Friday Flashback

This is a picture of what Henry's room looked like before there was a thought of Henry. It was a guest bedroom. And it was used on a fairly regular basis.

Once there was a thought of a child in the home, we gave this child a code name of Harley. So now this room became "Harley's Room". Oh, and it was so much fun decorating. At this time, I didn't know if Harley was going to be a girl or a boy, but I was pretty sure it was going to be a boy. But just in case, the room needed to be decorated in such a way that it could go either way.

The first thing I decided was to have built-ins put in the room. I designed a unit to go across the back wall of the room that would include a window seat, a dresser, and an adjustable "desk" that could do double duty as a changing table.

I scoured the web to find a set of bedding that I loved and found one that had cartoonish bugs in "baby" colors. I was "lent" a crib by my dear friend Joyce. It had been Hailey's when she was a baby. I researched and found the best brand of glider. The key was that I wanted a glider that didn't look like a glider. And other various accoutrements were added until the room was ready for Harley to come home and occupy it. Here is what the final result looked like:

After a bit, Henry transitioned from a crib to a toddler bed that was a fire engine. The bug decals came down and new decals of firemen and policmen and firetrucks and police cars were put up.

And last year, as he began kindergarten, his room was upgraded to an official "Big Boy Room" complete with a regular bed. The glider was removed, the decals were taken down. The theme of "travel" was selected. He now has icons from various places around the world, like the Eiffel tower, the Statue of Liberty and Big Ben. His bedding matches with additional icons from around the world, like the Kremlin, The Great Wall of China, The Sphinx, Taj Mahal, etc.

It fits him.

Wordless Wednesday

Nate the Great

Today, there was a "Book Character Parade" at Henry's school. So we reviewed many of Henry's favorite books and tried to decide what would be a good character for him to be for the parade. His first wish was to wear his Anakin costume. While we do have some Star Wars books in our library, I wished for him to pick a more literary character instead of the a movie character that had been made into a book.

We considered Roscoe Riley, but decided at the end that it would be hard to tell if Henry was dressed as himself or as Roscoe Riley, since Roscoe is a first grade student. We needed something that would stand out a bit more.

Of course, we considered Curious George or The Man with the Yellow Hat. But in the end, we didn't think we had enough time to pull those costumes together.

We contemplated David of the David Shannon series, but ran into the same issue as Roscoe Riley.

We reconsidered Anakin and again, dismissed it thinking we could come up with something better.

In the end, we decided on Nate the Great.

We figured we could pick up a few props and be able to do the title character justice. After searching high and low for a kid's-sized trenchcoat that could be picked up on the cheap, I finally settled on an adult sized one. At first, I thought I would do some creative sewing on it to try and make it a bit smaller. I found one at the Good Will store, so I wasn't in much and figured I didn't have much to lose. But after trying it on him as is, it was decided that wearing the bigger size added a "cuteness factor". So I left it alone.

Here is the finished product:

I had fun attending the parade. I was pleasantly surprised by how many of the students actually participated. Those that didn't dress served as the audience of the parade. The students gathered in the cafeteria and then paraded through each of the pods to show off their costumes.

Some other notable characters were spotted. The first grade teachers all dressed as different iterations of Junie B. Jones (who I thought was just for girls, but Henry absolutely loves!). The Cat in the Hat was there, along with Thing 1 and Thing 2. Clifford the Big Red Dog made an appearance. So did Snow White, Hannah Montana and Fancy Nancy. Spongebob Squarepants was also there (is he really a book character?). The main characters from "If You Give a Mouse" and "If You Give a Pig" also made an appearance. And that was just the teachers!

Among the students, Diary of a Wimpy Guy was very popular. There were also several princesses, a few butterflies and sports players. There were a few Star Wars characters, including Darth Vader himself. Oh, and there were various pirates. And Batman, Spiderman and the rest of the Super Heroes (so comic book heroes count as book characters?). Oh, and my favorite, there was a whole class that went with Chicka Chicka Boom Boom...all posing as a different letter of the alphabet. Very clever indeed.

All in all, it seems all of the kids had fun and I was glad I got to participate. I felt bad for the mom that was just showing up as it was all over and the rest of the parents were heading out.