Time spent playing with children is never time wasted
We're very fortunate to be able to have a playroom in our house for our kids, but I've recently had to rejig how it's organised because it just wasn't working for anyone anymore.
Our playroom is our conservatory - we found that we weren't making the most of the room so we were able to kill two birds with one stone: we found a purpose for the room and found a way to hide our sons ever-growing collection of toys.
So first, a quick overview of the main features of our playroom. We converted it as a first birthday present for our now 3 year old son. We worked with what we had to store at the time and went for stereotypical kids toy storage - toy chests and a shelving unit with funky canvas baskets. The floor is too hard for a toddler to play on, so we fashioned our own floor out of the foam alphabet and numbers you can get in toy stores. We also have a sofa bed in there (we had it already) for the dual purpose of a surplus bed for guests and somewhere comfy for grown-ups to sit when they're supervising play time.
Fast forward two years and our son's toy collection has inevitably grown, to a point where the storage solutions we had weren't working - there weren't enough shelves and the baskets were too small. Our son has graduated beyond baby toys to bigger things like train sets and play kitchens. We started using Really Useful Boxes to contain everything; they're clear, so we can see everything that's in them, and they're easy to stack.
Sad as it made me to lose the visual impact of our playroom, we bit the bullet last week and decided to ditch the fun shelving for a complete run of Really Useful Boxes to store all the toys in. We decided that functionality was more important than appearance. The shelving unit has been relocated to our son's bedroom so he can have a few more toys up there, so we're still making good use of everything we bought (as Rocky from Paw Patrol would say, "don't lose it, reuse it!" - yes my life is just a series of Paw Patrol quotes now that I have a 3 year old). It's not the prettiest solution in the world but it suits our current organisational needs for that space.
There are a few key benefits that make losing the aesthetic worthwhile:
- It's versatile
The Really Useful Boxes come in a variety of sizes that can all be neatly stacked on top of each other for uniformity, meaning we can always find a box that's the right size for a particular kind of toy but still keep some sort of order to how they're stored. With our daughter now here, our toy collection will only get bigger and more diverse - the playroom system we have now supports this.
2. It's visual
We found that our son was only playing with the toys that he could see, meaning that all the things that were hidden in the baskets were being neglected. Now that everything is visible inside the clear boxes, we're hoping for a better toy rotation. This should be helped by the fact that everything is now put back in the playroom each night (no matter where it's been played with) so he sees all of his toys each time he goes in to get something out to play with. Which brings me nicely on to...
3. It's functional again
We had got to a point where none of us were spending any time in the playroom, and our son's favourite toys were just stacked up in a corner of our living room. The redesign means that all of the toys once again live in the playroom, meaning that we're more likely to spend time playing in there again; we have to go in there to get them out, so we're more likely to just get them out on the floor in there instead. Additionally, I can't stress the importance of having our living room back again. You can't underestimate how important it is for a parent (especially one who's at home all day) to be able to relax in a space that's free of kid clutter at the end of the day. He still has a few toys in the living room, but it no longer feels like Toys'R'Us (showing my age now!) have opened a branch next to our sofa!
So there you have it, I learned an organisational lesson the hard way last month - Insta-worthy spaces mean jack-s**t if they're not serving the purpose they were intended for. Yes we have a slightly less pretty play space now, but we have one that is much more likely to be used as a result of being willing to sacrifice the idea of how a playroom should look. And who knows, maybe form will follow function after all, and we'll find a way to make it prettier again, but right now I don't care as long as my kids can play away the hours in a space that's made for them.
