I've had the itch to learn woodworking for years. I found out I was pregnant with John shortly after beginning a woodworking class through WCTC and had to bow out of the class and get a refund because I couldn't be around the sawdust and fumes regularly. 

Fast forward a few years and I took a Woodworking for Women class at Woodcarft in New Berlin. I learned the basics of all sorts of tools and came home with a small peg board that I made myself from a piece of raw lumber. 

We used a table saw, jointer, planer, router and drill press in the class. The class was specifically for women and there were only 3 of us attending the class, so the instructor was detailed, thorough and really let us try out the tools so that we would be comfortable with them. He talked us through, showed us on his own piece of lumber and then let us use the tools.

After the class I was empowered and excited! Still, I didn't have the tools at home to start any kind of woodworking and I wasn't looking to spend a lot of money on a woodworking gym membership (yes that is a real thing). 

So I waited *somewhat* patiently that we would eventually buy some kind of saw I could safely use at home. We already owned sanders, a Kreg Jig system (I bought for myself) and we have a pneumatic nailer that Erik purchased when we redid the mudroom at our last house. 

 Fast forward to this past Christmas when Erik surprised me with a table saw that he picked up from a coworker of his. He got it all fixed up and ready with a brand new blade and taught me how to use it. 

I had these plans in mind for a bench for our hall bathroom so the kids could share a stool rather than constantly fight over the potty stool they climb onto to brush their teeth. Also, I wanted to return the potty chair/stool to the downstairs bathroom for when John is ready to potty train.

I showed the plans to Erik and he and I devised a different style that would work better for our needs (although I did fight him a little on this because I had this one set in my mind). Plus, I planned to use scrap wood for my first build to keep costs low for something that would be a practice project.

One afternoon during nap time Erik helped me cut all of the pieces we would need before heading out of town for a quick work trip. It was up to me to assemble this thing using my Kreg Jig!

Best laid plans, right?

The wood was a little warped, which I already knew but figured I could sand. The Kreg Jig was tricky, plus I wasn't planning out where my holes should go and just trying to assemble it as quickly as I could. This was a huge mistake on my part. I learned very quickly that completing a project, even a simple one, still requires patience and planning, 2 things I admittedly don't have a lot of.

So, I had to scrap some of the pre-cut pieces Erik helped me with, put on my big girl pants and be comfortable using a very large and intimidating table saw all on my own. And I've gotta admit... it was awesome.

It still took me a little work, patience and proper planning. I still messed up A LOT.

But I got really comfortable using the saw.

And eventually, I assembled this bench. And I could not be more proud of it.

The next day, I stained it. And then put on a coat of triple thick polyurethane.

I think my little minions approve, too. John walked into the bathroom the first time and immediately said "wow!" And they quickly jumped up and started using their new stool together. Shockingly, without even throwing elbows into one another!

This room makes me happy. I loved working on it and felt so much joy once it came together. It was bittersweet as well because it meant that our baby was officially turning into a big boy and a big brother, which is a pretty tall order when you're only 21 months old! 

I started working on this room in June 2014 with the new baby coming in late September. Talk about giving yourself a deadline! I talked to Will's pediatrician about when to move him into his new room and she recommended about 3 months before baby came in order to make sure that he was settled in and that there was no confusion about the crib being for baby and the big bed being for him. 

I had received advice from a number of friends that also had multiple kids close in age (Will and John are 23 months apart) and everyone's recommendation to me was to simply buy another crib, which is something we decided we didn't want to do.

It seems weird looking back because that is only 3 months older than John is right now and I can't imagine preparing to move John into a new room and sleeping in anything other than his crib. 

So without further ado, here are the glorious before photos of Will's big boy room.

That wallpaper border was in a few of the upstairs rooms and it was U-G-L-Y. There was dark brown carpet, which was in surprisingly good condition and cleaned up quite nicely when Erik used his carpet cleaner/oxy clean combination on it. The blinds were really cheap vinyl with these huge ugly boxes at the top. There were random speakers and shelving installed throughout the room. Below is just another view of the wallpaper border and the closet.

