Finally -- The Guest Bedroom

Happy Friday everyone!  I want to thank you all for the nice comments you've left for me over the last week or so.  I'm very appreciative, and I haven't forgotten about you.  I posted on Monday and haven't been back on the computer since then -- until today.  I'll be paying my regular visits to everyone in the next day or so.

Back in January of this year, I gave a very brief, sneak peek of what I was doing to our son's old bedroom to give it a new look and turn it into a guest bedroom.  I really thought I would finish it sooner and would be showing it to you during the winter months.  That didn't happen, so here it is finally, almost completely finished.  This is a long, picture-heavy post, folks --just wanted to give you fair warning.  :)

 

 I wasn't able to get a shot of the whole room, but my husband can do that with his wide-angle lens.  I just wanted to go ahead and get pictures during the daylight and record them, so to speak, so I can feel like I've almost completed this project.  It feels like it's been dragging on forever.  :)  The picture above was taken in the evening, and I had placed a blue throw at the end of the bed.

This picture was taken this morning (the bedroom gets the morning sunlight).  My husband's grandmother gave us this quilt the first year we were married.  Someone she knew made it, and the pattern is called "Grandma's Fan."  We have a quilt rack in our bedroom, and I've had this quilt on it for years, but other stuff kept getting stacked on there, and I was afraid the quilt would get messed up.  It's been packed away for a few years now -- so glad I thought about it.

The bedspread is an old chenille one that my mom gave me.  The dust ruffle happens to match the curtains, which I've had in here for years, and both of those things came from my mom, too.  The dust ruffle and curtains also go well with the tartan plaid comforter I got for the bed back in the winter.

So, I'll back up and explain a little about how I put the room together.  The wallpaper in this room was here when we bought the house.  It's still in good shape, and I wasn't in the mood to take it down and re-paint the room at this time.  I think it may be grasscloth, but I'm not sure.  It has textured ridges and looks like grasscloth.  The paper has an off-white background with a blue and beige (or khaki) muted pattern on it.  I originally had plans to put a white coverlet with a blue and white toile bed skirt on this bed, because I already had them and really like them.  However, I soon realized they wouldn't look right because the wallpaper is too off-white and so is the trimwork in the room.  The curtains are off-white too, so everything would have clashed with that snow-white coverlet.

My mom had loaned me this bedspread a few years ago, so I got it out of storage.  Then I needed a bed skirt.  I didn't want to buy a new one if I could avoid it (they're expensive), so I asked my mom if she had one I could borrow.  She rarely throws anything away, and she has a stash of curtains and bed linens.  What a happy accident that the bed skirt was the same pattern as the curtains, as they both came from the same store.

Since the wallpaper pattern has a lot of blue in it, I decided to make use of that.  In addition, I saw some pictures last summer of red, white, and blue bedrooms, and I fell in love with that look.  That's what I decided to go with.  My challenge was to try and use, as much as possible, the things that we already have here, in order to save money.  The things I ended up purchasing new for the guest bedroom were the tartan comforter and pillow shams, the area rug beside the bed, a throw pillow for the bed, a new bookcase, and a new lamp for the chest of drawers.

This is the bookcase, which I purchased with some of my Christmas money.  I got it from Home Decorators online; they were running a sale at the time, so I think I got a good deal on it.  I believe it's four feet by five feet, if I remember correctly.  We used to have a big bookcase in this room when our son was growing up, but we let him take that with him when he moved out.  I switched out the German stein on top of the bookcase for my Jim Shore rooster, which I thought looked more like spring and summer.  You can see the hummingbird's nest I found back in January on the second shelf.

The rooster has a lot of red in it, and the basket has pops of red, too.

Back in the winter, I had a print by a local artist hanging over the bed.  It was a gift and I love it, but it's a snow scene.  We have two snow scenes, both beautiful, but I've gotten to where I just don't want to look at snow scenes year round.  I was actually looking at buying a summer print online and getting it framed here, when I went down to our basement for something and saw this propped against the wall.  Yippee!  Saved some more money.  ;)  This is Number Two Meeting Street, a bed and breakfast in Charleston, and we bought this poster print when we were there on our honeymoon during Spoleto Festival.  It even has the year we were married on it.  I brought it upstairs, the colors worked, so I cleaned it up and we hung it over the bed.  I'm so glad I found this because I enjoy seeing this reminder of our time in Charleston.

You can see part of the area rug in this picture; I purchased it from Amazon at a great price.  I do still need to get a mat to go under it because it constantly slides around.

I forgot that another thing I purchased was this little cloth on the nightstand.  The finish on top of the nightstand is damaged, so I needed something to cover that up.  I found this vintage cloth in Southport for $6.00.

