One Room Challenge: Boys Cottage Bunk Room Reveal!

Hi Guys! I hope you are having a glorious week. Today marks the end of the One Room Challenge, hosted by Linda of Calling it Home, which means it’s time for me to share the big reveal of the boys’ Cottage Bunk Room.

Cottage Kids Room |This Mamas Dance-2

 

You can follow our House Journey on my Instagram( @thismamasdance)  with a ton of build photos by checking out #Kootage or take a look at Our House Tour

Matt and I literally built this room from nothing- it’s a part of an 1100 sf addition that we added on to our humble 900 sf lakeside cottage. It has been a HUGE job, a giant learning curve (since we aren’t builders by trade) and mostly completed on evenings and weekends.  Our work efforts have definitely fizzled out in the last year, as life has gotten busy with other things. Why is it the last 10% seems to be the hardest to finish, am I right? It felt like such a huge victory to get all of the electrical run, insulation in, and pine tongue and groove up on the walls- that we moved our boys in as soon as we had lights and carpet. The room sat as is since last Christmas, and all of the “little” things were constantly in the back of my mind.

I am a mama to 3, a dance instructor, I homeschool my kids, and my husband runs an independent film studio, so it’s a lot to juggle. I am sure you can relate. Yet, here we are! There is still trim to be finished, and painting of said trim, a roof to be stained- as well as some fun little details I didn’t get to, but I’ve rekindled my motivation! I am looking forward working on this space in the weeks to come. Joining in on this challenge really helped me to make some great progress though- woohoo!

The best news is, my kids LOVE it! It is such a blessing, and so fun to have a home to make our own, a place where we can rest, grow and dwell in peace. Thanks for you encouragement over the last few weeks- things definitely came a long way in the last two days. I had definitely hit a wall… or 4. If you would like to follow along from the beginning you can do so here

Week One| Week Two| Week Three| Week Four| Week Five

We live by the lake, and I love blues as well as neutrals, so I went with a relatively classic lake house scheme. White washed planks, and plenty of whites, with blues and a hint of green throughout.

DIY bunks |This Mamas Dance-5

blue and white kids bedding |This Mamas Dance-1

DIY kids collection storage |This Mamas Dance-5

Grey Wash Wall Shelf, Ikea brackets |This Mamas Dance-1

White bunk beds, blue and green accents |This Mamas Dance-1

matte black reading light |This Mamas Dance-5

I added a curtain rod to the bottom bunk, and used a fun wall hanging from Pottery Barn as a curtain… my mom gifted it to the boys several years back along with the striped quilts, also from PB.

Bunk Bed Curtain Map |This Mamas Dance-1

Blue and White, Kids room |This Mamas Dance-1

vertical book rack |This Mamas Dance-1hanging plant holder |This Mamas Dance-1

kids reading corner |This Mamas Dance-1

I layered a few small, inexpensive rugs to cozy up the reading corner.

Cottage Kids Room |This Mamas Dance-1

On the opposite wall are the lockers, offering a ton of storage for kids treasures… and let’s be honest, all the stuff they hoard, and the toys they don’t want to get rid of. The metal lockers also offer a great space to display kid art. All of the accessories on top of the lockers were from around the house- antique apple crates, and some inexpensive thrifted items like the lantern, tennis racquet, and tool box. The succulents are all faux- from the dollar store. Awesome I know. The globe came from Home Sense (in Canada)

pine dresser |This Mamas Dance-5

lockers |This Mamas Dance-1

sailboat painting |This Mamas Dance-1

These lockers were originally blue. 2 cans of white spray paint later, they were the lockers of my dreams.

canadian lockers |This Mamas Dance-1

cottage kids room |This Mamas Dance-4

I love the way the warm wood tones pop against the pine walls now that they have been white washed. It was a mammoth job to stain all of these walls, but in the end it was totally worth it.

log hook rack |This Mamas Dance-1

Nothing in our house is perfect or overly precious. Most of the things we have are thrifted, gifted or handmade. My (just) 6 year old and I created this little hanging rack and had fun doing so. This is a piece of wood he had saved because he thought it was cool, and now we all get to enjoy it.

cottage kids room |This Mamas Dance-3Cottage Gallery Wall |This Mamas Dance-1

Hi, my name is Ashlea and I like imperfect, random gallery walls. I really do. This is so cute IRL. It was a happy little surprise I had no intention of creating. Don’t you love it when that happens?

Wood and rattan rocking chair |This Mamas Dance-1

This massive rocking chair came from Costco of all places. It’s technically outdoor furniture, but was $80, and is so, so solid. I like to imagine myself sitting there as the children rest peacefully in the reading corner, and I read them stories. No one fights, pokes each other in the eye, or cries for a bottle.

