Our "temporary" cardboard box space rocket

We moved into our new house back in January 2012, and shortly after that we bought ourselves some dining room furniture which came in lovely large boxes. "Brilliant!" I thought "Big cardboard boxes are so much fun, let's make something cool!".

Harry and I spent a really fun afternoon making a space rocket. I even took a few photos with the vague idea that I'd blog about it someday, certainly not expecting it to take this long!

I made a pointed roof and cut a large circle in the side for the window, then we painted the whole thing blue. It had a door that opened and shut, and for the inside we made a control panel with raised stickers and moving steering wheel. I found him a hat that he could use for a space helmet, and he loved it.

It was pretty awesome if I say so myself. Mia was crawling at this stage, and so she would get inside it too and they played in it beautifully. We found a temporary spot for it in the corner of our new dining room, and there it stayed.

And so we fast forward three and a half years and yes, the space rocket is still there. It is as much a part of our dining room as the new table and chairs. Over the years it has been modified somewhat, various play dates have involved decorating it with stickers, the roof and sides have been reinforced with patterned Duck tape and after the door fell off I replaced it with a piece of cheap fabric to make a curtain. The control panel, steering wheel and original stickers are long gone.

It has become so much a part of the room that we barely notice it any more, and it wasn't until I took this photo (for which I had to move the table and chairs out the way) that I really realised just how scruffy it looks, especially in our dining room where in theory we entertain our guests! But the thing is, this space rocket is probably the most played with toy in the entire house, and I'm not lying to say that it is in play daily. Many of the other toys we had at that time are long gone. Even the Duplo isn't played with as much as the space rocket. It's not used as much for blasting into space now, it has become a den, a hidey hole, a place to store little toys and a hiding place for teddies. If something is missing, it's the first place that I look. Several times the rocket has come very close to the recycling bin, and yet when it comes to it I just can't do it. 

It takes up so much space, and yet I can't imagine the dining room without it. I really think it'll be here until they leave home! Would you have put up with it for this long?