Organizing Toys

When I am feeling very sluggish (January, February, March, April) and I need a pick-me-up, I organize. When you think about it. This is the perfect time of year to organize your house top to bottom... 1. The holidays are over, nothing to do 2. You are stuck inside 3. The walls are starting to creep in on you. 4. Better to do it now so once those warm months hit you will be ready to play outside!
So, in light of these observations I have decided to go through step by step organizing. Most of my closest friends are already very organized and therefore not in the need of my services. So...do you want to be my friend? Do you need me to organize something for you? Please.

Lets start with toys. If you are at all like me the toys have exponentially grown over the holidays and are threatening to take over you life and your sanity. I have a plan.

First: gather all the toys in your entire house to one central place for the sort. (It is optional for your kids to be there. I find it helpful if they are NOT. After all, I know best what they play with and what they just scatter around for someone (me) to pick up.) Dump them all out and start sorting into piles: blocks, legos, dolls, tea party, dress ups, trucks, Pet shops, etc. *Don't forget another important category: Garbage/ Donate.

Some categories will be obvious and some will be "to unique to classify" (Like the Micky mouse ears that light up) or if you only have a few of something then they can be clumped together.
Sorting is great because it puts things together the way they use them. For example: My kids love to play with their dogs, they put them on leashes, they play vet, etc. So instead of keeping the dogs in with the stuffed animals I put them all together in their own tote. *Don't be stingy about getting rid of things. If your kids don't play with it anywmore or it's broken, or it came from McDonalds or the dollar store, etc.

A repectable pile of garbage

One of the most important things I do with our toys is store half of them... This serves two purposes; it cuts down what is in circulation by half and it gives the kids a chance to see what they have and play with them, when they are tired of what is out, we switch them around. You would think it was Christmas morning when we open the toy bin up. (I guess that was 3 things.) They could be stored high in the kids closets, in the garage, in a spare room...

Our toy space is in our main living space so I like it to be neat and tidy. I took pictures of each of the groups of toys while I had them out (before putting 1/2 in storage) to go in the front of the canvas totes. Since Grace is the only one that can read, this works well so all the kids can help with the cleanup.

There are lots of different ways to store toys; in big plastic drawers, on shelves, even in bags for each category if everything gets thrown in a big toy box. The reason it is good for each thing to have a 'home" is that it gives a defining space where it should be and makes it easier for the kids to play with and pick up when they are done.

Pretty neat huh?

Any questions?