White Washed Pine Planke Walls, White Trim |This Mamas Dance-1

Please do not to comment on my high water drapes. I had plans of curtain clips and letting out the hem, but considering the fact that I was putting up trim Tuesday night and painting it Wednesday morning, just marvel at how far this corner has come! Thanks.

cabins sign |This Mamas Dance-1

White lockers in bedroom |This Mamas Dance-1

green tool kit |This Mamas Dance-1

Below is the not pretty, but oh so practical under bed toy storage. I love it. I contemplated removing the under bed toys for the photos, but then decided that this is real life- and the bedroom is already 100x cleaner than it ever has been. It’s there just to remind you that  “Hey! Kids live here!”
Under bed toy storage |This Mamas Dance-1

cottage kids room |This Mamas Dance-5

So there you have the 360 tour. I have to bite my tongue and keep from commenting on the little projects that didn’t quite get done. Over all though, I am so happy with the progress that was made in here! For someone with a DIY house, and project ADD, focusing on bringing ONE space together was such an awesome concept. It gave me focus. I made a plan, and more or less stuck to it.

Most of the projects in here were DIY, and have more detailed posts that I will link to below- with a few more to come in the weeks ahead. I am also working on a video tour of the space, with a few details of how it all came together- so look for that soon.

Here is reminder of the space just 5 short weeks ago….

Pine Wall, Kids Room| This Mamas Dance-1

pine walls white trim

And today:

DIY bunks |This Mamas Dance-1

Thanks for stopping by, and please say hello. 🙂

-Miss Ash

P.S.- Yes I took the ladder off the bunk- I plan to build a new one that is mounted to the bunk without reaching down to the floor to maximize the under bed storage.

Source List

  • Pottery Barn: quilts, drapes, bunk hanging map
  • Target: bean bag chairs, wall sconce,white sheets
  • IKEA: plaid grey/white pillow, beige pillow, green storage boxes, black hooks, standing floor lamp, wall clock, shelf brackets, blue and beige striped rugs
  • Wal-Mart: black curtain rod
  • Canadian Tire: under bed storage bins
  • Homesense: globe, faux animal skin rug

DIY Projects

Shared at: Sundays at Home, The Creative Gallery

50 thoughts on “One Room Challenge: Boys Cottage Bunk Room Reveal!

      1. Hi Bethany- thanks for your lovely comment! This room is part of an addition to the home, and the pine is the finish on the studs- no drywall. It is 5/8″ thick I believe! Clear, kiln dried pine from a local lumber yard.

    1. Thanks mom! Isn’t that a fun use of that wall hanging? I thought about hanging it up the wall but there wasn’t a wide enough section that went up high enough to do it vertically. I love that it is being used now- and Gabriel pulls it closed every night. This room wouldn’t be what it is without Gramma’s touch 🙂

  1. Ok. Now I’m inspired to tackle my boys room 😉 Beautiful space, and I love all the personal touches and diys – it turned out perfect!

  2. Ashlea, this is incredible! What a fun and cozy space for your kids. I love the whitewashed walls but having done that in our basement, I know what a pain in the butt job that is. Good on you for getting that done! Love the bunk curtains, the lockers, the random gallery wall. This room is full of charm and how sweet that your kids their own hand in decorating it (that coat rack rocks!).

    1. Thank you so much for your comment Jen. I love the look of the white wash- but you are right, it is tedious! At least it is just one coat instead of the 3 it took to paint our living room and bedroom 😉 I am looking forward to seeing what you do at your Cottage, as I know it will be a beautiful, functional and inspiring space! Thanks for stopping by.

  3. This room is so perfect for the kids, who are adorable, btw! The white wash walls are gorgeous and I love the curtain on the lower bunk. I wouldn’t know it wasn’t done if you hadn’t said something–it looks great!

  4. So proud of you for finishing in record time ? my favorite parts
    The dark stained wall
    The shutters ☺️
    The boys little shelves with their letters
    And reading corner
    It all looks so lovely !!!!
    Great job mama ?

  5. This room is awesome!!!! Love all the wood, and you guys built this thing? WOW! I love how you added the cool curtain on the bunk and the lockers are just perfect! Your kids are very lucky indeed!Congrats and CHEERS to us for another room done!

  6. This room is great. Can’t believe you found the rocker at Costco! Love the lockers, and the walls – I’m sure all that whitewashing was exhausting but it looks so good now. And the little home made hooks are so sweet. Hope you don’t mind me including your room in my ORC round up – I just love it!

  7. absolutely fantastic job on the boys room, right out of the design magazine, good work Mizzzz Ash ?

  8. Ashlea…

    First off, I thought this was one of those HGTV dream home tours or something. But I was wrong. DEAD wrong. This was ALL YOU.

    I’m completely smitten with every square inch of this room… it’s just incredible. I lost my breath when my eyes landed on the storage lockers. They are soooo perfect in this room!

    Loving everything to the point of having to feature you this weekend on Party Junk. Thank you for linking up!

    1. Wow Donna! You are so sweet! Thank you so much for your words- it was a fun project and also a time consuming one 😉 Little by litle. Haha! Thank you for the feature and for being awesome! Means so much.

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