At one point or another, all parents experience their children moving out of the home and into their new adult lives. Whether the child moves out during college or at a later date, chances are you won’t need the space you once needed when your immediate family all lived under one roof. Some parents opt for downsizing their home, which is a great option. But if you’re planning on staying put, here are a few ideas for revamping some of those now-empty rooms.
Create a Home Office
The pandemic has changed the way we think about working from home. While things are opening back up and looking optimistic, there are still so many of us where working from our homes has become our new normal. While this might be what we are expecting long-term even with the pandemic hopefully ending, now would be a great time to upgrade home offices to a more permanent place in our homes.
If you’re an empty nester, why not upgrade an old bedroom into a home office! Start by removing your bed and repainting those walls a color that helps with motivation. Depending on what type of feeling you are typing to promote in your workspace, you may want to look into some color psychology beforehand. For example, painting your walls green may help with calmness if you have a stressful job. Or if you’re looking for more motivation, orange has been said to help with productivity.
Consider also upgrading your office furniture for your new space. If you’re moving your office from a smaller room to a bigger former bedroom, you may want to upgrade the furniture to fit the space. Instead of looking to buy top-of-the-line office furniture, consider looking for discounted office furniture. For example, Bob’s Discount Furniture has a wide variety of desks and office chairs to choose from that don’t break the bank on your new space. If your space is big enough, consider also adding comfortable seating options like a small couch in case you feel like being a little more relaxed that workday.
Invest in a Home Gym
Now that your kids have moved on and allowed you more space in the home, this might be the time to consider investing in home gym equipment. Most families with at-home gyms often reserve space in the basement for the bigger workout equipment. Depending on how big your space formerly occupied by your children is, consider moving your gym out of the cold, wet basement and into a warmer dryer bedroom. However, before you get moving that heavy machinery upstairs, check out one of these virtual home design apps to make sure it will fit before you make any moves.
If treadmills and heavyweights are not your things, making that extra space into a meditation or yoga room would be an excellent tradeoff. In this room set up a space for your yoga mat, a meditation corner, and place a table for your laptop or bring in a television for instructional yoga or meditation videos. Incorporating nature/plants, positive wall decor, and decluttering the space will help create a positive, calming environment for your daily practice of quieting the mind.
Design a Get Ready Room
If you’re a mom, you might experience the need to put others’ needs before your own. Now that your children are taking care of their own homes, now is the time to do a little something for yourself. Designing a “get ready room”/walk-in closet will give you the space to store your clothes and other items, while also giving you a place where you can get ready for the day or decompress while you get ready for bed.
Start this room out with determining where you might want to put a table for getting ready, putting on makeup, and doing your hair. Makeup tables are easy to come by online, or you can make one yourself with an old desk and mounting a large mirror to the wall in front of it. Depending on how permanent you want to make this room, you can install shelving and other built-in storage to your walls within this space. Many hardware stores have closet kits you can purchase and install yourself. These come with hanging rods, shelves, cabinets, and drawers for you to place on your walls around the room.
After that, all you need is some nice wall decor, an area rug, and a lounging couch for days you need to relax!
While changing your children’s childhood rooms may seem sad, with it comes a new beginning. Whether it be a new office, home gym, get ready room, or something else entirely, it is completely up to you. Take this opportunity to reinvent the space to be whatever you want or need within your home.
