Home Tour: Kid Edition

Through out this blog I have showed almost every nook and cranny of my home, (mostly in 10 minutes snippets) but I have never taken you on an home tour. It is about time to give a peek of the larger picture and put all the organizing show n’ tell into context.

I will be honest however and say that I’ve shunned a home tour in the past. This is not a home decor blog nor am I particularly gifted in design. Further still, there is more I want to do in my home that I haven’t had the time, money, or even energy to do.

How ironic that my mission is to focus on the living that is taking place in our space and not striving for a picture perfect ideal we see portrayed in magazines. This mission is to keep me in check.

As my lovely sister-in-law Stacy (who inspired me to give this little tour) puts it,“Every moment we spend wishing for things to be different is a moment we could be rejoicing over what God has done for us or is doing in us.” Well said.

So without further ado here is my home and since I am anxious to show you my latest project, we are starting in my girls room.

Since we have lived here for 8 years, it has gone through tons of changes. I don’t even have a picture of when it was an office pre-kids. But here is the room right before my oldest was born.

Here it is just a few short years later when we added a “big girl” bed. Still needed that changing table though.

But now with no more babies, we’ve upgraded to a bunk bed. What they say about how terrible they are to be made is all true! I made them here but usually if the quilts cover the sheets we’re good.

The two shelves that once were above the changing table in the 1st picture are now their pseudo nightstands. Their ever-changing favorite knick knacks are on display. Usually the shelves are a lot more cluttered than this! I have one pack-rat in particular that we clean off monthly.

My favorite thing about the room is the size. Especially with bunk beds, there is tons of room to play!

Our toy bookshelf keeps everything accessible yet maintains all that floor space that I love.

Under the window is our mini workstation complete with corkboards to display masterpieces. An old coffee table from college and 2 hand-me-down classroom chairs (spray painted orange) make it budget friendly too.

Our updated routines are now kept front and center between the corkboards. The project I was telling you about was to give our “rustic” table a new look, thanks to Pinterest. I used 2 packages of Kids’ Art Tape to recreate the look.

But be aware, if you let your kiddos decorate their own piece of furniture while you are focused on making straight lines, you’ll end up with very strong adhesive on things you’d rather it not be on.

Once I finish liberally using Goo Be Gone through out the house, I applied 6 very light coats of a matte polyurethane top coat, to protect the new rainbow table

Unfortunately, it is still not totally kid-proof. The tape colors bled after a small spill at a recent tea party. I am not too concerned. It is for crafts and such. At least now I can wipe it down with a damp cloth and rogue crayon scribbles come off with a magic eraser (without the poly coat, the eraser was not so magically).

Before we step inside the closet, the two little hooks with the blue and green containers are where we lay out our clothes at night. Those containers were the sad recipient of my spray painting blunders. Don’t be fooled, they look horrible close up.

On to the girls’ super large closet.

I have never shared what it looked like before I got my paint brush lovin’ hands on it. This is the only picture I have. It was pre-blog era, (i.e. very few pictures taken).

As you can tell, in my updated version I’ve gone labels crazy!

Before we go, can we spend a moment on the maps? I love them. Which probably explains why I chose  the “take notice of me” oversize frames. They are hung low to encourage the occasional geography lesson.

Take a closer look at organizing strategies at work

• How we organize our bookshelf
• Organizing the closet and how we rotate toys
• Organizing Clothes
• How we clean up the room (on most nights)
• Our Treasure Boxes– how we store all the girls trinkets
• Making our DIY Corkboards
• Staying organized
• toy organizing in another room