Beckett's Play Space

Since moving into our house last August, painting and sprucing up the basement has been on my to-do list. We finally got around to it this summer, and I would consider the project about 95% complete. I haven't quite gotten everything put where I want it, yet, and there are a couple end tables I am working up the nerve to paint.  Our basement is basically one big, open room. While completely open and without any doors, the back part does look like it's own separate space.  Chris has tried to convert it to his "man cave" but my plan all along has been to make it a play area for Beckett. Since converting the space, this little area has quickly become my favorite spot in the house. It's fun & colorful and gets lots of LOVE during the day, and after Beckett goes to bed, I get to go down and put everything in its place -- call me crazy, but I thoroughly enjoy putting everything in its proper bin and organizing all the toys!

Before we started working on the basement, it often looked like this:

The area in back, on the left side, is the new play space. 

Beckett's toys were just lined up along the couch or walls (or more often, scattered everywhere). Until we moved all of his toys to the back, I hadn't realized how much smaller having all the toys out front had really made our basement look.

Since his new play area was going to be out in the open - not a traditional playroom where you can close the door and not have to look at the chaos, I knew I wanted something that looked like it belonged with the rest of the basement decor while also kid-friendly and practical. I also wanted something that would be functional for several years, not just work with toddler toys. I found this idea on Pinterest and knew right way it's what I wanted.

You can read about it here.

Since the shelves pictured above are from IKEA and our nearest IKEA is 8 hours away and I couldn't get the shelves shipped, I had originally thought Chris was going to have to build them for me {he tries to run and hide every time he hears "there's something on Pinterest I want to show you."}. Luckily, a road trip through Chicago coincided with us starting our basement project this summer so the timing was perfect to make a shopping trip to IKEA! Here is the result:

My absolute favorite part of the original idea was the cushion to make a bench, but as you can see we have no cushion. Beckett loves pushing his trains and cars along the bench so much that it seemed it would be a waste to cover it up!

Here are the items I ended up with to create Beckett's play space:

*Kallax Shelving Unit {we bought 3 & they were super easy to assemble}

*Kusiner Box {comes with 3, they can also be attached to one another but I use them separately}

*Drona Box {comes in a few colors}

*Bekvam Spice Rack  {click here for other book display ideas}

*Lillabo Play Mat

*The picture frames for his artwork are also from IKEA. I couldn't find them online. They were a great deal at only .99 a piece!

*Your Way Cube with lid {Thirty-One}

The column in the middle we painted with magnetic paint bought at Home Depot and then painted over with the same color as the walls. The magnetic paint is oil-based so it's smelly and can be messy. The magnets are Melissa & Doug and were found at Target and Kohl's. 

Overall, I would say this was a fairly simple Pinterest project that makes a big statement. It's very functional for keeping things put away as well as creating an inviting place to play!