The mission from the beginning was to create an atmosphere where our two young boys would enjoy bedtime. In fact we wanted them to look forward to it and what better way to make that happen than by building their very own custom bunk bed house with all the fixings that belong on HGTV, shiplap and all!
We are big fans of the show Fixer-Upper and we wanted to incorporate that farmhouse look and feel into this bunk bed house so we knew shiplap was going to be a must. Having just shiplap though can really flush out a project and not allow it to pop so we knew we needed to add some color without making the bed too laud. Most DIY projects begin with the sketch pad. These drawings are so spot on they may as well be actual photographs! Not so much...
CONCEPT ART
THINK THROUGH EVERYTHING
When designing this it was really important to consider a number of things such as, how much room would they need inside? How big will they be able to grow inside this house? How will we change the sheets? How do we keep this from collapsing on them? All are very important to consider. As we answered those questions we were able to come up with the exact measurements we needed to allow the house to check every one of those boxes.
A good rule of thumb with any project that requires measuring and cutting is the old adage, "Measure twice, cut once." I highly recommend this council. Measure everything. Measure the bedroom wall distance and ceiling height. Leave yourself some wiggle room because there will likely be something you hadn't considered. You don't want to take the roof all the way to the ceiling anyways.
TIME TO BUILD
Prepare a cut list before beginning. Know the length of boards you will need and how many of them you will require. It's fun to start projects but they will go significantly slower if this step is not cared for properly because you will have to stop and utilize precious brain power throughout the project and end up working at a slower pace. Take a deep breath and get your measurements down before you begin. I started off with a conventional frame and added some additional support so this bunk bed house would have extra strong bones. I decided to do much of the initial assembly in our garage to make sure I wasn't in for any surprises. In the end I don't regret doing this step because it provided me peace of mind that my measurements were correct. Were I to do it again I would skip this step.
GETTING SOME MUCH NEEDED HELP FROM THE BOYS
This is a great way to use your extra scrap wood that you have no use for. It will all be hidden behind the shiplap.
TIME TO BRING IT INSIDE FOR FULL ASSEMBLY
There was still a lot of work to do at this point. The roof needed to be built. Most of the painting still needed to be done. This was the point where we could start seeing some daylight at the end of the tunnel. 
A word of caution. Make sure you measure your widow frames to start and stop at the same levels your shiplap starts and stops. I know it looks like that is just how we did it in these photos but I made that critical error of not considering their heights in relation to the shiplap and it added many hours of additional work because I had to make special cuts around the shiplap so they would fit the window frames. The good thing about those kinds of lessons is you only need to learn them once!
THE FINISHED PRODUCT
This is the best part. You break out your vacuum and clean up the great big mess you made and then you let your kids see it completed for the first time. Their reaction was priceless. They even jumped into the air they were so excited. They have been in this bunk bed house for just about 3 months now and bedtime is no longer the fight that it used to be!
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