When it came time to update this room we had our work cut out for us. We ripped down the wallpaper border and gave it a fresh coat of neutral paint. Other than that, this room was used as our "office" for quite a while before we converted it into a guest space for family.

Yes, this is what we considered an office. Don't judge us. There's a desk in there after all. You just have to look beyond the piles of crap and you'll see it hiding under all that paperwork.

We had transitioned it to a guest room/office but I have zero pictures of it from that stage. We did use it for a number of out of town guests so I can assure you (or maybe this is just to assure myself) that it was somewhat cleaned up and in suitable condition between the years of 2011 and 2014. Or maybe it wasn't and that's why I did not find any photos of it during that time...

Anywho, fast forward to 2014. I'm pregnant with John, Will needs a room. (Sorry, I tend to get sort of off track in my writing which is very similar to having a conversation with me in real life.) So, we ripped up the carpet because, even though it was in good shape, the color was really outdated for the house and we wanted to refresh it for the space. We ordered the same style and color that we used in the nursery (both from Home Depot) and have been really happy with it. But, before we get there, here is the room ready for carpet & paint.

At first, Erik didn't want me to paint it. I think he was both worried about me painting while pregnant and also thought the neutral color would be just fine. I can't say I disagreed with him on either point but I had given in to that idea when we did the nursery and I wanted to update his room with a fresh coat of paint this time around.

After the painting was complete, Home Depot came to install the carpet.



Finally, we were able to start pulling the room together! We used Erik's old bed and dresser from when he was a kid. At first I wanted to paint it or restain it but I can honestly say that I love the look of the wood in the room. There's a desk that goes with the set that is still in storage and we hope to eventually have the boys share a room and utilize the bed as bunk beds.



I made the duvet and pillow covers all by myself. I apparently have a strong desire to sew when pregnant and thought that making a quilt would be a lot cheaper than buying a Madras version from Pottery Barn. While it was cheaper, in the end it was still quite an expensive project. I love how it turned out and am very proud of it.

We slowly started adding items into the room and letting Will play in it while I was finishing up the details. As you can see from the picture below, he seemed to love it!


I used Pinterest a lot to get ideas for what I wanted to put into the room and DIYed quite a few items to put into the space. I knew I wanted to do a red/blue theme but we didn't want to choose a certain theme for him and wanted the room to evolve over time to meet his tastes. I know, that sounds really strange to say about a not even 2 year old but I didn't want to decorate his room in all trucks or all Elmo and then have him not like those things in a year or 2. I think we made the right decision and love how all of the items came together. Its very "boy" without too much of a theme and, in my opinion, is really cute.


We have a mix of Brewers, Packers, airplanes and lots of toys, stuffed animals and books.



I bought the letters for his name at Hobby Lobby and painted them red.




The little fire truck had flowers from Erik's parents in it and we got it the day he was born. The wooden helicopter is actually a bank that Erik had as a kid.




The little reading nook gets used all the time. I made the bean bag and the book sling bookshelves. The map is from Amazon and we plan to start marking the places we visit. Donald Duck is from Erik's childhood as well - its really fun being able to use things that have meaning to us in Will's room, whether its something from his past or something that I took the time to make.



I bought that shelf from Goodwill ages ago, painted it blue and added the hook so that Will has somewhere to hang his hats, pj's and bathrobe. The blocks on top of it were a gift from some very good friends of ours when Will was born and have his name, initial, birthday and birth weight on them. The puppy plays music and was a gift from Nana & Papa (Erik's parents).



The pictures are the birth announcement that Nana made and another birth announcement we received from another set of very good friends after Will was born. I love walking down the hallway and seeing these as the first thing before I go into his room.

