New Classroom....A Work in Progress: Cubby Edition

You can follow Tracy at her new blog: The Knit Wit Teacher

I'm linking up this week with Jena from Sew Much Music and Lidsey from Mrs. Law's Kinders. Each Friday we will be posting about what we are creating in our classrooms and showcase our "Artsy Fartsy" side.


I have started fixing up my new room for next year. This is going to be a looooooong process! Or school is overdue for a remodel. We have really old cubbies that are beige, dirty, and falling apart. Our walls are in dire need of scrubbing and fresh paint and the built in book shelves are the same as the cubbies. Our classrooms are very dark due to the lighting and we have old brown chalkboards that make things very drab. 

I'm planning on a complete overhaul, or as much as my budget will allow, this summer. 

Yesterday I started on my cubbies. 

(Ignore the mess that is my room. Maintenance won't clear my room out for at least 2 weeks so I had to start the redecorating process with everything stacked up. )

Before: 

Each of these sections was broken down into 4 tiny cubbies. They weren't big enough to store anything in so I decided to take the sliding panels out and make it into 8 bigger sections. 

First I had to slide out all the panels. That part was easy. Next I had to pry up the plastic dividers. THIS WAS A NIGHTMARE!!! Each piece had 4 staples in it. When I pulled on the sections I inevitably kept hitting my elbow. My elbows have some impressive bruises today! I keep telling Michelle that when she does this she needs to wear elbow pads. I'm not even joking. 

Sometimes the plastic pulled the staples out, other times it just ripped away and left the staples behind. I had to use pliers to finish getting all the staples out. After the plastic and staples were out I used a razor to scrape away years of name tags. All in all, just prepping the cubbies for paint/primer took me 2 hours!!! 

Let me stop and tell you something about myself. I am a klutz with a capital K. When I was younger my family stopped handing me anything breakable. In a 2 week span I broke a bedroom window, a coffee pot, a coffee cup, a jewelry box, and trinket of my moms. After this I was labeled a klutz and everyone in my family refused to hand me anything remotely breakable. I thought I would out grow the klutz phase.....

Apparently not: 

That would be primer on my classroom floor. Oops! 

I walked over and picked up the can. I turned to walk across the room and tripped over a chair. The can flipped out of my hands and landed lid down. Needless to say the lid came off and primer came out! 

I did my best to clean it up but FYI: primer doesn't come out of carpet very well. 

After scrubbing and using my ShopVac for an hour I gave up. Hopefully maintenance can work some magic and get it out. If not, I'll be getting creative with rugs this year.  

**I went in to work today and while I can still see white it's not as drastic as it was!!! Thank you maintenance for saving me! **

After giving up on my floor I started priming the cubbies. Another teacher in our school painted her cubbies last month without priming. She noticed that if you nicked the paint it came right off. I'm hoping that the primer will keep that from happening. If not, I'll look into how to seal it. 

My lovely hubby came in and took all but 1 hook out for me. The lone hook was being stubborn and refused to came out so we just left it. Surely I can handle painting around 1 hook....Maybe. 

After the paint spill of yesterday I cut apart trash bags to lay down as my tarp. They worked beautifully. 

It might be humid if.....your paint bubbles up.

Using a roller was not possible because it kept leaving bubbles behind so I was left with an edger and a brush. Just let me say that the garbage bag tarps were a great idea. The edger and I were not friends by the end of night. I kept dropping it into the tray of paint and then dripping paint everywhere. Should I ever have to leave teaching, painting is not a career option for me! 

 After:

It took me about 3  hours but I think the results are amazing! No more beige disgusting cubbies for me! 

Tomorrow I will go in and see if I need to seal it. After browsing several blogs I think I may use this finish. To avoid brush strokes they suggest using a Purdy brand brush. I may have to look into this. 

Next up: Scrubbing and painting the walls. Stay tuned!!!