When I was on maternity leave with my second child I toyed with the idea of opening up an in-home daycare in order to spend time with my kids and not deal with the stress of daycare and work. I even took a certification course with MotherCraft. I decided the daycare route wasn’t for me, but I did learn a few things from taking the course, such as setting up a space for multi-age children.
We’re fortunate enough to have space to set-up a playroom (it actually shares space with our family room). Containing the kids toys in buckets (storage unit from Ikea) my kids know where everything belongs. They can find the things they want on their own and they now where they go when they’re done playing with them. Of course that doesn’t always guarantee they’ll put things away. The table in the middle of the play room can be used for trains (it is a Thomas table) but sometimes the kids do puzzles or Lego on it too. And it’s big enough that my three kids can each have their own space with a stool for play.
Kids have their own space at the table
Storing the toys in buckets (i.e., one bucket for animals, one bucket for blocks, etc.) also makes it easy for play elsewhere in the house or outside. I only need to grab the one contained bucket of animals and take it out to the sandbox.
Drawers make taking toys outside easy
We also use low bookshelves (also from Ikea) to store individual toys, like the play houses and castle pieces, things too big for boxes. The kids can reach everything on their own. The room has overall lighting, but we installed some wall lights and a corner light with easy to handle rocker switches that the kids can turn on if they need extra light when playing.
All toys are accessible to the kids
Lastly, but certainly not least, we created a little reading corner. The little bookshelf contains all their books so they can get at them on their own. We tossed a bunch of pillows on the floor for seating. This room is on the third floor and only has one window so we made sure the reading area went right there. During the day the light is amazing to read by and we have a light on the bookshelf the kids can turn on if the outside light isn’t enough. This area is completely seperate from the play space so who ever wants to read can do so in peace (and it gets used a lot).
A comfortable reading corner
The kids love this space and so do I. And since we’ve organized it, I find it actually stays tidier and the kids are more self-reliant on their own play.
How do you incorporate kids space in your house?
Tags: getting kids to help, kids reading, organizing a playroom, raising kids, those darn kids
