Disorganized and Messy Online Support Group

My cousin called to chat and I confided in her my toy situation.  Then she made a fantastic offer.  She was willing to come organize my toys in a way that Mr. Three would be able to easilly pick up after himself. Now this was an exciting offer, both for the toys being organized and being able to teach Mr. Three, whom I was worried was absorbing my Disorganized and Messy ways.  Then as a party bonus, if you will, she was going to do all of it while I cleaned the rest of my house and she was bringing a crockpot of barbeque pork.  Now this was all an offer I could not refuse!

So when she came we turned on some music and got to work.  My cousin relentlessy gathered up into one giant pile each and every little toy owned by Mr. Three and put them in one big pile.  Then she accessed what he had and began to sort them by category: trains/ tracks, cars/trucks, motorcycles, food, people/action figures, blocks, animals and tools.

Once the toys were sorted by category she put each seperate grouping into a colored bin.  Now we happen to have that toy sorter that has shelving that comes with seperate colorful bins but she said in her classroom she used a cheap Walmart bookshelf and colored dishpans from the dollar store so you don't have to have the fancy toy sorter.

Next she took a few out of each bin and set them up in a cute grouping.  For example she gathered a few cars and trucks and put them on the table.  Then she photographed them with her digital camera and went onto the next category until she had cute photos of each category.

After all the pictures were taken she  printed them, cut photo holders out of an old half filled album and put the pictures in them and taped them to the bins.  Voila!  An adorable and user friendly system for organizing our little toys.  She did say  in her classroom she also labels each bin with the names of the categories to help the kids recognize words but my bins were too small.  If you like the system and have bigger bins you might consider labelling them.

The best part of this system isn't even the categories as far as I am concerned.  I have tried that only to have all my hard work undone.  It's the pictures.  My cousin said it may take a few weeks but if I consistantly make a silly game out of matching the toy to the toy category picture that Mr. Three could learn to put everything away nice all by himself just like the thirteen kids in her class!

All of this work took about two hours and then we sat down with her kids and Mr. Three for dinner, ice cream and a card game.  It was the perfect day and now I have a great system for toys so this is not just an article on organizing but a story with a moral to it; if someone offers to help dig you out of your Disorganized and Messy don't be afraid to say yes!  You may be more blessed than you can imagine.