Organizing tips/ideas?

[cjcouple]

Anyone want to share their organizing tips, ideas and/or favorite spots? We just did our entry way. So nice not to have a pile of shoes. We are going to have the walls repainted soon.

[cjcouple]

Qe also have a coat hanger/rack to place up after walls are painted.

[mamaalysson]

Oh man, I am on an organizing blitz! I’m a pretty type A person anyway, but the rest of my family is not, soooo...

I just did our front closet. I’m proudest of the closet rod. It’s always bothered me. It’s too low to fit any storage nicely underneath, and it has a shelf above that I have a stand on a stool anyway to reach. So I went to town on it. I took out the old rod, ripped the dumb shelf out and installed a new rod 6” higher. I put another rod at the very top of the closet and hung hanging shelves from it for the stuff we don’t need constant access to. Now our vacuum actually fits, along with a little rolling cart that the kids can roll out to get their hats and scarves off of. And the cart has a couple of little hooks for their backpacks. It’s very neat and we can actually close the door. Such a luxury.

IKEA and Sharpies are my organizing secrets with kids. Trofast systems everywhere in their playroom, all bins labeled. No excuses to not get their shit put away now.

[dizzycooks]

Sept 8, 2018 17:16:47 GMT -5 mamaalysson said:

Oh man, I am on an organizing blitz! I’m a pretty type A person anyway, but the rest of my family is not, soooo...

I just did our front closet. I’m proudest of the closet rod. It’s always bothered me. It’s too low to fit any storage nicely underneath, and it has a shelf above that I have a stand on a stool anyway to reach. So I went to town on it. I took out the old rod, ripped the dumb shelf out and installed a new rod 6” higher. I put another rod at the very top of the closet and hung hanging shelves from it for the stuff we don’t need constant access to. Now our vacuum actually fits, along with a little rolling cart that the kids can roll out to get their hats and scarves off of. And the cart has a couple of little hooks for their backpacks. It’s very neat and we can actually close the door. Such a luxury.

IKEA and Sharpies are my organizing secrets with kids. Trofast systems everywhere in their playroom, all bins labeled. No excuses to not get their shit put away now.

I’ll take pictures anytime...

[mamaalysson]

Sept 8, 2018 21:49:39 GMT -5 dizzycooks said:

Sept 8, 2018 17:16:47 GMT -5 mamaalysson said:

Oh man, I am on an organizing blitz! I’m a pretty type A person anyway, but the rest of my family is not, soooo...

I just did our front closet. I’m proudest of the closet rod. It’s always bothered me. It’s too low to fit any storage nicely underneath, and it has a shelf above that I have a stand on a stool anyway to reach. So I went to town on it. I took out the old rod, ripped the dumb shelf out and installed a new rod 6” higher. I put another rod at the very top of the closet and hung hanging shelves from it for the stuff we don’t need constant access to. Now our vacuum actually fits, along with a little rolling cart that the kids can roll out to get their hats and scarves off of. And the cart has a couple of little hooks for their backpacks. It’s very neat and we can actually close the door. Such a luxury.

IKEA and Sharpies are my organizing secrets with kids. Trofast systems everywhere in their playroom, all bins labeled. No excuses to not get their shit put away now.

I’ll take pictures anytime...

I probably need the app to post pictures.  I’ll see what if I can figure it out tomorrow.

[momin2013]

We have a similar set-up inside our front door (we don't have a mudroom): shoe rack, deacon's bench that opens, with a hooks/cubby thing hung above it. For me, it's key to have somewhere organized to drop everything when I walk in the door, so that works nicely. The only drawback is it's inside our front door, so our foyer sort of lacks the formality it could have. Oh well.

In DS' room, we got him this cubby organizer from Ikea that's 8 12x12 compartments (we have it lying horizontally so it's 4 cubbies across, 2 high), and the soft-sided boxes to go in it. That's been an awesome way to keep all his toys organized and out of sight in his room!

[cosmowife]

These racks from ikea have been a godsend. These two are for the boys.

I also have a third that I use for the adult coats.



