Creating Our New Home Office

Happy New Year! I didn’t intend to take last week off, but we’ve been so very busy working on new projects, I didn’t want to over extend myself by trying to get the blog caught up with new posts. Slacker blogger, I know. Lots of new stuff to come though, I can promise you that!

I have big plans for the new year. I have high expectations. 2016… wasn’t great. It was tough in several ways and I very much was looking forward to a fresh, clean slate. Anthony and I have been prioritizing several areas in our home that need to function and work better for us. At the top of the list, our home office. If you’re a long time reader, you know I’ve been working on our office, or trying to work on it (that might be the key word here, trying), for a few years now. These pictures might even refresh your memory of what our current office looks like cleaned up…

Seeing the office that clean is a very (very) rare thing, but the main issue with the office, is that we lack some serious functionality… elements that really make it difficult to work in our current space. Long story short, I don’t want to work in there when I’ve got no place to physically work. I’m not the best at working in a cluttered state, and funny thing is, I think that may actually be a nice way of describing the office. Brace yourself for these pictures…

If you think for one second that I have it all together, you’re totally wrong. Promise.

Simply put, I outgrew our office. I outgrew the amount of shelving and storage space I had. I outgrew the amount of filing space that we need in order to manage and operate my blog and business, but also all of the elements of our farming business. Our office is maxed out.

I tried… man did I try to get it to work for me, not against me. We made new organizing items, painted cabinets to hold supplies, brought in different furniture pieces, built shelves, etc., etc., etc., but no matter what I did, nothing worked. It was the ultimate challenge, and not something that overly motivated me to spend a ton of hours creating, writing and expanding in the areas I wanted to. Something had to change, and change it did with the fresh start of this year.

There’s one room in our home you’ve never really seen, and that’s our guest bedroom. It’s a little bit bigger in size, has two windows rather than one, but the main extra bonus of this room, is the closet. It’s deeper and bigger than the current office bedroom and it actually has shelves upon shelves built into it. Right now it holds all my extra home décor items, but I’ve been busy going through them all, pairing it down to the items I love and want to keep. Everything else is going to Goodwill, which gives me plenty of room to store paint, fabric, tools, supplies and anything else that’s just sitting on the floor in our current office.

Another big element of the guest bedroom, is that it’s a fresh slate. It’s a room where I can start over with the office design. I can create something that actually works for me/us now that I know and can pinpoint the areas and items we desperately need. That alone is huge. I know what doesn’t work, because I’ve already tried it. 

So, with that said, the office is moving into our current guest bedroom, and the guest bedroom is moving into our current office. We’re doing a little switcheroo and I couldn’t be more excited about seeing it come together.

I’ll be sharing the plan for the room and a mood board for the new office design later this week, but here are the main issues I have with our current office that will be changing in the new space:

• Storage Space- One of the biggest issues right now, is that I don’t have nearly enough room to store all of the supplies I use for projects, business and personal use. Half the time I can’t find what I’m looking for. I get frustrated and it makes working, and creating a wee bit stressful. I have plans for more drawer space, as well as how I’m going to utilize the closet shelving.
• Filing Space- Our office isn’t just used for the blog and my business; we’re also farmers. Anthony’s actual “office” may be the fields he farms, but we still use the office for all the billing, paperwork, insurance, vendors, payments, invoices, etc. It’s a huge part of our office and right now our system is horrible. We don’t have enough filing space for our personal items, let alone the blog and our farm. I cringe whenever I’m looking for a specific document because it’s all blended together into a hot mess. The new office will have plenty of filing space, and I’ll be shredding tons of old documents that we no longer need.
• Organizational Items- Another hot mess of our current office, is not having the proper bins, baskets and organizing elements that we need. I need to know right where my paint brushes are. I need to know where I can find project supplies, camera equipment and anything else that gets lost. I need organization. I need it to work together to create a functioning system. I’m searching for the best, money saving options.
• Computer- Perhaps this should be at the top of the list, but I’ve been limping my way along with the computer I have, dreading it as I go. It’s frustrating and it makes working very difficult and stressful. Anthony and I have discussed this in great depth, and a new computer will be joining the team, I’m just not sure at exactly which stage of the office makeover.
• Usable Desk Space- Bottom line? I need work space. I need space to write, make lists, create new projects, sketch new products, sew, etc., etc., etc. Right now I don’t have enough space to do what I need to do, and I feel extremely confined when I do work. The new office will have plenty of desk space that will allow me to multitask!
• Seating- My office chair needs to go. It’s uncomfortable to sit in for long periods of time and I get up with a backache. I have a few ideas for this, and I’m specific in what I want. I look forward to sharing more as I get further in the process.

Those are the main “big” issues that we need to solve, and while it’s a pretty short list, it makes up for it in the project overhaul and depth. We’ve already begun working on the new room (if you follow me on Instagram and watch my “Stories” you’ve gotten a lot of great sneak peeks!) and I’m totally in love with how it’s turning out. I’m going a different direction from my normal design and it feels glorious to be stepping outside of the comfort zone and exploring new looks that feel and look like me! I can’t wait to share our progress as we overhaul the new room into a space that not only looks great, but functions even better! I mean, a room is nothing if it can’t function how we need it to….

I’m so excited to see how this all comes together! Stay tuned for more details and our “official” plan of attack! 🙂