From dining room to design room, a makeover!

Woot!  This post made the top 10 at The CSI Project!

I am really excited about this week's CSI challenge (winner gets 4 gallons of paint, holla!).  I've already posted these pictures on my blog, but they were spread out over several posts, and it was quite a while ago.  So I've condensed them into 1 post to enter into the CSI contest.  Humor me, those of you who've already seen the transformation, (or just tell me again how much you love it, lol). 

When we built this house 2 years ago, I was pretty excited to have a dining room.  Never had one before.  And it was probably the first room I knew exactly what I wanted to do with it. I'd had the color scheme picked out for months : Tiffany-blue walls and black/gray and cream to accessorize.

And here is what it looked like.

I liked it.  I really did.  But I never fully decorated it, and it didn't get used as much as I thought it would... and before long it began to feel like wasted space.  My husband suggested I turn it into a craft room... it was something I had always wanted and I'd currently been using the kitchen table for all my crazy projects.  So I renamed it a design room (because I have issues with the word craft...  many of you know this about me) and got to work.

The new purpose for the room would be not only a place where I could create, but also edit photography.  So it actually became somewhat of a design room/office.  I also wanted to do things in this room that I couldn't do in the rest of the house... design things that just didn't quite fit in with the rest of my decor, or weren't practical with kids around, and that I thought were too feminine for the spaces I share with my husband. 

I didn't want to repaint.  I LOVE paint but I hate to repaint.  (It's a one time deal!)  Also, I loved this color - I'd been so excited to use it for so long.  It didn't exactly say "design room" to me, but I worked with it. 

I also couldn't afford to buy any new furniture for the room.  So it took a little swapping for other pieces in my home, and some DIY creativity to put together a functional yet pretty room (which was important, as it is at the front of the house, with full view from entry into the house, and no doors on it).

Here's the afters, and then I'll highlight a few areas.

The first fun thing I made for the room were the letters for my words "Inspire" and "Create".  I'd seen them in the Ballard Designs catalog and thought the words fit me so well.

I used chalk to draw little fleurishes around the word CREATE.

I wanted to display my ribbon in a fun way, so I made these holders out of dowel rods and doorknobs:

Course, my kids sometimes go in there and unwind my ribbon, and then I don't realize it until I've taken a picture.

This sewing table was made from 2 drawers and table legs I picked up from Home Depot.  I reenforced the side with my sewing machine on it with a piece of plywood, and I flipped the other drawer over to use as storage.

I keep jars inside to organize my thread, needles and buttons.

{I can't tell you how long it's been on my "list" to make some cute labels for the tops of those jars.}

I stashed my wrapping paper in a trashcan.  I LOVE to wrap presents.  So I have stacks of gift boxes on top of my armoire, and stacks of gift bags below my computer screen as well. 

My armoire, which used to house my china, became my desk.  This armoire is actually meant for a tv, so the space I've stashed my gift bags was meant to be for a VCR, etc. Now it contains my mess 'o bags.

I pieced 2 5x7 rugs (that I found for 50% off at Hobby Lobby) together to make an area rug.

I hung an idea board on the wall.

And I switched the round breakfast table (previously in the kitchen) with the dining room table.  The round table is now where I lay out my projects and I was pleasantly surprised to find that my dining table fit in kitchen!!!

I have had a lot of people ask me, it's so pretty, do you really feel like you can make a mess in there?  I mean, creative people can be messy, for sure.  I'm still one of them.  It doesn't have to be perfect all the time... in fact looking at the picture above I can see that my tablecloth is all off center (I have to wash it a lot and don't always take the time to repress it and put it back on perfectly).  But I love my new room.  I put a lot of thought into all my decor, but it was nice to not have to take anyone or anything into consideration except for myself in *this* room.  It's a positively indulgent space, just for me... beautiful and functional... the perfect place to get the juices flowing and get inspired about the things I love to do and am good at. 

{And I don't miss my dining room at all!!!}

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