Office Progress

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Wow! It has been awhile since I have posted any updates! My deepest apologies. Teaching is a marvelous profession but it is also time consuming, strenuous, and hectic. But holy crap I love my job! I feel like I have found the profession to which my heart belongs and I have extremely grateful for it.

 However I am still in the process of figuring out the balance between the demands of a personal life, and the demands of a burgeoning career. Unfortunately that means blogging and DIY has fallen down the list with sleep and work rising above the rest. Have I mentioned though that I love my job?

Anyways!

Since a couple of months ago I haven't had any roommates except for my sister, which I don't really know counts. So I've been working on turning the third bedroom into an office/guest room space. 

Here's what we've got so far:

I freshened up the stripes and repainted quite a few of them. With my Dad's assistance we were able to replace some of the damaged trim and drywall pieces, years of roommates  had caused a few to be sacrificed along the way.

Eventually I am hoping my desk will go along this side wall. I'm still stuck between moving the one from my room in there or building one.

Yeah. I know. Remarkably unimpressive. Here's another one of those doors that I want to finish off and make prettier before the holiday season. I want to paint the inside of the door white to match all the trim and make it lovely. This is one of the only doors that the previous owners did not cover with shelf-lining contact paper. So it will probably be the only one easy enough to paint.

I'm also going to upgrade all the door handles when I get to doing the doors. These rooms came with keyed entry handles. But no keys. It's been a real problem before. Plus some of them are busted, again from hard use with roommates. 

The Guest Room/Office To-Do List:

• paint the door
• replace the handle
• finish painting the trim
• get a bed frame 
• buy more pillows 
• move/build desk for computer and grading
• organize random crap
• hang some desperately needed wall art. 

It is an Office-al Start.

****If you are seeing this content on http://manufacturedhomefacts.com/ please be advised it is there without permission! thismessybusiness.com is the OFFICIAL and only site I publish on!***

I've officially been teaching about a month now, which is very exciting! I love my job and my school, plus I've got some great students that always rise to the occasion. I told everyone a couple months back that I was going to be working on creating an office/guest room combination.

Check out my mad progress!

Okay so I haven't done anything but put a rug in there. Partly because I was looking closer at my lovely stripes and realized that they have been so thoroughly abused by roommates that I really can't save them (painting stripes is a crazy amount of work so I was contemplating not doing them but.. alas.) 

I am going to be doing stripes again and I've been contemplating a few different selections:

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I love the bold white and grey colors. I think I may even have some grey that I could reuse from previous projects. And if not... I mean I do work at Lowe's after all!

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I also like the greige tones of this one. I sort of wonder though if that would be too much like what is in the living room? I wouldn't want them to look that close. It's nice to have some difference in the rooms.

What we want to do (by "we" I mean my sister and I, but mostly me) is set up a double desk along the window side of the room. We're thinking maybe something that has a similar look as this:

We think using filing cabinets that are redone all pretty and some wood on top would look awesome. But we have to incorporate a bed somehow, so here's some ideas:

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I really like that the bed is on the opposite wall, obviously the space is a bit different but I like what they did. I would have to have a queen size bed because my dad is 6'3" and my brother is 6'1" so there is no possible way they  would fit on an adorable day bed. 

Damn it.

If you follow me on Pinterest you may see that I've been pinning like crazy a bunch of different types of office and guest room ideas. Feel free to tell me how you decided to set up your space. What do guests even need in a guest room? Should I get a set of towels to keep exclusively in there? Toothbrushes? 

Here's one last look at the current room:

(omit the desk and tv stand, those aren't in there anymore, I sold the desk and moved the tv to Ally's room)

Hopefully I can make this a warm comfortable space for family and friends who come to visit!

Roommates Strike Out

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Some of you may remember a couple years ago when I painted the third bedroom in my house with stripes for a much desired office. Financially I couldn't support not having another roommate because I was still in college. Well 6 months after graduation and with having a full-time job I can finally do it. Plus another roommate would probably make me lose my marbles.

