I talked before about hitting our upstairs projects hard while I was home for 4 days a few weeks ago. We’ve kept at it, although things have slowed down a little bit since I’m back at work. Since our upstairs is basically the kids rooms with the Playroom in between, we’ve been working back and forth through them all instead of working one room at a time. This has really helped with my “shop our house first” budget and we’re still making good progress!
We stacked the boys bunk beds again–but this time there’s no crib in the room and I’m amazed how much space they suddenly have!
When we bought the Ladybug’s first bed, we made some long-range decisions about furniture buying that we’ve stuck with–and been happy with! We decided to go ahead and just get her a true “big girl bed” (a twin, with a twin mattress and box springs) rather than a toddler bed that would use her crib mattress and then turn around and get another crib mattress for the Cowboy coming behind her and then turn around and have to get her another bed and mattress anyway. We got some adjustable bed rails from Target and her transition was smooth as silk.
When we found out that the Speedracer was coming along right behind the Cowboy, we decided we were going to do the same thing (for the same reasons), but that eventually the boys were going to need bunk beds in that little room. So we bought bunk beds and set them up and the Cowboy slept on the bottom with a rail, and Speedracer was across the room in the crib.
However; when we decided to move Speedracer out of the crib, we didn’t feel that the Cowboy was old enough to sleep on the top bunk yet. So we took the bunk beds down and went to two beds. No problem.
And now we’ve stacked them again and the Cowboy is sleeping on top (and he loves it!)
Here’s the tricky part about modern bunk beds if you’re in the market–MOST OF THEM DON’T UN-STACK. I’m not kidding. Being able to unstack them and each of the boys eventually have their own bed was a big deal to me and we shopped high and low for ones that actually unstack into two separate beds. Most of them are not designed to do that. I was surprised.
Actually, it was also hard to find twin-over-twin because apparently everyone has a huge house and most of them are twin-over-full.
Most of them are also cheaply made, fake wood, or hollow metal. Not at all what I remember of our bunk beds growing up.
Ours are twin-over-twin Kendall bunk beds by Pottery Barn.
Expensive? Yes. (Although we got them on clearance because they discontinued that color which saved us a couple hundred, and we got free shipping and set up with a coupon, plus we purchased online so we got 3% back to Upromise savings.)
Quality? Yes.
If you can afford it (or save up for them) I would highly recommend them. They are real wood, and they are solid, and they are nice stacked or individual. And don’t forget that since they unstack you’re actually getting two beds. If you divide the price in half, you’ll see that they’re not too far off of a regular furniture store price for a single bed.
Now I have to think about using that empty space. Desk? Shelves for toys and books? I’m wondering if we can consolidate the boys into one dresser rather than two. Still so much to do!
