So, it looks like Elisabeth will move into Catie’s room soon. The room they’re going to share is about 100 square feet, but thanks to awkward door and window placement, pretty small for two girls to share for the next decade or so.
In other words, it’ll be a tight sleep for them when they’re gangly teens. And I have no doubt they’ll be gangly as teens since that was the case for both M and myself. I’m convinced the girls need a bed configuration that gives them a little personal space.
Read: not bunk beds.
You’d think that moving the girls into shared space would only be filled with joy. Bonding and love as we shopped for beds together and discussed themes and new quilts. Perhaps a simple bunk bed? Maybe an extra dresser?
You’d think it would be simple, but you’d be wrong.
The project has consumed any extra brain cells that I might have had.
Partly the inspiration of new bedding! new bed! remodeling! In my own gangly teen years, I tore down and repainted all of my quarter-round in my room in Rastafarian colors. On a non-existant budget.
Now, with Pintrest and shopping sites and friends who build bunk beds, the choices seem limitless.
Oh, and Ikea.
The choices really are limitless at Ikea.
Ikea has this bed, which is not pretty and surely not what the girls were thinking of when they said they wanted to be roommates. It’s a very low loft bed, which can be flipped over and used as a canopy bed. As soon as I saw it, I envisioned all the potential. One painted pink with canopy curtains for Elisabeth. Another flipped over to be a loft and painted light purple with Christmas lights underneath for Catie.
I was already sewing Elisabeth’s curtains on the sewing machine I don’t even own when I did a quick google. I discovered that millions of people (okay dozens) had already hacked and redecorated the Kura bed to be whatever they wanted. Like the picture in this post, where a mom painted and refashioned the bed for her little girl and now has the Pintrest-worthy pics to prove it. You can read about the hack here, on a website where Ikea fans share ways to reuse the store’s awesome products.
Oh my, these are my people. People who buy cheap Scandinavian furniture and then spend embarrassing quantities of time personalizing it. I couldn’t sleep Saturday night because images of hacked Kura beds were dancing in my head.
Sunday morning I polled the girls. Turns out, they don’t share my vision. And M has been beyond patient listening to my extreme makeover ideas, but he has the look in his eyes that I get when someone give me street directions.
That huh? look.
Soooo, I’ll keep you posted on the Operation Sleep Tight/Tight Sleep.
Luckily my extra brain cells are getting tired. The girls may just get their plain old bunk beds.
