Master Bedroom Makeover on a Budget

When my husband and I were first married we were blessed to get a lot of furniture from family; sure it was hand-me down worn out stuff, but the price was perfect for two young newly weds.  Almost 13 years later and we have slowly been replacing the hand-me-down furniture throughout our house.  Our master bedroom was the last room yet to be done.

It really was sort of the dumping ground for extra clothes, extra books, extra dining room chairs, mismatched furniture....
I was ready for it to be a place that I loved coming into, a place so nice that my husband hoped would no longer become the laundry dumping ground, but I didn't have a lot of money to do it.  I needed a master bedroom makeover on a budget.

I will be giving tutorials on the pieces I redid and made over the next couple of weeks, as I do those, I will come back to this post and add the links to the tutorials so this post will be the place where you can find it all.

Before and Afters

Reading Nook
Our room is an odd L-shape and the little L part is not really big enough for our bed, so it has always been this little odd place off the side.  I dreamed of making it my little reading nook.
I cannot wait to grab a book, sit on my chair and just read!
And my wall decor!  I am in love with it!
I made most of these pieces and will be adding tutorials.

Nightstands
I have actually been working slowly on my bedroom since December. The first things I replaced was the nightstands, one was a nightstand Eric had as a kid; the other was a piece that used to be in our living room. They were much too different to re-do, so I wanted to start from scratch.
My mother-in-law bought us our new nightstands for Christmas, they were just white and I refinished them with Annie Sloan English Yellow Chalk Paint.

We got new lamps and new clocks too.  Neither of us use the clock for our alarms, we both use our phones.  Be warned the bell is pretty dang loud, but it is a NON-ticking clock, a feature many clocks like this do not have and I definitely did not want a ticky clock by my bed.
My night stand has a secret little addition my husband added.  Every night I charge all my devices by my bed, the cords are behind my nightstand, needless to say they were so hard to get to and always falling back.  After I had a melt down about it one night, my husband surprised me with this

Three little hooks screwed into the back of my nightstand keeps the cords in place, making it so I never have to hunt for my cords again.  During the day I can just toss the cords behind the night stand and they still stay right up at top for me to easily grab that night.  Book Case The next big piece I had to do something with was our book case, another childhood piece of Eric's.
I wanted to use this book case as a place to display mementos and special things.  I painted with Annie Sloan Paloma Chalk Paint.  The background is actually a very thick wrapping paper that I found at Tai Pan, that I attached with spray adhesive; don't worry full tutorial coming soon.

Since these shelves no longer housed most of my books, (and they didn't all fit anyway)I needed a new book case in my reading nook.

I loved this horizontal book case from Target.  I ordered it in white and painted with the same quart of Annie Sloan English Yellow (yes I finished three pieces with just one can).

Bench
We had a love seat couch in our bedroom which we were going to move into the reading nook, the trouble is it is huge and took up half the space.  So instead we moved that couch downstairs and brought up the bench we had downstairs, which I painted in the same color as the first bookcase.

That is my newly made over bedroom.  We are renting our home so I did not want to repaint the walls or do anything that I couldn't take with me if we move someday.  Oh, and I have to report, since finishing it, all laundry has been immediately put away.  So, if you have a laundry problem like I do, just tell your spouse you need to re-do your bedroom.

During this process I learned some great tips:

5 Tips for Redoing a Bedroom on a Budget

1. Have a Plan- I looked on pinterest, thought about my room and have had a basic plan of what I wanted for several months now.  I even took room measurements and had these in my phone.  I also had a list on my To-Do App of things I wanted/needed to buy for my room.  That way I could plan and knew what I needed when I was out shopping.

2. Reuse and Fix it Up- I really wanted a fun color for my night stands. I searched and found some fun and colorful pieces but they were expensive!  Instead I got nice standard nightstands and made them the color I wanted them.  I also reused most of the bedroom furniture I already had and painted a few things.  There are so many great tutorials (and I will be adding some) that tell you how do redo furniture and it can save you a ton of money. Also, I did reuse our old night stands, they ended up in the boys' rooms.

3. Be Patient-  I have been working on redoing my room since before Christmas.  I did not go out and buy everything in one weekend as that would not have been financially possible or smart.  I waited for the 30-50% off sale at Hobby Lobby, I went to Home Goods I don't know how many times until I finally found curtains I liked.  You can save a lot of money if you buy things on sale or find things at a store like Home Goods, Ross, TJ Max, etc., you just have to be willing to look and leave if they don't have what you want.

4. Be Willing to Compromise- if you have a budget you are probably not going to be able to get exactly everything you want.  I had some different curtains in mind but wasn't willing to spend $60 a panel to get them.  So I kept looking, when I found my curtains, at Home Goods, I really liked them but they weren't what I originally was imagining, but at $24 for two panels I couldn't pass them up and now love them completely.

5. Set a deadline- While yes, I did just say you need to be patient, you also need to have some sort of deadline.  If you don't give yourself a time frame it is either never going to happen or happen so slowly that by the time you are done you don't even like what you started with.  In my To-Do App, I set a date for when I wanted to buy certain things.  I didn't stick to it completely, but it definitely stays on your mind when it shows something is overdue.


Have you ever redone a room?  What tips do you have?

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Following is where I purchased the different items, with links when available.  Also, as I do the tutorials, the links to the projects will be found down here too.  I did not receive any of these items or am promoting any certain store, these are just the stores I like that I bought things from.

Bedding and pillows- Home Goods
Curtains- Home Goods
Curtain Rods- Local linen store

Reading Nook:
 Horizontal Book Case- Purchased from Target-- Painted with Annie Sloan English Yellow (Tutorial)
 Blue and Yellow Chair- Target
 Lamp- we had
 Dresser- we had, removed the mirror and moved the dresser under the window
 Bench- we had, painted with Annie Sloan Paloma Chalk Paint
 Pillow- Home Goods
 Bird Art- Bought at Hobby Lobby
 Wire Frame Board- bought off local garage sale site

Wall Decor:
  1) Purchased at Hobby Lobby
  2) Date Art Work (tutorial)- purchased burlap Canvas at Hobby Lobby then created myself
  3) Love Frame- Frame from thrift store, "love" word bought at Hobby Lobby than painted
  4) 12x12 blank canvases I painted
  5) Circle Mirror- Hobby Lobby
  6) Rose Art- I created- Tutorial here

Night Stands and Accessories
  Night-stands- purchased on Overstock- painted with Annie Sloan English Yellow (Tutorial)
  Clock-bought on Amazon
  Lamps- Target

Book Case--Already had, painted with Annie Sloan Paloma- Tutorial here

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