Building a Bed for Annie

Several years ago Justin and I discovered that our backs were getting sore due to leaning over Annie's bed to change her and trying to lift her off a low surface.  So we decided it was time to raise her bed higher to prevent injuries to us.  We used the common bed risers--little black "cones" that the wheels of the bed frame sat in.  After a while we realized her bed needed to be even higher for us to prevent strain on our backs, so about 3 years ago Justin built this support to raise her bed to be at our waist level.

This helped tremendously and we have been using it ever since, but it has become an eyesore as we've worked to get Annie's room decorated in our new house.  We looked into getting Annie a SleepSafe bed that is basically a hospital bed with motorized tilt functions, but with a cute "crib-like" appearance.  However, insurance would not approve it for her, so it was out of the question. 

Sleep Safe Bed (image from SleepSafe.com)

So, Justin took it upon himself to build Annie a new bed.  We knew we wanted a captains bed style to make good use out of all the space beneath her raised bed, but none of the captains beds we saw in the stores were tall enough to get her mattress at waist height, and none of the beds in the stores would accommodate the use of bed rails that Annie requires.  So we designed a bed together to make sure it would be the right height and work with her bed rails without having the rails hit the drawers.

We worked for 2 1/2 months to finish it, working late into the evenings and all day on most Saturdays.  We were very grateful for a quick jump-start from Justin's parents who really helped us get the actual building started.  So here are some pictures of the process and the end product.  I am SO pleased with it.  We learned a lot and made lots of errors, and if we could do it again, it would probably be even better, but I'm very happy with how it turned out.  The beautiful quilt was made by Justin's mom for Annie's 10th birthday and it turned out so perfectly with the bed.


We built the base out of 3 separate components so we could move it into the house more easily.  There are 4 drawers and 1 cabinet on each side of the bed.

 One day we decided to take Annie's mattress out to the garage to check our measurements and it was a good thing we did because we discovered that we made it too tall!  And this picture doesn't even show her 2" thick memory foam topper that goes on top of this mattress.  We had originally planned to put a toe space down both sides of the bed to make it easier for us to get right up next to the bed to change her and transfer her without our feet hitting the drawers, but we had to eliminate the toe space.  Otherwise the bed would have been 3" taller than before which would have made it very difficult to lift Annie into.  We should have double checked our measurements way before this point!

Measuring it with her mattress.  Got the bead board cabinet doors built.

Finished the head board and foot board with bead board.  Got the top platform built to lay over the 3 compartments.  Nail holes are filled and it's ready to paint!

Painting...  (Eager to park the cars in the garage again!)

Sanding and more painting...

More painting and polyacrylic finish... almost done! 

Ready for assembly! We attached fabric pads to the bottom to prevent scratching the wood floor, and moved the compartments into Annie's room!

Getting the headboard attached.

Top slab attached.  It's done!

Both sides of the bed have one cabinet and 4 drawers.  This cabinet is slightly open because of cords we need to tidy up.  We used grommets to screw the bed rail ties into the top slab of the bed, so they won't wiggle or loosen.

Footboard

Annie's new bed and beautiful quilt!

 We built a shelf in this cabinet to keep Annie's suction machine and CPAP machine tucked away instead of taking up space on her chest of drawers.  We still need to drill a hole through the side of the cabinet and headboard to feed the cords through.  Then we can just grab the suction yankauer or her CPAP mask to use and still keep the machines tucked away.  It helps make her room look a little less hospital-y.  The storage this bed makes will be super for storing all of her diapers, chux pads, syringes, suction supplies, and all her other medical supplies.
 

 

Head board

So here's Annie's room with her new bed and quilt (and new lavender paint from a couple months ago).  Our next project is to use the leftover bead board from the head and foot boards to put on her dresser and nightstand to help them match even better.  We also plan to built an IV pole post onto the back of her dresser so we can get rid of the metal IV pole on wheels.  I need to still get curtains made and hung and put some pictures on the walls.  But I'm so glad this part is DONE!

Annie's room.