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Daycare Center and Family Home Forum>Ideas For "hiding" Childcare Stuff/Reclaiming My Home
April7 06:54 AM 10-08-2015
I'm not ashamed of my program and I feel blessed to have had a playroom for my childcare for so long; I know many people wish they had a space outside of their living space.

I live in a split level. The lowest level has a playroom and bathroom and my entry where families come in. The mid level is the living room and kitchen. The upper level has the bedrooms.

Having a beautiful playroom has been great for business but now that my son is 12, it is less and less of a fit for my family (it has been for a long time now, actually.)

Our living room and bedrooms are tiny. The play area is about 1/3 of our small house.

So, I am looking for ways to reclaim the playroom to be more multifunctional without it being a total turn off for business. I want my tween son and his buddies to be able to hang out in there without feeling that its a "baby space."

I have come up with many do-able ideas. What I am wondering now is how to put up chidren's abc/1-2-3 type displays that can be hidden, replaced, flipped over or something when they aren't here.

Ideas?
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daycare 07:03 AM 10-08-2015
Do you have a garage ? We converted our garage into a game room for my teens. They live it
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April7 07:08 AM 10-08-2015
No, the only space we have is what I have described. Would love a garage...no room to build one.
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Snowmom 07:22 AM 10-08-2015
I love hiding my childcare space when I want to as well.
Last year, I redid the playroom. We bought a couch from Costco that has a trundle bed (got rid of my cots) and it also lifts up on one side and I put all of the blankets and pillows in that space.
The toys are all in a nice dark stained maple treasure chest- which closes on the weekends.
The other toys that don't fit there are all placed in a net bag (like those lego bags you lay flat on the floor, then scoop up and tie) and all put in the LL Bedroom (which closes up on the weekends).
The books all go in fabric bins on a book shelf every day.
I have a huge fluffy rug down there (Target) that is NOT in a child print (just cream & brown).
It still looks kid-friendly. I have a big wall mural with my business name, which is actually a wall sticker I had made.
The only thing I don't have good solutions for is the kid's lunch table.
I have a big solid maple 6 seater in my kitchen. It fits nicely, but obviously doesn't fold up or go anywhere but where it is.
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Heidi 09:20 AM 10-08-2015
In my last house, I got an armoire and made that into the changing station. No more diaper table out in the open.
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Play Care 09:23 AM 10-08-2015
Originally Posted by Heidi:
In my last house, I got an armoire and made that into the changing station. No more diaper table out in the open.
I'm going to steal this!
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nothingwithoutjoy 09:26 AM 10-08-2015
I don't have any "teacher-y" displays in my home. No alphabet charts or anything of the sort. (Partly because it's my home, and partly because my philosophy of teaching includes creating beautiful spaces from "real" stuff.) However, the kids are surrounded by the alphabet and numbers and all that stuff: books, magnet letters, beautiful wooden letters and numbers, rulers, scale, etc, etc, etc. Home doesn't have to replicate school in order to be an excellent learning environment.
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Heidi 11:51 AM 10-08-2015
Originally Posted by nothingwithoutjoy:
I don't have any "teacher-y" displays in my home. No alphabet charts or anything of the sort. (Partly because it's my home, and partly because my philosophy of teaching includes creating beautiful spaces from "real" stuff.) However, the kids are surrounded by the alphabet and numbers and all that stuff: books, magnet letters, beautiful wooden letters and numbers, rulers, scale, etc, etc, etc. Home doesn't have to replicate school in order to be an excellent learning environment.
If you can get on the decor website, look at NWOJ's pics (way in the first pages). Lovely!
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AnythingsPossible 12:36 PM 10-16-2015
I have a house like yours, but we do have a large living room. Our lower level family room is pretty much exclusively used for daycare though my 14 year old occasionally goes down there to watch tv. We essentially don't use the room and my husband and I have been talking recently about how we could reclaim it and use it for us as well.
In regards to wall display, the one thing I have done with our calendar area is to put it on a science fair board and it slides under the couch when not being used for daycare. I imagine you could do this same idea for alphabet, numbers, shapes and such.
Daycare "stuff" has been my biggest frustration as my kids have gotten older!
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Meeko 01:47 PM 10-16-2015
My daycare is in my basement, which is H shaped. One side is ALL kids...a big playroom set up just for them and not used by my family.

The other side, and also the entrance to the daycare is our family room. We use the room for daycare all day too, but I want it to look as UN-daycare-ish as possible during private hours.

So we decorated with that in mind.

The coffee table in front of the couches is used for puzzles, lego etc. It is very large and heavy and has two huge drawers in it, where I can hide a ton of stuff.

The file cabinet off to the left of the picture holds my activity files. I didn't want regular office type filing cabinets.

The cubbies under the window hold the kids blankets, change of clothing etc. They hide everything. There is also a bench over there behind the couch where they can take shoes on and off and keep their shoes in bins under the bench. The bookcases on the right side of the picture, are our sign in and out area. I do have a bulletin board there, but deliberately chose wood ones that are not too "office-y"

The couches have legs and there are games and puzzles and boxes stored under them.

Between the couches is a wicker ottoman which also holds storage.

We don't buy anything for that room unless it works as storage too and doesn't look too daycare-ish.
Attached: DSC_0173.jpg (97.6 KB) 
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Unregistered 02:30 PM 10-19-2015
My book box closes and looks like a wooden chest.
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Tags:design, hide, reclaim, space
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