Florida Craft Room Progress
I could get used to this one-story living. Man oh man, has it made moving in…well if not a breeze, then at least easier! I remember moving our crap up the Georgia house stairs. The worst, and I mean absolute worst, was our king mattress.
I know, a mattress, right? How heavy could it be?
Well, for starters, it’s a Tempur-Pedic – a memory foam mattress. But don’t let the word “foam” fool you into thinking it’s something light and airy. I’m pretty sure they’re using it to be ironic or witty, or they may just be trolling their customer base. We’ll likely never know. What we do know that “memory foam” is just a misnomer for “spongy lead.”
The mattress weighs at least as much as I do and is about as easy to carry as a pissed off billy goat. Humping that monstrosity up those Suwanee stairs put me about as close to cardiac arrest as I’ve ever been.
Anyway, our Florida home is all on one glorious floor – all except the craft room. But that’s okay, because compared to our Tempur-Pedic, there’s nothing too heavy needed in the craft room.
In fact, my babes and I carried everything up already! Well, almost everything. There are still two more pieces of furniture buried in one of our storage units. I’ll be excavating those later in the week and carrying them up.
But before we carried, we cleaned. And boy-howdy, did that floor need cleaning! Besides white and green paint splatters everywhere, there was a layer of dirt so thick I was tempted to bust out my cleats and dust off my old baseball glove. Forget craft room – we could play nine innings up here!
While I thought of reliving my junior high school baseball glory days, Handan got busy with the Pine Sol. Now lest you think we just used a mop like normal people and called it a day, let me familiarize you with the way my babes likes to clean a floor.
It starts with a mop bucket of hot water to which is added a generous glorp or two of Pine Sol. You can’t beat Pine Sol for cleaning floors. It’s the best smell out there!
Once the cleansing solution has been properly brewed, a scrubby sponge is procured – the kind you might use to wash a plate or a drinking glass.
The final step before embarking on this floor-cleaning extravaganza is to reverse-heave yourself onto the floorboards and crawl around on hands and knees like a rented mule, scrubbing the floor with vicious ferocity to remove not only the dirt, grease, and grime, but also the paint splatters carelessly left by the previous decorators.
You’ll know you’re about halfway done when your knees, hips, back, wrists and fingers are all screaming in protest.
You’ll know you’ve finished when everything has gone numb, and you’re not able to stand up without help.
Cleaning the floor was the worst part, but since then, progress has been swift and satisfying in our quest to get the blog back firing on all cylinders again with a fully functioning craft room. We anticipate finishing by the weekend, and then we’ll be able to dive back into crafting while we’re doing room makeovers, landscape improvements and other DIY projects.
For starters, we painted the walls with Sherwin-Williams Infinity paint in Valspar’s Swiss Coffee color. We did something a little different this time and tried satin on the walls. The whole house is already painted in satin, and it does help bring more light into spaces like the craft room that don’t receive a ton of natural light.
Let’s take a look, and remember – these are progress pics. Nothing is tidy and very little has been put away!
So far, so good with the paint! We like the sheen, at least for this room. We’ll be playing a lot more with sheens in the house. We’ve got some walls in mind that are going to get the matte treatment, and we think they’re going to look fantastic. More on that in future posts.
We’ve got all but two pieces moved up, so the layout is pretty much set. The back wall with the window gets two base cabinets and two uppers. In front of those is my craft table and photography rig.
In front of the craft table, we’ve stationed one of the two rustic console tables I built. It will hold our Cricut Maker 3. The console is still in storage and will be brought up sometime in the next few days. It will go to the stair-end of the room across from my writing desk.
Along the side walls and facing each other are the other six base cabinets – three on each side. These base cabinets hold all of our crafting supplies, including Cricut mats, materials and accessories.
My writing desk is conveniently located directly outside the bathroom. If I install a mini-fridge in the vicinity, I’ll truly be living the dream! My desk is flanked by the two West Elm inspired storage towers I built a few years back. I’m so happy we kept them! And though it’s starting to show its age, I still have my beloved office chair we bought back in Connecticut before I knew a damn thing about style. At least up here, it’s out of the way and not offending anyone’s sense of style!
I’ve got Baris’s old sit/stand unit on the desk. Once I get it cleaned off and all my files sorted, I’ll be able to put it to good use.
Obviously, no writing nook is complete without Grogu.
The room is still a mess, but we’re going to get it sorted out by this weekend.
I’ve got a fan and two lights to install, we need to get everything that’s currently in boxes or strewn about the room into a cabinet, and we need to find a suitable rug for the middle of the room.
By next week it’ll all be done, and we’ll be back in business. Meanwhile we’ve got a few more irons in the fire, so be sure to stay tuned for more upgrades and updates to our new Florida home!
What a difference a coat of paint and a good scrub makes!
No doubt, Jay!
love seeing the in-progress photos and hearing about your plans —
Thanks, Elle! 🙂
The floors actually look really nice with the new wall color!
We went from 2-story to single and can relate to how much nicer it is when moving! Hopefully you guys will get to enjoy the new digs for a few years!
Oh Mo, I reeeeeally hope so. These old bones need rest. And martinis. And more rest. 😀
I agree with Mizz Mo. I like the dark floor with all of the white now that the room is filling in with furniture and Grogu. ;o)
It looks 1000% better!
I’m envious! I have a dedicated craft room/office with lots of storage, but it’s small, so whenever I’m crafting, it ends up looking cluttered. Your space is beautiful! Love the paint color.
