How My Youngest Son's Nontraditional Bedroom Turned Into My Favorite Place in the House
A tour of the Dopamine Den
When we were looking for houses before we moved to Georgia, we walked upstairs to a new build and I examined the doors off the master bedroom. There was the bathroom, which was twice as big as the bathroom in our 1960s-era house in South Carolina. There was a regular sized closet with shelving. And then there was a large closet, about 5 x 8 feet. As soon as I saw the big closet, I exclaimed, “We could fit a baby in here!” The real estate agent gave my husband a somewhat concerned look.
When we moved in a little over a month later, our fourth baby was 10 days old and we did indeed fit his bassinet and him into the closet. Our long-term plan was for him and his older sister to eventually share a room, but I wasn’t going to attempt that until he was sleeping through the night.
He eventually outgrew the bassinet, and so we set up a pack-and-play in the closet. I did have some clothes in there as well as a few Rubbermaid bins, but there was still plenty of room.
When he was around a year old we tried putting him in the room with his sister. It lasted about 30 minutes. Back to the closet he went.
It was around this time that we began to notice some things about Noah. The most concerning was that he would sit up against the side of the bed and rock back and forth, banging his head up against the side. When he was in the pack and play, this wasn’t a huge deal, except he’d eventually rock it up against the wall. We ended up stuffing cushions between the bed and the wall.
When he outgrew the pack-and-play, he was still rocking. We needed to move him to a crib, and it would have been the ideal time to try moving him into his sister’s room again, but I was afraid the rocking would keep her awake at night or wake her up in the morning. By then we had determined the rocking was a kind of self-soothing, so he often did it before he fell asleep and then when he woke up, before I came in to get him up.
And so we set up the crib in the closet.
You can see in the above picture that there is a piece of foam between the bed and the wall. This was to keep it from making a terrible banging sound when he rocked. Soon, though, I realized he was developing a red spot on the back of his head from hitting it up against the slats of the crib.
At two years old, Noah began speech therapy at with an early interventionist because he wasn’t talking. He then began seeing both a speech therapist and an occupational therapist at a private clinic, because I was starting to get really worried about the rocking.
The occupational therapist and I talked at length, every week, about the rocking in the crib. We eventually decided that our best guess was that it was a sensory-seeking behavior, because he only did it when he was trying to go to sleep or when he was bored (for example, when he was awake but I hadn’t come to get him yet).1 She recommended attaching a piece of foam to the inside of the crib where he would rock so that his head wouldn’t continue being irritated. This worked like a charm and this set-up remained until we moved him out of the closet.
So much time has passed that I don’t remember how old he was when he stopped rocking. But by the time he was a bit past 3 years old, he was able to communicate that he liked sleeping in the closet and didn’t want to sleep somewhere else. So we took the side off the crib (the non-rocking side) and he continued to sleep in the closet.
Then, right before he turned 4, I was out of town for the weekend. My husband sent me a picture of Noah’s mattress on the floor of his sister’s room. She had a bunk bed, so there was already a bed in there, but he was attached to his mattress. I figured it was just a one-time thing, but by the time I returned home, he had decided he was ready to share a room with his sister and the closet had no assigned use for the first time in 4 years.
By the time I got home from my trip, he had decided he was ready to share a room with his sister and she had helped him get his bed all set up (please note the arrangement of stuffies around the perimeter).
I now had a large, almost unused empty closet. You can see in the picture above that Noah had really taken to expressing himself on the walls. There were stickers, crayon marks, and marker streaks all around where the crib. (Know that I had never knowingly left him in there with a writing utensil; if you have ever known a toddler well, you’ll understand.)
A friend joked with me that I should turn it into a sort of “she-shed.” I had recently been at my parents’ house and had been admiring the nook in my parents’ bedroom where my mom has a comfy chair and bookshelves around her. Maybe, I thought, I could have a little sitting room?
The room has no windows, and so I knew that whatever color I chose to paint would make the room seem even darker. Against all recommendations, I went with a deep blue color. (I can’t remember the name, sorry). “It’s going to be so dark in there!” everyone said. “Yes,” I said. “I know.” I decided this room was going to be my version of a sensory deprivation chamber. Dark, quiet, cozy, filled with all of my favorite things.
I took down most of the shelving that was originally in the room and left only one small section near the door, which is where I would hang my clothes (that’s where they were already, and that was all the space they took up). As I painted, I began to form a vision of what the room could look like.
I couldn’t have been more pleased with the result of the dark blue paint. I even painted the ceiling, which made the room even darker. All that was left was to add some furniture.