Not good.

My current roommate has the room set up like this:

After the age of 15 I feel like teddy bears on the bed is kinda weird. But hey, that's just me. I also noticed that she has all of her wall hangings hung up in a bizarre mishmash which means there is likely going to be a number of nail holes and tack holes in the walls....

Since I no longer have any more of the two colors that originally went into the stripes I have decided that they need to be redone anyway. Thankfully they are already started so it won't be nearly as hard as it was the first time. I am going to start looking at colors to get an idea of what I want to go with.

So Office/Guest Room To-Do List:

• Find a full-sized guest bed
• Build desk for under window 
• Repair walls/repaint stripes
• Create awesome storage solutions 
• Fix door/paint door/do something with the door
• DIY some wall decor

If you have any other tips or ideas for creating a good combination space in here please let me know! It will be a bit before I can get all the furniture and such that I want in there so I am open to suggestions!

A Little Desk-perate

Since the semester is finally over and the summer has begun, I've finally been getting around to the things I should have done a long time ago. After this summer I move into my student teaching semester and then graduation (!!!) so I really needed somewhere a little more organized and ready to take on a full teaching work load. And that looked prettier.

The chaos of my desk before:

Needless to say there was not very much work going on in this corner. Just looking at it I feel panicked. Not good. Since my roommate Karly moved back to Alaska (sad face) I decided to take the desk that I had originally purchased for her room way back when and put into mine. 

Here's the switcheroo (and of course Lucy investigating. Cat.):

At least she's kinda cute....

After I chased her off and rearranged a little bit...

It's not very comfy on the wrists to have the keyboard on top like it is so I want to convert this little top pull drawer into a keyboard drawer. I think it'd be fairly simple and would look way better.

But for now this is the set up that I have going. It is much better! It first of all looks way better because it coordinates with all the other white furniture that I have in my room but it also has those handy storage drawers. I can fit stuff inside of them! It's magical really.

Here's an angle of the whole "office" corner:

When I grow all the way up I am definitely going to have a separate office area so that I can have my bedroom for it's original purpose but for now this definitely works much better then the old desk situations that I've tried. Not too bad for a thrifted $30.00 desk!

What do you guys think of the switch? Better?

Linked to: Liz Marie   Beyond the Picket Fence

Single Girl's Haven

During the last four years I have worked really hard to create the perfect first home for me. One thing that I have always longed for?

The perfect bedroom! 

And I would like to show you that I am getting pretty close to that dream.

Ready for lots of pictures?

Here's an overview of my space:

I've been working on making the office in bedroom thing as seamless as possible. (Yes that is definitely Pinterest you see on my computer screen.) My bedroom is big and bright for the most part but the position of the windows and doors limits how I can place furniture.

I did buy these fantastic lamps. Between the shades (Target) and the bases (WalMart clearance) I ended up spending $60.00. The yellow table toppers were actually napkins that were fifty cents at Salvation Army.

As you can see I really need to figure out something to do with all of my boots! I have about 14 pairs total in various locations around the house. Most of them are next to my chair though. hehe. I love boots, books, and bags.

My dresser vanity with my DIY bike art. I love to decorate with bikes. I do have one that I ride which somewhat justifies my love for them.

Lucy, surprisingly, stayed put during the whole picture taking process in the bedroom! Pouka (the fluffy gray cat) was a little more adventurous. (The quilt and brown black out curtains are from Bed, Bath, and Beyond. Bolster pillow is from Target. Cat was free.)

I just love my bathroom! It makes me so happy! If you missed it I recently redid the entire thing back starting in August. I think I finally finished it in November after many speed bumps. (Or rather holes in the drywall.)

My bookshelf has been a lifesaver in the whole process of transitioning to a office-bedroom. I still haven't gotten the decorations on the shelf right where I want them but I'm getting closer!

