Playroom Shelves

I left off with my last house post talking about the boys' bathroom. It's a hard room to photograph and it's just a normal bathroom, but I still love it. This week I'll keep up upstairs and circle bath to the Bonus Room.

I shared a post about our Bonus Room, and I think I mentioned how that room was not complete. I wasn't yet happy with it. It currently serves as a play room with the majority of the toys. We used existing furniture we had, but it wasn't working. We had some wire shelving that was meant to hold storage cubes. I had cute baskets to hold toys in there, but I didn't like how it looked. It felt cluttered. And when you have lots of toys, it's hard NOT to look cluttered.

I searched for cube storage and just wasn't finding what I liked. And when I can't find something I like, I make something I like!

Mr. JCrew has an amp for his guitar, so I wanted to created something that made it looked built in to the storage area.

It started off as buying wood deep enough for the cubes. They are 13 inches square. If I bought a 12 inch piece of wood, the cube would hang off. And my first idea was to make floating shelves.

I bought the wood, stained it and bought simple brackets. I also searched for brackets I liked, but went with cheap ones I could buy in a big box store instead of a custom order. They were silver and I painted them bronze.

I used a new stain for this wood and fell in love! Best brand! I've stained before and always did a bad job. This stain covers your sins! (ha) I felt like a pro and wanted to find more projects to stain!

Once I got the shelves up, I realized I needed longer brackets to make sure the weight would hold. Even without toys on the shelf, it was already dipping forward.

I then decided to put pieces of wood on the end that I could bracket the front end of the shelf to. It would feel much sturdier. And it did!

I was hesitant to make it look like a piece of furniture when I already have a console under the TV, but it works.

And it cleans up that area much nicer. Looks much more open and less clutter!

One day the shelves won't be full of toys, but we'll turn it into library shelves.

Play Kitchen

Our play kitchen got a small makeover.

It's nothing fancy, but it got some structure to it. We bought this play kitchen when Mr. Brigglesworth was just born. The boys have had so much fun playing in it.

Before, its setup was nothing special, but I thought if I added some organization to it, the boys would play a little better with it. We had one bucket that housed everything. The aprons were in there and the boys were digging to find those aprons. So, I bought those 3M Command hooks and hung the aprons on the wall next to the play kitchen.

The table and chairs use to be on another wall, but I moved those over to the play kitchen so it could be an in-house diner.

I was thinking of finding a cute picture to hang above the table and chairs. I searched around at Hobby Lobby and found quite a few. I landed on the perfect one!

The buckets next to the play kitchen now separate the play food from the utensils and cookware. The boys like organization as much as I do, so the buckets have stayed organized and don't mix.

Mister Pfitzer is obsessed with the play phone and carries it around everywhere. He can now say, "phone."

One day my kiddos will outgrow this kitchen, but right now it is a favorite that I'm hanging on to.

Bonus Room

The Bonus Room is not complete, but I'll share how far it has come along.

The first thing in this room was a couch. We bought a small couch from Costco.

We had a small bookcase that we kept the small TV on and the VCR player.

And you saw the music side of the room with the guitar's hanging.

We eventually upgraded the TV in that room and bought a console to conceal more toys.

It is definitely meant to be a fun room where all the playing happens and that's what goes down. Mister Pfitzer loves to get play time up here because it is a whole different set of toys he doesn't get to play with often.

It is a fun room that I am not done with. It is functional in how we have all the toys with easy access, but I'm not loving the look. I'm all about having toys easily accessible so the toys are actually played with, but I battle putting them on shelves to look "nice" but then I know they won't get played with.

Stay tuned for updates to this room.

Guitar Hanging

The Bonus Room is coming together in phases, but it's definitely a hangout spot.

I always envisioned it being our music room, and it definitely has a music side of the room. We have various instruments we put on display in that room. Mr. JCrew has an electric guitar and my dad had a guitar.

We at first bought wall hangers for the two guitars to get them off of the ground.

Then my mom came home with another guitar. She put it in the toy closet and it was taking up too much room on a shelf, so I went out and bought another hook to hang the third guitar.

