One Room Challenge Part 5: Happy Accidents

It’s the penultimate update before next’s big reveal for the One Room Challenge! Likely many participants are going through the same things I’m going through – namely, trying to figure out what’s going to get done before next Thursday, and what will have to wait for a later update. Check out parts one, two, three & four here. Be sure to check out the featured designer posts and the guest participants too!

As a quick reminder, here is my mood board for the space.

We made major progress this week, purely because the dresser has FINALLY been moved out of the room. Salvation Army came on Saturday and picked up this dresser, an armoire and a box of other stuff. I’m already amazed at how much larger the room looks, and it was really great to finally see my vision for the furniture layout in real life. So much so, that I’ve already made one change from my original plan for furniture placement.

Originally, my idea was to put the bench (aka old TV stand) along the wall where the dresser had been, but with the antique secretary desk in its new location next to bed, the balance of the room felt off. I moved the bench back to its original location at the foot of the bed, and think this looks much better. The room feels huge without the dresser, which I wasn’t really expecting. Lucky for me, the closet in this room is really big with lots of shelves so I’m not missing the dresser storage too terribly much at this point.

I also finished up all my painting over the weekend. It was a nice feeling cleaning all the brushes for the final time, and put them up for a little bit! The final pieces that were left to paint were the laminate shelves for above the desk and the picture frame for over the bed.

And speaking of picture frames, I’m making progress on wall decor as well. For the wood picture frame, I ordered a botanical print that I downloaded for free online and then got printed via Vistaprint. The final outcome of the picture frame was a happy accident. I did two coats of Old White, and then distressed it a bit around the edges. I went to pick-up the wax brush to finish it off and didn’t realize until it was too late that I had accidentally picked up the brush that had French Linen on it (for the open shelves). I ended up doing some dry brushing with the French Linen rather than give the piece more coats of paint (sometimes I think my blog should be called the lazy girl decorating guide 😉 ). After an actual coat of wax, it was ready to go.

I hung the frame over the bed, and flanked it with two sconces from Hobby Lobby. I just love the brightness of this room with the new paint color and wall decor. I also picked up some artwork (that still needs to be hung) for one of the walls at Marshall’s, keeping it simple with two dogwood canvas prints and a round mirror in between. I’m a fan of the “rule of 3” when decorating walls and like that the mirror echos the sconces.

The desk was also positioned in its final resting spot, and I brought down a rug I already owned that was in the attic. It’s a placeholder for now until I buy a new area rug for the living room, and move that larger rug into here. So, what’s left to do?

• Paint the room – Done 
• Replace the Blinds/Add a curtain – Blinds & current rod hung; need to pick up the new curtain from Wal-mart this weekend
• New Bedding – Done
• Paint Shelf & Desk – Done
• Rearrange furniture/remove furniture – Done
• Rug – Done (for now)
• Wall art & Shelving: Still need to hang the shelves and hang the plates on the other wall
• Lamps/Accessories: In progress
• Styling: In progress

Overall, I’m feeling pretty good about where things are, at least for the reveal next week. My guess is that I will beg, borrow and steal from a few rooms around the house to finalize. I know I’ll want some new pillows for this room, but I plan to make those and kinda need to finish the room before I can do that since I’ll be using the desk as a sewing table too.

Shared on Thoughts of Home on Thursday and the Creative Circle.