I happened upon this dark teal chair on Facebook Marketplace for $100 while I was in the middle of painting the closet. The seller seemed legit—they were downsizing and didn’t want to move it. It even came with its own ottoman. It was located only about 15 minutes from my house, so one afternoon I loaded up my little kids and drove to get it. I handed over $100 and took this home. I vacuumed it and cleaned it and let it stay in the garage until I was done painting.
Now that I had the chair, I could start thinking about what else to add. In my head, I saw some white shelving and other white furniture to add a bit of contrast to the extremely dark walls.
Here’s what I bought:
A set of two floating shelves
A small side table with wheels that would fit over the chair and double as a small desk (sadly, the one I bought isn’t available anymore!)
With these items purchased and assembled, I finally had what would be the preliminary version of the Dopamine Den—a name a friend jokingly gave it, but that stuck. My children even call it the Dopamine Den now, and I’m not certain my younger two even know what that means.
I also bought a gooseneck phone holder and repurposed a basket to keep my journals and books in. I clipped an additional lamp to the floor lamp for better lighting when I’m stitching. And I hung some fairy lights on the shelves.
That picture was from almost two years ago, and it was so crazy to go back and see how much I’ve added over the years. It has been a work in progress and honestly is still a work in progress as I add various things to the walls and shelves; remove things that no longer spark joy; find what works for me in terms of organization.
I’d now like to take you on a short tour of the Dopamine Den as it exists today, in January 2026, well aware that I’m going to be putting some of my “little weirdsies,” as my husband calls them, on display.
Here is the view, with the overhead light on, as you stand in the doorway. I never turn the overhead light on, unless I am cleaning or can’t find something. I am very much a little light person.
When I am sitting in my blue chair, this is what I can see. I’ll share more details in a minute, but all of my clothes that aren’t in my dresser are here, except for a few warm weather items that are in a bin in the bottom of my husband’s closet.
Here is the view to the left of my chair. A bulletin board I got at Target, a framed piece I cross-stitched, a calendar, a repurposed bird house that I turned into a place to keep more writing utensils, and some framed cards to remind me of past trips.
I found the 2025 version of this calendar at a Barnes & Noble at the end of 2024, and when 2025 came to an end, I was so sad to take it down. Thankfully, I was able to find the 2026 Feathered Friends Wall Calendar. I do not use this calendar for planning. I use Google Calendar. I mostly use it as a reference when I’m sitting in my chair and trying to figure out how many more days until a certain day. I just really, really like the birds.
This is the overflow of my collection of writing utensils, because I have too many to fit in the other receptacle in the Dopamine Den. As you can tell, this one is also close to being full. I got this birdfeeder in the dollar section at Target. I was there with a friend, and she said, “You could stick pens in there.” I bought it, painted it white, and hung it here to indeed put pens in it. (The writing utensils in here are a mix of Paper Mate Flair felt tip pens, Sakura Pigma Micron pens, Pilot Frixion erasable gel pens, Zebra Pen Dual-Tip highlighter markers, and BIC 0.7 mm mechanical pencils.) The ones in here are either duplicates of colors I already have in my other container, or they are colors I don’t use as often. I am not often compelled to highlight things in brown if I can avoid it.
To the left of the bulletin board, on the top shelf of the floor lamp with shelves, I have LEGO succulents, a candle, a jar of marbles (it was a gift), and a framed picture of Noah from VBS last summer that makes me laugh.
On the right side of my chair, in the opposite corner from the floor lamp, is that same basket you saw in the original Dopamine Den photo. Here I keep the books I’m currently reading, my journal, my bullet journal, and anything else I want to find quickly. Up against the wall are books that I’ve already read but that I haven’t been able to pull my favorite quotes from yet. I also have a phone charger that plugs into a long extension cord because sadly, there are no outlets in the Dopamine Den.
To the right of my chair is the little desk/table I mentioned. You can see the remainder of my writing utensils here. I also have a very old and worn coaster that my daughter made me several years ago and a stack of books on prayer that I’m working through.
Hanging on the wall is a piece of fabric in an embroidery hoop where I keep all my needle minders, which are a helpful tool when using a needle. They’re little magnets that hold onto your needle. These are my extra ones, just within reach if I need one, along with a few extra pairs of reading glasses (I am forever misplacing them).
These are the writing utensils that I keep close at hand. It looks messy here, but there are multiple sections and each section has a purpose: felt tip pens and highlighters; black pens; scissors/ruler/glue tape/bookmarks; markers in shades of red and pink; markers in shades of yellow and orange; markers in shades of black, brown, and neutral colors; and in the middle section, markers in shades of blue/purple/green.
In addition to the writing utensils I’ve already mentioned, the markers are all Tombow dual brush pens. I have bought or been gifted several collections, and now I am slowly collecting the remainders by buying individual markers. For regular writing, I use Pilot G2 0.7mm gel pens.
