There Be Monsters Here: How to 'Decorate' When You Have Children...and Cats

I copied the concept of this gallery wall from a website and it still took me roughly 18 months to finish.  

As the primary groundskeeper and decorator of our home, my standards are pretty straightforward: comfortable spaces that are relatively clean and relatively uncluttered.  This is partly driven by budget (low to nonexistent), partly by skill (also low to nonexistent), and partly by fear of being judged (you know who you are and I thank you).  However, at this point in our lives, it's really mostly driven by the fact that we have small beings living in our house whose sole purpose is to DESTROY. 

Of course, I want our kids to have respect for our space and the things inside of it.  I also want them to have a sense of ownership, to feel as though they can see opportunities in this space where they spend their time, to not feel as though there are parts of our apartment where they can't be or where they're afraid they'll break something. 

With that in mind, we've adopted some strategies around these here parts to try to decorate our apartment. 

Indoor/Outdoor Rugs

Our new living room rug - can you tell it's shred resistant?

So a couple of years ago, we renovated our apartment and I purchased a rug from Nordstrom for the living room.  It was your garden variety rug - patterns, muted colors, etc.  We didn't overpay for it, but we also didn't UNDERpay if you know what I mean. I had long term goals for this rug. We were going to grow old together.  Unfortunately, since we live in an apartment and have small children and fat cats and since the living room is a place where all of us hang out all of the time because it's one of like 5 rooms in our place, this rug could not stand up to the challenge.  And who could blame it?  I can barely stand up to the challenge. 

Peeps, did you know that they make special, more durable rugs that look and feel mostly like regular rugs, but can withstand the devilish feet of children and the menacing claws of cats?  THEY DO!  You can find these special delights under the subheading "Indoor/Outdoor Rugs" on literally any rug website.  Would I rather be using these rugs on a porch that overlooks our personal pond and private garden?  OBVIOUSLY.  Do these rugs also work fine in our living room and will hopefully last a lot longer than the nicer rug from Nordstrom?  YES. 

Durable and Cheap Furniture - Needle in a Haystack 

The kids are cute, but check out that sweet free denim colored couch.

Merriam-Webster tells me that furniture is defined as "movable articles used in readying an area (such as a room or patio) for occupancy or use."  That's interesting because kids define furniture as "fort building materials" and cats would probably use the words "scratching posts". 

You may be thinking, where do these definitions intersect?  The answer: the corner of Free and IKEA. Both of our couches were given to us for free by a neighbor.  Our side chairs, dressers, bookshelves, and toy shelves are from IKEA.  Our dining room table was purchased at Housing Works.  Are any of these winning awards for design? Nope. Domino Magazine is NOT calling. But I also care significantly less when they undergo damage than I would if we had spent more money on any of them. 

Wall Space is the Best Space

How do they all look so good together?! 

So, for some reason, our children and cats don't really seem to notice our walls or what is on them (aside from some pen drawing on Leo's wallpaper ::::::Scaliaface::::::). This is why I try to utilize the walls as the primary place of 'decoration' in our apartment.  We don't do tchotchkes(this is a ridiculous word) and I have throw pillow cases that I haven't gotten around to putting anything in. However, we definitely have stuff on our walls which I am counting as a WIN.  

The best stuff to put on your walls is obviously free art that your children(or cats, I'm not judging) make!  We are so lucky that Leo and Seth's school has a wonderful art program and recently we had two of Leo's pieces framed and basically it looks like we have two original Kandinskies(is that how you spell the plural of Kandinsky?). We also recently strung some hanging art wires which we're using as a rotating display.  When the art comes down, select pieces go into a filing box for the kids to look through now or when they are old and gray and need support remembering their youth. 

Scented Candles

I have yet to find a scented candle that Eric doesn't hate - could this be the winner?!

Our apartment's natural smell is a delightful blend I call "Bodily Fluids of All Persuasions and Varieties".  What with the cat pee, kid poop, and human sweat x 4, it's really remarkable we can even inhabit it.  Sometimes, there's limited edition scents that crop up like "Vomit" and "Overflowing Toilet". Keep an eye out for new releases "Dirty Socks" and "Crotch Stank" when puberty hits!

Pre-kids, we could kind of get away with the cat smell and it was, you know, fine-ish.  Now, however, we need a little support.  This is where scented candles have been critical to us not scaring away guests.  See, I can straighten and even clean the apartment to the point where it doesn't LOOK bad...but there's still a certain scent of something that makes you go...hmmm...what is that?  Light a scented candle though and you've got a delicious smelling house with an air of romance? mystery? arson?  You decide!  

The Toy as Objet d'Art

Wood T with Chess Board and Scattered Pieces, No 3 (2019)

Newsflash: Kids have a lot of toys!  Like, even when you continually throw out stuff they're not using, the toys just continue to multiply and breed like New York City cockroaches.  Unfortunately, just buying nice looking toys is out because the toys that your children like the best will invariably be of the plastic, brightly colored variety.  The beautiful MOMA animal puzzle that we received as a gift - never used.  The 1970s orange board game that I borrowed from school for tutoring - THEIR FAVORITE THING EVER. We would indeed be blessed if this goes with the aesthetic we already had going, but alas.

However, I have come to see that if we view these toys not as disruptive to the landscape of our home in the sense that they don't belong, but objets d'art which are strewn across the landscape of our home like wildflowers on a hill or like mushrooms on a pizza.  Doesn't that Magnatile add a little certain something to your dining room table? What kind of statement is your bathroom making if there is NOT a squeezy shark sitting on the bathtub?  Can we not imagine the train track to be both toy AND linear figure designed to make us ponder the meaning of life?