Article originally published in the Panama City News Herald.
LYNN HAVEN — Joelle Davidson walked into her children’s bedroom holding her 3-year-old daughter Mayvory Rienzo, followed by her boyfriend Josh Brady, holding her 5-year-old son Maverick Rienzo, and 16 volunteers.
Davidson and Brady set down the two children, each only a little taller than 2 feet, so they could walk around their new room. They looked around and saw a newly painted room filled with Mickey and Minnie Mouse decorations and furniture at their scale.
“It’s honestly perfect,” Davidson said, looking around the room in the Lynn Haven home.
The two beds, decorations, clothes, custom 18-inch high shelves and a painted kitchen were done for free by Rooms with a Purpose. The organization renovates the bedrooms of children with life challenging illnesses. Founder Sherry Melton said her organization means to, “give these children not only a place to go and rest and recuperate from what they are dealing with, but to give them independence anyway that we can.”
The two children with a rare genetic disorder similar to dwarfism, were nominated by Denise Bass, the children’s nurse care manager. Her job is to help the family navigate complex medical programs and coordinate appointments. Bass first heard about Rooms with a Purpose from other families she works with in Bay County. After seeing the single mother struggle to find safe furniture for children so small, Bass reached out to Rooms with a Purpose.
Because the children are so small, standard size children’s beds are to large and high off the ground for them to use safely. Bass saw that they were sleeping in cribs with holes cut in the mesh sides. This worked for a while, until Maverick, who his mom describes as “fearless,” started climbing the sides to get out instead of stepping out of the cut out onto the floor. Picking out clothes was also a challenge because dressers are much taller than the children.
Saturday morning, volunteers headed to the home in Lynn Haven to begin work. Four volunteers pulled everything away from the kitchen walls and painted the kitchen avocado green. Two volunteers took to the bed room and finished painting the inside of the closet to match the paint in the rest of the room.
Joe Warren, a volunteer and carpenter, brought two miniature beds shaped like homes. Davidson and Melton picked out the design because having the children on the floor would be safer than a raised platform bed.
Mayvory, walking into the room, went directly to the closet to find a new wardrobe at eye level. Maverick ran after being set down to his new bed, covered in warm tone LED lights. After looking at the beds, the brother and sister found the two chairs in the room, just low enough to the floor that they could sit in comfortably. Maverick handed pillows to the volunteers sitting in the room and motioned for them to play catch with him and each other.
Davidson is hopeful about the coming school year and thinks the new room will be a comfortable place they will want to spend time in.
“They do everything kids their age should do,” Davidson said. “Nothing holds either of them back.”