Allison's Wonderland: The Toys are Organized!!!

I told you after I finished my pantry that my next project was going to be the kids toys. I never believed I would actually do it. But on Friday (on mop day, no less) I just jumped into it. And once you start dumping toys all over the floor...on purpose...there's no going back. So, let me show you what I did.

The Problem-

This is what the room looked like before. I'm almost embarrassed to show you that picture. The chest that you see on the left is where the kids keep most of their toys. As you can see it is overflowing. Small toys get lost in the bottom. You can't tell what is in there so toys don't get much playtime until EVERYTHING is taken out and thrown all over the floor.

After my pantry organization I was determined to find a way to get this room organized by spending little to no money. So I went shopping in my house. I grabbed any basket, tub, bin I could find that I thought could be used to store the toys. Some of them were being used for other things, but that's ok...we'll solve that problem later. I only spent $5 on a tub from Dollar General. I'm ok with that.

My 2 biggest challenges in how I determined my next steps were:

1. How to separate "girl toys" and "boy toys" since at the moment my 6 yr old daughter and 3 yr old son share this room. We plan to move the 2 boys in here together when the baby turns 2. Then I'll get to re-organize! YAY!
2. Space- The only storage unit in the room that will hold any baskets, tubs, bins, etc.is the bookshelf and as you see it is overflowing with books. I couldn't buy a new piece a furniture for the room at the moment.

The Solution-

I took everything out of the toy box. The only things that went back in were stuffed animals- which it turns out were a lot of! The basket to the right of the toy box, which was previously their laundry basket, now holds balls-and a jump rope. The next pink basket is for Katie's Barbies. And the last red basket holds animals.

Here's where the real work began. The 3 clear plastic tubs on the top shelf already had those toys stored in them, but I moved them from the bottom shelf to the top. They hold legos in one, magnetic dolls in another, and random small toys in the other.

My lovely black and white Thirty-One bags were holding my 20 month old's toys in the living room but he had outgrown most of them. So I snatched them. The one on the middle shelf holds Katie's dolls and the one on the bottom holds books. Now the kids can take the whole basket of books to their bed at night and put them back when they are finished. The books still standing on the shelf are ones I didn't want to get messed up. I also took a lot of books off the shelf so that the ones in the basket can be swapped out.

The wicker basket on the bottom is for Charlie's trucks.

The blue bins on the top hold Charlie's Hot Wheels and action figures. The 3rd one is empty, but it looks nicer arranged in 3's right? The Thirty-One bag (polka dot) behind the blue bins holds Katie's My Little Pony toys.

This is extra storage space that I found in the closet. Sorry about the dark picture-the light in the closet was out. The shelf was once used for a box of shoes and a suitcase. And in the floor there was a box of bedding. I moved those things to the top of the closet. Now Charlie's big, bulky trucks can line up on the shelf. On the floor is the tub I bought, which now hold their dress up clothes, and Katie's doll furniture.