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A room of my own

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I’ve written ad nauseam about how I’d one day like to have a room of my own. A room where I can write, where I can work, where I can think.

With our new house, it has finally happened. In our first week at the new place, I took a week off of work to help unpack, and to rennovate my brand new office: a room of my own.

Before:

office – before
office – before
office – before

After:

Home office with treadmill desk by Andrea Badgley on Butterfly Mind
Home office with treadmill desk
Home office with sit-stand desk lowered by Andrea Badgley on Butterfly Mind
For when my legs get tired and I need to sit
officeafter_window
Home office window

I can’t tell you how happy this room makes me 🙂

Specs:
The office is a utility room in the finished basement. I share the space with a window, a water heater, the furnace, and the fuse boxes. Which are handy, since I have plugged in a heavy duty treadmill so I can walk while I work.

YEAH BOYEEZ!

My old bones can’t take the high impact workouts I used to do, and in my former “office” setup (in a corner of the rec room) I sat for 8 hours a day. My circulation was terrible, my shoulders hurt from hunching, my knees hurt from scrunching up in my chair, and I was always cold. Now I can get gentle exercise as I age, keep my circulation going, and keep warm, all while also being productive at work. I walked about 25 miles in the first four days of owning the desk. The desk is an Uplift sit-stand-walk desk and can be raised and lowered. When I want to sit, I lower the desk and slide my monitor and keyboard over to the sitting side.

To renovate the office, we ripped out old carpet and painted the cement floors. Eventually we’d like to install cork flooring throughout the basement, but that’ll take some time to save up for. I sanded the windowsill, the trim, and the baseboards, slapped on a coat of primer, and then brushed on two coats of semi-gloss white paint. I wanted a bright room since I spend so much time in there, and I really wanted a happy spring green color. I chose lime mousse from Valspar, but the paint itself is from Benjamin Moore, for which there is a family-owned store here in Blacksburg (they matched the color for me).

The ceiling is not shown in the pictures, but I painted the ceiling with a bright white ceiling paint. Holy crap, that was a pain in the ass. The ceiling is textured. It was not fun. But it looks a million times better than the dingy yellowing paint that was there before.

Today (and this week), I will sand, prime, and paint the doors in the same white as the trim. And then, my office will be complete. Yay!

30 thoughts on “A room of my own”

    1. It’s not nearly as hard as I thought it would be. It only took about an hour of walking slowly to get used to it. Now I don’t even notice that I’m walking while I’m working.

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  5. Brava! A room of your own. A few years ago, I converted our rarely used formal living room to my writing room. It’s warm with tans and blue-greens. I must confess though, that I am easily distracted by the view out the front windows but I relocate when I need to focus. Enjoy your room.

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  7. I would love a room of my own. About 10 years ago my husband made a desk “for me”; in our computer room. Although when I proceeded to put my writing supplies in the drawers, I was told it really was for him. BTW he doesn’t write, nor does he read. He made the desk for him to fill out his paperwork for his job, and I was not, under any circumstances to use it. I’m still writing at the kitchen or dining room tables, and I have to pick up all my papers after I use them, otherwise they will be thrown out – I’m not kidding. I dream of a “room of my own”. 😦

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  11. Awesome! Isn’t it a great feeling? I have a new office too and I share it with storage units, bins, shelving and closets. But it’s a space with a window and I love it! Congrats on your new room and here’s to productivity.

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  14. Congratulations on creating a room of your own. That shade of green is one of my favorite colors-soothing and energizing at the same time.

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  20. I love the color!
    I have never though about exercising while I write but I think I should try it because that’s when I get my best ideas.
    You should enjoy your writing room.

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  23. It looks lovely, the green is beautiful! Such a great place to write! And I love the addition of the treadmill, although I know I’d love my own for a day maybe and then it’d collect dust!

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  26. Makes me call on the great Virginia Woolf’s wise WISE words… Glad to see a writer’s advice executed by another writer. Fabulous 🙂

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