For the last 16 years our bedroom has been more of a family room than a place to call our own. Before going to bed at night we've either had to sweep crumbs from the bed due to toast-munching toddlers, remake the bed entirely thanks to Toby using it as an indoor trampoline or get into bed to find lumps of lego underneath the top sheet from where Toby has crawled (in summer we have a stretchy cotton jersey fitted sheet which he likes to sit under and use like a tent).
Over the years the bed has been a surface for tickle games (like in the pictures above), a thing to hide behind in games of hide-n-seek and a quiet place to snuggle at the end of the day for bedtime stories. Both of the children have at one time or another slept in our bed (or next to it in a moses basket as newborns) and we've frequently had family breakfast in bed - before Toby was born Amy used to sit between H and I every morning to eat her toast.
The walls of our room have been crayoned on by Amy when she was small and Toby has smeared my rather expensive face cream all over the floor and used it as a skating rink. Several times in the past he has smeared much worse over the walls, but we'll not think too deeply about that.
We'd never ban the children from our room but they both have rooms of their own that they now prefer spending time in, so it felt like it was time to reclaim a little space of our own again (and a room that was a more fitting backdrop to the crochet blanket that I spent so long making - it used to have dark blue walls).
The walls are now all painted, in the soft dove grey colour I had in mind (we went for no. 3 in the end), the pictures are re-hung (all are photographs taken by H) and the new furniture is in. I am so enjoying having a peaceful, tranquil space to retreat to now and then. In fact I'm off there now for a spot of knitting (Toby is at a holiday club for a few hours today enjoying the bouncy castle) and it might be a while before I come out again!