OurWanderingAdventures : Reading Nook

Monday, March 4, 2013

Reading Nook

This weekend has been quite a whirlwind with all the activity going on around our home. We purchased and moved into this home at the end of August and have just YESTERDAY, unpacked the very last box! I was so excited and when I saw what a difference it made, I was a bit upset I didn't do it sooner. We have a finished basement, so all of these boxes were taking up serious square footage in an actual room down there. As I began this project, I knew what this room was headed to be. As many of you know, we absolutely love to read around here, it's actually something that I would describe as a passion. It was time to carve out a reading nook in this room that will undergo a fun transformation.

A quick trip to IKEA, gave us all that we were going to need along with 'shopping out home'. The center bench part of the nook is actually a coffee table, but I wanted something wider as opposed to longer. I don't like to lie with a good book, I like to curl up & this was absolutely perfect. I had to take this photo from close up, because the room was FULL OF BOXES!!!!

Next, I began adding books and as that was being done, I was emptying boxes and was actually able to move further back with the camera. I used old board game boards as baking on some of the shelves and just may add more as I come across them. a realization hit me as this project was underway, and I came to notice that if I was physically seeing a change in the room, I was tempted to keep working and keep getting it done. In the beginning when the room was loaded down with boxes, I hardly wanted to be there and kept sneaking upstairs to just get away from the chaos. How much I loved just closing that door. The problem with that whole situation though, is that in closing that door and keeping it all hidden away, we were also closing the door on an attached full bathroom downstairs! How insane is that?!

Did I mention that we began this project on Friday evening and it went into the wee hours. So late/early was I working that I was actually able to entertain a call from a friend who asked to stop by at 3am, as she was in town! LOL!! She came over and that is when I stopped working. As she left right before 7, instead of going to bed, I headed right back down! Progress was being made in the shelves but the boxes needed to be weeded through again. As the clock rolled on towards 9 a.m., I had visitors that already found this room to be the coolest one in the house! AMAZING how a few simple things being done, can bring kids to books like magnets. Nope, I never got any sleep on Friday night and headed over to see my parents on Saturday where we stayed until about 10. I thought for sure I would pass out when we got home, but instead I kept working and finally fell asleep at 2 a.m.

Here it is, finally finished at 2 this morning and I am thrilled with the results. A dry erase board is in the center, underneath the bench is where all the activity and coloring books can be found. They actually are in some kind of order but I am going to want to organize them better in the near future. We want to be able to spread these books out and add in more educational toys in the mix, so we will be doing the exact same thing to the opposite wall. We also have loads more books in each bedroom upstairs and in the 2 bookshelves in the playroom, so we would like to move those down here as well!

Here it is, the opposite wall! YES, you CAN see it!! This room is empty of all books and looks amazing. I am in love and am thinking of sleeping down here for the next week. Right now, it just holds our daily schedule and some jumbo ABC career flashcards I came across one lucky thrifting day!