Window Seat and Bookshelves

I've been "project-ing" like crazy the last little while, so I'm just warning you that the next few blogs will be playing catch up.

I did get my window seat, bookshelf project complete! It was actually finished before the bed frame I just posted about.

A long time I ago, I posted this hopeful drawing:

For my birthday last year I asked for the materials to build it.  It kind of reminds me of making my own birthday cake in high school only now I'm making my own presents.

So I cut and I routed for adjustable shelf standards. And I primed and I painted and you get pictures of none of this because I was not thinking of blogging and I built the main boxes and put them in place and attached them to the walls.

Our living room was chaos for awhile.

Who am I kidding? We have five kids, our living room is usually chaos.

Gratuitous cute baby shot.

Then I started on the window seat:

 I trimmed and caulked everything: 

And painted and filled it with stuff:

The kiddos have decided it makes the perfect stage.

The window seat is all storage and holds many quilts, toys and games.
The tv shelf is on drawer slides and slides out and the tv swivels.

We don't watch much tv so it's nice to be able to shove it slightly out of view.
I'm really excited about the details as well.  All the shelves are adjustable. The dividers along the shelf above the window match up with the window casings, as does the trim on the window seat. The trim on the window seat also mimics the shaker design of our kitchen cabinets that are visible across the house.

And then there are the curtains!

This is what happens when I try to take pictures around here.

 My mom found these at a thrift store and gifted them to me and Erik helped me build the curtain rod I designed out of galvanized pipe. The curtains hang on the inside of the bookcases when open so they don't block as much light from the window.

When family comes it makes an extra place for someone to sleep; my sisters have been known to fight over who gets to sleep there.
It's one of my favorite places to drink a cup of tea and read a book or take a nap in the afternoon sun.
You know, when I ever get that luxury and whenever we have sun.  It's happened once or twice believe it or not!
When we first moved in, it looked like this:

And this morning, it looks like this:

I assure you, it is the same house, but we've definitely made some changes over the last eight years.

New Bed (Again)

I have been attempting to build things for as long as I can remember. Somewhere about the 4-5th grade my neighbor Diane and I built our own playhouse from scraps of lumber her dad brought home from his construction jobs. Alas, I have no pictures of our mansion but I'm assuming it looked a lot like this:

These would be my own kids occupying our front yard. 

Like I said, I have been attempting to build things for years but now I finally feel like I might be getting good at this. 

Erik received his "fire check" at the end of November and let me have a little bit of it for my very own spending money.  I did a little calculating and decided that I could make a dining room table or a headboard/footboard for our bed but I couldn't do both. 

I went with the bed.

I took these basic plans from AnaWhite, modified them for my bed, room and previously built storage frame; bought my lumber and got to work. 

I used basic pine and standard lumber and sanded everything like crazy. My dad helped hold things together so I could glue and nail the pieces and helped with some drilling and attaching of the 4x4 legs.

Then I applied a wood conditioner/pre-stain and then stained the bed. 

I let it dry for a few days in our upstairs (we almost have an upstairs house!) and then let it finish drying in the kitchen before I moved it to our room and set everything up. 

Want to see the finished bed? 

Isn't it lovely?! 

I'm pretty stinkin' proud of this project.