Adding on Rooms DIY fabulous UPDATE

I saw THE COOLEST thing on RachaelRayShow.com.  Don't laugh. You watch her show, too; don't deny it...

One of her gurus did some armoire makeovers that were amazing! Check out the videos here and here.  

They transformed basic armoires into several creative things:

a home office (I had seen the IKEA version of this, but it was cool to see them using an existing piece of furniture, especially to keep stuff out of landfills when folks upgrade their TV to a flat screen)

a murphy bed for guests in a living room or a child's room (holy crap! We can raise several kids in just a couple of rooms someday!  Whoo hoo!)

a changing station for a nursery (heck, with the space we've got, that will be the entire nursery)

and even a bar for keeping and serving drinks at a party.  

I also thought it would be cool to turn an armoire into a few other things:

a game room (room to store games, a fold out table, maybe a dartboard at the back)

a laundry room (minus the washer and dryer, obviously, but a nice way to disguise laundry room clutter and a fold-down ironing board)

or even a bowling alley, complete with a fold-out lanes and snack bar!

I was just kidding about that last one.  Mostly. 

I would love to hear your ideas or even what you have already used an armoire or similar furniture for.  Brag away!

Adding on Rooms DIY

"What?!?" you say.  "I thought this was all about living well in the space you already have!  I live in an apartment--I can't add on!"

Oh, but you can, my friend.  In a sense.

If you ever come over to dinner, my hubby will give you an entertaining tour.  It starts with the "foyer" (Ha!  That would be the rug in front of the door...) and ends with the "Master Bedroom" where apparently "the magic happens."  But I'll spare you that.

Yes, living in a small space requires a sense of humor and creativity when giving the grand tour.  We have a "map room," "library," "china room," and "formal dining room" all within the 10' x 10' space that houses two bookshelves and our dining room table.  Miraculously, the nook that holds the washer and dryer also contains the "game room" (shelf with boardgames), "cat room" (litterbox, food and water dishes), and "tool shed" (shelf with a toolbox).  It gets more wonderfully and ridiculously grandiose everytime he gives the tour.  

But what about actually carving out space for a new baby, home office, craft corner, etc.?  For my new office, it was amazing what we managed to pull off with some bookshelves, an IKEA folding desk, a file cabinet, a folding screen, and some "L" brackets...

Basically, we took over 20 square feet from the existing dining room area, and partitioned it off with two bookshelves.  We moved the two existing tall bookshelves (remember the library and the china room?) out of the back corners of the dining room and set them at right angles to the side walls, about two feet away from the back wall and three feet apart.  The handy hubby anchored them into the wall with the "L" brackets for safety, and voila!  I had a little nook of my very own.  The backs of the bookshelves are now my "walls", upon which I put some pegboards and pictures.  

We then squeezed tall bookshelf in, perpendicular to the back wall, on one side, and a short bookshelf with a little file cabinet on top, on the other side.  On the back wall (the real structural one), opposite my open "doorway" between the two shelves that face into the dining room, we installed a drop down IKEA desk (actually a dinette) that I can fold down out of the way to allow access to my tall bookshelf.  As a finishing touch, a friend gave us a folding screen that I can use to block the open "doorway," allowing me to shut my work from view come dinnertime (since the dining room table is about a foot away from all this ingenuity.

It's tiny, and certainly doesn't have much room to maneuver.  But it's mine (no more squabbling with the hubby about who gets what shelf space in our current office nook or in the living room), and it really does feel like another room... ish.  :)

I would think something like this would also work well for partioning off the back of a bedroom for a nursery area (make sure those shelves are really well anchored into the wall!), or part of a living room for a craft area, etc.  It makes the existing room that much smaller, but I've noticed that unless things get partioned off, they migrate into the main areas, anyway (remember Rules to Live By #5.  When things don't have a home, they get everywhere).  

Nook Sweet Nook, I say.  Just don't try to come visit me in my office. There's only room for one of us in there!