The Organized Home – Baby & Toddler Edition
Home is everything to us today. It’s not only our sanctuary, it’s where we work, school our children, exercise – the list goes on and on. So, a well-organized home is more important than ever.
The state of your home can directly impact your mood. When your environment is a mess, it might make you feel like one too. There is a psychological basis for why a messy space makes you feel more stressed and less confident. “Clutter signals to our brain that our work is never done, distracts us by drawing our focus away from what our focus should be on and bombards our minds with excessive stimuli.” (Sherrie Bourg Carter Psy.D. - Psychology Today)
While a cluttered home leaves a busy parent feeling even more frazzled, life with young children can make it hard to keep your home feeling clean and inspired. Some simple organizational strategies, though, can give you a home where you worry about clutter less and enjoy your little one more.
We reached out to Lindsey Sanchez, a mom and professional organizer, for tips on keeping the mess to a minimum. A New York native living in North Carolina and founder of @primspace, Lindsey specializes in creating home environments that are family friendly and easy to manage.
First, Lindsey is quick to point out that “staying organized with kids is an ever-evolving process. As children grow and develop, so do their clothes, their toys, the foods they eat, and so forth.”
Children in the baby and toddler stage quickly outgrow clothes, supplies and gear. Overnight, that supply of bottles and bottle accessories, once so important, becomes unnecessary clutter in your cabinets. Clothes your child has outgrown make her dresser drawers chaotic and overstuffed. Suddenly, you feel stressed every time you fumble around trying to find the things your baby needs now, at her current age and stage.
Committing to periodic sweeps of the most problematic areas for parents – pantries, closets and drawers - can make a big difference in your home. Every few months, go through and donate what you can, store what you think you’ll use for later children down the road and throw away the rest. The last part is hard, but necessary. Am I the only one who finds it hard to throw away the little essentials my baby has used and loved?
Toys are a different matter. If you buy the right ones, they’ll be a part of your family life for a long time to come. Lindsey’s objective is “to create a method of organization for each space with ease of maintenance in mind. For children, labels are essential! When everything is labeled, everyone in the household knows exactly where each item belongs. This is incredibly useful both when looking for a particular item as well as when it comes time for clean-up! When my clients have children that are too young to read labels, I will incorporate a label with a picture alongside the word.”
The concept of labeling with the picture next to the word is a great precursor to preschool, where your child will find this system in his classroom. You can get custom labels on Etsy and organize to your heart’s content. We found these labels on the Etsy shop monogramsbymollyshop. The bin system shown in the picture is a playroom must-have from Ikea.
Some of the other storage pieces we love for babies and toddlers? Stackable storage bins like these from Closet Maid that sit low on the ground and have wide openings for throwing lots of items in at once as you clean up. They’re perfect for blocks, balls, dolls and larger items.
Bin units like this one from KidKraft make it easy to organize sets with lots of smaller pieces. The bins pop out to easily carry the toys to another room. You can pop the bin back into the larger unit when you’re done later. They’re perfect for the toddler and preschool stage when kids’ play involves sets of toys – alphabet magnet sets, play dinosaurs, tea party toys, etc.
Cube Units like these from the Container Store are a must for any home with children. There are so many ways to configure them, they come in lots of different colors and finishes and look fresh and clean in any room of your house. Plus, you can find the cube bins that go in them in a variety of colors, patterns and materials to complement your own personal style.
We love having a few canvas toy storage bins laying around like these fun ones from 3-Sprouts. They are big enough to fit a whole zoo’s worth of plush or rolled up blankets for snuggling up in or laying out to play picnic.
Smaller bins like these from pehr are perfect for brightening up any nursery and corralling like items that you use together. One might sit atop a dresser with hair accessories, a brush and bottle of detangler hidden away inside. Another might hold hats and mittens in your mudroom in winter. When there is a designated spot for small items you use every day, you’ll instinctively put them back in their place and won’t waste time looking for them when you need them.
One of Lindsey’s most refreshing takeaways is that organizing a family home is meant to set the stage for play not inhibit it. Children can be more enterprising and imaginative with their play when the space they enter is clean and organized. Once playtime begins and they start to explore a mess will ensue! With a good organizational system in place, you’ll find it easy to get it all put back together again and ready for the next time. “Children play and make a mess because that’s what they are supposed to do! With my systems in place, resetting the space and the process of cleaning up is meant to be easy and, dare I say it – FUN!”
IncrediBundles.com believes in the power of play and the importance of making the lives of parents easier so they can focus on what matters most. IncrediBundles.com Diaper, Wipes and Book Subscriptions are the hit baby gifts and toddler gifts that keep on giving month after month.
