Nursery Update: Headboard (s)

Part of this whole rentervating thing is making things work in your current space that will also work for a future home as well. I am going to try to keep this explanation brief.

My bed since I moved out in college was two twin beds put together to make a king. Late last year my dad and stepmom got a new mattress and boxspring set so they gave us their old one because it was not that old. We then moved our faux king bed into the guest room.

Well now we had to figure out what to do with that guest bed. We did not want to get rid of it because there could be two scenarios in the future when we need it. 1) We would move into a house with 4 bedrooms and need a guest bed again. 2) We could use the individual twin beds as the kid's big kid beds when they move past their toddler bed.

We decided to keep them both. One is stored (under our bed actually) and the other we wanted to keep as a guest bed of sorts in the nursery. We configured it so that it is against the wall lengthwise and acts as sort of a daybed/couch without the side rails.

I really wanted to experiment with making an upholstered headboard and this was my chance. In order to accommodate for some flexibility in the future we made it as two twin headboards that can also serve as a king size when put together.

Most people go with plywood and padding. We decided to go simpler and do foam insulation sheets and batting. We cut them to the right width for a twin bed and left them kind of tall. We can always cut them down later (as you will see, the bottom portion is left exposed) but for now, since this serves as a day bed of sorts, we wanted something cushy to lean back on.

We got out our foam sheets and sprayed the portion that would be covered with spray mount. Then we laid the batting over that area. Just make sure you have enough of an overhang to wrap around back. I made this mistake on another project.

We were really careful to line it up and not create any bubbles or wrinkles. Then we wrapped over the top side and began stapling. One thing we did find was that the staples would not grab the foam if they had to go through the batting and the fabric so we tried to stretch the fabric to go further in than the batting. (*Basically, if you follow this method, make sure your fabric is about an inch larger on all sides than your batting).

 

After we did the top, we sat it up, smoothed on the front and laid it back down again so we could staple the sides. Then we turned it over and stapled down front on the bottom. You could always try to make this look nice or we even talked about wrapping a solid piece of fabric around and stapling on the back, but once we got it behind the bed, you could not see anything.

We planned on attaching this to the wall with command strips but once we slipped it behind the bed, it stayed just fine on its own. Use your own judgement on that one.

I really loved the fabric that we picked out and I am really happy with how easy this project is. I wonder how they will hold up being in a house with two kids but as long as they do, I am excited that we can use them in their rooms in the future. 

I am still trying to figure out if I want to trade out the back pillows for bigger ones, or add new ones but so far, Miller loves going in there and sitting on the bed.