My kids still love sleeping on a shelf!

A while back I blogged about the new bunk bed we built from a steel shelf for the kids. You can read all about it here. For a couple of reasons, we still have not moved Jack to the bottom bunk a year and a half later, but it is all ready for him as soon as the cold weather is gone! Also, Jayla did not have her own room very long. It just wasn't practical for us, so they all share a room now (we have only 2 bedrooms). Jonathan has taken over Jayla's bed because he is bigger and weighs more so he needs the bigger mattress. The bed (shelf) itself though is plenty big enough for him, but he loves having more room. He is now on a day bed, a girl's bed, but I don't think he cares. :)

So a slight modification we made was we just took off the bottom shelf and laid the foam mattress directly on the floor. It will be a little safer and easier for Jack, plus it gives the bottom bed a guard rail as well. I also finally sewed up some twin size flat sheets so that they slip over the mattresses like pillow cases. They work WONDERFULLY!!!! The bottom mattress in the picture does not have a sheet on it yet, so you can see how I covered the mattresses with black contractor-strength trash bags. The kids have not complained once about sleeping on plastic! Even though they have sheets and blankets, I assumed I would hear whining after a while about the noise from the plastic or that it is hot, etc. but nothing! They still love their bed a year and a half later, and it allows for much more floor space to get messed up, I mean, to play on! Oh, and they love having those plastic shelves right on their beds for all their personal items. They don't have much in them at the moment, but those things can hold a lot!

And here is the rest of their room. There is no way we could have fit 4 regular beds in here, or even two regular bunk beds!

That's it! (Um, please ignore the carpet stains and unfinished painting on walls!) Not much space, huh? But it is enough. They often play in the living room or the garage that we recently cleaned out and plan to turn into a family room "someday", so they are certainly not confined to this small area! We have a pretty decent-sized yard too. It has been way too cold to even think about going out there the last couple of weeks, but usually they love playing outside.

Anyway, that is their shelf bed that I wanted to show again as well as their clean room. It's not pretty, but it hasn't been this clean in quite a while, so I had to get pictures of it fast! ;)

Fun For Nothin'

I found a blog this morning (by following links on other blogs I am subscribed to) that I just love! I am enjoying the whole blog, but this is the first entry I read from it. Click on the button to go there.

This is just simple ideas of how to have fun with things you already have, like a rope or a box or maybe some pieces of wood! Check it out, and please leave me some comments with your own ideas! I am SOOOO wanting to just ditch all of the toys we have right now and play with "natural" toys that we already have. This makes me think of the book, "Little House on the Prairie" where they use stones and leaves to have a tea party. Fun!

My first award!!!! :)

I was just given the Frugal Gardening Award! Check out Mandie's site by clicking on the image. She has some great gardening tips!

Frugal Gardening Award

I hereby pass this award on to Chrysinda, Laura P. and Sasha! Get those gardens going and post about them, girls! :)

F R E E F O O D ! ! ! ! !

We are sitting in IHOP right now enjoying some free pancakes on National Pancake Day! Go get yours too from 7am to 10pm. They are taking donations for the Children's Miracle Network, so be prepared to donate.....but it is not required. Enjoy! :)

We'll probably be going again later today.

Sharing a blog

I just stumbled upon this blog that I wanted to share with you. This lady is quite offensive in some of her posts......I LOVE IT!!!!! :)

Okay, that probably sounds wrong. LOL! I don't think she is out to offend people and make them mad on purpose, but she is passionate about certain topics and not afraid to say so! Like me, only I wish I was more bold. She has a great sense of humor too.

Now, I haven't looked at her entire site yet, so I can't make a blanket statement that I love her whole site......but the parts I have read so far are great! I love it enough to post it here! :)

Some of the topics that she blogs about are attachment parenting, baby wearing (slings, etc.), breastfeeding, cosleeping, elimination communication, frugality, gentle discipline, baby sign language, UNSCHOOLING......and a few more! It looks like I may have a lot in common with someone else in the world after all! LOL!

Ah, I know there are many more crunchy people out there......somewhere. I just don't know anyone quite as crunchy as me IRL. Well, maybe a couple, but no one that I see on a regular basis, at least.

My kids sleep on a shelf!!!

And they love it! They all woke up smiling this morning and said that they were comfortable all night long and LOVE their new beds. :) They were very easy to put together, except for the one part that was bent.....it looks like it was bent during manufacturing. It still works fine though and doesn't pose any danger to falling or anything, and it is not noticeable unless you know to look for it, so I don't think I'll bother with taking it back. So here's what we did to make them:

I bought a huge shelf from Sam's Club that is 24" deep, 72" high and 77" wide. It has four adjustable shelves, so I used the beams from one shelf as side rails for the top and middle. I bought some foam from Hancock Fabrics that was already pre-cut and wrapped in plastic (so I didn't have to wrap them myself!), and they fit perfectly on each shelf! They were 3" thick, 24" wide and 72" long. I was going to leave extra room and not cover the entire shelf with a foam mattress, but they are a perfect fit, so I think I'll just leave them. So, now my kids have triple bunks! I plan to add a hanging pocket of some kind onto the wall beside each of them so they can have books and other quiet activities to do when needed. I also want to add reading lights for each of them, ones that will shut off automatically. (Any suggestions?)

The plan is that in a year or so, Jack will move to the bottom bunk, Jacob will move to the middle and Jayla will have her own room and her own bed. (We already have a bed for her but nowhere to put it!)

Here they are enjoying their new beds! :)

I caught a picture of them before they woke up this morning. :)

Jonathan moves around a lot, so his sheet is nearly off, Jayla doesn't move at all....her sheet is almost perfect, and Jacob, well, I need to wash another sheet for him, but he was obviously all over the place too and didn't even come close to staying on his sleeping bag! LOL!