If you have the time and the inclination, you can use you children’s bedroom as an device with which to teach your children on a massive scale and you can use the bedroom in several different ways too. You can use the bedroom as a subtle microcosm of the house or you can point out that what you are tying to do by getting your children involved with running their bedroom will be important to them when they endeavor to run households of their own in later years.
You can get them involved with having a tidy, beautiful, useful bedroom. This bedroom can be run on a budget and that budget can be split into pots for redecoration, furniture and bedding. You will control the purse strings, obviously, but you can permit as much input as you can handle or as much as you have the courage for.
Imagine the knowledge that a child, or teenager if you like, could learn from having run budgets and maintenance routines on a room? The kid would certainly be far better prepared for going out into the big wide world when the time comes. I think that doing it in this way, could be instructive and fun, but it would also create greater opportunities for bonding at a time in a teenager’s life when they seem to want to avoid contact with adults.
The furniture in a bedroom is pretty permanent and does not need changing more often than each couple of years at the most. Redecoration is usually done each two or three years, so the biggest regular, on-going outlay for most parents is bedding. Sheets wear out and styles change. The only downside of keeping your children involved with running their bedroom, is the expense.
It does cost more than if you do it alone. The most common reason for this is that, if you purchased items on your own, you would buy them before they were needed in a sale or on special offer. You can still do this, but it requires more setting up on your behalf, you cannot simply make spot-decisions any more.
One of the easiest approaches to take is theming. Decide on a theme with your child and then stick to it. You could have a rule that a theme should last at least six, nine or twelve months. This cuts costs significantly. If you can redecorate in a non-themed, neutral pattern or colour, this makes swapping themes simpler as well.
This teaches the child the consequence of taking decisions. What is decided now will be still there for up to a year. It teaches budgeting. It teaches that shopping around is certainly necessary, if you are going to get the best value for money. It teaches colour-co-ordination and the importance of thinking about matching colours before you purchase. It shows that planning is indispensable to the success of any project.
Done properly, using a bedroom as a microcosm of a household can give your child a leg-up in the real world outside your protection, when he or she has to go and take care of himself.
Owen Jones, the author of this piece, writes on a number of topics, but is now involved with decorative bed pillows. If you would like to know more, please visit our website at Modern Throw Pillows For Sale.