC
– Bed and armoire sourced secondhand via Kijiji
– Bed painted in “Coal Black” from Fusion Mineral Paint
– Mushroom linen fitted sheet and pillowcase by Grannet Home
– Vintage porcelain pink knobs from Firstfinds