If you stand up and turn around and look above my chair, you can see some more of my cross-stitch pieces. These are all random pieces I stitched and put in a white painted embroidery frame. Eventually, I hope to hang more.
The floating shelves contain an amalgam of things that are important to me, and some things get switched out. In fact, after I took this picture I realized I still had a Christmas item on the shelf (the wooden block with the church). Included on this shelf are a few cross-stitch pieces, a narwhal I crocheted, and a few items I’ve had since I was a baby.
I have all my old bullet journals here, and sometimes I flip through them for fun. All but one of them (the green one) are Leuchtturm 1917 A5 dotted journals, and I still regret buying a cheaper version that one year because it was not the same. I’m back to the Leuchtturms and I don’t plan to change.
This is the other collection of my journals, but these are my actual journals I write about things in. These date back to the summer of 2015, and I am so grateful for the seasons when I wrote frequently. It is always encouraging to look back and see the Lord’s care over many hard years. The giraffe was Noah’s; he used to sleep with it but then decided he didn’t want it, but I couldn’t bear to part with it. I like to think it’s the remaining connection between the Dopamine Den and its former purpose.
The lower shelves of the floor lamp are 1) books I want to read and 2) books for research and writing purposes. I also have a small trash can (it was supposed to be an ice holder) and the LEGO Botanicals Tiny Plants set that my sister and brother-in-law gave me for Christmas but that I haven’t even opened.
This is my makeshift gallery of some of my cross-stitch finishes that I need to frame or do something with. I have about 25 other pieces in a box that I also need to do something with, but these are currently hanging up so I can enjoy them while I continue to not do anything else with them.
Shoes, jackets, hoodies, and bags.
Yes, these are almost all of my hanging clothes—a few summer dresses are in a bin. You may be asking yourself, “Does she have more writing utensils than she has articles of clothing?” and the answer is almost certainly yes, although I’ve never counted. I never claimed to be a minimalist in all areas of life.
On the shelf above my clothes are a variety of boxes from Hobby Lobby that contain seasonal decorations I put downstairs in a tiered tray. Again, minimalist in some areas, and not so much in others.
To the right is my mini-fridge and our printer on top of it (my clothes are above these). On the left is another shelf where I keep my cross-stitch supplies and other assorted things (such as extra journals).
The fridge is looking a little sparse, but it is stocked with the basics: Chobani coffee creamer and Cherry Coke Zero.
In a basket on the shelf are all of my cross-stitch and crochet “works in progress,” which I keep in project bags with vinyl fronts that I made myself.
Finally, we have the coffee and snack station. I usually have a few more coffee cups up here, but not today. I use the orange cup to refill the coffee maker. That bag in the back is protein bars. Sometimes I have overnight oats in the fridge, and the plastic spoons are to eat that with. The peanut butter M&Ms are just because.
I have realized I am very weird about my K-cups. You may be looking at this and thinking that this looks very chaotic, but let me explain. First of all, the right drawer is just decaf. The other two drawers are regular coffee but I enjoy mixing up the flavors and never have the same flavor two days in a row, so I purposefully put them in so that no two of the same are touching. I recognize this is probably weird, but this is my Dopamine Den, and within its hallowed walls, I may do as I please.
I keep the box of extra K-cups on the top shelf and refill as needed (according to my fancy). I only buy K-cups when they are on deep discount and then I dump them in this large box, where they wait to be chosen for an honored place in the black drawers.
Here, then, is the Dopamine Den in all of its glory, with the big light off, the one and only quilt I’ve made hanging over my chair, a fleece blanket for cold mornings, and a library book on my seat, just waiting for me to sit down and start reading.
When I go on trips, even just for a few days, and then I come home, I always walk into the Dopamine Den and breathe a big sigh. It is part of home to me now, and it is the one place in the house where it’s just my stuff, and it only gets messy if I make it messy, and while my kids are always welcome to come find me when I’m sitting in my chair, they know that they may not remove things without asking, so things are always where I left them.
In a few days I’ll be sending out the first of my Dispatches from the Dopamine Den, a (hopefully) monthly round-up of what I’ve been reading, watching, and thinking about, and so I wanted to be able to tell you about this very special corner of our home. This is where I do all my best reading, writing, and thinking.
In closing, I’m going to give you one more picture of Noah sleeping in the crib in this closet, because it is my favorite one.
(It’s the little feet sticking through the slats for me.)
If you’re wondering why he would have been in his crib for an extended period of time after waking up, allow me to explain. First of all, I did not have a baby monitor because he was always sleeping only a few feet from my bed and if he was awake during the day, he was rocking, and I could hear the thumping from anywhere in the house. If he wasn’t rocking but was awake, he rarely cried, and so I wouldn’t always know right when he woke up. I don’t know if this was related to his speech delay. He was a very content toddler.