Toddler Home Decorating

I know all the parents out there will appreciate this post. It can even be applied to those parents with the four-legged kid variety. Children change your home.

It seems that before children your home always looked a certain way. Usually it didn't look like the aftermath of a tornado scene. I said "usually". That doesn't apply to any of my fellow hoarders out there.

When a sweet little baby comes along, there are the typical home improvement projects that take place. Nursery painting and decorating is a time-honored, but completely useless, rite of passage for new parents. I remember all the plans I had for Bean's room when I was pregnant. I wanted:

• a fiber optic milky way on the ceiling
• top of the line French furniture
• odorless and VOC-free paint for the walls
• emission-free carpeting  
• a built-in sound system that would play the sweetest lullabies known to man

Everything that Martha Stewart and the nature-moms say is best for your baby's space is what I wanted. What did I get? I got some beautiful furniture compliments of my in-laws. (Thank you!) And I got the odorless, VOC-free paint. No milky way. And it was all completed 1 day before I went into the hospital. (Thanks Hubz!)

And how many nights has Bean slept a peaceful slumber in this beautiful oasis of love created by her doting parents? NONE. STILL. Yes, she's 3.  I understand all of my parenting faux-pas here. She still sleeps with us. My back protests this every single morning. We've even moved her toddler bed into our room with no luck. She's offered it up to her Daddy but he's standing his ground.

Then when a baby starts to crawl, the baby-proofing comes into play.  Baby gates keep the drooling wonders safe from harm's way.  So do door locks that keep toxic chemicals out of your precious one's hands but continually break your own fingernails and cause eruptions of quickly hushed profanities.

As your baby becomes a toddler, they begin to express their own inner Vern Yip by putting their designing mark anywhere they can.  This can include...

the walls...

the fridge...

the table and chairs...

 and the back of the couch.

If you are anything like me, you start to forget what your house used to look like and begin to fret about what part of your house will be your child's next victim.  She's been eyeing the top of my bed posts for a couple of days.  She has just realized that the tops come off. Is there a bed post lock out there on the market?