DIY Playroom Renovation/Upgrade

Posted May 28, 2018 by Prairie Wife - 7 comments

I am not a DIY kind of girl…but this year seems to be the year for taking chances. 

We’ve lived in our home for over 10 years and I feel like it just needs some freshening up.

In January I redid our kitchen cabinets and our bedroom and I have to say the results were pretty awesome.

Sadly, The Cowkids just keep growing up. I’ve changed their bedrooms pretty consistently over the years to keep up with their new older tastes, but our playroom has been the same for 9 years.

Currently, there is a small table we use for homeschool and a dress up area. These are still used all the time by the two littlest Cowkids, and I don’t think we’re ready to change that yet.

On one side of our playroom is this large fold up desk and a bookshelf. The bookshelf has kid’s books and puzzles and a hodge podge of homeschool stuff on top. The desk hasn’t been used for it’s real purpose in about 6 years. I’ve found I’m more comfortable working in the kitchen/upstairs sitting area. It allows me to keep an ear out for the Cowkids when they play outside or kick the Cowkids downstairs to the playroom or to watch TV if I need quiet. I’ve embraced the fact that this bulky desk has simply become a dust collector and a catch all for random papers and computer cords. Yet, I haven’t been sure what to do with it or the space in the playroom to make it valuable…so things have stayed the same…

In the last few months I’ve noticed something with the Cowkids. They are really getting into board games. Monopoly, Risk, and TROUBLE as well as Trivial Pursuit (Harry Potter Edition). We have a large dining table that seats 10. This is where The Cowkids usually settle in to play their games which works fine until dinner time. With our large family we can’t just scoot the board down the table, and the kids get really frustrated with having to pack their games up half way done.

This led me to my renovation revelation!

I decided to change the playroom around so they could have a table to play board games and do puzzles (a secret love of mine too) and leave them out for days without causing any trouble.

I put the word out that I needed a sturdy table with at least 4 chairs at a reasonable price. Within 24 hours I found a winner, thanks to CollegeBFF for finding it for me!

The Cowboy picked up the table and we made a plan to get everything done this weekend.

I spent the week scouring Pinterest for ideas and settled on a multi colored chair/table approach. I wanted bright fun colors (it is a playroom after all) and I wanted to make the fact that we had 6 mismatched chairs look cool rather than tacky. I found several ideas and went out and bought three colors of chalk paint as well as some fun wall art from Hobby Lobby and two crates from Walmart to use as shelves…I’ve been dying to try that trend out! I bought some fabric to recover our bulletin boards and to upholster the one chair that had padding.

Then it was time to paint!

I used chalk paint because I like the matte look and the fact that you don’t need to sand anything, plus one thick coat does the trick. I also like that even though this furniture is going to get bumps and scratches, with chalk paint it ends up looking vintage and full of character.

I am so happy with the way this turned out!

We had to try the table in a variety of positions before we settled on this final look. Admitibley it did end up taking up a bit more space than I had planned. I’m OK with that, I wanted a space where all the kids could be at one time, and I’ve already seen that they can do that comfortably here!

This shelving works perfectly. I didn’t need something that could store a lot, just a few things that only I need easy access to. I also wanted to keep it small so that it wouldn’t end up being a catch-all.

The Cowkids were so excited and heart warmingly thankful when they saw the final reveal and they have already done several puzzles together (with limited arguing).

As hard as it was to admit that The Cowkids are growing up, I am excited to have a playroom that fits ALL the ages we have in our family.

Categories: For the Home, Prairie Wife Style

Tags: , bright kids playroom, chalk paint, DIY, Furniture Redo, Homestead, playroom renovation, playroom upgrade