Help me design a playroom.

[FloridaLisa]

I have a smallish sunroom (about 10' x 20') that I'm going to redecorate as a playroom. This will primarily be for my youngest two dc, a 3-yo boy and 1-yo girl. So far, I have a junior-sized couch covered in denim ( ), a train table and bookshelves with top shelves of books and the bottom shelves of toys organized in lined baskets.

 

What else would you want for your dream playroom? I don't want any foozball tables or really older kid kinda stuff -- more preschool oriented for my youngers.

 

Pictures welcome! Design away ladies!

 

Lisa

[JFSinIL]

fun patterned rugs with roads and buildings designed on it. Also - we used to have a large wooden truck of painted plywood with a plastic steering wheel large enough for a kid to sit in - the rear of the truck was an open bin perfect for holding stuffed animals or duplos or a kid sister.

 

Maybe a sturdy small type in one corner. And a sturdy toy kitchen with plenty of toy pots and pans and toy food is mandatory!

[iquilt]

We have a wall of white cubbies from Target that hold just about everything, all labeled. The toy bins are all different colors for pizazz (and who has time to match everything?) and the rest hold books. We use our playroom now for school part of the day so the other big piece of furniture is our old kitchen table and chairs, we call it the art table but it's really our multipurpose table. We recently took out the carpet and replaced it with laminate flooring, much easier to keep clean. I had planned a wall for a chalkboard, but now I'm leaning more towards a smaller dry-erase board (cost) that we can use for school. HTH :)

[Jennifer in MI]

Our playroom is a finished basement and I LOVE it! We finished our basement in our last house and it was absolutely perfect. So, we're replicating it in our new (to us) house.

 

All the toys fit in a closet. We are having this built around four shelves that are 24' long!! On these shelves are ALL the toys in bins. We have a TV down there with two comfy couches. We also have a dresser down there with all the costumes. Other than that, it's all open space - nearly 600 sq. ft. We're going to have it carpeted to make it softer (right now it's tiled). We just painted it a cream color so that it would be light and airy.

 

I love that the toys can be hidden and it is just a big open space for the kids to play!

 

Have fun decorating!!

[iquilt]

I would love to have a finished basement, or really a basement of any kind! Not happening in our area so we use a sunroom, too. That sounds like such a fun basement!

[Nestof3]

Our play area is half of our family room. I could not live without the Sterlite/Rubbermaid drawer units. I have larger ones on the bottom with smaller 8.5x11 paper size ones on the top.

 

The large ones are all labeled, like "Lincoln Logs," "road," "dinosaurs."

 

The smaller ones hold arts and crafts things and are labeled "stickers," "crayons" "colored pencils" and so on.

 

There are two Thomas style train tables my husband built which also have one shelf. Clear containers with no lids rest on the shelf and are also labeled. The containers hold Playmobil.

 

Their picture books, audio books and puzzles are on bookshelves in their bedroom, but if I had a regular playroom with extra room, they would be in there.

[LlamaMama]

I would add an accessible boombox for them to listen to music and audio books. Perhaps a play tent would also be nice? They could use it for a quiet place

to read or to put on a show. My relatives got us the one from Land of Nod. I like that it can easily be taken down. We have it put away for now so that my daughters can enjoy it as a new toy once we return it to the room.

[bkpan]

and made one whole wall a chalkboard with chalkboard paint and added a coat of the magnetic paint as well. The kids have the alphabet magnetics to play with and stick art work on the wall as well.:001_smile:

 

Kim in TN (used to be in NV)

[FloridaLisa]

Keep them coming, please! I love the idea of music -- I may mount one of those under-counter things somewhere. A basement would be terrific, but this is coastal Florida so if we dig a couple of feet, we'll have a goldfish pond. :o

 

I'm also thinking a couple of large floor pillows would be nice.

 

Lisa

[Michelle My Bell]

I know I am coming in late, but I wanted to add some things I did for our playroom.

 

 

• Add ART! I find framed prints at garage sales (Renoir, Degas etc...) and hang them in the room. I love the atmosphere it leaves.
  
• Add CENTERS! My art museum has a family center, with little play areas scattered around the room. A kitchen area, a puppet area, a drawing area, a painting area, dolls etc... I made similar areas in my playroom.
  
• ROTATE TOYS! Don't have all your toys accessable. In fact, allow very few to be seen at all. Keep the rest hidden and rotate them about 1x a week. This encourages creativity because they have to play with what is available. It also saves a lot of cleanup and reorganization. It also makes the new toys seem, well NEW!
  
• Keep it light and airy! Make sure to have an area that is easy to see and a fresh space to be in. I have a basement, we painted it white and we have windows that I open as much as possible. We also have good lighting.
  
• BOOKS! Keep a box of books (that you rotate) and a comfy bean bag or foam chair available for quiet reading times.
  
• KEEP It NEAR the Homeschool Room - We have ours near our homeschool room so the younger kids can play while I teach and I can still hear and see them.

Just some ideas for you!

 

Michelle

[battlemaiden]

First, let me just say if 10x20 is small, I want to cry. ;) :lol:

 

Having said that, we had a playroom in our last house and the most useful item was the Ikea cubby unit. I can't remember the name. We bought the individual boxes for each cubby.

 

We had a cubby each for: legos, trains, tinker toys, lincoln logs, kinex (on a higher level), "little guys", little people, etc.

 

It was incredibly helpful in keeping the room relatively neat.

 

Jo

[wide eyes & laughter]

son: my ds always liked those rugs w/streets to drive his cars on. Lots of open space so their imaginations can dictate. Fun, fun!

[Jodi-FL]

thinking you had your addition done! I haven't read all the replies, but when I was a preschool teacher (and had a basement in PA when my oldest were under 3) I set it up in centers: kitchen center, dress up center, block area, reading corner, "Go" corner (cars, trains, trucks, etc.). Don't forget to rotate toys, too, so they don't get bored or overloaded.

 

wish my youngest 2 could come hang out with your youngest 2 (but then the olders would want to come out, and so would I!)

 

J.