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entertaining u newspaper: your weekly guide to entertainment
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by kellie abrahamson
kabrahamson1@aol.com
It’s been a crazy couple of months for me. My family and I recently moved into our first home and unpacking, painting and decorating have taken up every second of my spare time. We’ve just about got the house where we want it but the bedrooms, particularly the kids’ rooms, have taken a backseat until now. In honor of EU’s home improvement issue and my daughter’s 5th birthday, my husband and I decided to give our little princess the room of her dreams. We took on the task over the weekend.
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In the month leading up to closing on our home, my daughter Isabelle and I talked a lot about how she would want her room to look. Isabelle is a total girlie girl and she’s been at that princess stage practically since she could talk. Of course, this meant that she wanted a princess room: pink, frilly and filled with regal, “glamorous” (her word) things. I knew we could deliver on some of her requests so I agreed and we began picking out paint colors. What really helped us at this stage was the Disney Color line of paint by Behr, available exclusively at Home Depot. Looking at their color pallet and sample rooms helped us narrow down exactly what Isabelle wanted. We settled on bubblegum pink (called “Pretty in Pink”) for the top half of the wall, sky blue (“Bibbidi Bobbidi Blue”) for the bottom half and white for a separating border. We would also use Disney stencils and stamps to add the finishing touches. Those embellishments would be in yellow (“Main Street Lights”), Isabelle’s second favorite color.
With the colors picked out, we then moved on to the furniture. Before we moved, Isabelle was still in a toddler bed. We decided to upgrade her to a twin and luckily a friend of the family had one she needed to get rid of. It ended up being a four-post bed with floral embellishments, perfect for what I had in mind. Initially, I wanted to paint it and her preexisting dresser white, but given the short time frame and the even shorter budget, we decided to hold off on that for now. Isabelle’s room would also have a small princess desk, a gift from my mother-in-law, and a princess-themed hamper.
The planning complete, it was time to begin putting the room together. As I’m sure most are aware, the worst part of painting is the prep work. The previous occupant of Isabelle’s room was a teenage girl who apparently had a lot of posters on her walls over the years. This meant lots of spackle and sanding. When that was through, I discovered she also liked to hang posters using scotch tape. Finding every little piece was a real pain, but critical to a decent paint job. With that headache done we moved on to another: taping. We used some painters tape on all the moldings, making sure the already white baseboards would remain that way. Next was prepping the wall for the white border that would run all the way around. Using a chalk reel, we made a blue line where we wanted the border to be. After laying down some drop cloths we got to work.
The painting itself never takes very long and we finished up most of it in a couple of hours. Midway through the second coat of pink paint, I had an idea. I had seen a home improvement show where they used magnetic primer on one wall of an office to give the homeowners a place to hang important documents. It seemed like a cool idea and I wanted to try it. Since we hadn’t begun the border yet, I decided to make that the magnetic part of the wall. We picked up a quart of Rust-Oleum Magnetic Latex Primer at a home improvement store and gave it a try. We decided to use it on only one wall since it requires multiple coats for maximum magnetic attraction. Five coats later, we were ready to put on the top coat. Once that was done, my husband did some touch up painting while I tackled the stenciling. The room was almost done.
Next came décor. As adorable as it is that my daughter desperately wants a crystal chandler in her room, I was not willing to blow my decorating budget on it. Instead, I got my hands on a pink princess hoop canopy to hang over her bed. It wasn’t a chandler, but it’s as “glamorous” as we were going to get. We also picked up a few posters, a princess-like clock and a full length mirror.
Once we were done, we brought Princess Isabelle in to see her new throne room. Her reaction was worth all the stress and hard work. With her room done, we’re one step closer to having our weekends back. That’s a nice feeling.
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