House A Home

Hey all, we have been working really hard making our new house a home. After lots of pinterest-ing and IKEA-ing to get organization and decorating ideas I settled on  the Dinosaur theme. And then I reconsidered. You can see why, with my inherent female indecisiveness, it has taken a month to finish Aiden's room.

We decided to save the dinosaurs for the bathroom - which is also almost done and I will have cutesy photos soon, and I chose a new theme for Aiden's room. That is "Aiden."

The theme "Aiden" includes the many wonderful facets of his growing personality and intelligence: counting/numbers. I really wanted to find a way to incorporate numbers because he is counting so high these days, and this makes me happy because I have always had my own fascination with numbers. I count things, I make up math problems in my head, I have a weird license plate game that I play in the car which I should probably stop doing because I have been pulled over way too often as a result.

Artwork -- I don't fancy myself an artist, but I do believe in fostering creativity, I believe I am creative, I believe Aiden has received that gene, and though he is not an artistic genius (yet) I want to celebrate and cultivate his artistic endeavors.

Family -- no matter what happens, we have family, he has family, family comes first. I am a strong believer in family, family is my religion. Both the family you are born into and the family you choose. Aiden has not begun to choose his family yet, but I want him to know always that he has the family has was born to.

Thomas the Train and Cars -- these are the kinds of things you tell yourself, "My kid is going to be smarter than that, he won't like such silly things..." but what it has come to is, my child is all boy and the trains and the cars are the piece of him that he didn't inherit from anyone, he just came to love them all on his own. I can only hope someday he will love ballet and James Frey maybe just a tiny bit.

In the corner opposite his bed, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I will try as hard as I can with the Lord as my witness, not to be a controlling parent -- but Aiden WILL love Harry Potter. He also has the house rules hanging on the wall and that tall green thing (IKEA find) for all his stuffed animals - less clutter in the toy box. Center of the photo, is the Thomas the train table that Mommy and Daddy built for him.

Alright, toy box to the right, sparsely full right now, but has all the big toys in it with much simpler access for him. Thomas choo-choos up on the wall there, nightstand with fish bowl (minus the fish) and my favorite feature - his overflowing bookshelf!

Cars themed bed! And on the nightstand is a photo of Mommy, Daddy and Buggey.

Alright - here's the numbers! He loves them, and guess where they came from...

These bins have been super helpful. One box for all his LeapFrog toys, one for all his Dinos, one for cars, one for tools, one for cars, one for McDonalds toys, one for trucks and one for extra choo-choo stuff that doesn't fit on the train table. 

On top of the shelf is a birthday card from Great Grandma Dottie. He doesn't see her much but she is absolutely in love with him and I hope he always knows what a cool lady she is. She has significantly influenced his dad (and his mom) and I think Aiden has a lot to learn from her in a short amount of time.

Above the bed is some of his artwork from last year - as a reminder to keep him creative and show him that he should be proud of all of his own work.

This is a shot from the door way, above the dresser is the picture that was hanging in his nursery. It says, "All because two people fell in love." No matter where he goes or what happens, that is a fact and it is why he is here. People are always saying they just want to make their parents proud - I think this is a reminder that I am trying to make Aiden proud.