Mama in the City

A blog about raising my family in downtown Vancouver

After I visit my sisters house I'm reminded just how different apartment living with a child is. She has a nice big house with multiple levels, multiple entrance's, a big back yard and lots and lots of toys and play things, her house is Ben's little piece of heaven. At her house there are multiple rooms filled with lots of things. There are, little pieces, big pieces and make believe items, a doll house, a play house and more! There are bedrooms stocked with train tables, ride on toys and big trucks that go zoom.

The main difference about being an apartment mama is that you can not become a collector of 'things'. As an apartment mama I continually purge purge purge and rid myself of anything too large or too big. When Ben was born we made a firm rule that there would never be any stuffed animals in our apartment that were larger than him at that time. We also made a rule that we would only ever have a maximum of 5 stuffed 'anything' at one time, so far this has worked out for us well. These rules left Ben with a few special soft creatures to cuddle and play with but that can be easily tucked away.

Since we want to maintain the appearance of being hip city dwellers, who aren't overtaken by the reign of Fisher Price, we have limited Ben's play things to one toy basket in the main living space and one big storage bin in his bedroom. I rotate toys every week or so and keep most everything else stored in Ben's moderately sized bedroom, and I am constantly thinking about living space when I go and buy anything for our little Ben.

We love the storage bin that is kept in Ben's room, it is full to the brim with fun play things and anything that doesn't fit is constantly weeded out. We wanted a place to stash all the big and little pieces and everything gets pulled in and out daily.



3 Sprouts Organic Storage Bin available at Raspberry Kids

Unless you are that person that loves to step on pointy Lego pieces or trip over a million puzzle pieces, apartment dwelling forces you to think twice about what to keep and what to toss. With that being said, Ben absolutely adores going to his Aunties house and pulling out every single toy available to him. He loves the big ticket items and playing with endless farm animals and rather enjoys the stocked playroom.

Of course Ben does not notice that when he returns home he only gets one basket of toys instead of multiple rooms of toys. I can imagine that if we did live in a house we would probably live up to each and every square foot of living space. Right now Ben lives fully in his 1100 square feet apartment and seems very content with his basket of toys.

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