Styling the Girls' Bunk Beds

Natalie and Michaela Byrd became roomies back in September, and it has taken me until now to remember to share some more about how I've begun to beautify their new bunk beds.

The main road block to my sharing was that their room resembled a FEMA disaster zone for some time, and I was way too embarrassed to show you pictures of the destruction. You might have thought we let a pack of baby wolverines loose in there!

After some decluttering and primping over the weekend, I decided to show you guys the beginning stages of their room.

The room the girls share was Michaela Byrd's, and the window treatments (I'll show you another day) were a really pretty color combo of purples, blue, yellow, and green. When I saw twin bedding sets in Target (on sale!) that coordinated with our Waverly fabric to a "T," I just knew I had to snatch them up.

Of course, before I could snap any pictures, I had to fix the blankets. And to fix the blankets nicely enough for photos, I had to pull the bed out. (Have you ever tried making a top bunk? It is close to impossible. Fyi, those ugly blue things are their music boxes, which they refuse to part with.)

This is what greeted me:

A newborn sized clog (?!), clothing tags, MY old stuffed animal, doll clothes, books, and lots of dust.

And that was just the beginning. Because I am easily distracted, I forgot all about taking pictures of the bunk beds and just started chucking stuff into piles left and right.

There were enough books under the bed to retrofit a small library, and I filled two trash bags with just junk. See?

Why, yes, that is a child-size golf club sticking out of that bag. Because no girls' room would be complete without a plastic putter that is bent in half.

I won't even speak of the bookshelves or dresser because I am still so traumatized. When I recovered sufficiently from the shock, I was ready to take some more photographs of the bedding.

The room stays pretty chilly because the pull-down attic stairs are in there, so I layered the end of each bed with a blanket.

Natalie's was a gift from my aunt. I love items with a personal touch or family history:

Michaela Byrd's was a Salvation Army find that matched the purple in the bedding perfectly. (It was cleaned very very well before we put it to use) I hate that someone "threw it out", but I love that we have something so pretty!

There's not much going on up on the walls yet, but I did score some fab lighting on my last IKEA Shopping Trip. The wall lamps are a muted apple green, and they coordinate so nicely! I think they were $16 a pop.

Michaela Byrd sleeps on the bottom bunk, so T screwed hers right into the bed frame:

There was plenty of room on the top bunk, so Natalie's went into the dry wall.

Hers is a particular life saver because she likes waking up at the crack of dawn, and was waking her sister up out of boredom. Now she knows she can grab a book and flip her light on until the rest of the house begins to stir.

They think their lights are the coolest!

I think we're off to a decent start now that I've done some decluttering. We have a long way to go, but the girls are enjoying the roommate life.

And lest you think I am some cold mother who forces her children to live a lonely, stuffed animal-less existence, I can assure you otherwise. The children and their menageries happily coexist here...without any wolverines.

I hope you'll join me on Tuesday for the next session in my series on Blog Commenting.

If you enjoyed this post or found it helpful, I hope you'll click your "Pin It" button to add this post to Pinterest, or a +1 for Google+. And I always appreciate your kind comments!

*Linking to Leslie's Purge Party at Goodbye, House! Hello, Home! and Sarah's Before and After Party at  Thrifty Decor Chick.