My room, my very own room

My mother’s day present from the husband was to do whatever I felt like doing while he took care of ‘everything else’– so first I finished the last armband on the Celtic Lattice vest, washed it and pinned it to block, and then I trekked up here and began going through all the crap covering my bedroom.

I swear, doing this kind of major organizing Event is a lot like knitting lace to me. First, there’s all this fussy-work. And it looks all messy. And you start saying to yourself, “What the @*^&@ was I thinking?! Why did I start this?! This is horrible and it will never, ever be good!”

And then the wash-n-block happens and suddenly (after many hours of sweat and cussing) (I have moved that extra desk to at least three places in this room, plus out of the room and back in again) (and then I wonder why my back is sore – that ain’t no pressboard, people, that is solid oak), there’s this incredible thing. And you can’t believe you did it, and you want to run up to random strangers and say, “Look! Look at this cool thing I did!” (Uh, hi there, Internet - Check out my bedroom!! Is it not cool?!)

We used to have a very large room that neither of us spent any real time in. Wasted space, big time. When we first bought this house, I had fond dreams of spending hours in here – it is a lovely, bright, airy room, awesome lighting for any craft you care to do. And so big! HUGE! I mean, HUGE-HUGE! Our master bedroom is almost as big as my entire first apartment, all kidding aside.

But when we moved in, we sort of shoved the dresser on one wall and the armoire on the other and got busy with the kids stuff and then were working and sort of never got back around to ‘optimizing’ our bedroom. Eh, it worked. Whatever. I’m tired. Let’s just go to bed…

Well. I’m ready to use it now. Check it out! I have a knitting nook:



All right, it is a little short on ‘sitting’ implements and table and other stuff that tends to be considered standard for a knitting nook (or anything else except what this may seem to be to the unimaginative eye, to wit, an empty corner). But it does have a knitting basket in it, so it counts.

The business desk, with ‘ready stash’ yarn storage bin, a small file box (off camera – I keep very little paper lying around thanks to the miracle of paperless billing and a decent all-in-one printer/scanner/fax/copier, also off-camera), telephone, shredder and recycling bin PLUS ALSO thanks to the fact that we never throw any piece of computer equipment away a sound system - two small speakers on the desk plus a sub-woofer under the desk (I could SO rock this neighborhood right now) (but I won't, because I am mature that way now and a mom and a Responsible Citizen and would never, ever want to set a bad example for the Denizens by, say, cranking up Redneck Woman and yelling "HELL YEAH!" at the top of my lungs while pounding back Miller Genuine Draft, dancing like I was hit by the Wine Truck, and eating preztels right out of the bag):



The craft desk (utterly indestructible) (seriously. I’ve tried.), with yarn overflow storage extra drawers for whatever might happen along in need of a temporary home, and the barrister shelves we can’t put anywhere else due to the fact that they have glass doors and thus must be put in the one (1) no-kids-allowed space in the Den (currently full of books that I would seriously have a heart attack and die over if someone covered them in crayon, like my full set of Child Ballads, 1808 printing, series 796 of 1000 complete set the-very-thought-of-crayoned-pony-princess-stick-figures-in-them-makes-me-vaguely-nauseous):



Yes. That weird stuff on the wall is unfinished drywall texturing. It used to open into a retreat off the master bedroom, which we walled off to make a room for Captain Adventure. I don't want to talk about how long ago that was, or why we haven't painted either space yet.

Eventually, I want to get a nice comfy chair and a good sturdy little table to go in my ‘knitting nook’; for right now, cash is tight so I’m saying that the office chair is perfectly comfortable, thank you. I’ll repurpose something from around the Den to be a footrest (hmm, Captain Adventure is about the right size…) (oh wait, using a small child for a footrest…would that be wrong?!) and call it done for now.

I’m sure that if one of the ‘trading spaces’ decorators were to walk in here, they’d drop dead of bad-designing induced heart failure.

But I don’t care. I have a place I can go when the husband is watching something I really don’t want to watch, where I can work or play or watch something I want to watch or knit or read or whatever I want to do…

Oh yeah. Life is good.

I’m going to go bring what little of my stash is actually here and not in storage up to its new home. And the vest being all done but the shouting, maybe start something new before dinner. I had promised myself that I would alternate ‘one for me, one for charity’, so I’m thinking I’ll cast on a cute little baby sweater or something.

In my room. Oooooh, I feel like a teenager again! Let me practice.

“GET OUTTA MY ROOM!”

“Do you MIND?! I am TALKING to my FRIEND!!”

“…nothing! GOSH! Can’t I have any PRIVACY around here?! GOSH!”

“I wasn’t locking YOU out of my room, I was locking my STINKY LITTLE BROTHER out! GOSH! You are just, like, such a fascist!”

“No, it's just incense...”

“I DIDN’T!! IT’S JUST THAT THE ONE BEFORE IT WAS REALLY REALLY SOFT! WHAT? WHAT?! I CAN’T HEAR YOU! THE MUSIC’S TOO LOUD!!”

…oh yeah, I feel youthful all over…!