Oh so Organized?

Well. I'm organized for now. Ha. I took Claire to pick out bins this morning. She wanted to climb in them...

I needed some different sized toy bins for toy organization. I had gone almost a whole year or maybe a tad longer before I got 2 large clear rubbermaid bins for Claire's toys. I just keep the lids in the closet so they are like toy boxes.

But...all the little toys would fall to the bottom and get "lost"---and she would only play with the toys on top! So then about last year at this time I got about 5 small baskets for toys, but they are really too tiny.

So today I got some smallish to mid-sized bins to organize toys. So now there is a bin for her Barbies, a bin for baby-ish toys like teethers/rattles (got to keep this out for littler friends!), a bin for things with wheels (and here I thought she had a lot of girly stuff!), a bin for random little "crap" toys/figurines, etc, and finally, a bin for blocks. I put one of the big bins in the closet to rotate the bigger stuffed toys/dolls. Her wagon is actually empty instead of full of toys, so she can play in it, which she did tonight, which kept her nicely away from the toys I was trying to sort.

The upstairs always seems more organized for some reason. It's mostly just books and stuffed animals/dolls in her "playroom." Plus, I think we spend a lot more time downstairs.

Now...I wonder how long this will last....ha! Actually, I'm trying to get into an evening routine of picking up. She thinks it's still fun at this age. Of course she gets easily distracted, but I think it will be easier if she knows Barbie stuff goes in the Barbie bin, etc.

She is pretty good about keeping her toy food stuff by her toy kitchen and her books on her book shelves. She knows her shoes go by the back door and her pens/pencils/papers go in her little desk. Yeah...I found a little plastic desk at a yard sale when she was like 11 months old! They were nearing the end of their day, and basically gave me anything I touched for 20 bucks TOTAL!!! It's the same garage sale I got her bike seat at.

I saw the exact same desk at Big Lots around Christmas for $30 so I was excited that it's a "new" desk, that's still being sold. It even has a little drawer in it and shelves on the side. The top is angled with pockets and places to put stuff. I decided to just let her keep her "own" paper, pens, and pencils in it since she LOVES that stuff and wants to play with it everyday. And knock on wood, she has never drawn on a wall or anywhere she shouldn't...knock on wood that she won't do this tomorrow just because I said she hadn't yet. Way to screw myself! :)

I actually got her craft stuff organized too. I re-purposed a 6-drawered mid-sized caddy thing that I've had forever. So she has all her crafty fun stuff there, which I stashed in the cupboard under the microwave. I couldn't do messy crafts anywhere but at the kitchen table. She's still pretty messy with the paint/glue.

We've also started leaving the baby gate at the bottom of the stairs down because she doesn't play on the stairs or anything anymore. She would the first several times because of the whole novelty of the thing...but I'm still a little leery to leave the top one down. I know that most home accidents are on the stairs. Kids fall mostly from stairs, highchairs, and changing tables, right? Hmm...so maybe I should leave the bottom one up?

I have to keep the top gate up though because otherwise she would have no boundary and be free to roam the upstairs, and that's just too far away in this house!

So I'm feeling a little bit organized, but not nearly as much as I'd like to be. I feel like there is still a lot that I need to do soon AKA...before baby boo two arrives. I guess picking out a name would be another good thing to do...ack. We are so not going to decide on this until like, um, he's born! Yeah, it sometimes feels like when you start organizing, that you just realize how much more stuff there is to organize.