functional wall art for kids (closet update)

A few weeks ago I shared an update on my preschool-age daughters' closet in our new house. Today I'm back with another update because I am just so excited with the way this latest update came out! I think something like this would be a perfect addition to any kid's bedroom, no matter their age.

So, just to refresh everyone's memory, here is what the closet looked like in my last update:

I had gone back and forth quite a bit on where I should keep the girls' dress up clothes, and had decided that, since their closet was so big anyway, I would keep them there with the rest of their regular clothes. But after a couple of weeks I realized that they weren't getting used very much there, so I moved the costumes. This left a huge, blank wall in the middle of their closet, and it looked, well, empty. My other problem was that I was having a hard time keeping track of which girl's clothes were on which side of the closet. When I was putting clothes away, I was finding that I was having to open bins to try to figure out whose clothes were inside in order to know where to put their clean clothes. The third idea/problem that I had in the back of my mind was that I wanted a place for the girls to keep some of their own things that they choose to put up on the wall now that they are older. I have always had their artwork and photos up on the walls, but they didn't really have a place where they could put things up themselves. Out of these three problems, the new wall setup was born!

I had the big, white letters S and L from our old apartment. I had found them on clearance one time and used them to hold the girls' hair clips. In the new house I am using a different system for hair clips, so I decided to decorate them and use them to indicate whose stuff is on each side (S and L are the first letters in their names). I decorated them with washi tape using the colors I have used for each of them since before they were born- purple and green- and stuck them on the wall with command strips. That's one problem solved!

Of course my initial thought for giving them space to hang up their own things was a bulletin board, but I quickly realized that giving my preschoolers thumb tacks was probably not a good idea. So I started thinking about other ways that they could safely hang things without my help. Next to their initials I tacked up s piece of ribbon and clipped a few clothespins to it. Under the ribbon is a metal sheet that I got years ago to use as a magnet board in the car, which I stuck to the wall and stuck some magnets on the front. They can use both of those spots to hang up photos or small drawings they make. I found a couple of strips of "key hooks" on clearance, so I hung those next to the magnet board for the girls to hang purses, bags, or jewelry.

That's the other two problems solved- the girls have places to hang their own things independently, and the wall looks pretty instead of empty! And now I can tell where to put their clothes with a quick glance.

Do your young children have a place to hang their own artwork in their rooms? What have you used? I am loving this new setup and the girls love it too, so I'm calling this a success!