small play // living room play space

around here, we're creating a play space where chase can best learn, grow, be challenged and have fun.  a couple of weeks ago, we started to create this space for him in our living room (where we spend 90% of our awake time). 

                        

it's a work in progress, but i wanted to check in with a 2 part post.  for this first post, i'll share some pics of the space so far as well as thoughts on my approach.  in a follow up post, hopefully sometime in the next few days i'll share my thoughts on toy rotation (i'm a huge fan already!). 

before

no i won't be sharing any before photos. that would just be too scary. just imagine a pile of toys in the corner of our living room, right next to that fireplace. definitely not conducive to learning and developing.  kids, just like adults, can get overwhelmed with chaos.  we definitely don't want anything distracting chase from learning and growing so we quickly got rid of the madness! - in his space anyway ;)  

the living room

we chose our living room because we spend most of our time here. chase is still too little for me to want his play space in a separate room.  our kitchen, eating nook and small office is near our living room.  we talk here and spend a lot of family time here. i didn't want to fight the natural flow of our daily activity so it felt right to carve out an area for him here.  

in the picture above, i was taking the picture from where our small office sits.  our 'normal' living room space now sits to the right of what you see above.  if i panned out, you would see our tv on the right. so his place space sits right in the corner of our living room.

shelving

                       

we opted for open shelving. @ his age, it's really best that he sees his toy options.  he forgets what he has when they're not visible. we chose the expedit shelf from ikea.  i like that the sections allow me to compartmentalize his toys easily.  every toy has a designated home. i think they also help prevent the open shelving approach from looking too messy. 

sometimes he plays with these toys right on the shelves within the cubby that they're stored.  i'm reminding him that he can take them off the shelf and onto another play surface. 

right now, the top shelves on the expedit house some of his regular sized toys and the lower ones hold books and smaller toys. the baskets also came from ikea.  i opted for short (versus tall) baskets - again, the idea being that they allow him to see his toys easily.

                        

we also picked up the mosjo tv stand from ikea. it's job is to give chase a surface to play on as well as provide some add'l storage. right now it sits against the wall. eventually, we'll be putting it on wheels so that we can move it to wherever he might want to play. i'm thinking this will come in handy in the kitchen for days he doesn't want to leave my side when i'm cooking or doing dishes.  

the rest of the play space & what's left to do

                        

so let's call this phase 1. chase has a functional play space. it's organized. it's definitely not overwhelming. he can see all of his toy options. he has fun. every morning before heading out and every late afternoon, when we come home - he enters his little area, spends a minute to look around, carefully considers what he wants to do and then plays away! it's priceless. he used to roam the living room playing with random things, things we didn't necessarily want him to play with. he still does a little bit of that, but not as much. he's plenty occupied by his own stuff. 

aside from putting that tv stand on wheels, we are also planning to:

• assemble the activity table we got (i'll be sure to post when we get to it). this will go where the tv stand is
• create an inspiration wall that will sit above his activity table
• install open book shelves underneath the window
• look for comfee seating for reading (right now we use his old tummy time mat - see pic above - kinda like circle time @ schools

toy rotation

i'll be back soon with my thoughts on toy rotation. we've been at it for a couple of weeks now and i'm loving it. i really feel like chase is thriving within that system. i can't wait to share what i've learned and my plan of attack so far.