Our shelves in Oliver's Montessori room

A few weeks ago Cristina from Montessori en Casa showed us what’s on her children’s shelves (which I loved) and asked us to do the same for the November Link Up. As I love this initiative, here’s my contribution (better late than never ;-)

We have very few shelves and they’re quite empty compared with Cristina’s children’s, mainly for two reasons:

• Oliver is only eight months old and we've just started on this Montessori adventure
• I still find it difficult to choose and buy toys for Oliver, who always seems to prefer a shoe, a box or a bottle :-(

So far, our shelves in Oliver’s Montessori room (we got it all from IKEA, and you?) have changed almost weekly, according to Oliver’s experiences and what entertains him more—and sometimes yes, we’ve had also socks and belts in our baskets ;-)

But this is more or less what we always rotate.

The rattles basket

As I wrote some while ago, a basket with similar toys is ideal for a baby to start setting an activity in Montessori style. Unfortunately just recently we lost Froggy, Oliver’s favourite rattle.

The balls basket

In this basket, we keep balls of different textures and shapes.

Colourful wooden toys

Oliver still doesn’t use any of these toys much, but as they’re very colourful they catch his attention and motivate him to stand up. At the end, we decided not to install a standing bar for him as we noticed that the shelf was perfect height and very stable.

All toys box

(Top-left shelf) As Oliver gets bored quite easily, I decided to hide some toys and other things that he didn’t seem very keen on and give them back to him from time to time—especially when I’m desperate and need new entertainment :-) And when I am very desperate, I give him the whole box!

The books basket

Since Oliver was born, I love reading books to him (Barney’s his favourite) and he’s gotten used to it: he often sits quietly on my lap, listening to the story and touching the pages. As we didn’t have much shelving room, I decided to put all his books in this basket.