We have a new house and so many projects on the list to make it our own! The $100 Room Challenge couldn’t have come at a more perfect time. I’m excited to see just how much we can do with that $100 budget and the month-long timeframe for our Teen Bedroom Update.
The month of August was a whirlwind. We moved into our new house three weeks ago and tried to get settled in as quickly as possible. School started and all has been going fairly smoothly there. And all of the other things that are part of regular life carry on all around it – work, cleaning the house, kids’ activities, and so much more. Life has a lot of moving parts right now.
But.
That doesn’t stop the urge to start making this new house our own. I have SO many plans and ideas. Simply repainting everything is going to take weeks, especially while trying to fit it in among the everyday stuff. That’s not a deterrent, just a consideration. 😉 The motivation and the enthusiasm leave no real room for overwhelm. Besides, the only one setting a timeline on any of this is me.
I may not be able to do everything, but I can do anything I choose to do.
$100 Room Challenge
As luck would have it, September brings with it the $100 Room Challenge. I’ve participated in the challenge a couple of times before, taking one room in the house and updating it in a single month with a $100 budget. It’s a lot of fun working on a project “with” so many other people and I always look forward to seeing all of the different styles and directions everyone takes with the project. And with a brand new house to work with and so many plans already on the agenda, it really is perfect timing.
I spent a couple of weeks letting the ideas roll around in my head, trying to decide which room I want to start on first.
-The living room is the most-used room and the one any visitors will see. But we are buying new furniture and that certainly won’t fit the $100 budget.
-The laundry room seems do-able. I have ideas for a wall treatment I want to try and I could probably stay under budget by finding a cabinet at the ReStore instead of buying a new one. But it hardly seems like a room that should take first priority.
-I know what I want to do with a mud room style area in the garage and the stairs leading into the house. I think we have enough supplies left over from installing the shelves in the garage to get it all done on a small budget. But the projects would require the husband’s help and he doesn’t have a lot of free time this month.
-The family space downstairs has so much potential. It includes a media room with a kitchenette (actually, it’s larger than the main kitchen) and a bonus area we don’t quite know what to do with yet. The rooms are full of possibilities. It’s such a large space, I considered taking a different track with the project and seeing exactly how far I could get with the $100 budget, knowing none of the rooms would truly be finished at the end of the project.
The room I chose is…
Kaitlyn’s bedroom!
Yep, I’m doing a Teen Bedroom Update for the $100 Room Challenge.
My daughter is just as excited as I am to make the house our own. Kaitlyn is almost 17 and takes after her mom in so many ways. It’s no surprise that she has ideas for her bedroom and would love to tackle it as soon as possible. She was right there with me, grabbing handfuls of paint samples at Home Depot the weekend we moved into the house. 😜
Teen Bedroom Update // Before Photos
Before I put on my paint clothes and get to work, let me show you the room!
We’re working with a pretty blank canvas here. The walls are kind of a cream color, leaning toward yellow, and the ceilings are the same color. The color is definitely not my favorite.
Kaitlyn’s bedroom is the smallest of the four bedrooms in the house. The closet is small as well. (The closet would be the door on the left.)
The bedroom has its own attached bathroom (the door in the center), which just happens to have the best shower in the house – so that more than makes up for the smaller bedroom. Her room is also the only bedroom on the lower level, so that holds a lot of appeal for a teenager.
That space in the corner behind the door is kind of awkward. We’re still working on a plan for that area.
The house is also very brown. Kaitlyn’s room is in the basement, so we want to brighten it up with some color on the walls. The doors and trim will be going white.
As for the rest of the plans for the room, I’ll tell you about those as we go forward with the project. Spoiler alert – the bedroom update obviously involves a lot of paint, but considering our schedule for this week, I don’t think we’ll tackle painting the room just yet!
I’m excited to see which rooms the other $100 Room Challenge participants have chosen! You can check them out here:
I’ll be back next Wednesday with a progress report on the Teen Bedroom Update – stay tuned!
alaynascreations 