The free bed

On Friday afternoon a friend posted on our Relief Society Yahoo group that she was giving away a queen mattress set, frame, and headboard.  I responded immediately, thinking that surely a bigger bed would be a blessing in our household.  Within five minutes of posting the offer, my friend agreed to hold the bed for me.

[Sidebar: I find it amusing that when we were newlyweds and Garry had a lucrative job, everything we owned was new.  We didn't acquire our first piece of hand-me-down furniture until three years ago. Now we have a couch, a dresser, a desk, a bookshelf, a kid table and chairs, and a bed from generous benefactors.]

After Garry got home I pitched the bed idea to him.  The kids overheard, which kick-started a lively discussion about who would get the big bed and where it would go.  After a lengthy debate we settled on a plan.  Zachary, who has had his own room for over two years, would move in with Tyler again and share the bunk beds.  Gavin would move to Zach's old room and use the queen bed alone.  Garry picked up the bed that evening, and despite a very busy Saturday morning ahead, we decided to attack the room swap project the next afternoon.

I took some "before" pictures of the boys' messy rooms.  First, Zachary's:

And then the room Tyler and Gavin shared:

 

The room swap project spawned a few side projects.  When Garry took the seats out of the van to transport the mattress, he ended up vacuuming the van, which was shockingly dirty.  Moving furniture led to de-junking projects.  (I was secretly thrilled about this.)  As we moved clothing to new dressers and closets, we thinned and organized those things as well.  We filled two big trash bags with junk to toss, plus two laundry baskets with stuff to donate, sell, or put away for later.  Dealing with that will be my project on Monday.

By about 7:30 p.m., both bedrooms were clean, organized, and vacuumed.  Zachary, who was initially upset about giving up his private room, was happy with his new space.  Tyler was glad to be sharing a room with someone who will respect his belongings and share his interests.  Gavin was thrilled with his big bed and blue walls.  He has also started to rediscover some of his toys!  

Here are the "after" pictures.  Gavin's bedroom:  We don't have immediate plans to buy cute bedding for the queen bed (although we did spring for a mattress pad and a bed skirt, and will need to buy a padlock for the crawl space entrance above his bed).  Gavin picked his favorite of our "wedding quilts" to put on the bed and we called it good.  His walls are completely bare, except for the name letters he wrecked last year.  I'd like for the room to be more decorated, but he's content, so I am (trying to be) too. 

Tyler and Zach's room:  For bed spreads, the boys are using the awesome quilts Aunt Heidi made them for Christmas.  After I took these pictures, we moved a little table into the room, where Tyler can work on his Legos in peace.

In a couple of years, when the girls are ready for bigger beds, we will move them downstairs to share Gavin's room (and maybe the big bed), and move Gavin upstairs to one of the smaller bedrooms.  Maybe by then I'll be sleeping through the night and such an undertaking won't be so overwhelming!