As you can see, our laundry room/mud room is hideous. But it is spacious. Some day we will get around to hiding the pipes, wires, hot water heater, etc. We have no basement so the furnace is also in this room.

[court26]

cjcouple,that looks great! My son has that same blue UA backpack
cosmowife,those shelves are awesome! I wish I had an IKEA within 5 hours of me!

I am in search of some ideas so this is a great post. DH recently built me some shelves for my laundry room that are awesome, but now I want MORE things to help me stay on track!

[nicolewi]

This is admittedly not my strong suit, but I keep trying.

I will post my one helpful thing, again, that I got online (from one of you??). I bought one of those plastic cascading folder thingies and hung it on the wall. It gives me a "home" for all the random papers the kids bring home that I need to hold on to for a while, like book logs, book orders, lunch menus, field trip forms, their daily schedules, teacher contact info, etc. I think this is the one I have:

smile.amazon.com/Smead-Cascading-Organizer-Pockets-92060/dp/B00H0FJLZS/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1536510619&sr=8-3&keywords=cascading+wall+organizer

It's been great for me to have an easy, quick, accessible place to stash that stuff.

Also, I bought more bags. Instead of randomly gathering up stuff for dance, etc, and throwing it into a bag each time we need to go, I have started to get dedicated bags. Each girl has a dance bag for that stuff so we don't go searching for shoes at the last minute. Each bigger kid also has a Lands' End drawstring bag that they can use for soccer or whatever other activity is going on, to corral their water bottle, ball, jacket, etc. We keep them all hanging in the mudroom. I have a tote that I keep snacks and activities in for the smaller kids, so I can grab it on our way out the door.

I want to do better about getting their clothes organized and meal planning. I have good intentions (which will probably quickly fall apart) of at least starting the year with having a whole school week of clothes laid out for each kid, and having a dinner plan so that we are stocked up on supplies.

[lexus]

Sept 9, 2018 11:36:15 GMT -5 nicolewi said:

This is admittedly not my strong suit, but I keep trying.

I will post my one helpful thing, again, that I got online (from one of you??). I bought one of those plastic cascading folder thingies and hung it on the wall. It gives me a "home" for all the random papers the kids bring home that I need to hold on to for a while, like book logs, book orders, lunch menus, field trip forms, their daily schedules, teacher contact info, etc. I think this is the one I have:

smile.amazon.com/Smead-Cascading-Organizer-Pockets-92060/dp/B00H0FJLZS/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1536510619&sr=8-3&keywords=cascading+wall+organizer

It's been great for me to have an easy, quick, accessible place to stash that stuff.

Also, I bought more bags. Instead of randomly gathering up stuff for dance, etc, and throwing it into a bag each time we need to go, I have started to get dedicated bags. Each girl has a dance bag for that stuff so we don't go searching for shoes at the last minute. Each bigger kid also has a Lands' End drawstring bag that they can use for soccer or whatever other activity is going on, to corral their water bottle, ball, jacket, etc. We keep them all hanging in the mudroom. I have a tote that I keep snacks and activities in for the smaller kids, so I can grab it on our way out the door.

I want to do better about getting their clothes organized and meal planning. I have good intentions (which will probably quickly fall apart) of at least starting the year with having a whole school week of clothes laid out for each kid, and having a dinner plan so that we are stocked up on supplies.

The dedicated bag trick is a good one! It makes life so much easier.

[cjcouple]

Yes, I like the dedicated bag. The red one on the left in my picture is my sons basketball bag. He also has a drawstring that he uses for PE and XC.

I don't have one for soccer because I don't have anything that stays in it. DS2 doesn't change his cleats at all. He leaves the house in full gear and just carries his water bottle. When they get home, the shinguards need to be hung and aired out, socks and uniform washed. My husband is the coach so he just keeps my sons ball in with the teams equipment bag. If he played school soccer, that would be different.

[cjcouple]

Sept 9, 2018 10:29:53 GMT -5 court26 said:

cjcouple ,that looks great! 

Thanks!!  If anyone is interested the shoe racks are at Lowe's for 13.99. I have 2 stacked.