Change Your Stuff—Turbo Decorating

Craft room at August Fields

This is Sara’s craft room. Sometimes I wish I was Sara. I think I would spend my whole life in my craft room, and I don’t even craft very often. But, I would if I had this craft room. And it is huge!


This is my craft room. It is messy and disorganized. And it is tiny! Sometimes I wish I was Sara. But I do have a little craft room and I am VERY grateful for that. So I decided my tiny craft room needed a little attention this past weekend and I had a turbo decorating-session. This is how it went down.

First, what started the whole thing was this image from oh happy day

…rows and rows of jars filled with all kinds of fun, crafty things. I thought of my empty canning jars and my crafty things, and decided that they deserved some showing off. Of course, I couldn’t just plop them in the middle of a messy room, so I started organizing and moving and added a little bit of decorating…turbo-decorating. Here are the rules:

Turbo Decorating 101
1. Decide what you want to accomplish and your time frame.
2. You can only use things you already have in your home.
3. Little fuss and no pefectness allowed.
4. It has to be finished that day.
5. You must listen to loud music or a good movie.
6. Diet Coke helps…so does licorice.

Okay, I got started by getting my sweet lawyer husband to help me move a big cabinet down 4 flights of stairs to the craft room (he hates turbo-decorating, but he is always a good sport).

Then I reorganized my supplies and moved them into the bigger cabinet. The smaller cabinet now holds all of my fabric and sewing things.

The bigger cabinet made a great spot for displaying my canning jars, now full of craft supplies, so I lined them up across the top. (I kept the lids on because I didn’t want my pretty things to get all dusty).

Next, beautify the table. My folding table is not beautiful, but it is very functional. It has paint and dings across the top, so I decided to cover it. I thought a nice tablecloth would be pretty, but I knew it would be covered with paint after my first painting project, so I decided to cover it with wrapping paper. I only had one roll, and it was a bit brighter than what I wanted…

…so I flipped it over, and taped it to the table. It will be easy to remove when it gets too dirty, and I can keep changing the design. (I use this idea for table coverings at parties as well).

The lighting in my craft room is not great, so Joe helped me hang these light that used to live in Lainey’s room until we moved her downstairs a few months ago. They have been living under the table in my craft room since then (see if you can spot them in a photo above).

He attached this bracket for buckets that hold misc. supplies. They also had a previous life in Lainey’s room.

Joe’s last task was hanging picture holders…ditto their previous life. I wanted to hang three, but one was broken, so we hung two.

Now came the fun part…decorating.

I added adhesive mirrors to the cabinet that were left from a project in Riley’s room.

I wanted to make a mobile like Liz’s DIY Ribbon Mobile at momtastic, but the only ribbon I had was not in colors that I wanted to use.

So I made my mobile using quilter’s spaghetti and fabric that I already had (I had a previous life as a quilter, hence my fabric collection). I tied them to the broken picture holder. It still had some life in it.

That little project led to the valance over the window, also using quilter’s spaghetti, and an old, somewhat bent, tension rod. DIY instructions here.

While I had the fabric and supplies out, I made some quick cord covers because there were too many cords hanging down the wall.

After the fabric projects were out of the way, I did a few quick paper projects, gluing cute word cards and letters to scrapbook paper. I have had the word cards for 4 years! I was so happy to finally use them for something.

I also made this cute create sign. DIY instructions here.

I wanted more color on the walls…so I dug through my card box and found some old art postcards that I used when I homeschooled Courtnee, 8 years ago. I knew I would need them again! They are some of my favorite things in the room.

Last thing, time for some paint. I dug this old toolbox out of the garage. Really! It has been several different colors, and was currently a golden color. I wanted something brighter so I used the one bottle of craft paint I had in the house, and I ran out of paint. I just papered the front, using scrapbook paper and modpodge, and strategically placed some plants inside to hide the other unpainted parts.

Here are some before and after pictures.

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Added bonus: the stinky gerbil gets to live in my craft room. She keeps me entertained, and there is nothing like the lovely scent of gerbil pee to stimulate all kinds of creative projects! Do you think Sara wishes she was me now?

And that was it. It was a fast and furious project, and definitely not perfect, but I am satisfied with what I accomplished…and most of the time I just want to be me. I will want to be me all of the time if I can just have a little chandelier like Sara’s. By the way, this post took about twice as long as actually doing the room.

Items from around the house that I reused (all are from Ikea):
-cabinet
-lights
-picture holders
-bucket and hanging strip
-mirrors
-picture frame

Supplies that I had on hand:
-fabric
-paper
-glue
-tape
-art cards
-yarn

Wish list:
-chandelier
-cute rug
-nice table

Willing to give away:
-stinky gerbil!

2 comments:

  1. lori....your craft room turned out amazing! what a major transformation. i love your fabric mobile, painted toolbox/planter and mirrors.

    the artwork too. great makeover! thank you for the nice comments too. :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. nice! I am jealous of your craft room. Definitely don't have one myself. I especially like the window treatment and planter.

    ReplyDelete