When our son was growing up, the furniture in this room was oak.  It was given to us by Hal's parents; he and his brother used it when they were growing up.  It's very nice, solid oak and very heavy, but it had lots of scratches from being used by three different boys (Will included) over the years.  Will actually has part of it in his room now.  For years, this room had a single bed, a bachelor's chest and mirror, and a chest of drawers, all in oak.  He also had a desk we bought for him and the bookcase; everything went with him to his rental house but the chest of drawers.  Here's a glimpse of the room back them --

I'm pretty sure he wouldn't be too happy about me showing this picture.  ;)  To the right of the window above is a large, framed corkboard that was here when we bought the house.  It was great for a young boy because he could put his school artwork and later, his posters, up here.  When he moved, I didn't try to remove it because I'm pretty sure there's no wallpaper behind it.  I just decided to work with it as best I could.

I haven't finished this yet, but I decided to do a travel board here of the various places we've visited over the years.  I still have some empty space to fill yet.  The world map was already here for our son; it has some small holes in it, so I may get another one later.

When my husband's grandmother moved into a nursing home several years ago, her family members inherited most of her furniture and other possessions.  We were really fortunate to get a queen-size bed from her, so we moved our double bed into Will's room, and the mahogany chest of drawers and nightstand in here also came from my husband's grandmother and great-aunt.  We were very grateful to receive those.

This banjo belonged to my husband's grandfather, who died when our son was nine years old.  Grandpa and his brothers were all musicians, and it means a lot to my husband to have this banjo.

I mentioned that I had also purchased a new lamp for this room.  This was my biggest splurge because I got it at my favorite local lamp store, and everything they carry is pricey.  But I can always find what I'm looking for there when I can't find it anywhere else.  I just love, love this lamp.

Below is the lamp that was here previously --

Just a tad messy, huh?  This room was piled high with stuff for us to go through after our son moved out.  That's why I'm just now finishing the room.  It's hard to see the lamp in this picture, but it's a fox reading a book.  I couldn't resist the whimsical look of him and bought the lamp for our son's room.  I purchased it years ago at a local store that's no longer in business.  They had a wonderful selection of lamps at reasonable prices.

Here's a closer view of the lamp.  It's not a big lamp, but it's tall, and it really looks much better here than it did on the chest of drawers.  My husband brought our son the Paddington Bear from England years ago.

The little pictures over this nightstand came from my grandparents' house.  My mom had them in her attic and she was glad for me to have them.

This oak basket used to sit on our hearth for years but has moved into the bedroom because Duncan wouldn't leave it alone.

The Raggedy Ann-style doll is about 45 years old.  My mom had a co-worker who made these, and mom bought one for me and one for my sister.  It fits with the old-fashioned look I wanted for this room and adds a nice touch of red.

There is also a vanity/dressing table that goes with the chest of drawers and nightstand, which we'll be putting here against the wall where the chair and basket are.  When we get the vanity in place, I'm going to hang a few red and blue transferware plates on that wall.  I'll move the chair over underneath the corkboard.  I'm also thinking of painting the chair.

I love silhouettes, do you?  This is my husband (on the right) when he was twelve years old.  It was done at Disney World on a family vacation.  That's his mom on the left, done right after she graduated from high school (I believe).  We bought the gold frames and black mats (which already had oval-shaped openings) from A. C. Moore, and did the framing ourselves.  I love the way they turned out.

What I still have left to do is get all the clothes out of this closet, with the exception of a few things, and bag them up to give to the Vietnam Veterans' of America next Friday.  I've already removed all the board games and puzzles from the shelf on the right, and we're going to install three more shelves at the other end of the closet.  Whew!

As far as this being a guest bedroom, we really don't have overnight guests (except for our son) these days.  We did when we were younger and lived in Greensboro, but it's nice to have this room ready if we need it.  I've already used it several times on nights when I couldn't sleep and didn't want to wake my husband.  I've tried to include most things that I think would make the room comfortable for an overnight guest, be it a family member or friend.  There will be room in the closet to hang clothes after this weekend.  ;)

There are books and magazines for reading material,

and a ceiling fan if the room feels too stuffy.

Plenty of lamplight to read by,

a like-new mattress,

fresh flowers,

...and a tray for tea-time.  If you're still with me after this long post, I really appreciate your reading this.  I'll leave you with the rest of the pictures.

 

Thanks so much for your visit -- I hope you have a great weekend!


Linking To:
Home Sweet Home party, hosted by Sherry
Best of the Weekend Link Party, hosted by Amy
Amaze Me Monday, hosted by Cindy
Metamorphosis Monday, hosted by Susan
Mosaic Monday, hosted by Judith

Thank you, ladies, for hosting!

Denise