basement refinishingplayroom ideas long

So I don't think I realized how LONG the winters get when one is at home with young kids. :) My project this summer is to make the basement into a pleasant place for adults to hang out, and for the children to play in. I'd love some suggestions, if anyone is into this kind of thing.

The goal: To turn the basement into a area that is primarily devoted to entertaining the children, but which is tolerable by adult standards.

The challenges: It's a basement.

What it looks like now: A large cement floored fieldstone-walled basement. The stairs come down in the middle of it, and on both sides and behind the stairs are cupboards-closets. So basically, the room is shaped like a donut - the cupboards-stairs are the hole.

Laundry machines are in the Northeast corner. Furnace and water tank are in the southeast corner. Stairs to the back yard are along the back (south) wall. Exit to the storage room and garage along the West wall. The ceiling is exposed floor joists, and a wild tangle of exposed plumbing. The walls have been painted green and white. The floor has been painted green. The ceiling is dark wood.

The challenges:

The basement has seepage along the walls in spots, so we can't wallboard-finish the walls. Because of the plumbing which dips below the level of the ceiling joists, we cannot tile or hang a dropped ceiling.

So we can't finish it nicely for less than about 30 k to fix the above challenges. Our fallback position is to work with what we have, and try to make it nice without dropping a huge amount of money.

Ceiling: We can paint the joists (which will lighten the room up visually, but the plumbing will still be a disaster. Another thing I was thinking was stretching sails (like from a sailboat) at the joist line, overlapping to create an inexpensive, more finished look. Other than that, I have nothing.

Floors: Everything in a basement has to be water-proof or cheap to replace. I'm thinking of getting those inexpensive interlocking foam floor tiles in different colors to warm up the room, and to designate play areas (ex: yellow tiles for the play kitchen, dark blue for the play area, etc.)

Walls. I have nothing. I'm thinking of building parbreastions to block off the furnace and hot water tank, visually and from the kids, but I'm so un handy it isn't even funny. Plus, there is that dampness factor again. We don't have mold, and I am concerned that adding wood and wallboard is going to encourage it. So I need some ideas on how to block off the furnace area. Do you all think that modular panels (cubicle walls, for example) might work? Other challenge - the laundry machines don't bother me visually, but we have a lot of lint in the air. Any ideas?

Lighting: No windows, may replace yard door with french door for light. Five bare bulbs at present. Charming, eh?

Decor at present, if you define decor as "stuff loosly organized, but still looking like butt": Back-south area - mats on the floor, collapsable playground slide, swing hung from the rafters - eg: playground. East area: pretend play, tv, need some comfy adult seating for laptop use, but don't know what kind to look at. Dampness an issue. North area: walking area, TV to be mounted on wall near ceiling. South area: Laundry and storage.

So basically, I would greatly welcome suggestions as to what options I have for ceiling-wall-floor-parbreastion and furniture. If anyone is into this kind of thing, I'd greatly appreciate it.

Donna