Pictures of the New School Room

My husband and I realized a few months ago that the kids had really outgrown their cool desk we made from Eliza's old drop side crib.  Thank you pinterest.  They loved it but were getting too big to use it.  They were in each other's way, and their legs no longer fit underneath.  In addition there was no room for them to do centers on the floor.  Simultaneously we realized that they no longer used the train table downstairs and that the play room, used to be my dining room, which housed the chinchilla was not working and needed an overhaul.  It finally occurred to us to make the upstairs the play room, and the downstairs the school room.  We moved some of the cabinets from upstairs down and Rich made a desk top across them.  We painted it with a pretty tan colored chalkboard paint and voila, school room with room on the floor, room for a desk for me, and room for their lego table.  Well, there was room for that only after we decided to give the chinchilla to our next door neighbors.  Silly but just taking care of that sweet rodent gave me so much stress and the inability to keep that area clean that I just couldn't do it.  She is well taken care of and we get to visit her often, but I don't have to sweep up poop on a daily basis.  Without further ado, pictures of our much used and enjoyed new school room.

The lego/building table.  The kids play with tinker toys, mega blocks, legos, marble runs, and other building/creating toys here.  There are supplies underneath, and empty bins to house current creations.  We have some books with ideas and lego machine making directions here.  Shown on top is CJ's two new sets from Christmas, the World of Warcraft set that he plays with daily and the Cars huge building set which is in progress.

Next to that we have the bins of building toys, play food, Mr. Potato Head, trains, blocks, puzzles, cars and trucks and other toys.  Then a sling bookshelf full of leveled readers, different from the larger sling bookshelf full of picture books in our living room, and the giant basket of little golden books in the upstairs playroom, and the large shelf of childrens' books in the playroom and each of the kids' rooms.  Needless to say, we LOVE books in our house.  Next to the books is Eliza's dolly carriage.


We have some great posters on the wall.  The human body came in a Magic School Bus Human Body kit that we are working through.  We have a poster on the Water Cycle I stole from a school I worked at somewhere, and a great poster on pollinators from a friend.  We also have artwork from the kids' Home Art Studio lessons DVD showcased on the walls.

 Here is the desk Rich made.  It stretches from one wall to the other under the window.  It has a space for each kid's stool, and the computer tower.  We have a swing out arm for the monitor.  There is more artwork from the classes they took at Florence Griswold Art museum shown, a winter landscape painting and an abstract style sculpture.  Plus an abacus that CJ got for Christmas.

 Over here is my desk, with the radio/cd player/ record player/ computer speaker thing.  I keep my homeschooling binder here with lesson plans, and a notebook where I keep track of what we have done.  I store our science kits and upcoming materials under the desk.  I love finally having a space to work on things while the kids do their independent school work.

 We also have a chalkboard for lessons and playing, and there are writing utensils, chalk, crayons, etc in pretty much every room of the house.  THEY ARE EVERYWHERE!!!  I am getting a little tired of stepping on crayons, but it is hard to complain when Eliza is writing a book as a companion to Harold and the Purple Crayon titled Harold's Best Friend.

We are loving this new set up, it makes it easy for me to be accessible to the kids and productive at the same time.  I can be making lunch and only be a few steps away if they need me, which makes it much easier to fit lessons in whenever we want to.  The organization makes it easier for me to plan and not forget about materials.  Plus it is still a fun play room full of educational opportunities for play.

We often congregate in the evenings when the kids are in their jammies to have them read to us and read our night time books.  We build together in this room.  We build legos, tinker toys, and most importantly we build a love of learning, a sense of togetherness, and special family memories.  What a great place to rest on our homeschooling journey.