How is your playroom/play area set up?

My babies are getting to the age where they have more awake time and are interested in doing things. I want to set up our play area and set up "stations" that I can rotate the babies through during their awake time. Maybe a boppy/mirror, their monkey gym, the swing/ the exersaucer...

I'd love to see pictures of play areas for little babies, and for bigger babies too. Or descriptions if you can't post pictures.

 

by 5 months when they really started moving around I knew I had to have a gated area, we were able to take part of our great room and fence in a 6' by 6' area with the metal gate, it can attach to itself to make a circle, or what we did - attach the "L" to the wall on either side and its great. We have all their toys in there, and at first before they were standing up and really moving around I tied the activity table to the metal wall so that it would be stable, now that they can climb on top of it, I had to quit that for fear that they would climb out!

 

Sorry I can't post photos but I'll try to describe it. When the boys were about 5 months old I set the room up into stations. I have the main play area that has a playyard fence around it. Inside that are some toys and when they were 5-6.5 months old we had the tiny love gym in there until they lost interest. We also put the Ikea playmat blanket in there from time to time. We have some soft play mats on the floor as a cushion since we have hardwood floors. When the boys started pulling up we put a couple of small 15"x15"x15" ottomans in there to give them standing practice. We've got their dangly toys attached at various points with links on the fence. On the outside, still in the room, we have 2 exersaucers as another station. We have the twins PnP that is extra large and that serves as another station but mainly as a napping spot. We used to have the swing and bouncy as another station, but they outgrew those at 6 months. Now we have 2 walkers and a recently acquired push-walker that we use when the boys are uninterested in the exersaucer. We're about to transition the exersaucers out of the room since the boys are losing interest in them. In another part of the house we have 2 doorway jumpers we put up before and after bath time at the end of the day so the boys can jump out any remaining energy before the wind-down time. I also use the doorway jumpers when I need to be at that end of the house to do housework. Only that end of the house has doorways. I also have a stroller in the living room (next to the playroom with all the stations) and I use that for tandem bottle-feeding and sometimes for shuffling the boys to/from the car or for going for walks in the neighborhood. I have another stroller in the car so this stroller is mainly at home.

 

we have a foam alphabet mat with the interlocking squares, and on that mat is an activity mat with the toy bar that goes overhead. next to all of that we have a baby einstein exersaucer and finally a fisher price jumperoo. the activity mat is good for tummy play and lying on their backs grabbing at dangling toys, which they still enjoy. the rest of the mat is space for crawling, rolling and sitting up. which means the mat area is a multi use station, we just sort of rotate them through which particular activity we think they should be doing throughout the day.

i'm not sure this helps you, though, with the age your LOs are at.

 

We matted a huge area in our family room ( tile floors). We got mats from Sams club, they interlock, 2x2, and are primary colors. They were only $22.00 for 8 squares and are VERY sturdy. We had the alphabet one and they started pulling it apart. I have a Baby Einstein crawl tunnel with dangling toys, the bucket shelves filled with toys in the bottom buckets ( they pull them out), their jumpies, a few leapfrog toys, a Vtech rolling ball ( they love it and it moves so they will go after it), books ( they love), a mirror, lots of chew toys, and a music table ( on 2 legs so they can sit and push the buttons).

All these toys I have in different areas on the mat so they don't get bored. My Lo's are crawling now so they don't stay in a "station". Before they were crawling I had a play gym, swings, jumpies, and boppies. I would just place them in different areas.

 

Well i will try an explain how we are set up, although it is up for review as the babies are becoming mobile.

By the window we have a swing, we have a large rug with a box of toys at the side of it so tummy time and story time takes place here, by the fireplace we have the bumbo's and another toybox, on the sofe i have a large v pillow where i sit them if they watch baby channel, by the tv we have a multigym and either end of the sofa we have a bouncy chair each.

 

QUOTE(piccologirl @ Jun 14 2009, 04:20 AM) [snapback]1353589[/snapback]
we have a foam alphabet mat with the interlocking squares, and on that mat is an activity mat with the toy bar that goes overhead. next to all of that we have a baby einstein exersaucer and finally a fisher price jumperoo. the activity mat is good for tummy play and lying on their backs grabbing at dangling toys, which they still enjoy. the rest of the mat is space for crawling, rolling and sitting up. which means the mat area is a multi use station, we just sort of rotate them through which particular activity we think they should be doing throughout the day.

i'm not sure this helps you, though, with the age your LOs are at.


We just Freecycled our foam alphabet mat away - we got so tired of finding the pieces and putting it back together. :lol: