The Craft Cave

My latest endeavor, with the blessing of my husband, is to convert the "man cave"  into a craft cave.  I have been attempting to do so while still maintaining the integrity of an area where the boys can play poker.  This has proven to be easier than I thought.  Minus the zebra pattern carpet, everything in there is still manly, yet useful for crafting.  Of course it helps that I'm not exactly a girlie type girl to begin with.

First things first was a table that I could bang on, scratch on, glue on, write on, basically destroy while I attempt to create.  What better answer to this than a workbench!?! And ladies, what husband wouldn't grab the keys and run to the car if you said: "honey, I would like to go to Sears and buy a Craftsman workbench".  KEY TERMS: SEARS, CRAFTSMAN, WORKBENCH.  Using these words, it is long after the bench is in the house and ready for use before he even has a second thought as to why in the world YOU would want one.

*Mandom: There is a Craftsman workbench in the house, THE HOUSE.  Inside, yes, in the house.  She let me buy a workbench and put it IN THE HOUSE.

Easy.  It worked.  And when he snivels his nose at the word "crafts", I give a sweet reply of: well if you ever need it just ask.  hehehehehe (yeah right.)


* Mandoms are my interpretation of what a man is thinking.  I find I am usually pretty close to the real thing. Consider this free advice :)


 Well, workbench aside, my first item for this room was a dog bed.  My adopted Staffordshire Terrier is glued to my hip.  Wherever I am she must be right there with me and I'm not going to deny that I quite prefer her company to most others. Technically her name is Ziva, but we lovingly call her Boogie.  This will be touched upon in another blog about my wild kingdom.  Anyway, Boogie is old, we adopted her as a senior and I go to great lengths to ensure her all the comforts required for a senior citizen. 

As there is no way she will let me sit in the craft cave without her, it was a necessary requirement to provide her a bed.  Now she is strange about beds, she does not like regular dog beds and will not lay on them for any reason.  Hence my dilemma.  So, my oh so creative solution was to up-cycle an old toddler bed.  I chose one that had long since been used up (I didn't really want to take one out of circulation that had plenty of toddler years left in it, the Lord knows some moms struggle as it is).  I removed one of the side rails and placed it next to the rail on the other side to create more of a daybed look.  Scrubbed it with one my favorite natural cleaning products, scuffed it with sandpaper, and finally spray painted it black.  (Notice the S cubed: Scrub, Scuff, Spray) I could not find any toddler sheets in red (go figure), so I used a twin sheet and pinned it down underneath.  I also used some foam therapeutic padding for the sake of Boogie's old bones.

The result is a super chic, modern doggy daybed.
I have seen similar ones for sale on the internet for $150+ dollars.  Mine cost a total of $65.  GO ME!!!!  Here she is in her new bed:

Sorry for the quality of photo, my phone was all I had near me when she made the discovery.