I REALLY want to re-do my entrance room to my daycare...

A little background...I do NOT live in my daycare. It is a group home daycare, and it is in a house, which used to be my great grandparents' house, was passed on to my grandmother, and when she retired she passed it to me.

The room is pretty large. We have a small reading corner, a tv area, an adult size dining room table (can be removed if needed, usually just gets JUNK stacked on it), a card table for parents to sign kids in/out each day, a very large front window, and two other windows. I know it's really hard to picture, but I don't have any photos.

My problem is, the entire room is paneling, minus one wall, which is brick. I want to leave the bricks as they are, and either paint or use some kind of something to decorate the paneling. I don't have a ton of money to do this, but I KNOW it is so outdated, and NEEDS to have something done to it. It's not welcoming. It is so plain. The playroom has alternating walls of blue and yellow, if that helps.

Any suggestions??? I really am open to ANYTHING you can come up with.

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Paint the paneling a brighter color. Paint is pretty cheap and makes the world of difference.

I am painting murals in my front playroom. Green on the bottom. Blue on top......then trees, flowers, bears, bunnies etc. I got my murals transfers from Create-a-toon....but you could blow up coloring pages cheaply and copy them on the walls. Or if you're artsy...you could paint freehand! How about the kids handprints all over?

Google images of playrooms. LOTS of fun ideas! Good luck!

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Meeko, THANK YOU!!!!
So I am a dummy...lol I have googled EVERYTHING but playrooms...Just found one pic that had a wall that was covered in patterened scrapbook paper. I have TONS of unused scrapbook paper, and easy access to a paper store too...

Definitely would only do one wall, but what do you think would work to hold the papers on the wall? I was thinking rubber cement, or even tape, but cover the papers with mod podge so they would stick together and be smooth...Does that make sense?? I have a really good wall I am thinking of doing, right behind the couch.

I am also thinking about using my Cricut and cutting out the daycare name, and then buying 4x6 OR 5x7 frames for every kid enrolled and putting each kid's picture in a frame, and fill the wall with those frames. The daycare name will be at the top, and will look like ABC blocks. I can't tell if I am making myself clear. lol I know what I'm talking about, but I don't know if it makes sense to anyone else!!!

I love the paint idea, I just don't know if I have TIME to do it... I think I would probably have to prime the walls first since it's paneling? I guess I could do that one weekend and do the painting another weekend. I would love to paint pictures on the walls so the kids can see what each center is in that room...BUT I am afraid I would get tired of the setup and not be able to change it! haha! I have a projector, so I could use that for stencils and painting.

My cricut could help with labeling areas, and that way if I did decide to change it I could just un-tape them off the wall? I am thinking "aloud" now...HELP.

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I am going to take some pics and show you what I did this weekend.

It was the cheapest I have ever done my DCR to date.

brb gonna take the pics...lol

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Home Depot makes a paint and primer in one! LOVE that stuff!!!

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What color would you do? It's a big room, so two colors may be good...Or just white and use their artwork and posters and stuff to give it color?? I just think the paneling is SO dark and dreary compared to the rest of the house (not downing paneling, just want it brighter since it's the ONLY room that isn't bright, and is the FIRST thing parents see!!!)

I think I will do the scrapbook paper thing, but also want to paint and add to that too. Daycare, can't wait to see your pictures!!!! THANK YOU!!

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Yes a light colored paint, I use a "kids room" paint because its more cleanable. To cheer up my walls, I put a wallpaper border up to: tropical fish here, but I'm in FL. There are 100's of child themed wallpaper borders. A cool thing to do w extra wall space is child art display, plastic "memo holders" I think they are called. I'd ditch the dining room table and go with a train table (your dck's don't eat at it?). So how big is this area?

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not sure if this is what you are lookiong for, but I just thought I would share a cheap way to cover the walls without paint..

So I used buther paper on the walls and we drew a really cute underwater fish reef
i then bought blue table cloth from the collar store and we found some fish there too which we stuck to the walls on teh table cloth after it was put up. We also found a fish net that we put over the fish, kinda hard to see in the pic.

The reading area has a picture of two flamingo birds which will become our bulletin board later.

total cost was $5.00

I love using plastic table cloths to cover the walls. You can tape everything up and tear them all down in seconds....

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No, we have a dining room that has CHILD sized tables and chairs...We use the table in this room for school age kids to do homework, but they fit at the child sized tables just fine...So I am definitely thinking about taking it out. We tried a train table before, and they had NO interest in it other than trying to climb on top of it and jump all over it. NOT good.

My dh has a friend who is VERY good with building things, and has told me he is going to build me another child sized table for that room, but he told me that almost a year ago!! The table is a formica table that was my great grandparents'. I hate to get rid of it since it was theirs, but I don't really like it either. ha!

I am not sure how big the room is...I am NOT good at estimating measurements. Maybe like 30' by 20' or something close to that?? That's not counting the couple of walls that come out. One wall has cubbies and coat hooks on it too, so pretty much unusable except for storing their things.

I have two bulletin boards, plus a parent board. The parent board HAS to stay per licensing, but the other two can be moved/REmoved if needed.

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Daycare, I love your pictures!! We have a roll of butcher paper that was donated YEARS ago...I have wondered what to do with it. I use it occasionally to do art projects with the kids, but have never even thought about covering up my dark walls with it!

I read about someone on here (maybe you?) that used plastic tablecloths for bulletin boards. I bought some to use, and have one of my bulletin boards covered now. the ones I bought aren't easy to tape on and off though. Unfortunately I didn't buy the good ones. ha! I will go see if I can find the tape-able ones in the next couple of days! Thanks

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I can't see the pictures???

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Yeah, this

OP, You could pickle the paneling which is painting on a color or two and wiping it off. Looks nice, kinda a distressed look but brightens up the walls without spending time and effort on detailing. The old panel shows through some and gives an old world look.

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http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_lEili6mwXW...hen...wall.jpg

Try this link... I found this picture last night, and I'm REALLY thinking of doing one or two walls. I don't know that I want THAT many patterns, but I want to do a few colors. Then I made black frames out of construction paper that I am going to laminate. I want to put a picture of each kid in a frame. I am going to hang the frames on top of the scrapbook paper.

I moved furniture around this morning. And of course forgot to take before and after pics. ha! The kids drew on some butcher paper this morning, and I hung it up like a border. They LOVE it.

Thanks for the ideas. Send more as you get them!! I am open to any!!

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Yikes! I would not want a wall like that in my daycare. Way too busy! I have a yellowish cream color on my walls and some posters and shelving. A super busy wall would make me go crazy and I think if the room gets too busy the kids have a hard time settling down.

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Well like I said, I wouldn't do THAT many patterns, and I definitely wouldn't do the entire room. I am thinking of doing solid calming colors, and maybe a few patterns in coordinating colors too. Nothing as crazy as the picture, it's just an idea

I sat the kids down today, and they decided that having a wall full of pictures of themselves would "make the room prettier." Seriously...THEY told me that before I even mentioned my own idea of using pictures of them! They aren't vain at all....ha!

I definitely agree that super busy would make everyone crazy, but I think with the frames on top, and NOT using wild patterns and wild colors would help.

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I think the paper on the wall would be more time consuming than simply using paint. It's a neat idea and if you want to stick to it I would do the bottom 1/3 or bottom 1/2 and then put the frames pictures of the children above that which would be on a neutral paint-color wall. Are you able to take down the paneling? We use to have that in our first house and it just screams "outdated".

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Would anyone be willing to share their pics of them?

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