Who is crazy enough to start a new project in the guest room 3 days before guests arrive? This girl! We added a beautiful new faux shiplap wall behind the beds in the guest room, and it looks great! But talk about stressful!
There actually is a perfectly good reason why I would put myself through that kind of stress. We have been planning to add shiplap to the wall behind the beds for several months now. The wood was cut, and I had put it into the room to acclimate for a few weeks. Then I found out family was coming.
Rather than take the wood back out to the garage (and lose that acclimatization time), I decided to just go ahead and install it. OK, so probably most of you reading this would have chosen the first option, but that’s just the way I roll.
Before
So, here is the room before we started. It’s nice, but lacking character (boring). My plans have always been to add shiplap and repaint the room Sea Salt by Sherwin Williams. I’m going for a coastal cottage vibe. Hey, there is the little nightstand that I had that not-so-fantastic milk paint experience with (before I painted it).
Installing the Faux Shiplap Wall
For the fake shiplap wall (or call it a plank wall, if you prefer), we used the same method we used in our mudroom closet makeover in our previous home. Here is a pic of the wall with the planks installed, taken two days before guests arrived.
That green tape is just marking where the studs were. We kept moving the tape down as we went to ensure we sent nails into wood rather than drywall. Later that day (and well into the night), I cut and added trim to the sides and ceiling, filled all the nail holes, caulked all the seams, and primed the wall. I think I went to bed around 1 am, cursing myself for starting this project with such a short timeline.
The Day Before Guests Arrived
This is what I woke up to in the morning.
At this point I will admit that I had a little bit of a meltdown. Nothing serious…just a few seconds of rocking myself in the corner thinking, “Why?!?” I still had to paint the entire wall (two coats), and move all of the furniture back into place, and I was really tired! But, then I picked myself up, put on my big girl panties and got to work.
The End Result
By the end of the day, I had accomplished this! I gave myself lots of pats on the back, a couple glasses of wine, and some chocolate as a reward.
So, would I do it again? Umm, probably would have been better to take a couple weeks delay, and just put the stinking wood back in the garage, rather than put myself through the stress. But, it turned out beautifully, and I’m one huge step closer to having the entire room done. On to the next project!
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