After getting home from the hospital with Jessica we came to realize that our living room layout really wasn’t all that functional. Live many families we had made the focal point of the room the television, at the cost of space on the floor.

Not only were we cramped in the living room, but we were also cramped in the dining room and I would quite regularly knock my chair on the wall behind me when I got up from my chair. Tamara was also starting to feel quite claustrophobic with her, Caleb and Jessica in the room all at the same time.

We managed to arrange a temporary swap of entertainment units with some of our friends. They got our large unit which you can see in the image above, and we got their smaller unit, which you can see in the corner in the image below.

The room is now a lot more conducive to conversation and there is a lot more usable room in it. The new entertainment unit is a bit cramped, but we are planning to someday get a smaller stereo that we can put on our book self that is in the dining room. That will unclutter the unit even more and make it even less of an eyesore. There is also a lot more room to play with the kids and I no longer bang my chair against the wall as we were able to move the table over a few inches.

Watching television in the room isn’t as easy now, but we really aren’t watching all that much of it any more. When we set it up for Caleb to watch we just ask him to pull out his bean bag, which he is more than happy to do (getting him to put it away is another story…). Our reasons for not watching much television anymore is partly because we are very busy, but also for personal reasons, which you can read about on my other blog Television is Sucking my Brain.