The Bonus Room - Part 1 of 3

      Today I (Ally) am writing the blog for an English assignment.  I am going to tell the story of how the girls in our family got Dad to give up his room. You see, Dad had wanted to use the room over the garage as a man cave, but we had a different idea. Mom had seen a picture in a magazine of a family/craft room.  Homeschooling can get pretty messy, so having a space where we could just leave a mess seemed like a good idea. At first, Dad was reluctant to give up his space. Around that time, however, construction began on his Morton building, so Emma and I convinced him that he would have a whole building to use as his man cave.  Because he is such a great dad, he agreed.  Mom happened to be 6 1/2 months pregnant at this point (no surprise there!) so we had to start immediately to get the room done by the time Jonah was born.   
   
   

This is how the room looked when we started. Pretty bad right?

We decided on a light dove gray to brighten up the room a bit.

The ceiling was a real challenge.  Since we wanted to do this as cheaply as possible the wood wasn't the best quality, and we had to resort to asking Dad for help. He was great and the only reason there is wood on that ceiling!  

It was also a great learning experience for the little kids.

Emma and I were Mom's helpers for the room.  Glynne isn't crazy about projects so she was
the official cook.

After sanding the entire floor, we finally got to paint it. 

To bring some fun into the room, we added stripes to the floor.  It took awhile, but was totally worth it. 

       

The room was now ready for the really fun part.  Decorating!  I'll tell you all about that in Part 2.