I love a clean house. If I’m lucky, I get one for about five minutes – you know, enough time for the kids to drag their stuff through the living room and the dog to track muddy paw prints through the kitchen.
But the downside to a clean house is that it makes the existing flaws blatantly obvious. And the one I rue the most? My bedroom.
I do not have a grown up bedroom. I have a lovely sofa. My girls have beautiful bunk beds. Our dining room table is genuinely nice.
But the furniture in my bedroom looks like something out of a bad college student’s dorm room.
This is totally my fault. When we have a few dollars to spend in the house, I’d rather spend it on the rooms that people see and the rooms where I tend to be. And that’s not in the bedroom. I’m not a lady of leisure. I don’t have time to just hang out by myself. I am generally running around like a crazy person, children hanging from every limb. I think that needs to change.
Today, when I was putting away laundry, I peeked over at my mismatched bed linens with some garish bleach spots and thought about how put together the kids’ rooms looked. Charlie’s bed set is cars and trucks. He has cute truck finials on his curtains and two cheery coordinating rugs on the floor. The girls have shiny pink and purple curtains, and set after set of pink and purple sheets that match their bedspreads and comforters. And yes, the girls even have a real live flower in their room that has not wilted despite much abuse (it’s a fuschia orchid and it’s beautiful). Simply put, the kids’ rooms are adorable.
So why isn’t mine more grown up? I want a real, grown up bedroom. With matching bedspreads and a real bed. I want lamps with working light bulbs in them. I want a rug without spots on it – and preferably one that matches the furniture. I want storage that does not involve: 1, milk crates; 2, banker’s boxes or 3, Ikea. I do not believe this is too much to ask.
As I curl up this Friday night, far too exhausted from the week I’ve had, I’m doing so with a couple of catalogues in hand. There’s no money in the budget for a brand new bedroom but I’m pretty sure we can squeeze enough blood out of that stone for some matching bed linens.
