We got the house we wanted!

It's almost twice as big as the one we live in now - 2400 sq. ft.!

Now I need to make some decisions. It has four bedrooms upstairs. There is a small study downstairs (basically, a bedroom with no closet.) Downstairs, there is a formal living room right when you walk in, then a formal dining room (carpeted! Ack!) and then the kitchen. There's no way we're eating on carpet in a rental.

There is also a huge loft area at the top of the stairs.

So. Right now, we have a boys room, a girls room, and my room - each room has three occupants. Baby X will be 13 months old when we move, so I'm thinking he can go with his brothers.

The laundry is upstairs, directly across from a bedroom. I am coveting this:
Family Closet

or this:

Family Clothes Storage


We currently have a version of a family closet and I LOVE it. Taking the clothes out of the kid's room was the best thing I ever did. Right now, we have mesh storage cubes - the boy's are in the laundry room, and the girl's clothes are in a hallway next to the bathroom.

I would love to sew, but I don't right now because I have to use the kitchen table for cutting and sewing. The same table we do school on, and eat three meals a day on. You can see why it never happens! One family has a sewing/craft room with a door that closes, and the other half of the room is the family closet.

Or, would we be better served putting two boys in each room and the girls in a room? It seems like such a luxury to use a whole bedroom for a closet - on the other hand, we do need to store seven people's clothes there. (Mama and husband dear get to have their clothes in their own closet, because we know how not to make 300 lbs. of dirty laundry in one day.)

I am planning on using the loft for toys, and the formal dining room as a family room with the television (we only have one TV and I prefer to have it where I can see it from the kitchen in order to keep an eye on things.)

Here's the loft - it's huge!


I'm kicking around the idea of making the formal living room into our school room/Montessori room - even though it is the very first thing you see when you walk in the house. The study would be a library. Swoon. Or should I put school behind closed doors?

Have you ever seen a Montessori prepared environment? Gorgeous!


The catch? I have not seen the house and I don't know how big the rooms are! Husband dear took a look at it and I've seen pictures, but that's it!

What do you think? I'd love to hear what you do, your thoughts, or any links! How better to procrastinate when I'm supposed to be throwing away my beloved babies purging my books and packing?

And... we will probably put the desktop upstairs in the loft area. We also have a laptop. Is there anyway I can install spy software so I can see what the kids are doing upstairs on the laptop downstairs?

Labels: homemaking