One of my readers seems to be at her wits end trying to keep her son from tossing everything on the floor. She was so tired of the constant chaos that she wrote to me for help. This is her situation and my recommendations:

Dear Kathi,

I am a subscriber to Add Space to Your Life and enjoy reading and seeing people’s lives change by simply getting organized.

Well, my question involves my son.  He is 8.5 years old and is the most disorganized child I’ve ever known, he keeps everything and most of it gets left on the floor or stuffed in a drawer.  It drives me crazy and I need some suggestions. 

He has school papers, books, toys, art/craft items, etc.

What we have in place Read the rest of this entry »

Situation: Too many books and toys and not enough storage. All this clutter and the little girl could not decide what she wanted to play with.

Solution: We downsized the toy collection and got rid of the outgrown games and books. We also reorganized the closet which gave us a bit more room for extra items that did not belong loose in the room. The dog loved the new found floor space!

Situation
A den that was no longer used by the family except for storage. What had once been a family gathering place and kid’s play area became a thruway as the kids grew up.

Challenge
Left over furnishings and toy storage containers still full of 10 year old and no longer used toys. New toys for teenagers like telescopes etc. This area was also a staging ground for donations to the local school fundraising auction.

Solution
Set a deadline for auction items to leave the home. Donate all excess furniture and old toys. Rearrange the room so that people might begin using the space for a lounging and watching television.

Situation: This long and narrow room had ample floor to ceiling and wall to wall cabinets but the toys were constantly out and underfoot. The challenge was that the younger child could access the older child’s toys and had not learned how to put them back into tubs. At the same time, she was quite young and only beginning to learn how to put things away for herself. Add too many toys into the equation and this room became a constant challenge and source of stress for mom.

Solution: Purge and sort through excess toys and donate to charity. Organize the toys by type and activity into plastic bins with lids that could not be easily opened by the youngest. Place her toys low and at her level and her older sister’s up and out of the way on the higher shelves. With snap lids that were not quickly opened, the young one could not easily dive in and dump all of the toys while no one was looking.  It was also easier to supervise her and keep her focused on one type of activity at a time. The older child now had her games and toys up where she could get to them as she wanted and knew how to put her toys away when she was done playing.

Situation:
A dining room that was transformed into a kid’s playroom. The challenge was too many toys. This created several issues which resulted in toys that were never put away.

1.    There were toys that were no longer used and taking up precious storage space
2.    With too many play options, the kids were bouncing back and forth between activities with no real focus
3.    Because new toys were constantly added without removing old toys, storage for every item was impossible, there was simply not enough space for everything.

Solution:
1.    We purged and donated toys that the kids no longer used.
2.    Keeper toys were reduced in half with half stored in the playroom for easy access and the other half stored in Rubbermaid tubs on shelving in the garage
3.    When the children grew tired of certain toys, they were rotated out or donated and replaced with a few of the ‘new’ toys from the garage tubs
4.    We placed toy collections with multiple small parts up high and out of reach of the toddler. He was able to play with these items only with supervision and when there was time to oversee that he put them back into their designated containers. When they were behind closed doors, he forgot about them anyway.
5.    I repurposed the shelving unit on the right in the ‘before’ photo and moved it into the hall closet where it fit perfectly without removing the shelf above and it became a very useful haven for backpacks, purses, shoes and craft materials.