How to organize and maintain a kid's bedroom? What works for you?

[profmom]

Straightening, sorting, clearing out, and organizing my 7-year-old's bedroom is one of the things on my list, "Things I want done this summer -- before school starts!" What works for you??

 

Here are some of our problems:

 

1) Too many toys! She's the youngest, so she has her toys and hand-me-downs. She also thinks she wants ALL of them. I've tried to set up something like a "toy library," but I must be doing it wrong. We clear out a bunch of toys, sorting them into plastic containers, take them out to the garage, and they end up trickling back in or somehow it's all messy again (even when I think I'm being consistent about having her trade something that was in her room for the toy she wants from the garage)! What is your solution to organizing toys? If you say it's limiting toys, how exactly do you do that?

 

2.) Too much paper! She has a desk for drawing and a cork strip to hang some of her work, but there's still more paper. I've tried giving her sketch books instead to keep the paper contained, but she still manages to use lots of loose paper too. What do you do with all this artwork?

 

3.) Too much junk on surfaces! Her dresser, a table, her desk, and nightstand are cluttered. Do I just need to be super-strict about only decorative things on most of these surfaces, plus a neat desk? Maybe I should reduce the number of surfaces?

 

4.) Messy closet -- but this is mostly because there are too many toys.

 

5.) Lack of good maintenance routine. What really works here? It's going to involve my inspecting the room twice a day, isn't it??:glare::confused:

 

 

Any tips will be appreciated!!

[Guest]

For the paper, I just gave my kids a "paper drawer". In it goes all those coloring sheets, church crafts, things they just can't live without, etc. I clean it out occasionally. Seems to work here. :)

[Guest]

My daughter actually had a drawer for awhile that she called "my don't -know-what-to-do-with drawer". I thought that was pretty cute. She knows that I like everything to have a home.

[Oakblossoms]

Keep their clothes in my room till the are old enough to care from them properly.

 

Pack up all toys in plastic bins. They get one bin at a time and can swap them out once a week. The bins can stay in the closet unless they start dumping or mixing. Then all the bins go away somewhere else.

 

Pack away all but one small basket of books.

 

Basket or drawer for art supplies. If they cannot keep them cleaned up then they go in the kitchen and they can create when someone is nearby. My kids get sketch journal or bright books from Rainbow Resource. I think that helps a lot with the paper.

[Soror]

Well, I'll speak about I do for mine who are 7(almost 8) and 5. They are each in their own rooms. DD5 (along w/ dd2.5 now) have a long bench w/ totes, a play kitchen, a toy box, desk and nightstand. Everything must fit neatly in those spaces and they must be able to keep it clean or there is too much stuff.

She has:

dress up clothes in the toy box

hairstuff and jewelry in the nightstand

pens, crayons etc in the desk

paper/stickers in a small basket on the desk and a stack of coloring/sketch books on the bookshelf

play food and dishes in the kitchen

baby toys in one cubie

puzzles in another and

musical instruments in the last

 

Ds 7 has one large book shelf in his room with a cabinet on bottom which has 4 big totes and some extra space:

 

he has:

play cars in one tote

outside toys in another ie ball, gloves, nerf gun

small box of legos

Box of k'nex

one tote of misc. lincoln logs, tinker toys, and a few odds and ends

a few remote control vehicles on top of his dresser

He does have a few odds and ends on shelves, which is ok as long as he keeps it reasonably neat.

 

I do have dd clean 2x a day but ds I generally might remind once a day but he naturally keeps his clean.

[justamouse]

Clean it (after I teach you and you are capable) or I throw it away. Don't believe me? Go ask your big sister.

[lotsofpumpkins]

My 7-year-old ds had trouble letting go of papers until about 6 months ago. I would sit with him and help him to sort them, and then one day it clicked with him and he does great cleaning up his stuff on his own now. All of my children have a "treasure drawer" in their dresser. They can keep whatever they want in there (except food, living creatures, etc!) as long as it fits.

 

As for toys, is she willing to give some away if she knows that less-fortunate children will be able to play with them?

