Master Bedroom Progress + To-Do List

We’re chugging right along with some master bedroom progress, but it’s at the phase where it’s going to look worse before it looks better.  And there are so many small details that I’m working on, it feels like we’re not getting anywhere.  So, I figured it was a good time to write out that to-do list, so let’s get to it!

The One Room Challenge is normally only 6 weeks, so I tried to plan out my blog posts accordingly.  Then, this season it was pushed back and extended to 8-weeks, and I’m thankful because we’ve been super busy lately.  (Both moving into our new house, and trying to sell our main house).  Throw in COVID, and we don’t have all the extra babysitters and moving helpers we thought we would have at this time!

In Canada, we just had a long weekend and I took full advantage to get as much stuff done as possible!  The Husband and the older littles were gone all day Saturday.  And I worked a bunch yesterday too (after picking up the supplies I forgot at our main house).

One Room Challenge Progress

Check out the design plan in week 1 here, and how to plan wall treatments from week 2 here

Follow all the guest participants here!

Ready to see what happened in the room since last week?

I finished the main feature wall (Tuesday I think?), then wrapped the wainscoting around the rest of the room.  It’s only going on the bottom 2/3 section (then the top will be wallpapered).

I made the two longest walls mirrors of each other, but the Husband thinks I should have added another vertical section next to the door.  (The feature wall’s last piece will be in the closet).

Then, I took down the two pieces I had on the window wall and removed the casings that were there.  We were going to keep it, but it was badly installed and I figured it would be the best time to do it.

The window is not centred on the wall, so we decided to make the squares un-even for this section.  I knew I wanted the batten below the window to be perfectly in the middle.  This means that the squares on the left are a bit wider (rectangles, really).  BUT I’m hoping that once the curtains are up (and our corner accessories), you won’t notice at all.

Prepping the Wall Treatments

I was originally hoping to use MDF but found out afterwards that the pieces were discontinued.  Luckily the same size was available in pine, however, that meant that I had to do a couple of extra steps.  And the main thing was making sure that they were properly primed with a solvent-based primer.

Even though I’m painting the walls a dark purple, I still didn’t want the knots coming through.  (I also had to sand the edges to make sure there were no splinters, and had to pre-plan which pieces I’d cut to maximize the good ones).

It was good that the kiddos were gone because oil paint is stinky!

Once I waited the appropriate amount of time for it to dry (a lot longer than I anticipated), it was time to patch the nail holes and joints!

Then, once everything was dry, sanded and cleaned up – on to the caulking!  I did that yesterday, and my poor middle finger is raw.  I used two tubes for the walls, and just have the final section in the closet to do (but I’m giving myself a break).

Today, I used a little foam roller to give everything a quick coat with a gray primer.  Using the coloured primer will help with my darker wall colour, but it will also let me see the areas that need to be quickly patched again.  (White on white is tricky!).

I realized that I’ll for sure need to use a brush for all the little nooks and crannies in the wall treatment.  The plan is to paint the baseboards purple too, but leave the window and door casings white.

So, ready to see the big to-do list for the room?

Tasks Already Completed

• Removed laminate flooring, old baseboards and window casings
• Took down old closet doors, shelf and patched
• Had new vinyl floors installed (throughout the whole upstairs)
• Re-wired new tamper-resistant outlets, a new switch and light fixture
• Built and installed new dressers in the closet
• Installed square board and batten wall treatment (and window casings)
• Oil-primed, patched, sanded, caulked and primed wall treatments
• Trimmed out (aka built-in) the dressers in the closet
• Painted the ceiling edges
• Started building the custom closet doors

Tasks To-Do

• Re-patch areas that need filling (then sand and reprime)
• Prime/paint the casings white
• Finish caulking closet and paint the entire thing
• Paint the wall treatments purple
• Install the wallpaper
• Build closet doors (need to cut centrepieces, drill pocket holes, prime them, caulk them, paint them)
• Install closet doors
• Install closet shelves and hanging bar
• Fill in the closet with the rest of our clothes
• Install curtain rod and curtains
• Clean the floors and bring in the rug
• Assemble the bed (and reinforce base)
• Bring in nightstands, mirror, etc.
• Repot plant and choose a planter
• Decide on light bulbs
• (Also need to purchase/install blinds, but Ikea is closed and they don’t ship blinds)

Ouch, that’s a lot!  I keep thinking, oh I just need to paint the purple, paint the closet, do the wallpaper and build the closet doors.  But then I add all the “small” tasks and it starts building up.  Not to mention that I still need to buy the purple paint and the closet stuff (shelf and rod).  I went to our local hardware store today but they couldn’t colour match the paint for me.

So now I need to make another trip to Home Depot when we’re in Sudbury packing up our house.  (I’ll get the closet stuff there while I’m at it).  I was hoping to chat about the wallpaper install next week, but there are a lot of tasks (and dry-times) that I need to deal with before that…

Oh, and our other new house/moving tasks are on a separate list… so I’ll be busy busy for the next little while!

Please tell me I’m not the only crazy person trying to move while also doing a One Room Challenge…?