We Are Empty Nester’s Now
Well it has finally happened. Our last little bird has flown our coop. Yesterday my husband and I helped our youngest move into her very own apartment. We are empty nester’s now. Even though we tried really hard to convince her that it may not be the best time, she had come to the decision that she was ready to leave. So after packing up all (well all that she wanted) of her things and helping her relocate to her new home, my husband and I now have an extra room and no idea of how to use it.
After a lot of talk and discussion last night, we think we have come to a solution of how to use the extra space. And it really was a discussion, I promise! I had wanted to make the room a guest bedroom, and he was urging me to move our desktop computer and extra stuff into the room. We compromised, and decided to make it a study type room, and add a sofa bed. So we will be able to accommodate all of our children when they come home for Christmas, which they do every year. I love that.
Family = Love
Every Christmas eve, all of our kids come home and spend the night. So even though they are grown, we always get to have Christmas morning with our babies, and their significant others. I feel very fortunate that my kids want to come home and be with us. Which is why I try really hard to make the holidays a memorable time that they look forward to as well.
And our other daughter still comes home several times a month to sleep over, so we do have a dedicated guest bedroom that is basically her room, even though she has her own apartment.
But since we already have a guest bedroom, we didn’t really need another one. Since the kids only come home all together once a year, it wasn’t realistic to dedicate 2 guest bedrooms, and have wasted space. So in our compromise, this is what we decided to do.
Turning a Bedroom Into a Multipurpose Room
For the now empty room, we decided to bring down our living room couch, and also buy a new computer desk. The old desk we had was cheap, and falling apart. And since we do use the desktop computer for both of our websites, and recording videos we decided to invest in a more substantial work space. We wanted it to be functional as well as look nice. And we found the desk at American Furniture Warehouse.
But as with any project, there has to be hiccups along the way. Nothing can ever be easy, right? So my grand plan of moving the couch to the new multipurpose room didn’t quite go according to plan. We could not get the couch to fit around the tight corner to get into the bedroom. So we had to opt for plan b, and move the recliner rocking chair into the room, along with the elliptical.
And the beautiful desk we chose, well that had to be fully assembled. So Dale (my husband) had the honor of putting the desk together. And I made myself available to assist if needed, but mainly just stayed out of the way.
There is still plenty of room to bring in the air mattress at Christmas time too, so the room can still function as a bedroom when we need it to.
The Snowball Effect
Since we had decided on how to use the extra space in the bedroom, we now had a lot of different options of how to move things around from room to room.
And my compromise to having the extra bedroom become technically an office was to buy a sleeper sofa. And we brought this into the living room. This will create yet another sleeping arrangement, and I got to pick out a new couch.
We decided to rearrange the living room because we are getting new windows (finally) in the next few months, and I didn’t want to have to rearrange the furniture yet again when they come to install the new windows.
So the living room got a makeover, and then it was time to move on to the family room.
The family room has become more of a dog room than anything else. Harley even has his own couch. But I was tired of how everything was configured. So since we were rearranging every other room, why not the family room as well? The dog kennels were moved, as was Harley’s couch. Because we now had an extra couch, so the nice couch will now be Harley’s, with a cover on it so we can hopefully keep the couch in one piece. The fireplace is usable, and viewable. And we can get to the windows easily when they need to access them to install the new ones.
Searching For The Perfect Accents
I do want to change out some of the artwork, and replace things, but for now this will work just fine. But as soon as I am done publishing this article I will be going to the Kirkland’s website to do a little browsing to see if I can find the perfect piece of art for the walls.
But the most important art work on the walls is the photos we have of our kids. I wish I would have had a digital camera when they were really little, but I am grateful I have the photos that I do.
I will be the first to admit I am not gifted when it comes to making a room look like the pages of Pottery Barn, but it works for me, so I guess it is what it is. Functionally eclectic, is that a decorating style? Maybe? But it works for our family, and that is what matters most of all.
What Matter’s Most
I always love to find a reason to justify going shopping. But in the end, what matter’s most is family. Yes, it is nice to be able to go buy stuff. But in the end, it’s just stuff. As long as our children are happy and healthy that is the ultimate definition of happiness in my opinion.
And now that all of our kids are grown and beginning their lives separate from us. Dale and I will just have to embrace being empty nester’s. It’s a new chapter in our kids lives, and ours as well. Time will tell how everything plays out, but now we have time to rediscover ourselves, and tackle life one new project at a time.
