Allie had been asking for a while to repaint her room. She is eleven and headed into sixth grade. When we moved into the house, she was five. Her taste has changed just a little. When we first moved in, she picked pink walls and a Hannah Montana comforter set. We have changed her comforter, curtains, and even her bed over the years. I was avoiding the major task of actual repainting. Two reasons- #1) I HATE painting and #2) she has a ton of stuff. I tell her all the time that she is going to end up on the show ‘Hoarders’ when she is older. She wants to keep everything and purging things out results in major meltdowns and tears. 

We had talked to her about what ideas she had and what colors she liked for a new room. About a year ago, we put a loft bed in her room to try and give her more space. She is way too tall for that now. Otis and I decided that when she went away to church camp for the week that we would get as much of her room redone as we could, so that it would be be a big surprise when she got home. 

You may have to close your eyes because these next few photos are extremely painful for me to share, and so I can only imagine that they might be just as shocking and painful to view.

This is what her room looked like when she left for camp-   
   
I could make excuses and say that it was this bad because of the chaos of packing, but the truth is that is looks this way more than it does neatly organized. 

(Insert a visual here of me hanging my head in shame)

She had a few requests when the topic of her room came up- 

1) she wanted a bigger bed. I told her that a larger bed would take away a lot of her space, but she did not care. She begged for a larger bed.

2) she wanted a mirror– that’s an easy request!

3) she wanted to use teal and gray for her colors and she liked the idea of having opposite walls.

4) she wanted a gallery wall. She has wanted this for quite some time. It is been talked about for so long that even for her last birthday and this past Christmas, I went ahead and gave her pieces for it.

Her room is still a work in progress. We still have to take out the fan and put in the new light fixture that we bought. We also need to get another shelf for over her second window.   She was surprised when she arrived home from camp. She absolutely loves it! She has done a much better job at keeping it clean and I have noticed that she spends more time in there now. 

This is what her room looks like now-

   
    
   
Like I said before…. It is a work in progress. We are all pretty happy with how far we’ve come though!!!