When I was taking the pictures of Will's room he wanted to make sure that I took a picture of him with his best friends, Bear and Catnap. How could I refuse his request, he's just too cute to say no to, but only some of the time. Ha!

Erik bought our family a 1964 Magnavox record player off of Craigslist for $60. This all came about one night while we were talking in bed and he mentioned that he saw one and was thinking about going to look at it (he's always scouring Craigslist for "something" but never really knows what he wants). 

He said he thought it would be fun to have a stereo with a record player so that we could play records and listen to music with the boys. I wasn't completely sold. He showed me a photo and I was, let's just say, a little underwhelmed.

The color was very washed out. The hardware was fugly. There were lots of water stains on the top of it. It smelled like a dead animal was inside of it (which I didn't know until later once it was in our house). So long story short, he looked at it, bought it and had a friend come and load it up into his truck with him. 

He took the stereo portion completely out of it and took it to 2 different vendors over the course of a couple months so that it could be tuned up. He took a million pictures of the wiring so that he could put it all back together once it was fixed. The actual turntable sat in our basement during this time.

He cleaned it inside & out. I cleaned it again. Remember that dead animal smell? Well there were definitely rodents of some kind living inside of it at some point over it's 60 year history. 

We decided to have it refinished in the hoped of updating it as well as alleviating some of the "musty basement" smell. Erik found someone, again off of Craigslist, and set up a drop off date so that we could have it stripped, stained & polyed.

We decided that painting the interior of it would help freshen it up a bit as well, so I embarked on that as a project while the boys were napping one October afternoon. You can't tell a huge difference in the photo below but trust me when I tell you that the smell was much improved after a coat of paint on that bad boy.

Erik dropped the cabinet off one day and we got a couple of text updates over the course of about 2 weeks from the individual that was working on the project. It looked great once it was stripped and we were really excited when the job was complete and Erik was able to pick it up.

He picked it up after work one evening and brought it home. I helped him unload it from the car and we took it into the house. I started looking at it and noticed the water marks were still on the top sliding portion. Then I thought the poly looked a little uneven. Then I noticed a lot of scratches. I brought it up to Erik who thought I was being overly critical of the work. 

Then, the next day, in the daylight we really started to notice some problems with it. The water marks were still very much in place. There were scratches all over the front of it. The stain was uneven in areas, as was the poly. There were brush bristles in the finish. Overall it was a big disappointment. We contacted the individual but after a couple of "polite" emails I dropped it because I knew that we weren't going to receive a refund.

Below are some of the photos after we got it back.

So what does one do in a situation like this? 

Well, learn how to strip, stain and poly a stereo cabinet after having never done a project like this ever in my life, of course!

So, I got to stripping. I had a bunch of stuff in the basement from when I originally started working on this lovely chair. I ended up painting the chair in the end and then finally finished it about a million months later. But that's neither here nor there. Unless it shows how quickly I actually work on projects. 

Anyway... back to the stripping. I'm sure there are right ways to go about stripping furniture. And I'm sure you can learn about those correct ways if you do research, read articles and watch YouTube videos. But anyone that knows me knows that I subscribe to the notion of "If at first you don't succeed" (get really aggravated about it and then reluctantly start over). So, I decided that I could figure it out as I went along and use what I had in my house.

This consisted of:

Citristrip Gel

A stripping tool

Gloves

Lots of shop towels

Aluminum pans (for the Citrus stripper)

Drop cloths

Mineral spirits, more gloves and some patience

I got to work one night after I had all said tools ready to go and started getting all the uneven stain and poly off the stereo cabinet. About 8 years later (or a few hours) I finally had the stain removed.

Next up was sanding. We moved it into the garage so that I could get to work. Luckily it was an unseasonably warm fall here in WI so it wasn't too bad being in the garage at night. This was pretty much the only time I worked on this portion of the project because its a lot easier to do when the kids are asleep at night versus only for a little while during the day.