 

When our toys got out of control a couple of years back, and my dc were so overwhelmed with the mess they couldn't even clean it up, I put everything into a monster rubbermaid tote and called it "toy timeout". They could only play with the toys that had still been up on the shelf. A few months later I finally took some time to go through the "toy timeout" box, and threw away a lot of trash (old papers, broken toys, etc). I also donated a lot. I figured if they hadn't asked for it in a couple of months, it was okay to let it go. The other toys were sorted and put into boxes up on the shelf. Once in a while we have to purge the toys, but it has gotten a lot better. I think we finally reduced them enough that it's not overwhelming to put them away. Having certain containers for certain types of toys helps. I've found that my dc play more and are more creative when there are fewer toys around. Too many just clutter up the playroom and make it unpleasant to be in there!

[Heidi]

Toys are not allowed in the bedroom other than sleeping with one toy in bed.

 

We had a day recently where we got rid of all of her toys except five. It was a sad day, but she got over it and treasures her few toys more than her three dozen. No more rotating boxes of toys that never got rotated anyway.

 

We have a paper drawer where we put art work that gets partially emptied every once in a while.

 

All shirts are hung on hangers. Dirty clothes don't touch the floor; they go straight to the laundry room.

 

The clutter and junk on the dressers goes in the trash.

[Plink]

I once received the advice, "Don't expect what you won't inspect" and I have found it to be very true.

 

We keep bedrooms in order by making cleaning (a achievable section, not the whole room) part of our morning routine. I don't tell them what to tidy, but I do supervise to make sure that they finish the task that they chose for the day. Hmm... Not sure if I am explaining myself well. Try looking here for more info about our morning routine.

Edited July 11, 2012 by LibertyH

[Samiam]

Here, we don't have toys in the bedrooms. It's not that it's not allowed so much, just that we have a room just for toys downstairs, so they don't tend to make it up to the bedrooms upstairs. Just no need.

 

That has helped ALOT as all kids' rooms that I've ever seen that were messy, was primarily toys. For that matter, the toy room is trashed on a normal basis here. By far the messiest room in the house.

 

If my space required toys to be in bedrooms, I think I would do a "limit" of toys, and most toys would be in boxes, and rotated in/out of use.

 

Also having a place to organize is key to be organized. Shelving, bookcase, etc....gotta have a place to put stuff.

[KungFuPanda]

I gave birth to a naturally organized child. In my experience this only works 50% of the time.

[acablue]

I hate clutter.

 

Toys: Our kids only keep one set of toys in their bedrooms. The boys have their Legos and Molly has her two favorite dolls and their accessories. Everything else stays in the playroom. At bedtime, if there are other things in their room, I take them downstairs with me.

 

Papers: Keep a recycling bucket next to the desk and instruct her to put everything in there that she doesn't want to keep. Keep a folder or binder handy for her to put things in that she does want to keep. Give a warning, then periodically throw all loose papers in the recycling. I also have a paper-fiend. :glare:

 

Junk: Do you mean things like hairbrushes, jewellery and random knick-knacks? My daughter always forgets what she owns if it's put away in jewellery boxes, so I got a few small plastic tubs that she keeps on her dresser for "hair things", "jewellery" and "other things".

[Kaleidoscope]

I emptied my kids rooms of everything and started over. They were only allowed to choose 3 types of toys to keep. It was a hard day but a good one in the long run. I spend so much less on toys now and the value what they have.

[violingirl]

Our mantra- if you can't keep it clean you have too much stuff.

 

- Everything has a specific place to go.

- I've taught them how to clean up and put everything back in it's appropriate place.

- We clean up by the end of every day. We very rarely let it go more than a day unless kids are sick or something.

- I inspect after they clean up and anything left out becomes my toy and goes in a box in my closet to be brought back out whenever I feel like they've been doing a good job of keeping things picked up.

