What I thought was going to be a little shuffle of some of my cubes to make way for a melamine tabletop surface, ended up being the partial renovation of 2 rooms and a complete move into a new, bigger scraproom! If you want to see a looong video of my old room and setup, there are videos under the “My Scraproom” tab at the top. But here’s what my room looked like 2 weeks ago:
The left-most side of my scrappy space
The middle and main working area
The right side of my scrappy space (Hi, Maya!)
My back wall of Jetmax cubes
I’ve been hating those folding tables for awhile now because they shake and don’t provide a smooth surface for working. I finally decided to replace them with a large melamine surface, and to bring some of my cubes from my back wall to support the surface and provide storage under my tabletop. Once I made the decision I was so excited about it, I immediately began to dismantle my back wall and plan my new setup.
Goodbye Gracious Living Folding Tables!!!
Hello, new setup!
Now all I needed was some melamine to top off my new workspace!
My new backwall is shorter and allows some space for my typewriter!
Forever the optimist, I head out to Kent to pick up some melamine on a Monday afternoon, after spending the day arranging this setup. We learn at Kent that the melamine I want (I want it to be 30 inches deep because I’ve gotten used to a 30 inch workspace with the folding tables) needs to be custom cut at the cut shop (only $1 per cut). No problem! Go ahead and cut it then! I’ll be over here waiting… Only the cut shop is booking into Thursday! Woah, Thursday??! My room is all taken apart! I can’t wait till Thursday! I wanted to set it up tonight so I could scrapbook Thursday! So ok, I’m waiting till bloody Thursday to get my melamine. It will be worth the wait to get it in the 30 inch width. While we wait for Thursday we decide to finish off the drywall with mud and tape. I work long days Tuesday and Wednesday, so when I say “we”, I mean “Scott.” But I helped out on Thursday in the day.
No more nail holes!
Hoping to get a coat of paint up before we pick up our melamine today!
So Thursday comes and we are told not to try to pick it up before 5pm because the cutshop is busy and it might not be done until then. I spend the day waiting for mud to dry and rearranging my cubes. I can’t wait to set up my tables tonight! We will likely pull stuff out and pain this weekend! Not only am I getting new tables, but also new walls, hooray!
Except not. We get to Kent at 5pm, and guess what? Our melamine, which multiple staff reportedly saw on a cart all through the day, is mysteriously missing. Our Melamine, which we paid for on Monday, is not here on Thursday. The cut shop is closed, so they can’t cut s another 2 pieces, and tomorrow is Good Friday so the store is closed. The young woman said she’d call us on Saturday to find out what happened. In the meantime, we got a refund, but I have no tables!
Saturday we get a call saying the cut shop is closed Saturday but they will put a rush on our order and it will be ready first thing in the morning Monday (store is closed Easter Sunday) and it will be FREE. I am dissapointed, but over the weekend, Scott suggests a switch up and that will give him a bigger photo studio, the kids a more cozy and sectioned off playroom, and give me a much bigger craft room. So, I’m moving to Scott’s old photo studio, Scott is taking the large room that was a play area, and the kids are taking my old (recently mudded and taped but not yet painted) scraproom. So we spent the weekend mudding, taping, and sanding the old photo studio/new scraproom. The room is huge: 12 by 17 feet! My old room was 11X12, so I have room to spread out!
My NEW Scraproom!
How I spent Monday
And guess what? There was no Melamine for us on Monday (surprise surprise!) Something about being out of stock now, checking the Dartmouth store… it will be here on Thursday, it will still be FREE, and now they will deliver it for free too. Ok. I’ll believe it when I see it, but in the meantime, I have flooring I need to move.
The other thing I did Monday
Meanwhile in another part of the basement, the girls are loving their new space!
I had to work all day and night Tuesday but Scott got the room primed (this is it at lunch time)
I also worked all day and night Wed. but Scott put the kids to work painting
There is yellow paint on her Uggs now. But my room is done.
When I came home Wed. night at 10, this is the room with one coat of paint!
We got the second coat of paint up that night, then had a quick paint fight before calling it a night!
It’s Thursday again… I’ve moved my stuff in… now where’s my melamine?!
Ahhh! There it is! Arrived just before supper.
Get ‘er up!
Now, it’s coming together!
Here it is almost done… the finishing touches were added over the weekend
… and here is just the workspace
7am Sunday morning and Sophie, Maya and I are taking the new Scraproom for a spin!
If you’ve made it this far in this post, you must be a scraproom junkie (like me!), so here is a video tour of my new room:
You may be wondering who is Mercy Tiara, and why the name? MercyTiara is an anagram of my first and middle names, Tracy Marie. I discovered this name in the 90's in grad school when we were all coming up with alter egos for one another in a lab one day. I've used it ever since, but you can call me Tracy or MercyTiara, or anything you want... just don't call me late for supper!
