Decorating Guides
5 Must-Know Decorating Tips for People With Young Kids
Let’s face it: Kids can wreak havoc in the house. Take this advice to save yourself the headaches until they are grown
If you’re looking for kid-friendly ideas when decorating your home, try doing a little thought experiment. Imagine that a very upset Hulk just got his hands on the piece of decor you’re considering. How does it hold up? If the loss of that item would deeply affect your emotional well-being and your pocketbook, maybe consider something a little less sentimental and expensive.
After living with two kids for a hundred years now (mine are 6 and 4, but when talking about kids, you add their ages and multiply by 10 to get the true passage of time) and recently moving into a new apartment and buying new furnishings, I noticed I had learned a few things from past decor choices gone wrong. I can’t say that everything is smooth sailing when it comes to our home now, but I can say that following these kid-friendly decorating ideas resulted in many fewer headaches.
After living with two kids for a hundred years now (mine are 6 and 4, but when talking about kids, you add their ages and multiply by 10 to get the true passage of time) and recently moving into a new apartment and buying new furnishings, I noticed I had learned a few things from past decor choices gone wrong. I can’t say that everything is smooth sailing when it comes to our home now, but I can say that following these kid-friendly decorating ideas resulted in many fewer headaches.
3. Say no to rugs, pillows and bedding that can’t get tossed in the washing machine. Large bath mats and rugs can be somewhat difficult to clean. Instead, look for smaller rugs in materials that you can throw in the washing machine, such as flat-woven cotton rugs.
Get a few that are about 2 by 3 feet and put one in front of the kitchen sink, one in front of the bathroom sink and one outside the tub. Toss them in the wash every week or so, and they’ll be good as new. Same goes for throw blankets and pillows. You’ll be much happier if you can just toss something into a load rather than try to spot-clean it or have it professionally cleaned.
4. If you can’t wipe it, reconsider it. A lot goes on at our dining table — more than just eating, such as coloring, painting, playing with Play-Doh and slime, and handling all other sorts of gunk that companies have come up with to seemingly give parents a panic attack. Don’t let it.
Try to find materials that are easy to wipe down. We once had an unstained wooden dining table that seemed to absorb every marker (even the so-called washable kind) and paintbrush stroke like it was a hipster covered in tattoos. I recently bought an inexpensive yet sturdy table made of medium-density fiberboard (MDF) covered in acrylic paint. It’s incredibly easy to wipe off, and I even dared to buy it in white (I know!). Granted, the top surface on products like this is pretty thin. If any large chunks or dents are taken out of the surface, the wood-colored fiberboard will show through. Good thing it was cheap.
Additionally, I can’t stress enough how much of a blessing a broken-in brown leather sofa has been. Every smear from markers or yogurt or grubby little fingers comes off with a quick wipe-down. Of course, you still need to be careful with scratches and punctures, but in my experience, those have been much less of an issue than spills.
Get a few that are about 2 by 3 feet and put one in front of the kitchen sink, one in front of the bathroom sink and one outside the tub. Toss them in the wash every week or so, and they’ll be good as new. Same goes for throw blankets and pillows. You’ll be much happier if you can just toss something into a load rather than try to spot-clean it or have it professionally cleaned.
4. If you can’t wipe it, reconsider it. A lot goes on at our dining table — more than just eating, such as coloring, painting, playing with Play-Doh and slime, and handling all other sorts of gunk that companies have come up with to seemingly give parents a panic attack. Don’t let it.
Try to find materials that are easy to wipe down. We once had an unstained wooden dining table that seemed to absorb every marker (even the so-called washable kind) and paintbrush stroke like it was a hipster covered in tattoos. I recently bought an inexpensive yet sturdy table made of medium-density fiberboard (MDF) covered in acrylic paint. It’s incredibly easy to wipe off, and I even dared to buy it in white (I know!). Granted, the top surface on products like this is pretty thin. If any large chunks or dents are taken out of the surface, the wood-colored fiberboard will show through. Good thing it was cheap.
Additionally, I can’t stress enough how much of a blessing a broken-in brown leather sofa has been. Every smear from markers or yogurt or grubby little fingers comes off with a quick wipe-down. Of course, you still need to be careful with scratches and punctures, but in my experience, those have been much less of an issue than spills.
5. Run from materials and pieces with too many nooks and crannies. Kids spread crumbs around so much, you’d think they were battered and deep-fried. Every nook, crack, crevice and hole in your home will be filled with food crumbs, dried-up Play-Doh, Lego pieces, marker caps and every other small piece of detritus you can imagine. Get ahead of the chaos by avoiding furniture with too many hard-to-clean seams or joints, as well as woven materials, shaggy rugs and anything else that creates a sinkhole for crumbs.
A few years ago I bought a rug made from recycled newspaper woven in cotton. It’s a beautifully cool piece that has sentimental value to me as a journalist. But I’ve never found the right use for it with young kids. It’s got so many places for crumbs to fall into that it’s difficult to shake out or run a vacuum over. It’s just not worth it to have around. So it stays rolled up in my closet. Maybe someday it’ll come out.
Tip: Visualize how the piece you’re considering would hold up to a child’s eating a package of graham crackers directly above it. If your first thought is, “The horror!” then file that piece away for when the kids are older and wiser. So, you know, maybe just wait until they’re out of your house.
Your turn: What decor did you learn to avoid after having kids? Share your advice in the Comments.
More
21 Things Only People Living With Kids Will Understand
8 Things to Consider Before Moving Into a New Apartment
Browse decorating guides
A few years ago I bought a rug made from recycled newspaper woven in cotton. It’s a beautifully cool piece that has sentimental value to me as a journalist. But I’ve never found the right use for it with young kids. It’s got so many places for crumbs to fall into that it’s difficult to shake out or run a vacuum over. It’s just not worth it to have around. So it stays rolled up in my closet. Maybe someday it’ll come out.
Tip: Visualize how the piece you’re considering would hold up to a child’s eating a package of graham crackers directly above it. If your first thought is, “The horror!” then file that piece away for when the kids are older and wiser. So, you know, maybe just wait until they’re out of your house.
Your turn: What decor did you learn to avoid after having kids? Share your advice in the Comments.
More
21 Things Only People Living With Kids Will Understand
8 Things to Consider Before Moving Into a New Apartment
Browse decorating guides
Tip: Always have club soda on hand for preventing carpet and rug stains.
2. Skip anything too nice for now. This is perhaps the quintessential rule when buying furnishings for your home if you have small kids. You’d be amazed at the amount of destruction a toddler can wreak upon anything in his or her path. Anything that can be stained, broken, dented, dinged, scuffed up or drawn on will inevitably bear these scars of battle. In some cases, the more expensive you go, the more durable the item. But just use caution. I once found our son absent-mindedly sawing on the edge of our dining table with his butter knife. If that table had been a family heirloom, I might have been a little upset.
Browse multicolored rugs