 

Every 3 months or so we go through and re-sort toys, get rid of broken things, and get rid of papers. The papers are still the hardest since my kids like to draw a lot. But we have perimeters the kids and I agree on for what to throw away- anything that is "scribbles" or quick drawing that they didn't finish, any scraps that they cut out and were saving for some reason, and anytime there are 20 drawings of the same thing I can get them to pick the best 2-3 and keep those. It was really hard (and there were lots of tears) the first few times we had to toss papers, but we just can't keep every little thing they draw. They can easily draw 15 superheroes in a day so their art box is out of control by the end of the week if they keep it all.

 

My boys also have 7 younger male cousins to pass toys on to, and that has made it easier for them to give things away when they know it will go to cousin X or cousin Y.

[Soror]

Our mantra- if you can't keep it clean you have too much stuff.

 

- Everything has a specific place to go.

- I've taught them how to clean up and put everything back in it's appropriate place.

- We clean up by the end of every day. We very rarely let it go more than a day unless kids are sick or something.

- I inspect after they clean up and anything left out becomes my toy and goes in a box in my closet to be brought back out whenever I feel like they've been doing a good job of keeping things picked up.

 

Every 3 months or so we go through and re-sort toys, get rid of broken things, and get rid of papers. The papers are still the hardest since my kids like to draw a lot. But we have perimeters the kids and I agree on for what to throw away- anything that is "scribbles" or quick drawing that they didn't finish, any scraps that they cut out and were saving for some reason, and anytime there are 20 drawings of the same thing I can get them to pick the best 2-3 and keep those. It was really hard (and there were lots of tears) the first few times we had to toss papers, but we just can't keep every little thing they draw. They can easily draw 15 superheroes in a day so their art box is out of control by the end of the week if they keep it all.

 

My boys also have 7 younger male cousins to pass toys on to, and that has made it easier for them to give things away when they know it will go to cousin X or cousin Y.

 

I should just waited you were more precise, this is our system pretty much.

 

Personally, I don't like toy rooms because then there ends up being a lot more toys and another room to clean. If they are limited to what is in their room it doesn't leave room for as much and they are each responsible for their own messes.

 

I also agree with Justamouse- if you cannot keep it clean then I will and I'm not sentimental, at all. The kids like it when I help them organize though. The time before last that I helped ds, who was right at 7.5 at the time, he went on and on about how lucky he was and what a great mom I was because most moms probably wouldn't help their kids clean their room. I didn't tell him this mind you but I didn't correct him :)

[chepyl]

Right now, we have a playroom. All toys stay in there. I send the kids twice a day to do a quick pick up. It seems to be working.

[kroe1]

For every house I move into, the first thing I do is install closet organizer's in the kids' rooms. When they are little I also have shelves on the walls. The garage has large shelving hanging from the ceiling for all the plastic boxes of toys and Christmas decorations. I keep toys hidden in every room of the house so there is less dragging of toys from room to room. And, finally, we have the one toy rule.

 

HTH :)

 

Now if I could just get the dog on a one toy rule.......

[Lawana]

We used underbed storage containers with wheels. Dc could each keep as many toys as would fit in the containers. We had 2 under a twin size bed. I have one that had no problem sorting out unwanted /unused items, and one that that everything was special. With her, we would box up and put in the attic things that wouldn't fit in the underbed containers. Every once in a while, she would ask for something from the attic, but for the most part it was out of sight out of mind.

 

The advantages of underbed containers are two:

1. Since the containers are shallow, dc could see almost everything at once. It eliminates the desire/need to dump the entire container to search for something.

 

2. It makes the room neat when all toys are put away, eliminating visual clutter.

[Tess in the Burbs]

well I require weekly cleaning so the floor can be vacuumed. The closet often goes unnoticed but when I do see it out of control it's done when I have time to stand guard so it happens :glare: But as long as they can get to the bathroom without tripping over toys it's once a week cleaning here. Clothes in drawers I prefer folded but hey, it's their wrinkled choice not to. But the clean room is usually only a few hours b/c once it's vacuumed they take the toys back out. but we have tons of buckets and drawer units to organize things.

[MiniBlondes]

Wellll, this is an ongoing process for us and we change our routine quite frequently but here's the gist.

