Hellobee

I think Mr. Deer and I are definitely minimalists when it comes to having a bunch of “stuff” in our lives. Before Little Deer was born, I thought we would have a few good quality toys and like the other areas of our life, we wouldn’t need to worry about too much clutter. Well, fast-forward to having a rambunctious 10 month old who loves to take her many toys, books, and stuffed animals and throw them wildly all over the house. Sigh.

I do so love getting on the floor and making a mess with LD, but it is nice to be able to get things cleaned up quickly too. When thinking about all of her toys, I decided that:  1) I wanted her toys to be easily accessible so she could pull them out herself and 2) I wanted us to feel like we still had an adult space, so the ability to tuck away her toys out of sight was important. We don’t have enough space to give her a designated play area, so staying organized and incorporating her things with our normal furniture was key. With a few tricks here and there, this is the breakdown of how we incorporated Little Deer’s toys – room by room:

The bulk of LD’s toys are in the living room because that’s usually where we hang out and it also gives her plenty of space to play. When we moved into our new house, our landlords gave us a welcome basket (best landlords ever!). It’s quite a large basket, so I decided to use it for LD’s toys. Since we don’t put too many things in our entertainment center, we decided to pull out the shelves on the right side so that LD’s basket of toys could sit nicely inside. That makes it easy for us, accessible for LD (she quickly figured out how to open the door), and when we’re done playing they can be put away out of sight. This works great too in that once the basket is pulled out, LD also likes to grab a toy and crawl inside the entertainment center. It’s a perfect little hideout!

Also in our living room, we have a bench that we use as an ottoman. This is not only great because it’s soft and padded (no sharp edges in sight!), but because it has an area underneath for storage. I’m still on the hunt for the perfect baskets for it, but for now it’s a great place to stack some of Little Deer’s books. On the inside of the bench closest to the couch, we have a basket with our television remotes and our Bibles, but the outward facing side is all for LD’s play. She often cruises around the bench and then stops to pull out some books for us to read. It works out great.

DINING ROOM

Continuing with the basket theme, I found another basket at Goodwill a few years back for two dollars. It now holds Little Deer’s toys and sits in the corner of our dining room. I often set it in the kitchen for her to sort through and play with while I’m cooking, or I’ll put it next to our dining room table since she likes to crawl around under there too (which is right in view of the kitchen). Now that she’s getting bigger, she’s also enjoying tipping the basket over and dragging it around with her. Silly baby! Though I usually leave it sitting out, it’s easy to grab and stash in the hall closet if we want to get it out of the way.

KITCHEN

Sometimes regular baby toys just are’t enough to keep her occupied, so when I’m in the kitchen Little Deer also has her own drawer full of kitchen goodies to play with too. I’ve dedicated the bottom drawer which houses our tupperware to also be her kitchen play drawer. Besides the tupperware, it’s also full of her favorites like a wooden spoon, spatula, some measuring cups, a whisk, and a few toys too. While I’m cooking or unloading groceries, I’ll just open up the drawer and she’ll go to town pulling everything out and scattering it around the kitchen. Though it gets messy fast, it’s easy just to put everything right back in the drawer when we’re all done.

LITTLE DEER’S ROOM

Though there’s no problem with having baby items out and about in LD’s nursery (it is her room after all!) I thought I’d mention how we organize toys in there too. I’m not strictly a Montessori follower, but I do love the idea of making LD’s things accessible to her. She’s already very strong-willed and independent, and if she wants a certain toy then by all means, I’m happy to let her have it!

In her room we set up shelves with cubbies. They’re mainly for her toys, but the higher shelves also have her shoes and a few clothing items. She can easily reach things and pull out the bins to get at the toys she desires, which is great. Next to the cubbies I have yet another basket (sensing a trend here?). This one holds her extra stuffed animals and blankets, which she also loves to pull out frequently. The last thing in her room, her bookcase, is somewhat accessible to her too. I put a few of her loveys in the bucket on the bottom shelf, and a few of her favorite books on the next shelf up for her to get to as well. I will add that for safety we secured all of these items to the wall, so that if she were ever to climb on them they wouldn’t topple over.

And that’s how the Deer family tackles toys! Phew. We don’t have any of her toys in our bedroom, and if we’re ever in the office I usually just pull out a pink bin full of toys from her cubbies and bring it in with us. I’m all about making things easy, so having baskets, shelves, and cubbies for storing LD’s toys and such works out perfectly for us. I should add that we don’t have many big baby items out anymore. The jumperoo has been retired to the garage, as has the swing. The only other thing that sits out is her walker, and we usually park it out of sight next to a bench by the fireplace when she’s not using it.

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How do you keep toys organized in your home?