The state of our loft is pathetic. When we were house shopping, it was a requirement, along with a great kitchen, 3 bedrooms and a garden tub in the master. I didn’t have a huge want list, just a few. I envisioned the loft being a great space for us as a family to play games, etc as well as a great place to send Jacey if we were watching something downstairs that was inappropriate for her. Instead, this is what we have…a mess. No one utilizes the space and it sits there collecting dust while downstairs we are constantly shuffling around 3 laptops, various cables and external hard drives

Thus the wheels in my head started turning and lofty plans were born.

We are going to turn the loft into an office (what we should have done to begin with, since this is the first time in 10 years we haven’t had an office “space” and now WE have to lug the huge sectional and tv down the stairs to get rid of). The question that stand now though is what do we want to do furniture wise? We have to have desk space for 3, storage space and space for a new flat screen tv.

I have a feeling, we are going to be making a trip to LA for IKEA :). I think…

Thankfully I don’t have to have a definite plan for another month or so. Bryan needs to be off of mids and I’d prefer to have our PCS claim money (yeah right) instead of spending our own.

I have held onto this picture since the first time I saw it on Holly’s blog. She made this craft desk and I <3 it…a lot. This is idea number 1 for Bryan and I to share. I can see our files/pens/etc on the inner shelves and all my old cameras/photography books on the outer shelves. I love the fact that it is higher than a normal desk, since stools encourage me to have better posture which equals less back pain. Plus, with the large surface, I can evict Bryan’s laptop when I need more craft room :). This can be made with locally acquired items, which means no need to go to IKEA…that alone is its only downfall.

This is idea number 2 for Bryan and I. An IKEA EXPEDIT shelf only with 2 of the desk extensions meeting in the middle instead of one. Love the amount of storage/display space with this one, it is just insane.

Idea number 3 for Bryan and I, also from IKEA. 2 of these facing each other (yes, I have a thing about facing the wall). Only problem here is, not very much storage, so we’d still have to sort out an option for that.

Option number 1 for Jacey…

Option number 2 for Jacey. Yes, I have a black and white theme going on. We already have an IKEA printer cart that we love in black, plus some of my Paris prints in B&W with black frames from my work office that we are using as inspiration.

Then, this for the tv, dvd player, DirecTV box. Only horizontally.

We’re also thinking about throwing a few bean bags up there, so we do still have the “option” of it being a media type room if needed.

Perhaps it is time for me to enlist the drafter in Bryan and get him to work on the design/layout :).

Yes, it is still in progress…sigh. We did get the room painted but the dining room table…well, that is another story. We ordered the one that we fell in love with from Sears…first mistake. We thought, they would be reputable, since they are a huge brick and mortar store and we hadn’t ever heard of most of the other retailers. Ha….reputable…whatever. First of all, we ordered it and then were informed it wouldn’t be delivered until 3 weeks later. Fine. We never received any contact from Sears for 2 weeks, so we called. Well, they can’t tell us when it will ship, because the third party shipping company (who we had no idea it was coming from) was involved in the Iowa floods. Then, 2 days before it was supposed to arrive from the initial estimation, we get an email saying it won’t even ship for another month and if they don’t hear from us, they assume we are okay with this. Well, no we aren’t, so we call. Then they inform us that we can’t cancel the order because they have no way of knowing if it has shipped or not….huh? Didn’t *YOU* just send me an email saying it hadn’t?! Several calls and several transfers later, with the threat of a cc chargeback (since yes, they charged my card the day I placed the order, not when it shipped like most retailers) they agreed to initiate a refund. 2 weeks later, we finally got it.

So, to make a long story even longer, we have a painted room but no table and now we can’t find it anywhere in stock. Needless to say, we have put the whole table on hold since it has turned into such an ordeal. I’ll share a finished pic when/if we ever get a new table…LOL!