ORC7: Mom's Bedroom is Done!

I hardly know what to say.

After seven stressful weeks we're done. Every day for the last week, I thought, tomorrow, we'll be done. Tomorrow we'll be done and I can finally take my pictures. Well, that day has come. We're done. I took the pictures this morning. Boo rah.

Here are all the posts in the series as we went along.

Week 1: Introducing Mom's Bedroom
Week 2: Moving Backwards
Week 3: Working with Inspiration
Week 4: Eeek Week
Week 5: Cross Your Fingers
Week 6: Not Gonna Make It


My Mom is a recovering hoarder. We have been working on decluttering her house for several years, now. Just in the past two, we've turned our attention to decorating and sprucing up her spaces once they were cleared. I love organizing and given her needs, that's where we've focused most of our efforts so far.

But not this time.

This time we took on a decorating project, pure and simple. In fact, I turned to her yesterday and said, you realise, Mom, we haven't solved any problems or come up with any solutions. All we did was create a pretty room.

And she turned to me and said, what do you mean? I can sleep in my bed.

Apparently, she had found the room so depressing, and so ugly and so sad that unless she was expecting company, she never cleared the room enough so she could function in it.

I hadn't known, even though the before pictures tell the story.

You can see more "before" pictures in Week 1. When I look back at them now, I feel like crying. No, your screen didn't suddenly break out in spots, those walls were really bad.

I don't think she'll find the room depressing anymore.

C'mon in!

Ta da!

There used to be a large stuffed closet and a left over space on this wall.

From the side:

The east wall:

Ready for the DIY run-down?

Drapes (above) made by Mom.
Headboard (below) made by me, with help from my husband and my Mom.
Pillows and duvet made by Mom.

 sorry about the spots on my camera lens (cringe).

My husband rebuilt the bench from a thrifted coffee table and I upholstered it.

Mom made the bedskirt from fabric in her stash. The trim is new, though. We discussed various options and I sent her out to find the silver. It wasn't 'til we put it on the bed that she realised it echoed the headboard. She was so happy to "discover" it. Funny Mommy. I told her that's why I was here!

The Rasts from Ikea, hacked, of course. My husband built the mirror frames and I painted them.

This incredible blanket. Mom made it after I found the Moroccan wedding blanket from our inspiration picture. I hadn't been expecting her to do that at all, but she found some chinchilla on sale and just went for it.

Isn't it a beauty?

And a very last minute addition: the lamp base on the dresser. Thrifted. Spray painted. I brought a lampshade from home.

A little last minute shopping and styling by me (which I realise leaves a lot to be desired, but it is fun to learn):

yum, texture!

all shiny and sparkly

And Mom has a gorgeous, glamorous, softly sparkling room to call her own.

Boo rah.

This was an incredible experience. Now that it's all over, I'm glad I took it on. Many, many thanks to all of you out there who left me kind, encouraging comments. Dealing with my Mom and my husband in order to get things done had its moments of frustration, as you can imagine, and knowing I wasn't alone helped tremendously.

Even though its cliche, I have to say this really was an experience of a lifetime. Being an interior designer/decorator has been a life-long dream of mine and I felt like I was given the chance to live a little bit of that dream for the past seven weeks. For that, I will always be grateful. I confess there were moments I wondered if I had lost my mind. And I wondered if it would be worth it.

It was.

It most certainly was. Many thanks to Linda of Calling it Home for throwing down the gauntlet. I will be back in October.

If you haven't done so yet, please check out the incredible projects by both those invited to take part (who were wonderfully supportive of all the rest of us) and those by the linking participants. You will be glad you did.