Kids rooms can be such trouble when it comes to keeping clean & organized. I recently, with the help of some IKEA products, got the clot...

Organizing the Toy Closet, Product Recommends, & a Room Tour

Thursday, November 03, 2011 , , ,

Kids rooms can be such trouble when it comes to keeping clean & organized. I recently, with the help of some IKEA products, got the clothes under control. Next I needed to tackle the dreaded TOY CLOSET!
Toys are the worst.
This is what my girls room looks like every other day. Because every other day we pick up all the toys and shove them back into the closet. And the room looks clean again, until naptime is over and it all vomits back into the room. 
For obvious reasons, I was fed up and in desperate need of some organization. 
So back to our new IKEA to pick up some VESSLA.
According to my online Swedish to English dictionary, "vessla" means "embodies". Perfect, because I needed something to embody these toys. 
{WHY do toys these days have to come with so many little pieces? You can't just get a Barbie. Barbie has to come with 50 accessories that will only end up hiding in weird little places all over your house...}
I wanted to label all the VESSLA boxes, so I have to tell you about this awesome little label machine that I recently received through the Amazon Vine program. This has quickly become my favorite household gadget, it's amazing! {And no, I have not been asked or paid to say all this. I just sincerely love this thing.}
This is the third label maker I've owned, but this one is by far the king. It has 14 fonts, over 80 decorative frames, tons of features I've never seen on a label maker before, and you can purchase additional tape cartridges for ALL types of labeling. 
Glow-in-the-dark labels for camping accessories and light switches.
Iron-on labels for kid's clothing or sewing projects.
Gold on black labels, plaid labels, clear labels...
Which is what I wanted for this project, clear labels.
 And then I went a little label-crazy...
 But that's the thing about keeping a clean house 
{which I dream of but never succeed in.} 
It has to be organized. A place for everything!
Can you tell I've been having a blast with the label maker?
Anyway, next came the dirty work...
So then it was time to start sorting. 
 I learned three things on this project.
First, we actually don't have as many toys as I had thought. Once they were sorted and boxed, it no longer seemed like too many toys. I still got a donation box going for things we no longer care for, but it became apparent that the mass of toys was so much more intimidating when they were un-organized. 
 Second, we really don't have as many music toys as I had thought. I guess we didn't need a whole VESSLA for those. {But, hey family, Christmas gift idea??? We have a box to fill, here.}
And third, this little monkey toy, which Eisley loved,
scares the crap out of Violet. 
It terrifies her. 
 Before taking on this project I had to assess how many VESSLA to get and what to label them. I ended up with six: Kitchen Toys, Musical Instruments, Puppets & Dolls, Puzzles & Games, Baby Toys, and Dress Up & Costumes. 
There are tons of organizational containers out there. I chose the VESSLA because you can also purchase lids for them, they have little wheels on the bottom making them easy for kids to use, and they fit well into our toy closet. 
I have one more in our living room for those toys that end up all over the house.
Books get their own shelf, and behind the VESSLA was enough space to tuck some random toys into. This system works perfectly for us!
 What was utter chaos yesterday is clean, functional organization today! Toys aren't so bad after all... {And as you can see, I also have a couple VESSLA boxes down there for storing out-of-season clothes for the girls.}
Finally both sides of the closet are tidy and labeled. 

Since we're here I figured I'd show you what the rest of the room looks like. Hardly a Pottery Barn Kids dream room, I know. But as renters, I hope maybe I can give some fellow renters some inspiration? Maybe just even a little???
We have permission to "paint away", but we just haven't done it with this room... {yet.}

The chair is a bad upholstery job I did. 
The drawers from a flea market. Bed is from IKEA. 
Eisley's little "house". This kitchen, because we couldn't afford Pottery Barn's similar one. Santa brought this doll crib last year, too. 

 Her roll-top desk. Okay, I was the one who had to have this. Found at an antique mall. Husband haggled the price down. Love that guy. Love my in-laws for taking him to auctions and teaching him how to haggle. {I've even seen them haggle down hotel rooms.}
 This is Eisley's "Bedtime Checklist". 
It's a--you guessed it--IKEA frame. She uses a dry erase marker to check off her bedtime chores.
This is the other side of the room. 

Violet has finally outgrown her bassinet {which can be found here, but don't buy it because it was pretty but seriously poor quality} and lives in the corner of this room until we get Violet's room together and figure out what to do with a round bassinet...
Finally, the little console I painted a while back {remember?}, Eisley's pet fish, the bright pink Foo Dog, and... a camera???

 Yep. That's our little baby cam! This is something Justin & I used to think only hover-moms purchased. Then I got one to review from Amazon Vine and all I can say is--WOW!
It's actually a really great thing to have for several reasons. This model tells us the temperature in the room, it can play lullabies, it has night-vision, and an intercom! It's also safe against creeps who try and pick up on monitor signals from outside your house.

We thought we'd put it on baby, but it's actually a great toddler/small child gadget, too. When Eisley tries to sneak out of her bed at naptime I can simply tell her over the intercom to get back into bed and go to sleep. 

Although she's still a little wary of it. When Justin saw her wake up yesterday he said on the intercom, "Good morning Eisley!", he then walked into the room and she looked like she'd seen a ghost and said, concerned, "Camera said good morning."

We can also keep an eye on the girls playing while we're cooking dinner in the kitchen, see if Eisley has fallen out of bed when we hear a noise at night, and monitor Eisley for any more of her Sharpie rampages. 

So, turns out we're believers in the whole baby-monitor-camera thing. Who knew?
So there you have it!
A freshly organized kids room. 

...plus some product recommends and a room tour. 
If you're still with me - thanks for coming!
________________________________________

One more ting about product recommends, I'm planning a week of "Heather's Favorite Things" coming soon. If Oprah can do it, so can I! Except I can't give you all each item for free, there might be a give-away or two. I hope it will give you all some ideas for great Christmas gifts this year! I'll be posting every day for a week, probably right before Thanksgiving, each day focused on a certain genre such as "Beauty Products" and "Cleaning Products."

I have some great things to share...

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1 comments

  1. Wow, just wow. Can you come organize my house? I'm totally looking into the Vine thing...

    ReplyDelete

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