Wednesday, February 24, 2016

Organizational Challenges

Another birthday, another influx of toys.

Reagan is about to turn four. Birthdays when you're four are exciting. She's been checking out the toy aisles for weeks, wondering what this birthday will bring. Since Christmas she's developed a few new interests, and she was very excited to start her collections.

My organizational style for toys is to set the kids up for success when it's time to clean up. It's much easier to tackle the toy soup when you know what you're looking for. We have an organizer that works well. We have a bin for Barbie. A bin for Disney Princesses. A bin for Paw Patrol. A bin for Strawberry Shortcake. When it's time to clean up, they grab a bin and go hunting.

The biggest challenge with this sort of system happens right after Christmas and birthdays. We get a new "variety" of toy that doesn't fit. It doesn't have a bin, or a box, and there isn't quite enough to justify one. If you have one pony, one character, what do you do?

What I ended up using for these lone stragglers were these boxes. The handles let them be easily carried from room to room. We started using these to house the girls' weekly surprises. They're sturdy, they're translucent enough to see what's inside, and they work well to house the strays that conspire to confuse our cleanup.

It's hard to manage birthday presents from friends, but an easy way to "try out" a new toy that you aren't sure about is to use a system like Pley. Pley allows you to rent toys like building sets and character sets, and then return them to get a new one. If you love a set deeply and want to start a collection, you know what to ask for. If it's a "fun for a few weeks" set that you won't add to, there's no harm in trying things out.

When it comes to organizing toys for easy clean up, what's your biggest challenge?
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