The sofa chair at the foot of my bed is awesome for curling up with one of my magazines or homework. Sometimes it gets piled up with clothes but it is definitely comfy. One day it will be back in a room where it can fold out into a guest bed.



(The "Keep Calm & Carry On" pillow is from Hobby Lobby. The yellow one is made out of a place mat from Target and I made the small one using a free printable.)

Laying on top of the calendar on my desk in one of Pouka's favorite locations. Especially when I'm typing a big important paper. Super comfy.

I still want to do something else with those gigantor closet doors. My most recent idea was to install a big curtain rod sort of thing across the top and put up some white linen curtains or something like that. The problem with the doors is that there is about 6" in the middle that you can't get to unless you actually crawl behind the doors. Plus I think it would be prettier. Thoughts?

That is the almost completely finished master bedroom/bathroom! So far it is my favorite place to be. It is cozy and has my personality all over it! It's a space that is designed just for me and that is my favorite part. I know when I go home from my crazy life of full time working, full time school, and 15 hours a week of student teaching, my room will be a little retreat.

There's still a couple projects I want to do:

• install double rods
• make closet curtains/doors prettier
• paint trim around door frames
• finish gallery wall behind bedroom door.

But overall there's not much left to do! I think it's fantastic! After 4 years of working to make my house awesome I can really see it coming together! Nice thing about a house though, it's never really "done."

Take A Sit

Since I gave up my office space back in November I've been working really hard to try to make this tiny corner of my room work as an office area. Not necessarily the easiest thing I've ever done. I've got the wall art down for the most part (may still tweak the stuff around the mirror) and the organization is okay for right now. The problem?

The chair. My parents picked it up for me during one of their IKEA trips at a really good deal, it used to be the display I believe judging by the hole in the top of it where info used to be. The thing of it is that it is not the most comfortable chair ever.

I tried to dress it up with a cute pillow that my Mom so fantastically made for me but it still isn't exactly what I want.

So I've been pouring over Pinterest (see? I justify the hours I spend on that site!) trying to find some inspiration and ideas for a new office chair that would be trendy, small, and easily tucked away. No gigantor leather spinny chair is going in my chic master! Here's some of what I've found so far...

These guys from westelm.com are totally adorable and vintage-y! I dunno that they'd be very comfortable but I do love the white one... ahhh...

Maybe one of these white chairs would be cool too! They have a see through back sort of so they wouldn't look like they take up as much space and I could put some fun fabric as the cushion... (white would be a bad idea) I could probably find at least one at a thrift store or something in town and paint it. I can paint!

{source} These are totally cool! Again probably not fantastically comfortable but I love the clear ones! I think they are way fun. They have a vintage shape with a modern appeal. Could be just what I'm looking for!

Hmm.... decisions decisions! I think I will have to go thrift storing this weekend to see what I can find in terms of getting a new chair for my office corner. The semester starts next Tuesday! Eek!

Welcome 2012 Good Bye 2011

It's still hard to believe that 2011 is over! I felt like that year was never going to end. It was a crazy year in my little life, but I definitely have no regrets from last year. One of the greatest things that happened? I started my blog! So let's see what happened in The Messy Business house during the last year...


I redecorated the guest bathroom, updating the light fixtures, decor, vanity, and paint.

Tore out the ugly and weird vanity and replaced it with an IKEA shelf for more storage.

 One of the biggest, and still probably my favorite remodel, Renovating the laundry room to make it actually a useful space!

Finally got a new rug for the living room from Target!

Another favorite project... the master bathroom!! Remember how awful it was before??

And now the beautiful after!

My friend Stephanie moved out of her old house and gave me all of her patio furniture. It just needed a little elbow grease and paint!

Turned out great don't you think?

 The most recent project has been the master bedroom! It has also gotten a totally new face lift with the bathroom. It's such a great fun space now! I am totally in love with it!

We also figured out a way to dress up a cheap bookshelf. I will say that it looks great in my bedroom where my home office is also located.