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This is why we can't have nice things....

Meet my stealthy-Ninja climber, 3 year-old Lily.  Sadly, this isn't the first time she has scaled her changing table.  However this is the last time.  After I maneuvered the table to where she couldn't access the shelving on the side to use as a ladder and then locked the wheels in place (all without Lily's knowledge) she still managed to move it to where she could climb it yet again.  See how proud she is?  She should be very proud.  She managed to do this without my knowledge.  Despite still using a baby monitor in her room I had no idea she was awake until I heard the tell-tale crinkling sound of her getting into the wipes.  Note the massive mess on the floor.   Ya know, I might not really be *that* concerned about the mountain climbing if she could figure out a way to get down.  This girl can climb UP with the best of them, but getting DOWN is the problem. I've tried everything from helping her get down, having another kid show her how to get down, and finally just tough love: if I ignore her surely she'll figure it out. No dice. One day she'll figure it out, right?  The diaper changing table stopped being the diaper spot long ago A. because she out-grew it about a year ago and B. we only do diapers at night and nap time.  However it has a ton of storage space, and the table was a safe place for her humidifier, wipes, and baby monitor.  So after 3.3 faithful years of use the diaper changing table must be removed from her room. One problem: I'm cheap and don't want to buy a new set of dresser drawers to replace the drawers from the table, and what extra furniture we have available is mismatched and less than pretty.  What am I to do with the loss of all that storage space? PAINT ALL THE THINGS!

Meet subject #1:

This lovely guy has been hidden away in closets for years.  Perfectly adequate in providing a space for sweaters, PT gear, and the like.  But not something one wants to look at for extended periods of time.  Ugly handles, chips and gouges, and a loverly faux oak stain. I'm sure it came from Goodwill at some point, but he's been with us through each PCS so I truly have no recollection of how he was acquired. His main upside: It's real wood and has mega potential. Meet subject #2

Now this secretary isn't that bad looking, and has actually been in Lily's room here in Portsmouth from day one.  It's white and matched her white crib. I put a pretty drawer pull on her and called it a day 3ish years ago.  This is another piece of furniture I've had for-ever.  I'm pretty sure I had it in my first apartment in Stillwater.... um.... *doing the math* 12 years ago.  The inside is full of cubby holes and the door is still sturdy enough to use as a desk, if needed.  I've basically just changed the pull to match whatever room she was living in.  She's had a black pull, red pull, green pull, and now this pretty purple bloom pull. Once it was decided I'd paint everything we headed to Lowe's. The only design requirement I had was that they had to match Lily's super PINK room.  I was overwhelmed by the bajillion paint choices.  Thankfully Cayce saved the day and picked up two purple cards and said how about we go two-tone?  Done. We settled on Byzantine Purple (dark) and Grape Arbor (light) in Satin. We gathered up the rest of our tools and a new set of knobs for the dresser then headed home.

This is why I have no free-time.  I was so excited for school to be over in June.  I was thinking to myself "think of all the time you'll have to do whatever you want!" Right. What that translates into is free-time to do all the things I've been neglecting for 3 months.  And THEN only have 3ish months to do it all before I go back into school-hibernation mode.  So instead of just making due with what we have I chose to spend my entire 4 day July 4th weekend working on these lovelies.  In the end I'm in love with them, but it was a chore for sure.  Anywho.  Here's the final results.

Subject #1 redux: Subject #2 redux:    I swear they are the same colors. I just suck at taking pictures. Note: The Grape Arbor color (light purple) is what I originally wanted as Lily's wall colors before I went insane and had an attack of extreme PINK.

And because I was truly in the "PAINT ALL THE THINGS!" mode I also painted the footstool she uses in the bathroom: Oh. What did I do with the changing table? I spray painted the purple knobs with some green I had left over from another project and then moved it into the dining room to use as a pseudo-buffet.  I couldn't get rid of it.  Even though I have finally started letting go of a lot of Lily's baby stuff (mainly going through the totes and totes of her clothes and the cheaper items) I'm still holding onto her crib in the hopes there will be a baby #2 in the future.  But that's not a reality until we get settled in Colorado next year.  So until then I re-purpose!

Posted by Cayce, Sara, and Lily at 7/10/2013 01:20:00 PM