The first time I pulled out all of Isla's clothes and began to put them away, I was overwhelmed. How were we going to fit all the clothing for both girls in a space that was currently consumed with clothing for just one girl?
My girls have way too many clothes. I just can't help but buy clothes for them, especially when I find a good deal. And then there are the grandparents and aunts chipping in too! The result is a whole lot of little girls clothes.
My project yesterday was to organize their clothes: pull out things that no longer fit or are no longer worn and put everything else in order. The key to making everything fit in their room is to clean things out on a regular basis. I think I do a fairly good job of staying on top of this, but it was definitely time for some organization yesterday.
This is probably extremely boring to most of you, but since I love reading other people's real life organization tips, I'm sharing mine as well.
This is the girls' dresser. Audrey is super thrilled to show it to you, can't you tell??
We inherited this dresser, and the drawers and shelves are really big. That's nice because it can hold a lot of clothes. But it's also a pain, because it can hold a lot of clothes...and those clothes get disorganized very quickly.Right now, Audrey's pants are in the top left drawer and her pajamas are in the drawer below that.
Inside the door, Isla's pajamas are in the basket on the top and Isla's pants and white onesies are in the basket on the bottom. To try to take advantage of some of the empty space, I tuck her sleep sacks in right next to the baskets.
Then there is the huge drawer at the bottom. I have tried to divide the huge space into smaller spaces with baskets. Audrey's socks in one, Audrey's panties in one, both the girls tights and leggings in one, and Isla's socks in the last one. Behind the girls' socks, I tuck the diaper/panty covers that coordinate with their dresses. This system works okay, but it gets messy quickly...especially when Audrey helps put the clothes away.
In the closet, I hang all of the girls shirts, dresses and one piece outfits. Isla's on the left, Audrey's on the right, and empty hangers in the middle to separate the two spaces. This is mostly in season clothes, but there are some of next season's clothes hanging up on the ends as well.
Again, the key to making this work is frequent purging of clothes that are no longer being worn. This is the pile of clothes I pulled out yesterday. I have a system for these clothes as well. In our basement, I have two storage areas with tubs for clothes: one for clothes that we are going to keep and one for clothes to sell in our spring garage sale.
Right now, everything Isla outgrows goes straight into the garage sale pile. For Audrey's old clothes, I evaluate whether I think it is something Isla might wear. If I don't think I will ever put Isla in it, it goes straight to the garage sale pile. I'm not really sentimental about clothes, and I see no reason to hold onto clothes that we are not planning to use.Then there are the bows. Oh the bows! My aunt keeps us well stocked with bows and hair accessories. Currently, Audrey's clips are stored liked this.
Hanging them like this works really well, because it is easy to see and pick out what you want quickly. The biggest problem we have is getting them here. We lose bows ALL OF THE TIME. I bet we really own twice this many clips, but they are all lost somewhere. Before taking this picture, the girls and I went on a bow hunt to comb the house for missing bows. We didn't find very many, so I really have no idea where all the other bows have gone.
Isla has her own collection of bows to wear with her helmet. But since they are Velcro, I can't hang them like Audrey's. So, her bows are all stored in this box along with some headbands. It's a little more of a pain to find what I'm looking for this way, but I don't really know what else to do with them.
There you have it, our system for keeping clothes and bows organized! Thrilling reading, wasn't it? I really do find it fun to organize things and read ideas for organizing things. I just need to figure out how to stay organized once the initial excitement of getting organized is gone.
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