I sanded. Then I sanded. Then I sanded some more. I wanted to get the water marks out and to remove some of the uneven areas of the piece, not to mention all of the scratches. I also had to get some different sanding tools in order to get into all of the grooves on the front as best as possible. I made a couple trips out to different hardware stores before I finally found a combination of items that worked for me.

Then came the fun and rewarding part. The staining. We moved this old girl down into the basement for the final stages of the project. We didn't want to risk it being too cold or dusty in the garage and thought it best to move it somewhere out of the elements. I did some finish sanding on the inserts and told Erik I was going to start with those before attempting the whole piece. 

I'm really glad I did because in my research (yes, I did actually research something!) I found that it was recommended to use wood conditioner before staining in order to give the stain a nice even finish. I didn't want to risk ruining the piece after all the prep work I had done. So, off to the hardware store I went to pick some up.

I applied it. I waited the recommended time. I stained.

Spoiler alert: There were little water spots on the insert I did. It did not look as good as I hoped. We asked a woodworking friend about it because I thought maybe I had done something wrong with the stain. He said it was definitely the wood conditioner. So I sanded it down, skipped the wood conditioner and, thank goodness, the stain looked great!

It took me a couple of days to finish the stain and poly and then we let it rest in the basement so that everything could cure properly.

Erik got to work installing the new black speaker fabric that I had picked up at Joann Fabrics. The he installed the hardware. It was starting to some together really well and we were both really pleased with how nice it looked! No uneven stain! No brush bristles in the poly!

T-minus 1 day until this kiddo is supposed to make his or her appearance into this world. But, I have a feeling tomorrow is not going to be Frank's birthday. I guess we shall see!

In the meantime, here I am as of last night. Technically it was taken 2 days before I'm officially 40 weeks but I figure it's close enough. You can argue with me about it if you want to but I'm 1 day away from being 40 weeks pregnant. You may not want to deal with those pregnancy hormones.

And, the side by side comparison from when I was skinny :)

As promised, here are pictures of the nursery. Yep, it's done and just waiting for this kiddo!

The crib is from Pottery Barn Kids. My mom helped me make the quilt and I made the crib skirt. all. by. myself. Pillow cover, too!

The dresser/changing table is also from Pottery Barn Kids. The dresser has diapers, cloth diapers, onesies and all sorts of hand me down clothes.

I made the pinwheels from cardstock and stuck them on the wall with some double sided foam adhesive circles. That way, if baby pees on them, I can just take them down and rearrange! Originally I planned to do a mobile above the changing table but saw the pinwheels on Pinterest and figured I'd give it a try.

The glider/rocker is from Dutailier and is super comfortable. I already had the side table and the ottoman (which I may slipcover eventually... we'll see). I found the lamp at Marshall's, the coral bowl on clearance at Target and the owl picture at Pier One.

Bookcase is from, you guessed it, Pottery Barn Kids! It's not part of the same collection because the bookcase that went with it was discontinued. But, we found one in the same finish and it matches perfectly! We got lots of books and toys from our showers so this was perfect to fit everything.

Erik put together and installed the closet organizer and I found the baskets at Target, which fit perfectly into the closet organizer openings. They are filled with blankets, burp cloths, diapers and all sorts of other goodies.

Our awesome friends Steve & Jennifer were up visiting last weekend and Steve helped Erik get the doors installed. Thanks, Steve! :)

Here's a view of the room to give you some perspective of how we have things setup. Almost all the frames in the gallery were frames I already had on hand that I spray painted black. Some of them have artwork in them and some of them are waiting to be filled with pictures of baby, baby footprints, hospital bracelet, etc.

Curtains are from Target and the toy basket was a gift from my sis-in-law. It fits perfectly under the window and has a lot more toys in it.

And here's another view of the nursery to give you the rest of the perspective.

So that's it, folks! Now all we need is the baby and the room will be complete!