Rooms Upset: Phase One

Inge showing off all our work

Our house is getting a face-lift.  Mostly our room arrangement is being redone.  And with that, comes new paint and hopefully clean carpets for those areas.  Ideally we'll also end up with a better organized home and an easier time keeping it up, which will further (again, ideally) lead to more contented children.

I didn't take any before photos.  It's just way ... too .... well, choose your ending.
❑ frightening
❑ embarrassing
❑ shameful
❑ other (please specify)  ___________________________________

But let your imagination run wild.  We're coming off 17 years of the constant pregnancy and lactation cycle.  Ten years of homeschooling full time.  During those times we had several infusions of additional household goods and miscellany, due to cleaning out the homes of several family members.

All of the above description was followed by over two years of a somewhat severe depressive episode during which theMom did little but sit.  Or sleep.  Or play spider solitaire.

Intermixed and intermingled with all of that is a family of ten children.  Ten busy and creative and perhaps destructive children.  (And how is it that creative and destructive so often go hand in hand?)

Picture months of grit and grime.  Months of disorder and chaos.  When I moved the beds, there was a twelve inch "decorative" border of dirty footprints, handprints, and saliva dripmarks.  When the Mr. Clean Magic Sponge doesn't touch the grime, ... well, ... that's just plain gross.

Other areas had fancy detailing of fingernail paint, crayon, pencil, super glued paper projects, and mounting tape, among other things.  There were a few areas of handy tack and/or booger sculptures and in still other areas, images carved into various surfaces in relief. 

Did I say chaos?  Empty bins.  Bins filled with the wrong things.  Some bins and boxes filled with everything and anything.  Colorful origami projects.  And colorful origami scraps.  School papers carefully saved from last year and now scattered about, as I predicted they would be.

Beads from making and taking apart jewelry.  Beads from disemboweling beanie babies.

Barbie hair.  Stuffed animal hair.  My little pony hair.  Little girl hair.

Chewing gum containers.  Ring pop rings.  Straws.  Tootsie pop wrappers.

Lip gloss.  Fingernail polish.  Hair bands.  Plastic shape bracelets.

OK, I'm done now.  I'm sure there was more, but I got most of it off my chest.

We have three two bedrooms that are to change occupants, and a bedroom to turn into a family room.  And a family room to change into a bedroom.  And much other cleaning and sorting and organizing.  And of course, normal life and meals and laundry and etc.

Here's stage one. 

The little three littlest girls are currently sleeping on a mattress on the floor of Elsie's room.  Their dressers line our hallways until we get the room currently serving as Sophie and Clara's bedroom ready for them.  Their former room has been mostly cleaned up to make our new family room.

I still have to wash the window, find some sort of curtains at the local second hand stores, create some arm covers for the well-used couch out of the curtains I took off the windows, sand some ... some, ... something from the back of the door, paint the closet, reinstall closet doors, and finish organizing storage space.

But!

I think it looks wonderful already.  I'm so very excited.  No more TV in the living room.  No more sweaty bodies on my nicer furniture and no more dirty feet on my new living room carpeting.  Newly painted walls.  All those things I have yet to do, ... they can wait until deep winter.

One room prettied up.  Aaaaaaahhhhhhh.  That's a sigh of contentment.

Next it's on to moving Elsie's things into Louisa's room and making that room into Sophie and Stella's.

~ ~ ~ ~
This little addendum is just my geekiness feeling pleased with how nice these toy bins look up high.  Not just that they are out of reach, although that's a bonus.  But I like that they're all lined up so nicely.  I like the names on the boxes.  A little snippet of life.  A little morsel of what boys and girls in the two thousand teens play with:  Little People, Cars, Princesses and Ponies, Beanie Babies, Barbies, Dress-up.