In the struggle for work-life balance, there are those things that have to get done every day, week or month, and then there are the larger projects that really need to get done, but are unpalatable for a variety of reasons. Home decorating tasks fall into this category for me- first, home décor is low on my priority list (I cannot fathom ever working with a “designer” or deliberately “redoing” rooms in my house without a bona fide need), and second, I’m no Martha Stewart and I’m certainly not one of those DIY home decorators. Unfortunately, once in a while even the decorating-impaired like me have to spiff up the house to meet, in this case, a bona fide need: My kids, now 7 and 11, are living in rooms last redecorated when they were babies. It was time to take down the pictures of trucks, trains, and planes, all done in primary colors and get rid of the alphabet block carpet. It was time to take down the smiling pastel jungle animal wall hangings and the pink and yellow comforter and bedding. I agreed with my maturing brood that the time had come to create “big kid” rooms, but such things are not my forte, and more importantly, right now, putting a bunch of money into home decorating was not on the agenda. It was time to get creative.
Two months later, both rooms are done and everybody’s happy, we did not break the bank, I did not have to learn to paint murals, and we’ve created 2 big kid rooms that we’ll be able to update over the next several years with minimal cost. Here’s how we did it. Key in this process was creating a blend of affordable and lasting choices for Mom and letting the kids have as much say over their rooms as possible.
1. Choice of “Room Theme”: To accomplish the goal of creating a “me” space for each kid, I let my son and daughter pick the theme they wanted for their rooms. My son wanted an Asian-Themed room, and my daughter wanted Pink and Black Zebra/Cheetah. Sigh. My commitment to them to help them make these themes real substantially improved labor relations when they were tasked with thinning out clothes and toys and helping with projects.

2. The Furniture Issue: The only things we kept in each room were the beds, which were a trundle and bunks purchased a few years ago when they exited their cribs. Both kids needed more storage space for clothes and treasures, but I was reticent to buy “kid furniture” as we’d need to replace it in a few years again, which I wanted to avoid. Instead, we opted for adult furniture (modestly priced) for both kids, black for my son and pine for my daughter. For each kid we ended up with a dresser, a chest, and 2 nightstands. The stuff we bought is substantial enough that they could absolutely take it with them when they move out, but not so expensive that getting the finish marred will be a stress. The adult size creates lots more room.

3. Decorating Issues:
Son: “I want my room re-painted to look like the earth fading up into the sky and I want a mural of a Japanese village painted on the wall.”
Uh, no. So what did we come up with? Well, the room was already painted pale blue (sounds like sky to me), so when we agreed that neither of us was a good enough artist to do the mural as he wanted it and agreed that hiring a professional would be great but was out of our budget, I asked him to rethink what it was he was really after for the feeling of his room. He came back with the suggestion of putting bamboo around the room so it felt like a bamboo forest. We compromised by deciding to create a feeling of a bamboo fence around the room by adding bamboo matting (purchased in a 4-foot roll and put up with a staple gun) to the walls. The blue paint looks like the sky above the fence line.
Daughter: “I want pink and black zebra-painted furniture and pink and black zebras painted on the walls.”
Uh, no. We compromised with inexpensive pink and black zebra bedding and window treatments and artwork of pink and black zebras and other jungle animals.
For each kid, we chose inexpensive art and a couple of accessories in keeping with each theme. The kids and I did this together on the internet, and we only ended up spending a couple of hundred bucks total. We also bought a themed “accessory” for each kid. For my son, it was a garden pagoda ($20) and for my daughter it was a zebra-print jewelry box ($15). I also, on the sly, bought a “cool” item for each kid. For my son’s room, it was a mirror for over his dresser shaped like the sun and for my daughter’s room, it was a cool bedside table lamp. Division of Labor: Clearly, neither kid is yet old enough to do all the work for this themselves, so much of the work was done by yours truly. They are, however, old enough to understand that getting your room redone is a privilege and a lot of work for someone, so they were both engaged to help throughout the process. First, no progress on either room occurred without each kid going through all their toys and stuffed animals and reducing the volume of each substantially by giving things in good condition charitable organizations in town. This was a painful process, but was given a time limit of 1 week in each case, with the agreement that the end of that week, Mom would come in and do a final reduction. Both agreed, did a good job of culling their stuff and saving a limited amount of stuff for the “keep” pile, and at the end of the week, I was able to go in and get rid of even more stuff with no argument. They also were charged with helping with the cleaning of grubby baseboards, jumbled closets, and generally stepping up to help when asked as the rooms came together. They were responsive and grateful, and it made the jobs so much easier.

The End Game: Both kids have more grown-up rooms they really like, and we spent a weekend on each room and under $1800 for each room, including all the new furniture. For relatively little money, we used bedding, window treatments, art, and accessories to create the themes they wanted. The good news here is that I know the themes will need to change in the coming years, and we can re-use the furniture and simply replace the accessories. Each kid participated heavily in the process of clean-out and clean up, and were part of the discussions of affordability and compromise for what they wanted and what was really possible. All-in-all, Martha can eat her heart out; we’ve accomplished our mission for now, and when it’s time to kiss the pagoda and the zebras goodbye, we’ll revamp again for a pretty small pricetag relative to the payoffs.