playroom ideas

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Hi, we're moving into a new house where the kids will have their own playroom. I'm looking for suggestions for furniture, and general do's and don'ts. My kids are currently 3 and 16 months. Does anyone out there have ideas/suggestions that have worked well in their home?

Thanks.
helen

[Jeanne]

I too have a playroom. My girls are 2.5 and 5 months and I'm still trying to figure out exactly what to do in there. What I've done already is to take all of their 8x10 pictures and hang them up in there. That way we and they get to see themselves as they've grown. I also took fabric from each corner and made a draped X on the ceiling. I glued silk fabric flower petals to it and hung a flower ball in the center. This is a girlie playroom for sure. I painted the walls in a soft neutral yellow and am trying to decide if I want to do a chair rail in cork. That way they could hang their artwork up themselves. We have only an art desk in there and a table and chairs. I was going to put other bigger furniture in there but when we have kids over, they need as much room as they can get. We have a train table in there and occasionally a tent wit tunnel. The room isn't that big so we have the FP doll house and kitchen in our living room. For shelves, all we did was hang one low shelf across the perimeter of one wall and put bins on top for organizing small toys. Now I don't have to worry about furniture tipping. Works well. I would love to hear your ideas as well as any others!

[Toodle]

We're just starting a playroom for our 10 month old boy. We have carpeted the whole room with a good quality nylon loop pile carpet, soft enough for no rug burns. To safely cover an electric baseboard heater, we had a carpenter build a wooden heater cover into the form of a bench. Our son received a handmade, oak rocking horse for Christmas, and that's in there. We cut the ends off a cardboard wardrobe box to make a tunnel, and we will paint it or cover it with colorful paper. For his current age, we'd love to find some large foam blocks and ramps on which he could climb. We don't want to do much furniture or art stuff yet, because he's not ready for that yet and needs the room for motor skills practice. Would love to hear other ideas.

[lmintzer]

Here are some pictures of our playroom. We recently remodeled our basement and half of the main living space is a playroom for Jack (2 3/4) and for Joshua (13 weeks). I didn't do anything as creative as the above posters but it came out cute anyhow. We bought a play/art table from PB Kids in honey color and 3 chairs in red, blue, and green. We also bought a train table and rolling storage carts and a shelving unit for toys. For Hanukkah, we added a cute red and natural kitchen by Small World Kids. We put a colorful rug (inexpensive--from Crate and Barrel outlet) under the play table to catch Play Doh crumbs and other craft spills. The colors coordinate with our family room area which consists of a sectional sofa, 2 ottoman cubes, and a small home theater system. We've yet to really decorate yet, but we were thinking of a map of the U.S. in primary colors. We put up an "art clip board" over the table to display Jack's art projects. It is a piece of a wood painted blue with 3 chip-clip looking things to hold art work. I'd love to come up with a good way to put up more art--maybe something like a clothes line type contraption that I can clip more projects to.

Baby is crying, so I have to run. I'll try to attach pictures later.

Lisa
& Jack, 4/20/01
& Joshua, 11/16/03

[C99]

Lisa,

I'd love to see photos of this if you get the chance!

[lmintzer]

Hi Caroline. I can't figure out how to re-size the pix--I'll try to take some new ones and save them in a smaller format. Should be able to swing that sometime this weekend.

Lisa

[lmintzer]

I'm still having problems with uploads, but I remember I posted pix in in the BBB Lounge a while ago. Here is the link. There are a few pix of the play room side here, though the shelving unit (off to the side) is hard to see.

Still not decorated either. No time with new baby!

http://www.shutterfly.com/os.jsp?i=67b0de21b356696125a2&open=1

[mcades]

We've converted our dining room into a "formal playroom" as my friend calls it! This is really convenient b/c it's right off the kitchen & keeps most of the toys out of the family room. We moved the dining room furniture into the living room, since we were rarely using both of those rooms with 2 kids under 3.

* In the 'new' playroom, we put an old, handmedown cushy velor armchair - not too attractive, but so comfy for the supervising grown-up!
* Also, got 2 bean-bag cubes for big people now, little ones later, on sale at Target for $10 apiece. They're very firm, not a suffocation hazard as far as I can tell (& I'm super safety-conscious).
* At Costco, I found these wire stackable cubes that I arranged as shelving & storage for bigger toys & books. They came in white, black, or primary multi-colored (my preference). Also from Costco we received the 3-tier plastic storage bin unit & their train table for Hanukkah from the grandparents. All priced very well! The train table fits really well into the bay window.
* I used to teach & have a set of ABC letters that I used to have hanging over the chalkboard in my classroom. The letters have cute little pictures that match the letter sounds. I laminated these & hung them up on the wall, above the chair rail. My 2 1/2 year old runs into the room & yells, "Look at all the letters!" and then sings his ABC's.
* For the future, I plan to string a clothesline across the length of one of the walls & pin up his art projects from school & home.

~Michelle