Beta Mum's Blog Beta Mum on 20 Jun 2007 07:34 pm
When is the right time…
… to redecorate?
Is it like having kids?
There’s never a right time, you just have to go with the flow and wait for it to happen.
That way madness, and grey glutinous walls, lie.
What I mean is, at what age will my children become human enough to make it worth spending good money on paint which won’t instantly be defaced by sticky fingers sliding up stairways, and won’t be chipped off by small plastic toys flying off into the oblivion that seems to be an essential part of every game they play.
When we moved into this house the children were aged 1 and 3, and the place was immaculate.
White walls, cream carpets, stainless steel multi-bulb light fittings, and white tiles on the bathroom floor.
Now there are fingerprints and scarification from plastic toys everywhere below waist level, we have to replace a blown bulb every week or so, and the carpets are more grunge grey than silky-cream.
Of course it was easier to keep the place tidy, clean and untouched when we were both working and the children were at nursery three days a week.
But once I left my job to stay at home and “work”, little things like friends coming round to play started to seep into our well-ordered routine. And while two children can make a mess, three or four can create a maelstrom.
A year ago we redecorated Ben’s room. We didn’t mean to, but we bought him a high sleeper bed with a desk underneath for his birthday, and when we removed the old cabin bed we found he’d used the wall beneath it as a test site for a future career in graffiti art.
We removed all the stickers and scribbles, then when we painted that section of wall we had to paint the whole wall, which made the other three walls look faded, so we ended up spending an entire weekend repainting his room, relocating the things he keeps in it, and erecting the new (to us) bed.
Now, just one year later, we may as well not have bothered.
When we moved in I re-painted the walls below the dado rail a more bearable shade of yellow. Now they’re streaked with what could be marmite, jam and finger smears; but which could just as easily be mud, blood and something left over from a prison dirty protest.
I keep thinking they’ll soon be old enough to risk redecorating, but then I watch them scraping their way up the stairs, resting their feet on the walls and lobbing stuff about in an airport baggage-handler kind of a way.
I asked my next door neighbour, whose four daughters range in age from 15 to 23, when he thought I should go for it. And he said,
“Oh, when they’re about twenty.”
on 20 Jun 2007 at 8:29 pm 1.Jen said …
I cheated. Half of it nice/arty/cool. The other half with blank wall, posters in frames (easily replaceable) and sections painted in blackboard paint for scribbling (i.e. DO YOUR HOMEWORK or BE GOOD type messages scrawled at night by *ahem* someone).
on 20 Jun 2007 at 9:07 pm 2.Mutterings & Meanderings said …
I think your neighbour might be right - or wait until they want ‘nice’ things around them, on the walls etc and are embarassed by their scrawls of so long ago …
on 20 Jun 2007 at 9:56 pm 3.Drunk Mummy said …
Oh, Cathy, I am right with you on this one! I can’t stop going on about the despoiling of anything ‘nice’ in our house by the kids. It’s the chipped paintwork which is so galling (and so difficult to remedy when its already been painted over so often!)
I am fed up foaming at the mouth about such topics, while the kids (and husband) look on, bemused. They are all aesthetic hooligans!
on 20 Jun 2007 at 10:02 pm 4.Pig in the kitchen said …
We apparently have matching houses. But ours is a rented house, and the landlord has used very cheap paint which will not wipe clean. I look in horror at the carnage my four children have wreaked in less than a year. We are on a three year contract, there may be just rubble left. At least the contract is between landlord and hubby’s company! nothing to do with me…felt tip on the wall? Hmmm?
Pigx
on 20 Jun 2007 at 11:07 pm 5.lady macleod said …
I remember when I was pregnant with Q and looking at nurseries. There was a room built with the walls set for them to draw on them, it was a four sided white board! I thought it was so cool, but I fell for the lace, pink, and ruffles instead. that stay at home gig is a whoosey isn’t it?
on 21 Jun 2007 at 5:19 am 6.kailani said …
I totally understand! Our carpet was put in before we bought the house and it’s now obvious that it wasn’t pre-treated. It looks like it belongs outside on the patio. I desperately want to replace it but with a 5 year old and a 18 month old, I don’t think that’s going to happen anytime soon. I guess I’ll just have to keep the visitors away. LOL!
Thanks for stopping by!
on 21 Jun 2007 at 8:41 am 7.Lucy Diamond said …
Isn’t ’shabby chic’ in at the moment? I’m nearly there, with the ’shabby’ look. Still working on the ‘chic’ bit…
on 21 Jun 2007 at 9:09 am 8.Stay at home dad said …
I can’t help on this. I wouldn’t redecorate for another decade while my wife thinks a major renovation is just around the corner…
on 21 Jun 2007 at 9:10 am 9.Beta Mum said …
Jen - yes a friend of mine used blackboard paint, but said the room ended up covered in chalk dust. Not sure I want to add to the dust.
M&M - I await that stage impatiently.
DM - yes, Mike doesn’t seem to see the same way I do. And he claims he only needs glasses for long distances.
Piggy - the paint in this house wipes off instead of wiping clean, very irritating. We’ve since used ultra high strength wipe clean paint - just short of the vinyl wallpaper much favoured by people in the sixties. Now I can see why.
Lady - I think the hormones rushing around our bodies after birth have much to answer for in the choices we make for babies’ rooms, and clothes.
Kailani - welcome. Pre-treated? I haven’t heard of that. Sounds like something to do when we eventually get another carpet, or move house.
Lucy - I don’t know what’s in, but if shabby’s part of it then it’s for me.
SAHD - I can see where she’s coming from. You are at home after all, aren’t you?!