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I’ve been doing chore lists with my kids for about 3 years now. I really liked the Chore Stick method for when they were younger and they needed my help with most things (like maybe even reading the chore stick when they were really little!). Lists are just so good for older kids who can read and are transitioning to be self-sufficient, but still need lots of reminders.

I laugh a little reading some of their chores, like “Wash your hands after school.” Wow, I am such a mean mom! And it is just one of the mysteries of the universe why some days they take over an hour to complete chores, but if chores stand in their way of something they want to do like play with friends … they can have them done in 15 minutes. Hmmm. I wonder if it has anything to do with the books I sometimes see them carrying around with them while they do their chores?? At least now I only have one phrase I have to repeat: “Keep working on your list” instead of the ten-thousand phrases I was having to repeat before the lists: “wash your hands”, “hang up your backpacks”, “put your shoes away” PLEASE.

Today I want to show you how I just re-did the area where the chore lists are hung up. I wanted to brighten up a corner that doesn’t get any direct sunlight – tough task!

Recently I shared my kids chore list printable, you can see that HERE.

Before

This is what it looked like BEFORE –

And in my recent Mud Area Tour (see this whole area HERE), I showed you a candid picture of my daughter checking something off her list while I was taking pictures. I’m always tweaking areas in my house and moving things around a little bit, so you can see how in a few years, this corner looks just a little different.

But now it looks really different!!

The New Kids Command Center

I’m really happy with how it turned out, though I may have switched around some of the paint colors in hindsight. Oh well, there are too many other valuable things to do with my time than obsess over this. But don’t be surprised if I show this in a few years and it is all different colors. Ha!

The biggest compliment I received was from my daughter Allison who looked at the corner with a big smile and said “it looks so cheerful, Mom, it’s so much brighter than before!” Bingo! Cheerful is my decorating-style goal in my kid spaces, so I guess I nailed it.

I had so much fun painting and putting all of this together. My inspiration was the wreath: I knew I wanted to use it and I loved the colors. You can see from this picture what a difference the natural light from the living room makes from the non-natural light in that corner!

Here are the boards! Right this moment they only had chore lists on them. I actually took off the personally identifying things that were on here for my kids – their sports schedules, birthday party invites (with phone numbers), etc.

This top section is just meant to be inspiring and pretty. I ordered the printables off of Etsy – so easy to find 4 that I liked that fit the mood of summer coming. The yellow boards were their old chore list boards, but I painted them yellow!

I used my vinyl cutter to do the letters on the sign and the names on the boards. Those are magnetic boards and the clips are magnets. I bought the magnetic boards pre-cut and painted the frame.

These are the school year chore lists. New lists will be coming for the summer – I’m excited for things like water the garden to be on the list, and hang swim towel instead of hang backpack!

My 3 year old doesn’t have chores yet, I am still training him on cleaning up after himself and being my helper. I displayed some of his preschool art. Today is his last day of preschool. He didn’t know what that meant, but he got to wear his Star Wars pajamas to school and told me that “Today is Awesome Day!”

The shelf will hold shoes, socks, hair stuff (there is a mirror on the wall adjacent), seasonal items like sunglasses/sunscreen in the summer and gloves in the winter, and then an Outbox. The Outbox has diapers right now, but they are definitely on the way out of our house right now – woohoo!! When those are gone, I will use that to put library books or things that need to be returned to a friend or the store.

That’s a little stencil design on top of the shelf. I knew I would mostly want to keep it empty instead of decorated, so I gave it a little character.

This corner connects close to the laundry room, garage door, mud area, a bathroom and the hallway to my bedroom. It sees a lot of action! I’m so excited for a little bright cheerful thing in this corner every time someone walks by.

I bought this shelf second-hand and chalk-painted it. I added the bins with tags. Sports bags will replace where the kids shoes have been. Kids grow and organizing needs change. Tweak, tweak, tweak!! You’ve heard it before, but the only constant in life is change! If we are flexible and willing to go with the flow, we will be alright.

These colors are a brighter version of the colors I have throughout my main areas, but since it is in such a dark corner and it is for my kids to use, I wanted it brighter than the others.

You Belong Here! I believe in sending constant subliminal messages into the minds of my children to help them feel good and comfortable in their world. Life is hard. Being a kid and being a tween is hard. I want them to feel love and peace at home. I want home to be a sanctuary from a crazy world that doesn’t make sense. I want them to always know that they belong here.

I love distressed finishes.

This stencil turned out okay, but looked way better after I distressed it!

I am positive a mom is the one who decided that Shabby Chic was an acceptable trend. Bless her heart! It is either me or my kids who will add the first scratches, and I’d rather do it first in an artistic way so that their scratches just blend in.

I love how these tags turned out! I painted cheap gift tags from the dollar spot and then added a black label and did a really cool iCraft Deco Foil finish on them. I learned about deco foil when I was at a conference recently and saw a demo – I knew I wanted to come home and try it on something. I am in love with it now and already have plans to use it more places. I definitely made some first time user mistakes, so I will do a post and share more about it … so you can avoid those same blunders!

Even though my little “oops” stick out like a sore thumb to me, I still put up the tags and my kids think I am amazing. (They are still in the sweet age of being my #1 fans. I pray that never changes, and please don’t tell me it will … I can hope, right?!)

Does perfection ever stop you from just getting something done? Trust me – I’ve figured out we are so much harder on ourselves than most people are on us, so to move forward, sometimes, we just have to get over the little things!

I won’t lie, I love my new Kids Command Center.

Kids Need Command Centers Too!

Kids need a command center too, just like adults do! A place to keep important papers they need to see, keep their to do list and calendar items … even a place to do their hair in the morning. This has it all! And right next to this is where they hang their coats and backpacks. I really think this corner is going to be so much more functional for my family. I’m excited to see my little people make use of it!

From my home to yours,
Mary