Simply Organized of NWA: Organizing the playroom: Reclaiming Our Spaces Series

Do you have kids?

As you can probably relate, things got real disorganized once we had children. It is hard enough to keep yourself organized. But then you get married and you often marry someone with opposite tendencies as yours. I did. Then you might have kids and all ~~hell~~ clutter breaks loose!

My house is 1777 square feet. Smaller than the average home for four people but we feel it is large enough. If we can't live within this boundary we have clutter issues. Can I just say how blessed I feel to actually have a room designated for play and play things?! If it weren't for this room my living room would often look like this and make me throw up every single day:

Two steppin' it

I tackled this room in two phases. First, my seven year old and I purged and sorted the toys. My kids are like most Americans. They have too many toys. In spite of us having Birthday parties where we tell people gifts are not allowed. In spite of pretty good Grandmas trying to not spoil our girls. Somehow toy accumulation takes over.

I had organized this area in a way that worked well for me and my seven year old handled it pretty well too. But then came Lu and her organizing style is ~~non-existent~~ different. She is newly three so it was time revamp the toy organization. I decided the best thing I could do is box toys up and start them on rotation. I had a lively Facebook discussion with other moms who helped me decide on my method. Here are all the reasons I chose this route:

The less options the more they will play in a focused manner.
Having the majority of the toys out of rotation equals more space to explore.
Over-stimulation is reduced.
Each time they open a new tub, to them it feels like they have new toys.
With each tub rotation it's another opportunity to purge and maintain.
It's way easier for everyone to clean up. At the end of the day it all goes back into the one tub that is out for that week. And it's not really that many toys.

I gathered all the large tubs I had on hand and decided that was all we would use. I kept some toys out for permanent use. It took Miss Smarty pants and me about three hours to go through all the toys. It was a lot of work but we enjoyed our time together. Since my tubs are all totally different I used plain white labels and dressed them up with different types of washi tape! That made it fun for me.

The playroom closet

The playroom closet had been looking like this:

My daughter loved those green organizers at first. She put hats in one, skirts in another etc. Eventually she didn't like using any of this as is. And I felt this setup was under-utilizing this space. I moved the last of the two toy tubs into the closet and left it like this for two weeks.

I spent that two weeks thinking about how we needed to continue to change this space. I observed my girls' play more. I spent time thinking about it and looked around at inspiring ideas. I felt the best thing for this closet was to outfit all of it in custom shelving. Not. In. The. Budget. Bummer!

So, I stole some great storage drawers from my 3 year old's room. I also raided my Clever Container stash (one reason it's nice to be a consultant with them) and created shelving with the Shelves-On-The-Go.

I wish you could have been beside me when I hung up the portable shelves. I was really giddy.

Beyond toy organizing

Here is the rest of the room:

*Let me explain why Totoro is tucked under there. My seven year old says he is a spirit so this is the perfect place for him. Have you seen that Disney movie based on a Japanese story? I think her idea is that Totoro helps protect her. It's her playroom so that's where it stays. And hey, it can protect our guests that sleep here too. Don't you love a kid's imagination?

Yes, the pink tree stays up all year...it serves as a nightlight. And yes, some of my husband's toys are in here too.

Here is how I display kids' art. I have some nails hammered right on the paint line. I used some twine and ran it around the nails. Now I just use clothespins to hold them on. After they've been displayed a while we decide what to keep and those that make the cut go into the "forever box."