I feel so overwhelmed with all the junk in our house. Any tips for clearing clutter?
I'm especially looking for help with toy rotation/storage and organization. We lack storage in our home, but I want to keep *most* of Chloe's toys for little sis
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Wash and dry all the ones you want to put away well, pack them in rubber made bins, and store them in the attic or basement?
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@Mae: attic is virtually tapped out (it's a crawl space) and basement is a finished living area with no storage. Like, NONE.
We are getting a shed (hopefully?) this summer so we can move all our lawn equipment into it, which would clear the garage.
Seriously, SO MUCH JUNK.
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Toys: see if you can find all the pieces for everything. If you can't, get rid of those items.
Look for furniture with storage, like those cube ottomons, those are great for duplos, for example.
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@looch: good point about an ottoman doubling as storage. I'll have to do that downstairs!
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We have under the bed storage for D in her room. 4 big flat bins that roll under her bed plus a few smaller containers.
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Do you have an attic or basement you can store them?
For general decluttering, I see it as if I haven't worn/used it in the past 6 months, it goes either in the trash or donation pile. No second thoughts. If I need it again in the future, I'll re-purchase.
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@Alivoo01: no basement storage. It's also a finished living space and doubles as a play room.
Our "attic" was unfinished when we bought the house. It's nothing more than a crawl space (my husband can only reach and grab, absolutely no room to stand), and it's pretty maxed out with our winter clothes + Chloe's old clothes (saving for baby) and Xmas decorations.
ETA: good call on the 6 month rule. I cannot tell you how badly I want to have a dumpster put in my driveway so I can throw junk out the window. Literally.
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In case you're curious, my #1 must have in a new house is storage space and closets.
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Another thing you can do is those plastic sterlite brand storage drawers. My mom moved out some furniture in her living room and replaced it with one of those and I thought it was silly, until I realized it is chock full of stuff for my son. It works well and can be used in other parts of the house eventually.
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@looch: I'll look at those, thanks! One of our biggest storage issues is all the tiny pieces that go with toys. Like, we've got a Barbie overload going on and shoes and hats and clothes are everywherrrree.
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I'm a plastic box fanatic. I have at least 20 of those small (shoe box sized) plastic boxes from Ikea and many more of the patterned cardboard ones, all labelled up. One for batteries, one for cables, one for dog treats, two for craft stuff, several for smallish toys.... the list goes on. I then have shelves everywhere. The little things can go on shelves when they're in boxes! For very tiny things (Barbie shoes for example, or small craft items), I love sets of tiny drawers - you can get plastic ones, wooden ones, decorative ones, functional ones....
.... it could be like Barbie's fabulous walk in wardrobe!
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I've just run around the house, snapping my storage! I'm a pretty mediocre parent but I'm a grade A obessive-compulsive!
Here you can see:
- Playroom storage - boxes on shelves
- On top of wardrobe storage (Large ikea cardboard box)
- High shelf inside a wardrobe storage (more boxes!)
- Little set of drawers - I use this one for costume jewelry
storage
- Pots on a rail (Ikea, again) for little bits
- Inside drawers (Ikea AGAIN do drawer dividers) -
I recently cleared out a lot of her baby/infant toys and stacked them in plastic sterilite bins in the garage. I use tons of plastic bins and baskets in the house to keep things organized. We just stack them on the floor in a corner of her play area so she can access them easily. Everything has it's own basket and that really cuts down on the amount of *stuff* that just rolls around.
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