Rooms Reassigned

We have a little problem. A cute, little problem. A cute, little, early-rising problem. His name is Michael and he has a hard time staying in bed in the morning. That is not so much a problem as is the fact that he feels the need to drag Josh out of bed with him. During the summer, when all of us were able sleep in until the late hour of 7 am, we had it pretty much under control. However, since Jason has been going to work early in the morning, Michael has been getting up earlier and earlier. He was waking Josh up too and Josh would stumble downstairs with his blanket around him telling us how tired he was and that he just wanted Michael to leave him alone to sleep.

These days, I am very invested in Josh getting enough sleep. Going back to school is exhausting. His allergies have started acting up as well and that takes a toll on his body. So, the other day I had the idea that we should put our sleepers, Josh and Ben, in the same room and let Michael get up early in his own room. I admit, it seemed a little silly at first because one would think that that eldest child (considering that we have three of the same gender) should probably get his own room first. Being a first child myself, that seemed right. But, I didn't have any control over the personalities of my kids or the order they came in, so I had to change my thinking. I mentioned this plan to Jason Sunday afternoon. Much to my surprise, he said, "Let's do it now."

So, we did.

It was a much bigger project than it appeared. It was easy to decide that Ben should be moved to Josh's room and Michael moved to the other room. It was a lot of work to take the bunk beds apart, move one bed to the other room, take the crib apart and move it into the other room, move the changing table to the basement, move the dresser into the other room, move the couch into our room, move our bed over to make more room, and move the table into the other room. I am thinking that perhaps since we haven't moved houses in 3 years that maybe we just needed to get the urge to move out of our systems by rearranging the top floor. Craziness.

Here is Josh and Michael's room before:

And here is Josh and Ben's room afterwards:

I realize that spartan might be a word used to describe the decor. I keep thinking we aren't going to stay here long so I don't want to invest in decorating the rooms. Of course, I have been thinking that for three years now.

Here is Ben's room before:

Yeah, it's a bit of a wreck. I am not going to post pictures of my room because it is also a wreck. However, as the Mom, I reserve the right to have the messiest room in the house. So there.

And here is Michael's room afterwards:

We took down all the pictures of Ancient Egypt that Jason had on the walls so that Michael wouldn't destroy them or start to worship the old gods.

The boys all seem happy with the arrangement and Josh has been able to sleep until 7 am every morning since the change. I love it! A funny story about this change: While we were rearranging the furniture, Josh was talking on the phone to Nana. He told her about the changes we were making. He said, "Guess what, Nana? Ben and I are going to share a room. And Michael gets his own room. Except, Mommy and Daddy are going to stay in their room because they like sharing a room."