"Some went down to the sea in ships, doing business on the great waters; they saw the deeds of the Lord, His wondrous works in the deep. For he commanded and raised the stormy wind, which lifted up the waves of the sea. They mounted up to heaven; they went down to the depths; their courage melted away in their evil plight;
they reeled and staggered like drunken men and were at their wits' end. Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and He delivered them from their distress. He made the storm be still, and the waves of the sea were hushed. Then they were glad that the waters were quiet, and he brought them to their desired haven." Psalm 107:23-30

Sunday, December 9, 2012

Order

This weekend I came up with an idea to add more order and peace to our home.

We have a lot of toys...like... a lot. I like toys. We even have, gasp, plastic toys. We even have...non open ended toys. But I think a lot of parents underestimate their kids' abilities to make almost anything open ended. Our kids don't get much TV to occupy them, maybe a couple shows a week, and since they're at home all day every day, they become very creative.

Earlier this summer I had a garage sale and sold off a lot of non open ended plastic toys. While I don't really regret getting rid of some of the things I did, because they were large and really really non open ended toys, my kids still ask for them even 6 months later!

So, instead of going on a crazy purge again I found these. I am going to, one afternoon when they are sleeping and otherwise occupied, go into the playroom and box everything up in these bins. I will leave out the legos, one large toy too big for a bin (we have several things like a parking garage, melissa and doug castle, etc), and one bin worth of toys. The rest will be neatly stacked in the storage area of the basement.

But even further I'm packaging up all of our children's books in a different color bin. We have sooo many. And while I know I could get rid of a ton I'd rather bin them up and put out enough to fill this little fabric bin we have. I can rotate them every week or two. I'm thinking simplifying a ton will make our days soo much easier and to have 4 o'clock come around and not have the house look like a toy store threw up will be so nice.

This change comes after a change I made in the bedrooms. We got rid of all our kids dressers and I bought each kid 3 fabric "bins": they have no lids and handles on either side. My oldest has black, my middle blue, and my third green. One bin is for shorts, one for pants, and one for jammies and underpants. They slide easily under the bed. All shirts are hung up in the closet. This cleared up so much space in the bedrooms, got rid of the problem of dressers being a disaster both inside and on top, and also made it so the kids can very easily put away their own clothes.

What changes have you made to simplify and organize?
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4 comments:

  1. CathyDecember 17, 2012 at 11:59 PM

    I love bringing order to my home. Being flexible is a great help. I mean, a certain organizing system might work for a while, then need to be tweaked again, into something different. And I love getting rid of unnecessary stuff, it simplifies everything.

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  2. MelroseDecember 18, 2012 at 6:50 AM

    I so agree. Being flexible, learning new ways, refining old, is the only way to find all the places that you've missed before. Here's to simplifying!

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  3. AnonymousMarch 8, 2014 at 1:51 PM

    I find this very intriguing, Melanie. Very. I never have really like dressers. I like them for myself, but not for my kids. I will have to think on this idea of yours. Bins to go under the beds.
    Karen

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  4. MelroseMarch 8, 2014 at 3:35 PM

    Karen, it has been such A HUGE blessing! I can say now over a year later it has been a huge success. The bins are light and easy to move, only about 18 inches by 12 inches and maybe 14 inches deep. The littlest kids can be handed a pile of clean laundry and told to "go put this in your pants bin". With only 3 bins, laundry sorting is easy. Everything else gets hung up. Then we have a family sock basket. No dressers, no bulky furniture taking up room. Wonderful!

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