After a particularly rough night 2 weekends ago, on a Saturday morning no less, I started moving.
It wasn’t even 8 AM, and I was packing things and moving them around. Moving clothing, toys, books, bookshelves, blankets, all the things that go in the kids rooms.
Sara hasn’t had a “room” to call her own up to that point – she had all her clothes in our dresser, she slept in our bed, with me – but it was time. I was ready to start the process of moving her to her own room. Sigh! I was so ready to move her out, but knew that part of me was never going to be fully ready. I just had to do this – I have to be able to teach my girl to sleep. I have to sleep, too. Brains don’t function as well as they could if they don’t get enough sleep, ya know?
We weren’t quite sure what we were going to do for a long time, we loved the idea of keeping our spare room for guests, but how could we get both kids sleeping out of our room? We considered bunk beds and having them in the same room, but eventually came around to the realization that we would be just delaying the inevitable. So, we decided on separate rooms for the kids. Now, which room would be Sara’s and which one Alex’s?
We decided to ask Alex what he thought. We presented the options fairly and without making one seem better and the other worse. It was simply the facts. “Alex, do you want to move your room to the end room or do you want to keep your room where it is?” He was unsure if we would move all of his toys, clothes and particularly unsure if we would move his name. We assured him we would – and he decided all on his own that he wanted to move to the end room.
So, here is what the final rooms have become. I’m loving them. They were fun to create and really think about what each of the kids would like.
Sara’s room has a full bed on the floor. Some might say I’m doing this too early (gasp!). But, it worked out really well with Alex, so might as well do it again! The bed goes one the floor since the baby will fall out of the bed at some point and you don’t want the fall to be too big. But, falling out of bed is a learning process. They do learn to sleep in the bed and not fall out – when was the last time you fell out of bed? (see, it’s a learned skill!) We did this with Alex with a twin bed, but not long after moved to the full size. It’s just so much nicer when you have a sick kid or you want to read books in bed.
I found this amazing small quilt at an antique store on the Oregon Coast. I wasn’t even looking for it – but, once I saw it – I knew it was something that would be the inspiration for Sara’s room. I loved the bright colors and flower like motif. I also purchase some fabric flags from this etsy store –
Jump Up And Down (love
etsy!) They were bright, colorful and cheerful – just right for Sara. We hung up her name, got her some bookshelves, hung her clothes in the closet and bought a new apple green rug with swirls.
She loves bouncing on the bed and climbing up and climbing down. She loves playing with Alex on the bed, and when I ask her to put her head on the pillow, she immediately puts her head down on the bed and looks up at me with the cutest baby eyes saying “Mommy, I put my head down – see”.
We’ve started reading books to her at night and she has her own nightstand with all sorts of choices for books; animal books, flap books with little peeking flaps (I call them Peek books), first word books, baby faces books, going to night-night books, good night gorilla book, all bright and bold colorful books. And she’s started snuggling with a little owl lovie. It’s so soft and I can foresee that she will be snuggling with this for many years to come (Alex snuggled with his dog love “Dog-Dog” for many years).
We have three owl-snuggies, so that should last us.
We didn’t show it here, but we made a growth chart for Sara. She’s two inches (!) taller than Alex was at one year. TWO inches.
I was also inspired by this vintage print and thought it was so beautiful – all the colors were right. So, I matted it and put it in her room.
Alex’s room was inspired by these beautiful fish paintings I got from the Oregon Coast. He loves all things underwater and we decided to carry on the theme from his last room to this one. I had them matted with a beautiful blue mat and they surround his bookshelf with all of his stuffed animals and beloved books. His name is right up on the wall. In fact, the day we asked him which room he wanted to be his, and he chose the end room, he thought he was going to start sleeping there that night! I had to think of something fast – why wasn’t he going to sleep there THAT night? Well, his name wasn’t moved over yet. Once his name was moved, he would sleep in his new room.
He has a queen size mattress that is very nice and we just didn’t want to give up. We came up with the idea that Alex could sleep in the office in his sleeping bag when guests were here. It would be special for him and free up his nice room for them. I just got a comforter cover to better suit him and of course “Marshmallow” the teddy bear is there with him every night.
We moved his growth chart along with all of his clothes, etc. We even hung a second lower closet rod so that he could reach his clothes. Genius! He has been able to dress himself fully for a
long time, but now he can actually reach his clothes and put them on. And we bought him a new rug for his room(thanks
Overstock.com!). Not that either room NEEDED a rug, but it completes the look, shall we say.
They have been sleeping in their own rooms for about 2 weeks now. It has gone MUCH smoother than I would have thought. Probably due to the fact that Sara is just so easy going. Although, she does have her opinions about certain topics, and she’s voicing them more and more, she has been fairly easy to transition into her own bed, her own room. Alex has been pretty easy too, he wants to come and sleep with Mom and Dad, but that is nothing new. He is loving his big boy room!
And we are loving having our room back to just us (well, most of the time!)
Good night everyone – sleep tight!
