Toddler bed to floor bed room makeover

During our trip to Australia, my niece had a sleepover birthday party. One of the mattresses got left out after the girls all went home and Little Bean decided that he wanted to sleep there. My toddler was now sleeping on a Montessori-style floor bed. At least once a night, he woke up and didn't quite know where he was and climbed into my bed. But after a little cuddle and reassurance, I could easily put him back in his floor bed to sleep the rest of the night. Not too bad as far as transitions go.

Now that we're back at home, I thought that we should be consistent and bought a floor bed for his room. He'll quite happily stay there to sleep through the night. 

But what to do with his old toddler bed? I had some inspiration one day when he snuggled up with his Pillow Pets to read a book on his floor bed. I was going to transform his toddler bed into a book nook and activity centre. I moved his Pillow Pets and book basket into the bed, added a snuggly blanket to lay on and that was pretty much it for the book nook part. As for the activities, I decided to add a chalkboard and felt board to either end of the bed. I've been waiting for the shops to reopen after the Vietnamese New Year holidays so I can get some supplies to make the boards. I'll get to it in the next few days and write a separate post for that part of the makeover.

Here are the before and after pictures for his book nook. Little Bean has given it two thumbs up and has been spending lots of time in there.

 Here is his new floor bed. I've put foam matting around the edge as he rolls around in his sleep a lot and I'm a little worried that he'll roll right out of bed. Next to his bed is Big Bear's bed and nappy change mat. He really likes to take care of Big Bear. We change his nappy and clothes, give him bottles and play with him.

 Little Bean mostly eats at his wooden table. The chair is still a little low for him, so occasionally, he'll eat at his highchair style table if he's eating messy food like soup. His water bottle is kept on this table so he can get a drink anytime. He used to sit and read at this table too but now he usually goes to his book nook instead or brings a book to me and sits in my lap.

The window shelf with all his activity baskets and toys.

 He likes to choose his clothes now so I made this little area for dressing. We don't have a permanent chair here. We'll usually grab the one from his dining table or he'll sit on the step. I hang two choices of outfits up for him and there are usually two pairs of shoes in the red basket. At the moment we have a pair of sneakers with socks and a pair of sandals in there. There is a basket on the chest of drawers for bibs and wash clothes for wiping his face or cleaning up spills. I also added a washing basket to his room and he loves to go and put his dirty clothes in there after dressing. Anytime he uses a cloth or bib, he quickly heads to the washing basket with it. There's usually a spare bottle of water here too.

Right now, I'm sure there are Montessori purists looking at this TV in his bedroom and muttering under their breath. Originally, I wasn't going to have a TV in his room but he loves to dance along with his children's music DVDs like The Wiggles, Sesame Street and Play School. There just isn't enough space in my room for us to have a hearty dance and singalong, so we moved it to his room. It doesn't get TV reception, so it's only on for a little while each day for us to watch a DVD, sing, dance and exercise together. This week, we've also started to play percussion instruments along with the DVDs. Little Bean like to play the tambourine and maracas best. In the future, I plan to use it to watch short video clips and mini-documentaries related to the theme we're studying.