Thanks, Lucy! We hope to have it decluttered by the weekend! 🙂
Thanks for sharing this! We are in the transition of moving to Florida as well!!
Please don’t put pressure on yourself to post to this website! Just take a few pics along the way -and you will have more mental energy to show us the updates at a later time as you get your work
space together!!
We will be here whenever you are ready!!
Oh, I’ll post as often as I’m able to, Anne. It’s a little tough these days, but smoother sailing is just ahead! Where are you moving to/from?
Looking good !! That space is enviable — can’t wait to see it completed and put to good use. I agree with the one level living. I love it too. Ahhh Pine Sol. That is what we grew up on in New England.
It’s snowing here in Charlottesville right now. Last Thursday it was 80 degrees. Happy Spring…
Thank you, Cheryl! Ah snow. Can’t say I miss it, lol! I’m getting used to the heat here! 🙂
It’s looking good!
I can relate to trying to move a mattress. If you’re looking to give yourself a stroke, that’ll do it!
Right now, I am transitioning part of our unfinished basement into a play room for the kids.
You’re an inspiration!
Thanks, Nicolette! Send us a before/after of the basement!
My advice on paint: do not use flat or eggshell in a room with water. Bathroom/kitchen/laundry. You will NEVER wipe those splatter marks off. Ever. Congratulations on the progress!
It’s good advice, Heather!
Looking good guys!
I want to know about that lighting setup you have for blog photos. I need to upgrade:)
I’ll have all that info in the source list in the reveal post, Kimberly! 😉
It will turn up great, I am sure! Someone needs to sew a cover for that blue chair….:)
There is nothing wrong with ‘that’ blue chair 😉🙃 — It looks rather sci-fi-sish, 👽 🐱🚀 – which I love – and actually looks comfortable..
It’s totally sci fi and amazingly comfortable. And Handan is so happy it’s not at the entrance to the house anymore, lol! 😀
Hey, that chair is my ride and joy, lol! Or it was 7 years ago when we got it, lol! 🙂
Wow, the paint made a HUGE difference! Looking good.
I know, right?
We use Swiss coffee on all of our jobs. It’s a great color
It is! We love it now!
Fabulous Craft Room.. I am slightly envious and happy for you. Love the overall look and feel you are giving this space. Can’t wait to see the full finished area. When I moved to CA, I needed a rug for my small craft area – I found a beautiful @ wayfair.com – https://www.wayfair.com/rugs/pdp/bungalow-rose-hackman-abstract-graylight-blue-area-rug-w007168270.html?piid=1742318139 ..
Thanks, AJ! I’ll have the boss check out the rug! 🙂
Maybe ignorant, but what is Grogu?
Grogu, colloquially referred to as Baby Yoda – in Star Wars …
Grogu aka Baby Yoda aka The Child…it’s a character from the show The Mandalorian on Disney+
That room is looking great already, the new paint is fabulously bright. I have to agree with Handan about cleaning floors, especially dark ones – the only way os one you hands and knees with a scrubbie and lots of hot water.
Jeez, and here I thought mops were useful, lol! 😀
Looks like Grogu is hiding from the remodeling chaos. I can’t wait to see what the final result will look like. I would kill for a craft hobby room. I really need one. I have a hobby nook that is woefully inadequate. And your mention of moving mattresses up stairs brought back my own memory of moving a Tempuredic up stairs. Lead sponge indeed. It’s a chiropractor’s dream. Even worse was the fact our box springs from the original mattress set we had when we moved into our house would not fit on the ceiling underhang at the base of the stairs (8 ft ceiling in a typical NE cape where the stairs are right by the front door and steep so the ceiling is low at the first couple of steps. And yes, the box spring would not fit so we had to cut the frame in half to bend it and reconnect it. Later got a split box spring. But when I heard the movers say “Uh oh”, I had visions of the armoire chest not fitting up the stairs (it did). Turning the corners into the bedrooms from a narrow hall was not fun either. Guess home builder’s in the 50s did not think about accessibility.
LOL, I had the same issue in my first rental in Cambridge, MA back in ’95. Used 1-800-MATTRESS to buy a bed only to discover the box spring wouldn’t fit up the stairs. That’s the day I learned about split boxes. At least back then (when I was young and fit) I had people doing it for me. Wait, shouldn’t that be the other way around?? 😀
Wow! That floor is gleaming! Great job!!
I like to gaze at myself in its reflective surface after I collapse on it after a long day of lugging boxes, lol! 😀
Wow – your craft room may have solved my storage issue for all of my husband’s storage problems. You show 6 base cabinets in your Craft room. Where did you find them? I showed them to my hubby and he agreed we need some of those right away. It looks like your Craft room will be every crafter’s dream room.
IKEA, Sue! It’s all from IKEA. We actually have NINE of those base cabinets! 🙂
I AM THRILLED YOU ARE BACK ON LINE !!!!
I love your humor and realistic look at life !! great ideas too !!
I used to live in Florida Port CharlottePunta Gorda but escaped to live on our sailboat and after 15 years of goofing off-island hopping..no phone NO post box … exploring ALL COUNTRIES in central America…finally, we settled in England. I LOVE IT HERE AND WILL NEVER RETURN TO AMERICA……!!! BEEN HERE OVER 20 YEARS NOW,
KEEP UP THE CREATIVE WORK AND LOVELY IDEAS.. I FOLLOW YOUR CONSTRUCTION AND IDEAS TOO…LOVE EM
SANDY
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Thanks, Sandy, we’re glad to be back! Wow, you’ve had an amazing life so far – here’s to many more years of adventure…even if it’s on the same island from now on!