I have been planning on building a bed for Phaedra for a while now, and had figured I'd mix and match some ideas from some of Ana's other plans to get what I wanted. Then she came up with this, and it was perfect! Phaedra is not yet able to use a ladder to get up and down from a loft bed, so I was planning on stairs. Her bedroom is small, only 8'x10', and I hadn't figured out how to manage the stairs so that the bed wouldn't take up the entire room.
I decided against the stairs on this bed, since they would take up too much floor space. Instead I put a couple of 2x4s to make a ladder up to the platform. Phaedra loves her bed, and figured out getting up in no time at all. It took her about 3 days to master getting down.
I decided on paint instead of stain for the bed, because it was what I had on hand. It is CIL Smart from Home Depot in the melamine finish. Hopefully it will stand up well. The cutting and assembling took no time at all, but the painting took me two weeks! Next bed I make will be stained instead.
The best part, because I already had the paint, was that it cost less than $50 for the materials!