The space below the guitars has some more musical instruments so that the boys can just breakout in music at any time. The wire cubes came from the old house and work for the moment. It's not my favorite set up, but I am living with it. I don't know if new cubes that are all the same color would work or if it needs to change all together. I actually have more wire pieces to make it longer, if needed.

We'll see how this area changes. I really like having the guitars hanging on the wall.

Bonus Mirror

Moving on up the staircase, I found another large mirror for upstairs. The walls in the bonus room are bare, with the exception of one, but it hasn’t bothered me.

But I did find that the landing part of the room felt bare.

Looking up the staircase, you see the little chair, but that’s it.

I decided to be on the hunt for a large mirror. One that looked like a window. My hope was that the light from the little window across from the mirror, would bounce off the mirror and shine more light into the room. 

I was at Pier 1 and looked at their mirrors. That’s when I saw it! And it was on sale. It was at the back of the pile, so I tried to hold all the other mirrors, stick my camera back there and take a picture so I could see it. That didn’t work. I still couldn’t tell.

I then proceeded to move all the mirrors individually so that I could see the mirror and make a decision. I loved it!

I brought it home and showed Mr. JCrew. I’m sure he’s not as excited as me, but he showed support!

Now that it’s up there, I love it! It’s just what the space needed. And Little JCrew told me that it looked like a window, so I knew I did good!

That side of the room now feels complete. It feels like there is a window up there and it bounces the light into the room. It's also awesome how the wood color and paint went with what we already have.

Taking the Home Out of the House

Now that the majority of things are in storage, the house doesn’t feel like home anymore. It feels like we just moved in, with the exception of an awesome yard!

Today, I’m sharing what the house currently looks like with things off the wall, no décor and empty closets.

The living room still felt full because of the massive couch.

The rug is clean and rolled up. The pictures are off the wall and the “tower” as I call it, is in storage. 

Over this past weekend, Mr. JCrew's brother-in-law lent us his truck and we moved the big items. The couch, rug, ottoman are now of out the room.

The air mattress made its way into the living room now.

The dining room still has the table, but the rug is clean and rolled up as well. It has become my drop station since the foyer table is gone.

The kitchen has some empty cabinets. It’s been the last thing I was packing because of what we still use. We are making sure to eat everything in our large pantry, since we will have a smaller one. The dishes will be packed up soon and we’ll eat off paper plates. I’ve got the bubble wrap ready, just need to get more boxes.

The boys’ bedrooms are the most dramatic. Little JCrew’s room has mattresses only. I joke that the two little guys are sleeping on a king size mattress. They love it.

Mr. Brigglesworth’s room did just have his dresser and chest of drawers.

The dresser went to storage, while the chest comes with us. We'll use it for the boys' clothes. Now this room is my packing room. And thanks to Julie, I have a million boxes calling my name!

The new owner likes the pallet wall. He did ask questions about it as to why I did it. Kind of funny when I told him because I wanted to! Ha. But he said he liked it.

The master bedroom is empty. This room remained unchanged for a while, until we got the truck. I then took the clothes out of drawers and they are in makeshift drawers/bins until we move into Mom's house.

We did have the air mattress on the floor, but as you saw, it got moved to the living room.

The bonus room is also just as dramatic as the boys’ rooms.

It is completely empty. It was the room I wanted to empty first, but Little JCrew’s room won that contest. I sold most things in the room. The train table is currently at Mom’s house and the desk is in storage. I sold the couch, loveseat and bookcases (2 different sets). There was one bookcase Mom told me to hold on to because it was a good size to put in a closet someday. Great thinking, Mom!

And that’s it! The porch furniture is off the porch and spread out with my mom’s neighbors.They all openly welcomed rental furniture to use on their porch for the next year. It looks great! 

 The boys' big playhouse is over at Mom's along with other outdoor toys. Her tiny yard is filling up!

I’m kind of enjoying the emptiness of the house. It is weird but also calming. You don’t need a lot of things. Yes, décor makes a house feel inviting, but what makes it a home, is who you share it with. I’m making so many memories playing on the floor and finding unconventional toys to play with, that it really makes me evaluate all the “Stuff” we have.