Thursday, March 26, 2009

The girls are now sharing a room!

As I mentioned in my post of our Utah trip, we went to IKEA in search of a bed for Flower. The reason for that is that is because we would be adding River to her bedroom. They would now be sharing. River has been in our room and in our bed. I never thought I'd have a baby in our bed but I love it. I love waking up to her smile and it's so much easier to feed her if she wakes up. It's made easier by the fact that KG is only in bed with me two nights a week. But my goal was that by four months, she would be in a crib and with Flower. This is perfect timing because Flower was showing signs of jealousy that she was in our room. I think it will be better for all of us.
As you can see from the before photos, there wasn't room for a crib in there unless she just didn't have a place to play. We knew that wouldn't fly. Our solution was to get her a bed that was off the ground so her play area would be underneath.
Here are the before photos.
The other reason I wanted to redo her room was because she has too much crap and it's so unorganized. I love the 'under the bed' cubbies but there was really no way to keep them organized. Our solution for that was to buy a big shelving unit with boxes that can be pulled out. We purchased the perfect one at IKEA and photos are below.

The closet is another area of irritation for me. There are just too many small things and she just shoves things in there and closes the door.
Finally, the day after we came home, the building began.
Daddy daughter building time. They were building the new shelving unit for her room.
Flower organized and lined up all the small parts for KG.
She had so much fun helping him.
Wednesday Flower spend the entire day with my sister. River had a doctor appointment and then I had a long work day so this was way more fun for her. That also allowed KG plenty of time to put the bed together. It was almost complete when she got home and she was excited!
I'll admit, when we were purchasing this bed, I was the nervous Nelly(it's usually KG), afraid she was going to fall, or that she would be afraid to use the bed because it was so high, or too afraid to come down the ladder. Well here's the big test...can she make it up the ladder? And what will she think when she gets there?
Halfway there.
Almost there.
She made it to the top and LOVES it!
She goes up and down like a champ. It really is high. I am 5'1" and can stand under the bed with a few inches to spare. She slept up there last night and had no problem.
This morning Flower and I started the massive project of organizing. We started with the closet.
Check out that absurd pile! This is what was shoved under her bed and in the closet. There are clothes, toys, books, dolls, stuffed animals, shoes. Ridiculous.
Our pile is finally gone! Much was donated, much was tossed in the trash, and much was organized in the new red boxes!
After that we took a break and then while she watched Tom and Jerry and while River slept, I went and finished it up. When KG woke up he put the crib together.
My sister is allowing us to use it and dropped it off yesterday when she brought Flower home.
River's new-to-her crib.
Peaking through the bars. She loved being in there. She laid there and babbled for a good long time.
She loves the new mobile that we got, also at IKEA. It's a bunch of fish. Really cute.
KG then helped me move out the trash, finished putting the red boxes together for the shelving unit and organized the rest of the room. We finished around 8:30 tonight!
The room is complete.
We all hung out in the new room to really enjoy it and celebrate our hard work.
This is the shelving unit. I love those boxes! She has kitchen stuff in one, Cinderella castle building stuff in one, shoes in one, purses and bags in one, princess dress up clothes in one, instruments in one. So far it's wonderful. They are harder to get out then the system in the closet we were using before so I will now be able to make sure her room is cleaned from playing with one box before I get another box out. I am of the belief that children will solo play better if things are organized and there are less toys. I'm hoping that theory proves true because she really doesn't play much in her room and rarely alone. Who would want to when it looks like the above photos though?


We got that cute light at IKEA too. It's kind of dark under the bed because the bed somewhat covers the light on the ceiling. This was a perfect solution.



Here she is enjoying her new space with evidence of our celebratory ice cream sandwich all over her lips. :)
Both the girls were asleep so quickly. Flower loved having River in there. I am missing River already. Two of our concerns with this new set up: 1. That River will wake in the night and wake up Flower. 2.That Flower will wake up River in the middle of the night if she wakes up to go to the bathroom or in the morning when she wakes up.
My hope is that we'll all be getting more sleep for two reasons. 1. River won't be waking up knowing I'm next to her and will feed her. 2. Flower won't be waking up in the middle of the night to join us in bed since River gets to be in our bed.
We'll see how it goes!

5 comments:

Callie said...

We put Nevaeh in Aliya's room and it was rough for about a week and a half. When Aliya would go to bed she would wake up Nevaeh. If Nevaeh woke up at night it woke up Aliya so we had two upset kids. When Aliya woke up in the morning it would wake up Nevaeh and of course ME which I HATED! But, it has worked itself out. If Aliya falls out of bed (hopefully Flower never will) and screams Nevaeh now sleeps through it. Aliya is really quiet when she goes to bed and wakes up now that she's aware that it wakes up Navy. And if Navy wakes up, Aliya sleeps through the whole thing. It's great, they love sharing a room and somehow they have gotten used to each other. Good Luck to you! I'm sure it will be great! =) Oh and kudos to you for sticking to your time frame.

A-me said...

we got izzard a loft bed too. We put up some curtains on the front and side so she can have a "fort". She loves it!

The girls room looks so fun and organized! Nice work mom & dad!!

Audie said...

Love their room! The crib is super cute. We are headed to Utah in a few weeks and I totally plan on hitting up Ikea. I need some great ideas for when the girls share a room! Tootles!

Lori Lou said...

I love Ikea...One of my all time favorite stores.

Lynnette said...

LOVE IT!

Let's kick it.

can you dig it?

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