The whats and the wherefores

Sometimes where you have to create is every bit as important as what you're creating. When #1 Son flew the nest, our daughter called dibs on his old bedroom so I, in turn, called dibs on hers. I had always wanted my very own creative/home office space and I was ecstatic that I would soon have lots of room. Ha.

Unfortunately, the combination of a haphazard 'decorating' style (due to budget constraints) and the addition of Epic Farms, Inc. to the space quickly turned it into a major disaster area. A hectic schedule didn't help things either; in a perpetual rush, I developed the deplorable habit of plunking things down in there to deal with later (and I'm sure many of you are already aware that "later" rarely happens).

After several near fatal (from apoplexy) paper avalanches and an increasingly overwhelming urge to just chuck it all - or light a match - I knew I had to do something drastic. Armed with some Christmas and birthday gift cards and a little bit of my own money (thereby negating the old adage: You CAN so too get blood out of a turnip;o) I decided the time was right for some serious rearranging (before somebody got hurt).

Just your basic appallingly disorganized disaster. Which, for my fellow acronym junkies, ironically becomes "B.A.D.D." (which is a good one - ha;o)

I got off to a good start initially with the pegboard and a couple of storage pieces, but since I was funneling most of my money into the non-profit I couldn't afford to do much of what I wanted. I tried really hard to just make do for a while with the various freebies I scrounged up; I really thought I could pull it off...

Obviously, my *cough* grand plan failed miserably.

While I do like the filing cabinet (it was free and DD sanded it, then I painted it to match the room), the shelves were kind of a bust. Lots of wasted space in there. It was really meant for a garage, but beggars can't be choosers. Wow, I really gotta do something... Yeesh.

At least I'm happy with the pretty border and sunny yellow paint (one less thing to do - yay!)

I love graph paper for figuring out a room. Even if you're not an architect, you can still come up with a close enough layout to see what will work, and what will not.

I'll be honest, my ginormous fantasy craft table was the thing that gave me the most trouble. I drew it, changed it, redrew it, and changed it so many times I lost count. Took me a couple of months to come up with a plan that I really liked.

I was still working on the table plans when I started tearing up the floor (such fun - NOT!)

The carpet had been recycled from my parent's house years ago when they replaced theirs. Good for awhile, but definitely not the best for a crafty space with rolling chairs.

I found these inexpensive parquet tiles at Fred