Well you've all seen the mess that
was the playroom. After relocating all toys, furnishings and random stuff (
headless Barbie dolls), GG and I decided that it was time to
seriously sort through, purge, and reorganize the kid's stuff.
Honestly, I said I would never be
that parent; you know the spoiling kind, but oh, it's so easy to
overspoil you kids. You don't even know you're doing it. Gifts for holidays, special occasions, and random things bought on clearance or at the Dollar Tree throughout the years
REALLY adds up. Then YOU (
actually I), have a huge, overwhelming mess on our hands.
Pictures of our playroom show that everything had a place and a space. It was a functional room for the kids, but it was kind of always an eye sore for me.
Not my favorite room in the house. It desperately needed paint on the walls, ceiling, a new light fixture, and oh that carpet, yeah stains ALL over it.
It's' an old house; what else can I say?
Since the big mess that fell from the heavens (
or the ceiling), we've been granted the money to actually update this space in a big way.
So I did what every other digital woman does... I pinned. I have finally found a color scheme, a vision for organization, and all the little details in between, that I believe will make this room, my
most favorite room in the house. All I need now is a lot of storage options, seating, a place for the TV and DVD player, a new rug, a functional play table and a new home for the kid's play kitchen.
It all started with the inspiration room that I found on
Pinterest designed by
Jen of I Heart Organizing. I'm sure you've seen it as well.
I love everything about this space. The storage/seating area is perfect for small rooms like our 11.5' x 11.5' playroom. We have a great hand-me-down
Pottery Barn Farmhouse table and chairs. I plan to paint the top with chalkboard paint as well, such a clever idea. The colors of this room really speak to me as well, but I wanted to go with softer shades. I've decided on aqua, yellow, grey with pops of dark teal. Before actually choosing room colors, we first picked out our new flooring. We went the cheap route and got North Perry Pine (vinyl wood plank) from Lumber Liquidators. It was marked down to $0.79/sq ft. I used an additional 20% off coupon and got 2520 sq ft (my house is 2506 sq ft) for
$1725 (after discount and taxes). Yeah my husband and I saved a ton by choosing a much more resilient flooring than traditional wood or laminate. AND we got enough of it to cover the ENTIRE house. There will be a lot of weekends of tearing up old carpet, prepping floors, and laying down our new tile, but it will be worth it come next year when all of our flooring is installed.
Our new ceiling fans (
bought 5 of these beauties...) will go in all of the bedrooms (including playroom) and the scrap room. Hunter is a wonderful brand, and these were discounted at
Amazon to
$69.95 each, yes another awesome steal! The grey design bins will go in our new cube storage from Walmart (just like Ikea, just cheaper with great reviews).
This beautiful paint was the inspiration for the walls in the playroom. I went super cheap though and bought a gallon of "oops" paint at Home Depot. It is Glidden and the name is chipped off, so I can't figure the name. It is very similar to the above color, perhaps more aqua with more blue in it. Still VERY close and for only
$9.00 I couldn't pass it up. Also I love the BHG Galvanized bin for taller toys like the Stars Wars light sabers and swords that we have.
Of course no room is complete without a beautiful, cheap lamp ($25), and love decor. I love, love this yellow pillow.
And I have plans to sell off our freshly, professionally cleaned green shag rug and replace it with this yellow gem. The Target toss pillow really inspired me to change my color scheme to include only aqua, dark teal, grey, and yellow, so, stinkin' cute.
In our playroom, which is a bedroom (technically), we will have storage in our closet similar to this. We have shelving almost identical now, but we plan to move the shelves and make space for the play kitchen to have a home. Additionally, we plan to buy one of these
BHG 8-Cube Organizer (like Ikea, but cheaper alternative), to hold books, bins, TV and lamp.
Last but not least, we have a cheap bookshelf that I plan to repurpose as art supply storage with plastic shoe boxes and these wonderful hanging galvanized tins (
I own all this already), just going to pretty it up a bit. I'm thinking a beautiful dark teal on the white bookshelf. It could use some prettying up.
Well that's the plan. Our room will take a different shape, VERY similar to the inspiration room. The cube storage will come from Walmart and fit perfectly in the space. I have it all measured out.
I can't wait to start slapping paint on the walls. Tonight we are going to texture the ceiling. Once that's done, we'll remove the current light fixture and get to town painting that sucker. I LOVE white ceilings. Makes low (
8ft) ceilings like ours seem more open and taller.
On another note, I've been spending a lot of time organizing in my head.... putting toys in their various baskets. I plan to make some pretty little labels to make it easy to keep clean too (
just like the inspiration room).
I mean we will have 16 storage cubes to fill (the other 4 will hold books) - so this is how I plan to organize them:
1. Cars
2. Large Legos/Duplos
3. Blocks
4. Barbie
5. Little people
6. Disney figurines
7. Dora play set
8. Loving family
9. Action figures
10. Dinosaurs
11. Animals
12. Puzzles
13. Foam blocks
14. Wooden toys
15. Educational toys
16.
Under the Farmhouse table will be a large bin that holds train stuff.
The bottom floor of the closet will have the kitchen and our 3 tiered rolling cart next to it. I plan to house kitchen food/plates, baby dolls/accessories, and misc. dress up items (keys, wallets, money, cards, jewelry) in those bins. If there is enough room, I'd like to place hooks on the side to hang dress up clothes.
The second shelf in the closet will hold our Little People playsets, doll houses, and small lego bin.
The third shelf in the room will have stuff animals that we refuse to get rid of - all the Disney stuff pretty much. WE love Disney at our house.
The small bookshelf will be repainted and house markers/pencils, crayons, scissors/glue/paintbrushes, and chalk in little hanging pails. Coloring books, drawing pads and paper will be housed in magazine holders, and clear shoe boxes will hold stamps, paints, craft supplies, and art supplies.
That's all folks. Our playroom pin-spiration. I hope you feel just as inspired to organize and update rooms in your house on a thin budget. I plan to post more pictures of the room in progress as well. Just need to get my camera hooked up to the ipad. Forgot to do that today.
