Sunroom Before & After

During our staycation in July, we worked on several projects around the house.  Even though we've been in our house for over a year, I haven't done much decorating.  I like to keep things simple & clean, so I don't overly decorate anyway.  I finally got tired of not having anything on the walls and a few rooms feeling like they've never been touched.  I think I've been waiting for the perfect design ideas to hit me & also for a windfall of cash, so I can order everything from Pottery Barn and call it a day.  Finally realizing that is never going to happen, I decided to use what I had, buy a few things, and try to do as much as I could with a modest budget. 

One room that I really wanted to change was the sun room.  When we bought the house it seemed like the perfect playroom for Miles.  It is right off the living room and we didn't have any furniture for it anyway.  However, Miles really didn't use it that much and I decided I wanted to reclaim it.  My mom has a sun room that we use every time I'm there.  She has part of it for Miles' play area and the rest is a sitting area.  That seemed like the perfect use of space for my sun room too.  Plus, Miles has his closet for a playroom.

Since the sun room is right off the living room, and that room is scheduled for a remodel down the road, I needed something that would hopefully work with the color scheme & design later.  It's a little bit of a gamble, but hopefully it will work.  I narrowed my two design choices down to leaving the wall color brown, adding white curtains & a light blue couch, or painting the walls blue, adding white curtains, and a neutral couch. 

Here is the sun room before.  Have you ever seen a darker sun room?

We had to borrow a friend's truck to drive to Jackson to get the couch.  Darrin had driven home from a recruiting trip in St. Louis that morning and then we immediately piled in a small truck, on a hot day, to spend a few hours retrieving the couch.  I feel ya, Miles.

I love the finished look.  Obviously I went with painting the room and getting a neutral couch instead of the opposite. I'm so glad I did.  I think the new paint color totally changes the look of the room.  I'm far from a design expert, but I wanted a light airy room and I think we accomplished that.

Miles & I are spending a lot of time coloring in the new sunroom.  So, we went from no one using the room to both of us using it a lot.  Miles has found the key to me playing more...do something I like to do, which is color, not play with his Batman cave.

We've also been reading a lot of books.  I've been checking out ten at a time from the library and we go through them in no time. Sometimes, all in one night. 

Unfortunately the room is not heated or cooled, so we need to find a solution for winter. Surprisingly, the summer is not an issue at all.  Probably b/c we have so many trees that shade our house.  Last winter, we had to close the French doors to the sun room for several months.  We tried a heater, but it didn't work.  We are going to explore some other options b/c I don't want to do without this room all winter long again.