Kids are always growing.
And changing.
And sometimes it’s hard to keep up. Especially for a Slob Mama who gets overly discouraged about failed organizational methods anyway.
But if I’ve learned anything through this deslobification journey, it’s that I must keep trying. Again and again.
And again.
A few weeks ago, a few days after a visit from Grammy (when she was a welcome roomie for my 6yo), my daughter slept on the pulled-out trundle. Y’know, that we’d never put back under her bed.
She told me the next morning at breakfast that she’d made her bed.
As this isn’t the norm for her, I asked what brought on this sudden burst of neatness. She explained that since there were no stuffed animals on that bed, it was easy to make.
Hmmmm. Easy to make.
As in, her bed is difficult to make. And she was right. It has been the spot for all of her stuffed animals. Her many stuffed animals.
Which makes it virtually impossible for her to easily make it by herself.
I don’t have a before picture of the bed. The reality is that even though the stuffed animals go on the bed, they don’t really stay there. They end up scattered all over the room. It really was a no-win situation.
Too many stuffed animals + a too small space to store them + a need to sleep in that space every night = one more reason why the room continually stays messy.
In a sudden flash of inspiration . . . I noticed that the top of her cute-as-can-be china-cabinetish-thing was void of stuff. I could go back and look up the post where we put it in there to find out what I originally intended to go on those shelves, but that didn’t really matter.
The top two shelves are hard to reach, so they’re perfect for stuffed animals that don’t get played with often, but are still loved and wanted. The bottom shelf is for Mostest Favoritests.
Yay for a real spot for her stuffed animals! Yay for easier bed making!
And if this doesn’t work, I’ll just try something else!
(Pretty please let this work!)
I’m crossing my fingers but just in case…..I saw a bookshelf that might work for this. It was a rain gutter. They used it to stand the books so the kids could see them but the placement is important here…
They were nailed along the wall just about the long side of the bed!
That would be a great place for stuffed animals.
tutorial
I’ve seen that! Yes, I think it would work.
Hey Nony, nony, hey! I’ll cross my fingers for you, too. That looks like a good solution tough–solves two problems in one, hooray!
I had to do a reevaluation of my boys room recently too. We angled the bed so it was not jammed up against the wall on one side. Now with both sides accessible, the bed is easier to make {and does get made more frequently!}.
I’ll bet your daughter loves having her stuffed animals in a place of honor so she can look at them when not playing with them!
True! Half of a stuffed animal’s value is cuteness, so looking at them all lined up is fun!
This is a seasonal one – but could be adapted. When my boys were in grade school, I made them Christmas quilts – went on the beds right after Thanksgiving and stayed till New Year’s – they voluntarily made their beds every day for a month – till about jr. high age, anyway! So a special blanket or bedspread they picked themselves (or something special made by Mom or Grandma) might give some extra incentive.
I just repurposed something yesterday for my daughter’s growing menagerie. The dress-up clothes were pared down a month ago, so I moved them into an odd (and not often used for its intended purpose) laundry basket. It stays in the closet, so it doesn’t really matter what it looks like. The cute, lavender, stackable bins that used to hold dress-up things are now corraling all of the stuffies. And the too-small, now-unused basket that the animals used to live in? Garage sale!
One solution I found years ago. A netting placed in a corner (at the ceiling), and tied to each side of the wall. Animals off the ground, and a lot more walking area..