Part 3 of 5 in our October Empty Nest Series: Repurposing a Bedroom Without Erasing the Memories
For months after our oldest son left for college, I didn’t change a thing. His room stayed exactly as he left it, and when I say exactly, I mean exactly. The turquoise walls, the queen-size bed, the bookshelf, the desk, the trophies, the books, and the Periodic Table poster he made in high school were all right where he left them. And because he was a college freshman, there was also a healthy supply of dirty laundry, snack wrappers, water bottles, and approximately 35 pairs of sneakers, courtesy of his employee discount at Reebok.
In Part 1 of this series, I asked you to stand quietly in the rooms in your home that feel frozen in time. This was mine.
For a long time, the room just sat there. Every once in a while, I’d wander in when I missed him. His younger brother would occasionally sleep there, and somewhere along the way, I started using it too. It wasn’t because I had some grand design plan. It was because the room was quiet and nobody ever came looking for me there. When I wanted to take a rare afternoon nap or needed a few minutes alone with my prayer journal, his room was perfect.
I didn’t realize it at the time, but something important was happening. The room wasn’t sitting empty. It was waiting.
The Christmas That Changed Everything
That first Christmas after he left, I found myself doing something I had never done before: I decorated both boys’ bedrooms for Christmas.
For years I joked that our house looked more like Whoville from How the Grinch Stole Christmas! than anything you’d find in a designer magazine. The designer in me always dreamed of having one of those beautiful, coordinated Christmas trees. The mom in me could never part with the traditions.
That year, instead of putting all those childhood treasures around the main Christmas tree, I had a spontaneous idea. What if I decorated each boy’s room with the Christmas memories that belonged to them? So, I started digging through the bins: small trees, lights, Christmas books, childhood ornaments, and battery-powered stuffed animals that sang Christmas songs.
My goal was simple. I wanted my college student to feel welcomed home and my high school student to reconnect with some of the excitement of Christmas. Mostly, I wanted both boys to know they were deeply loved.
Two Sons, Two Completely Different Reactions
When my younger son came home from school that day, he ran upstairs and stopped in the doorway, frozen. I heard him take a breath. Then came the hug, the gratitude, and a careful inspection of every ornament, decoration, book, and stuffed animal. He told me how much he appreciated it.
A few days later, my oldest arrived home from college, suitcase in hand. He tromped up the stairs, stopped in the doorway, paused, and looked around. “Nice,” he said, and started unpacking. I still laugh about it today.
One son wanted to absorb every memory. The other was simply happy to be home with the family, the dogs, and a refrigerator full of free food.
Repurposing a Bedroom, One Small Step at a Time
Once Christmas was over, I packed everything away and started my annual January deep clean. That’s when I found myself looking at the room differently. For months I had preserved it exactly as he left it, but now I started wondering: what if this room could serve more than one purpose? Not instead of being his room, but in addition to it.
So, little by little, I started making changes. The desk was removed, and the closet was organized. The shoe collection was edited down by my younger son who helped himself to the left behind collection. The turquoise walls became soft, neutral gray, and the bedding was replaced. Nothing dramatic happened overnight. The room evolved the same way our lives were evolving: one small step at a time.
That’s the approach I recommend to clients, too. Repurposing a bedroom doesn’t have to be a weekend makeover. Small, intentional changes give everyone in the family time to adjust.
What I Didn’t Expect: Our First Guest Room
The biggest surprise wasn’t how much I enjoyed the space. It was how many other people enjoyed it. For the first time in our married life, we had a dedicated guest room.
When my parents came to visit, they finally had a place of their own. And because they always traveled with their dog, Bell, that suddenly meant a house filled with three dogs. My mom loves reading and quilting, and my dad has never met an afternoon nap he didn’t enjoy. More than once, he would disappear into the guest room with Bell stretching out beside him while my mom settled in with a book.
Honestly, it made family visits better. They were comfortable, they had privacy, and I wasn’t worried about entertaining them every second of the day.
If you’re thinking about repurposing a bedroom in your own home, Ask Yourself:
- Is this room sitting empty, or is it waiting?
- How am I already using this space without realizing it?
- Who else could this room serve throughout the year: guests, hobbies, rest?
- What is one small change I could make this month?
The Bottom Line: A Home Can Evolve
Looking back, I think that’s when I started to understand something important. The room didn’t stop being my son’s room just because the walls were painted, the desk was gone, or my parents were sleeping there during a weekend visit. It was still part of his story. It was simply becoming part of ours, too.
In many ways, it was doing exactly what a good room should do: adapting to the needs of the people using it. On ordinary days, it gave me a quiet place to rest and pray. When the people we love came to stay, they were welcomed in. That’s what designing for the 350 days, not just the 15, looks like in real life. Life moved forward without asking anyone to forget what came before.
At Design Organize Gather Co., we help families take those small steps. That might mean organizing a closet, choosing a new paint color, or reimagining a room for the next chapter.
Coming Next Week
Repurposing one bedroom raised a new question. Once we moved to our lake house, we weren’t just partial empty nesters anymore. We were downsizers. The house was smaller; the closets were smaller, and there was no basement or garage to swallow decades’ worth of stuff. Both boys still needed rooms when they came home from college, but those rooms had to serve many purposes for the rest of the year.
What I learned surprised me. The biggest mistake wasn’t choosing the wrong furniture. It was assuming I knew exactly how every room should function before I had lived there. Next week, I’ll share how our lake house taught me to let rooms evolve over time, why some of our best design decisions took years to uncover, and how multi-functional spaces helped us build a home that works for college kids, guests, work, hobbies, and everyday life.
Because sometimes the smartest thing you can do is live in a home long enough to discover what it really needs.
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