I initially wrote this about a month ago pre-pandemic. While it seems somewhat untimely to post now, these days I am feeling pretty nostalgic for simpler times. I just need one night of not reading frantically about Covid-19 and planning for apocalypse, both as a parent and an emergency doc. I had to make some room for the human part so the doctor and mom part could survive this thing. Although buying some N95’s on amazon and laser printing some face shields probably would have been more useful for survival than a blog post about frivolous things.

What a different world it was just a few weeks ago when my biggest worry was if my kids would like my choice of wallpaper. I miss that wallpaper lady. I hope to see her again one day. In the meantime, here are her innocent musings from a not too distant past about sweet moments with her children.

Here’s a shot of the playroom to tide you over.

My eyes droop heavily as the pleather rocking chair squeaks in the dark with each rhythmic movement of my foot. I can faintly make out the soft sound of my 3 year-old daughter delicately eating her boogers and whispering to an imaginary princess. “I’m a big girl nunicorn,” she breathily tells the princess. Then, indistinguishable sounds in a made up language. I used to find her elaborate sleep routine maddening. She was my prison warden, jolting upright and staring at me in an accusing manner immediately upon the sound of a floorboard squeaking as I tried to make my escape. Now, the Stockholm syndrome has set in and I am fully charmed. I know I will miss this one day. Just a few months ago she used to whisper to the imaginary princess, “me’s a baby blue mouse.” Time is slipping through my fingers. She’s growing up. I think she senses I’m a good audience for this shit and adds a new elaborate detail to her routine each night. It begins by her sitting on my lap facing me. She’ll take a minute to arrange my hair solemnly, like a hair dresser might, leaning back to inspect her work in the dark. Then she asks me about the kitchsy Bulgarian landscape paintings in her room behind my head. “Who painted my paintings?” she asks. She is delighted each time I tell her it is her grandfather Minko’s father who is also named Minko, who painted them. “Is it that he died?” She asks solemnly in her French syntax “Yes.” I answer. “Where did he die?” she continues, as if this is the next logical question. “San Francisco.” I tell her. “Is it that there’s dragons and castles in Sanfanpisco?” “Oh yes.” I respond. “Oodles.” She is satisfied. Then she begins the elaborate procedure of planting tiny drooly kisses on my forehead, cheeks, nose and heart in that order, and like a dog circling carefully before he finally chooses his spot to sit. Then she chugs an entire glass of water like a grown man, lays down to sleep, reminds me that she’s a big girl nunicorn and demands to kiss both of my hands. Then she gets up to pee 1 minute later and repeats the whole process again. Sometimes there is a third round. Most nights she will add that I’m the most beautiful princess and that , in her words, she loves me “in the whole big world and the little world too.” So, as a prison warden, she’s kind of pretty great. I suspect I’m being played but I’m willing to overlook it.

My 5 year-old son, who is sleeping soundly in the next room in a nest of stuffed animals and under a stuffed shark twice the size of him, has also been thoroughly charmed by her. I think the happiest I’ve ever seen him is when my daughter bestowed him with one of her sweet little nose kisses. My son enjoys making up random child rules to nonexistent child games in his head and psychically communicating them to his little sister. They are sweet little kindred spirits, those two. They will spend hours sword fighting each other with boxes on their heads and enacting elaborate death scenes, or pretending they are dalmatian puppies numbers 102 and 103 like it’s the obvious thing to do. They have informed me that they plan to marry each other when they grow up. It’s so cute I might just let them.

In the meantime. These little dalmatian puppies make me want to create magic for them. So, during my nightly routine dozing off in the squeaky pleather rocking chair, I daydreamed about converting the closet in their playroom into a jungle tree house. It would be a crime to deny them this magic. It would also be a crime to go through with it given the tiny size of the closet and the prohibitive cost of such a transformation. But alas, I do not have a time machine or even just financial reason, and the psychological reward of seeing my son literally fall over from joy at having a jungle tree house was too amazing to care about niddeldy piddles like crippling debt.

All that to say, check out my jungle playroom. I like to think of it as a pandemic bunker for kids and that I had great foresight. So far the kids have been hoarding whatever trinket they decide is worthy of treasure status in the tree house like diligent little squirrels. I’m not sure if a tiny pokemon or a brass scorpion are useful bunker items, and they seem be completely oblivious as to the absurd amounts of toilet paper they should be hoarding, but who am I to judge? I don’t even have hand sanitizer.

A little glimpse of the playroom before the renos:

I was kind of fond of the 1970's kijiji yellow leather couch but it was so massive you had to sit on it with your legs extended like a toddler.

Camera one.

Camera two. Not the worst. But not exactly an indoor jungle treehouse.

Ah, the closet of entropy... bane of my existence. Scoffing at my desire for inner peace. Endlessly barfing out legos and plastic child garbage that I felt strangely driven to keep supplying it.

The inspiration. Wouldn't this be easier on the eyes?

A plan is born.

Hot tip: if you don’t know anything about modern technologies and are too old to figure it out, powerpoint is a good ghetto way to cut and paste objects into your dream rooms.

The extended room plan. Since I was using the storage space for play I had to put storage in the play space. It's pretty much wall to wall hoarding made acceptable by IKEA.

The diorama. I fucking love dioramas.

I made this for the contractor after he asked me how to attach the ballpit net. I think I was still in my pyjamas with hair like a wildling. One sec, I said, my eyes crazed with the prospect of a diorama. Cut to rifling through the recycling for cardboard boxes, fruit bags and scraps of paper. 10 minutes later I presented him with my mini-diorama while trying unsuccessfully to hold back a smug diorama smile. He just raised his eyebrow. But for a second, I thought I detected a glimmer of diorama appreciation in his eyes.

The process:

A blank canvas.

The closet hole after wallpapering.

I love this Rousseau inspired wallpaper I found on etsy. It was almost sad to cover it up.

If you go jungle, why not just go full jungle? So I painted the ceiling and trimmed the wallpaper.

The ballpit side.

After:

Ta da! Jungle playhouse.

Fighting sharks in the ballpit.

Cute little faces.

A climbing wall and a kijiji-sourced ikea swing.

Lion cubs on a pulley.

What's a playroom without a pinteresty play kitchen?

I think I have enough material to write a book of how not to spray paint a play kitchen. But I probably acquired too much brain damage from the fumes to be able to write it.

Roussea monkeys remind me of that lady in Italy that tried unsuccessfully to restore a 19th century fresco of Jesus.

The steep child-trauma slide is more dangerous than the tigers.

I see you.

Swing fun.

Side view.

Collections.

Just a vintage Bulgarian baby doll sharing a donut with a giant eye.

Reading a book in the nook.

Those white STUVA benches are pretty much entirely filled with legos.

Kermit sings monkey a sweet song about rainbows. Godzilla pauses to realize his anger issues stem from feelings of loneliness. He decides not to burn them alive with his fire breath.

Or maybe he’ll just wait until the song is over.

She's at the stage where she thinks reading is looking at pictures of ponies.

It's pretty cozy in here.

I barely fit and it’s almost humiliating to climb in here, but I have been known to hang out here after the kids are in bed with a cup of “tea” while I enjoy the view.

This is the slightly updated version with secret compartments for spy kid adventures and some ship steering wheels just cuz.

You should be humming "the circle of life" in your head right about now.

Alligators in the ball pit.

There’s even a secret passage from the ballpit to the climbing wall. This was my husband’s idea, which I first scoffed at as is my wifely duty and then adopted as my own.