Controlling the Collections

A few months ago we rearranged the girls' bedroom.  It was a good thing because it allowed the furniture that they needed (beds and dressers) to fit more efficiently while still leaving them plenty of space on the floor to play.  What it did NOT do, however, was provide space for their rapidly growing collection of treasures.  What no one tells you when your cute infant daughter first arrives in your home is that she will collect VAST amounts of "things", all of which are labeled "Indispensable and Precious Treasures" and all of which must be kept forever and prominently displayed on every available surface, regardless off how full those surfaces already are.  When you have a second cute infant daughter the problem only gets worse.

These treasures were the source of many mother-daughter disagreements, which lead to discussions like this one: "This acorn from last year is not worth saving."  "YES IT IS!! IT IS MY FAVORITE  ONE AND DADDY GAVE IT TO ME!!" "Could we get rid of the other acorns then?  You can keep just the special one."  "NO, THEY ARE ALL VERY, VERY, VERY SPECIAL!!"  Eventually the acorn problem was worked out to nobody's satisfaction and mother and daughter moved on to the next precious stack of scrap paper.  Repeat discussion.

After too many repetitions of these arguments it became clear that some sort of solution needed to be found in order to protect and display truly special (and fragile) items from being broken and buried under mounds of less desirable junk (the mom's opinion, not the child's).  A trip to IKEA provided the much needed shelving and some tips from Aaron provided the know-how to properly install them.  (Yes, I did it myself.)

The girls were so thrilled to finally have a place to put their pottery pieces that they willingly allowed me to remove several stacks of old papers and even some dead leaves from their bookshelf.  What they weren't willing to give up was moved to some new storage boxes (also from IKEA - I should get some sort of store credit for all this endorsing) that fit under their bed.  I might not agree with the girls' "what to save" policy, but at least i don't have to look at it any more.

On an unhappy note, the little table no longer looks like it does in the pictures.  The collections have begun again and there isn't much table top in sight.  Oh well.