Roomies

Remember this post, when it was Sunday night and I had just returned from Chicago and JP had just left for Austin and I realized we had a painter coming at 9 a.m. the next morning and I didn't have any paint colors selected? That was fun. I ran home during lunch and spent exactly 30 minutes flipping through his tiny sample book and googling colors to see if someone had a picture of a room in that color on the internet because I am TERRIBLE at visualizing. Terrible. I was pacing in high heels, about to cut a check for too much money from our decimated bank account to paint the biggest room in our house an unknown, unselected color. Not good, so I temporarily punted on the living room and picked out the color for the kids' room instead. I wanted something that would look good with bright pink and navy blue, so (again, since I'm terrible at visualizing) I grabbed a shirt in each color from the kids's closet and pressed the sleeves up against the 1" x 2" paint sample chart. I flagged three colors that looked good and picked the prettiest name: Simply Heaven.

 

I really like it.

 

 

 

 

I re-used both kids' linens and furniture from the Austin house (and luckily, the room was big enough to fit it all!). We have the second matching twin headboard, baseboard, and frame stuffed in the guest room closet for when Claire graduates from her crib. I love that they're going to sleep in the two beds my sister and I slept in in the rooms we shared in Los Angeles and Houston when we were little. I did get Landon some new art- he'd finally outgrown his trucks. The two movie posters are from the harshness etsy shop (he's getting a third for his birthday, which is why they're currently hung off center- it drives me crazy) and the "L" is wrapped in real comic book pages and then mounted (from the spottedflats etsy shop). I absolutely love them. It's hard to find superhero decor that isn't cheesy or cheap looking. Claire's original nursery prints are now over the changing table and she continues to love her butterflies. When she gets her twin bed we're going to do a bright pink comforter and then let her pick out a few sets of fun colorful sheets (I saw some cupcake ones at Target yesterday that were adorable). I like doing the solid comforter/fun interchangeable sheet combos, it's so versatile and inexpensive.

RG left me a comment a few weeks ago asking how it was going with the two kids in the same room. Specifically, she said, "In this new house we're building, our floor plan (while nothing like yours, so far as I can tell) is similar in this way - our kids will be upstairs, sharing a room, while our master suite is downstairs. I am simultaneously excited about finally being able to sleep through a night without hearing my children's every wriggle and snore (they have always shared with us, through necessity) - - - and also FREAKING. OUT. about two things. (1) the stairs - will they wander and fall in the night? (2) naps - on the weekends, do your kids nap simultaneously, or go to bed at the same time? Do they not stay up and giggle and talk forever??"

So, for (1), after living in a small apartment in Chicago, we specifically looked for a house that would put the kids (or kid, then) on a different floor from us when we were sleeping. I wanted SPACE and we loved it while we had it. It was a little annoying for a few months when Claire was old enough to be in her own room, but still getting up for middle of the night feedings (we kicked her out of our room pretty quickly; my insomnia did not appreciate sharing a room with another creature capable of making noise and it freaked JP out to have sex a few feet away from our sweetly sleeping daughter, so upstairs she went- I don't mess around with sleep or my sex life). Climbing up those stairs was never so onerous as at 3 a.m., but it sounds like you're past that anyway. As for the kids coming down- Claire was always in her crib, so it wasn't an issue, and Landon was a confident stair walker by the time he finally left the room in the morning without us going up to get him (he never, ever left his bed in the middle of the night- I just don't think it occurred to him). Friends of mine have solved the problem of wandering kids by putting a baby gate across the kids' door, putting a childproof doorknob thingy on the inside doorknob of the kids' room, and/or putting a solid baby gate at the top of the stairs. We also put glaringly bright nightlights in the hallway between the bedroom and the stairs to help light the way. For what it's worth, having the kids on the same floor now has worked out fine. Our house is pretty sprawling and you have to go down a hallway and through the family room to get to our room, so you can have 3 closed doors between us and them, and there's a closing door on the other end of the hallway that goes to the kitchen as well, so that helps eliminate the feeling that you need to whisper once the kids go to sleep at 7:45 p.m.

For (2), the sleeping together has gone surprisingly well! We've had our moments, when we heard giggles or screams and squeals a good 45 minutes after we thought the kids were asleep, so we had to yell and be mean, but they do always go to sleep eventually... and it's getting much better as the novelty wears off. I love love that they play and talk in the morning and even though they're not supposed to do it, it is very sweet to hear their whispers when they're falling asleep at night. I have such fond memories or whispering with my sister at night, I love that they'll have them too. For naps, they both take them at the same time (like they go to bed at night at the same time), so it hasn't been too big of a deal. Landon doesn't usually fall asleep anymore, but it's still mandatory lights out quiet time and more often then not, he ends up asleep by the end. Our only struggle so far with the room sharing has been reading books at night. We're now reading chapter books with Landon (Magic Treehouse series and, currently, Ralph the Mouse) and Claire just isn't interested. So one of us reads to Landon on his bed and the other reads board books with Claire on the carpet on the floor. We tried splitting up in different rooms at night to read, but they really like having us all together and we prefer it too. Claire was our problem talker- Landon even said one night very late, "Mommy, I think I need my own room for sleeping so Claire will stop talking to me." but she's mostly stopped. I think it was just the excitement of the move combined with her new greatly expanded verbal skills. But he really loves that they share a room in general- it's pretty adorable to hear him yell out, "Bear! To our room!" and see them race off.

 

Pics of the new living room color and decor coming tomorrow(ish)!