The Book Nook

I've been wanting to create a little book nook for my kids for a while now. I pictured a gallery wall of book covers immediately in our playroom. We don't have a large playroom space by any means, and when you throw in a train table and a large activity table, it gets even smaller. But there was certainly room for a little corner to be designated a "library," (this is what my kindergartener has named the space, as she bosses plays teacher and assigns every family member a 'center.') We have a small sectional (Ikea Ektorp) that splits the room in half, so behind the piece that juts out is where I decided to make this nook. I simply moved the bookshelf/storage cube-y thing we had there, up to my son's room (who desperately needed some furniture anyway), and had some of those little white bookshelves that you can buy for super cheap at any Target/Walmart type of store, and placed them horizontally. Grabbed a rug and some floor pillows we already had, some old pillows I have yet to re-cover, and who doesn't have 800 stuffed animals laying around? Then I collected some book covers, and sprayed a bunch of frames I had (a mix of Dollar Store and yard sale finds) with spray paint that matched a color from the cover, and sprayed some wooden letters I bought at JoAnn's:

 Instant little book nook. Now, in my head I picture a super fluffy shag rug, ginormous bean bag chairs/poofs to lounge around on, new lighting, and ditch the bookshelves all together and get some awesome shelves...

BUT, this will do for the time being. If that doesn't happen as soon as I'd like, I'll at least make soft little seat covers so the bookshelves can be like a little L-shaped bench. We'll see.

I love the framed book covers idea. If you read yesterday's post, you know how special these books are to me, and several of them came from books that had literally fallen apart into many pages, so it was a perfect way to preserve them. I was going to spray the letters different colors, but with the colors from the book covers and frames, I decided white would be the best choice.

Best part is, the kids love it, and I'll often look over and see one of them (or all of them) taking a book, and sprawling out on the rug to "read." I spotted Tinkerbell here minutes after I finished setting it all up:

And today, after school (and I mean RIGHT after school), my kindergartener, who does nothing - and I mean nothing - but play school these days, got right back in there and was reading to her "class:"

So that's the Book Nook, (or Library Center according to my 5 year old budding teacher) for the time being. Total cost: $14. $8 on letters, and $6 on frames. I'll keep you posted as I make the updates I mentioned earlier. But for 14 bucks, it works just fine for right now;)