Decorating for Kids

When you enter my home, you can immediately tell that I have kids.  Or that I have a strange obsession with Christmas lights.   This monstrosity is what you may see first.  I'll explain about that more in a minute.

My youngest son, Will, is a 9-year old special needs child with a HUGE love of 2 things, balloons and Christmas lights.  So, of course, I have both of those all over my house.  We call him the "king" because he rules our world.  He's gets the most attention and is spoiled rotten.  But he deserves it.  He has had alot of serious "medical drama" in his short life.

King William

This was one of the first signs that I ever made....of course, it was for the king.

This sign hangs on the wall next to his bed.  The crown was printed from The Graphics Fairy site.  


Speaking of his bed, as I have mentioned before, it sits in the master bedroom.  His dad and I have gradually moved most of our furniture out of our bedroom to accommodate his.  We have to sleep in the same room with him...to monitor his breathing and seizure activity when he sleeps.


I have  two windows in the bedroom.  One has my favorite blue silk curtains and the other:

Yeah, the weird little yellow sponge man.  


That's actually a fleece throw that my sister gave Will for Christmas one year.  I hung it from the curtain rod with clips to give him something to look at while he is in his bed and insulate the window during the winter.  He likes it so much, it just stays up year round. 


Next in the master suite, we have unusual lighting.

A red paper lantern star from World Market hangs above the end of his bed.  Does it match my bedroom decor?  No.  Do I care?  No.


This strand of lighted beads hang from his headboard.  He loves all of the colors.

Remember the large wall mural that I painted for the big blank wall in my bedroom?  Now it has a string of blue rope lights wrapped around a curtain rod above it. For the king, of course :)

When it comes to the rest of the house, Christmas lights are usually incorporated into "my" decor.


You may remember the birdcage and mantel that I did for Christmas...at least the Christmas lights looked like they belonged there then, haha.  

Even the Spring mantel had to have a string of Christmas lights.

That leads me back to the monstrosity that I call "the redneck chandelier".  


My son loves the look of white LED lights.  I think it's the blue-ish color of them.  I took a string of white LED icicle lights and hung them from an embroidery hoop.  Then I suspended the whole thing from clear fishing line. 


I was trying to create a hanging "tube" of lights for him.  I hung it from the curtain rod over a large window in the living room.  During the day, it's the ugliest thing you've ever seen....displayed prominently in the largest window in the house.  Lovely.

This is how redneck we are.  See those lighted Christmas balls on the other side of the window, hanging from the ceiling on the back porch?  Yeah, we leave those up year round.  Will loves them.  The king rules!

The redneck chandelier looks a little better at night.  I cut up a white window sheer to put around it hoping that it would look a little better.  It doesn't.  Do I care?  No...Will loves it.  That's all that matters.


Do you do any crazy decorating for your kids?

Linking to:

The Space Between's Every Day is Party Day
Have a Daily Cup from Mrs. Olson's Share Your Cup Thursday
Toys In The Dryer's Fun Stuff Fridays