Julien and Jonah's Room

At last, I finished their room!  When we moved into this apartment, we decided to separate the bunk beds since the room was big enough.  The thing I don't like about bunk beds is it's sooo hard to wash the sheets often from the top bunk and it's hard for them to make their beds too.  I also found some super cute ideas online for displaying artwork and for bookshelves.  So, I got to work to give them a room makeover!  Originally, I called up my dad and asked him if he would be willing to help me build some book shelves for the kid's room.  He was willing.  With Rich's schedule, there was no way we'd ever get around to making these together, and my dad is pretty handy with wood.  I had several options that appealed to me. What first inspired me to make bookshelves that would display their books better were these rain gutter, bookshelves.  But once I found some other options like this I thought I would rather go with wood.  That one was super cute, but with the space I had to work with, they didn't quite work; plus, that one looked a little more difficult to get the books out of...but definitely cute!  I also knew with that one, my dad would be doing most of the work, and in my older age, I don't like waiting around for things.  So finally I found this idea and decided I could do that all by myself!  By the way, if you did take the time to glance at that last site, it said, $20 at the top.  Well, she wasn't talking about per shelf, but total for all the shelves she made.  She had a few more supplies laying around her garage than I had, so it cost me a little more.  But over all, it cost me a little over $5 to build each shelf!  Not bad at all.  These are actually called "picture ledges" and can be sold for $10 per shelf for the small ones, and $20 for the longer ones.  We are pleased with how they turned out.  The whole reasoning behind them was to encourage more reading.  When books are on a typical bookshelf it's easy to forget about certain books and easy for them to make a mess searching for certain ones. There is something about seeing the front of a book that makes it more tempting to pick up.  So they are working out nicely and being used just as we had wished.  The idea I fell in love with for displaying their art work was this.  Found at Ikea.  The online store doesn't carry them and we don't have an ikea here.  I did find some on Ebay if you are interested, but after shipping (for two sets), it was going to cost me $60.  So nope, as cute as they are, I just couldn't justify that one.  I then found this idea from potterybarnkids.com, still expensive, but gave me the idea to make my own.  So for a few bucks, I made these (seen below).  All supplies bought at a craft store.

Jonah's side

Julien's side (yes, we are actually allowed to paint in this place.  But since it's just a rental, we only painted this one wall in the whole house).

I love children's books!

Instead of getting side tables, I just made some smaller shelves.  The lamps are great for bedtime reading!  What I really wanted was wall mounted swing arm lamps, but hello, they are SO expensive!  These lap desks (on the floor) were Christmas presents and have also come in handy!

Ta dah!! I am proud that I tackled all of that on my own, and super relieved I'm done with that room and don't have to think about it anymore!  I think I'm tired of projects for now!