Making a classroom feel like home...

I've been thinking alot about what I want to do with my classroom this coming fall. It's time to decide once and for all. I love all the bright colors of fun bulletin boards with their pompoms and tissue paper flowers. In fact, I helped create some for a friend last week.  

But I really want to feel at home in my classroom this year. I want to walk in and feel like I'm in a home, not a classroom. I'm afraid I'm going to miss the bright and fun of the colors and the pompoms, but this year I'm changing things up. I'm really going to try to use decor items that I would use in my home. Some of what I would like to do, I know I can't. Frames around bulletin board instead of borders. Warmer paint color. Wallpaper. So instead, I'm using what I can. I have only just begun, but here's a start:

I spray painted my plastic tubs silver. I love the way they turned out. These were lime green dollar store plastic. I also covered them in a spray topcoat, to try to minimize the inevitable chipping. I love lime green, and it hurt me a little to cover up all that bright fun, but do they make me feel at home? Do I have lime green plastic tubs in my living room? No. That's my goal. Not eliminate fun colors, just be more intentional about feeling at home.

Here's my next step: recreating my reclaimed wood wall in the form of bulletin boards.

 

 I found this here on Amazon. And I'm not sure if it's because I have Amazon Prime, but it was free shipping!  So I've been dreaming of wood bulletin boards for the last 2 days. Seriously. DREAMING of it. In my actual dreams. Trying to think of what to use as a "frame". I would use pieces of fence post actual wood, but it's too much wood. The one in my house doesn't have a frame around it. So what to do to frame it in...a white fence post frame??? Hmmm...there's a thought. That sounds like a ton of work, though, if you ask me. And at this point, I don't think I have it in me. So a paper border it is. But I'm keeping it simple: white (flip over one of my 5,000 already purchased borders) and gray. But I still need some color on my bulletin boards, so I'll be thinking that over.

One more hurdle: reduce, reuse, recycle. I'm trying not to buy 12 rolls of new border, "new" Goodwill furniture, more bins, baskets, organizers, name plates, whatever.  Some purchases are inevitable. But I'm trying to use WHAT I ALREADY HAVE! It's tough. And even though I haven't made big purchases at the teacher's store, and honestly, I probably won't, my friends in the spray paint aisle at Home Depot are getting to know me very well.

 
[Glitterfy.com - *Glitter Words*]