 

They 'clean' their rooms twice a day. The first is before lunch. I don't require a heavy clean so much as a de-cluttering. If you took it out at 7 am and you haven't played with it since 8... well.. it's 12 now... time to put it away. The fact that they're hungry and want lunch usually helps motivate them. I don't check this one but they know how to clean it in case I do. Then about 15 minutes before bed I tell them it's time to pick up. This is when I expect the room to be actually relatively clean.

 

As far as how we organize it... My 7yo has the following categories of things in her room:

 

1) Paper and various art supplies

2) Books

3) Barbies and Monster High Dolls

4) American Girls

5) Littlest Pet Shop/Polly Pockets/other little playset things

6) Stuffed Animals

7) 'Random' toys (i.e. a cash register..or a guitar)

 

And here is how she sorts it:

 

1) Paper and various art supplies The art supplies go in a basket on a shelf on her desk. The 'paper' goes in another basket. Once it gets full, she's responsible for cleaning it out and deciding what is important. Tiny pieces of paper STRESS ME OUT. They know it so they keep it out of my sight. Otherwise I'll throw it all away.

2) Books - Bookshelf unless it's one that she's reading, in which case it's on her bedside table.

3) Barbies and Monster High Dolls - We have 2 milk crates beside the Barbie house. As long as the stuff can fit in there, she can keep it. If it starts overflowing, she has to give some away.

4) American Girls I'd say AG takes up about 50% of her room. There is SO much of it. She has a AG cottage which opens and closes. She 'hides' most of her AG stuff in there, including the dolls. We have a AG armoire where she can hang up clothes and things.

5) Littlest Pet Shop/Polly Pockets/other little playset things Similar to Barbie. The LPS houses and PP houses are all closed and against the wall. She plays with all of these things together so all the little pieces go in a fabric basket.

6) Stuffed Animals On her bed. Except lately she's been putting her Webkinz in the AG cottage. I don't care as long as it's out of my sight.

7) 'Random' toys (i.e. a cash register..or a guitar) - HERE is where I get her. We have a tote and we call it the 'random toy tote'. She is allowed to have as many random toys as she can fit inside of the tote and CLOSE the top. The tote then goes in her closet. If she gets a new random toy but her tote is too full, she has to decide what to donate in order to be able to close it. The result of this is that she rarely plays with random toys.

 

Other than the closed 'random toy tote' her closet is ONLY for clothes and shoes. We have a system for organizing those as well. If anything is on her bedroom floor when I come upstairs to tuck her in, it gets confiscated. Also, we have a box in the laundry room that we call the 'sock box' and all of their underwear and socks get tossed in the box. It's way easier than folding 110 tiny pair of underwear or matching a bazillion pair of neon striped socks. Especially since the new trend is mismatched socks.

 

This system is working for the moment and has been for about 2 months. Good luck!

 

ETA - As far as junk on surfaces, it comes down to what KIND of junk? A place for everything and everything in its place. Is it little pieces of paper? Paper basket. Jewelry? Jewelry box. Brianna has a lot of 'doo dads' that are important to her. Like a pretty rock she found outside. Or a bead. Or a feather from a craft project she made at VBS. She has an old shoe box that she has decorated and calls her 'Secret Thing' box. All 'doo-dads' go in the box.

Edited July 11, 2012 by MiniBlondes

[garddwr]

My kids' bedroom has beds and not much else--I keep bed linens in the closet. Their clothes are in a separate room (closer to the laundry area), toys are minimal and kept in the common areas of the house. The bedroom is for sleeping. They do play in there, and they like the un-clutteredness of it.

 

That's what works for us!

[prairiegirl]

We have this same problem and I think the key is to daily tidying up. I have just decluttered dd's room. We spent a week (yes, it took that long) in throwing out and organizing and I am hoping that we will be able to maintain the cleanliness by tidying up (and my inspecting it) every day.

[Blessedmomof4:)]

I needed help in this area myself! Great ideas!

[A.Balaban]

These are great suggestions!

 

I am "getting ready" to go through all my kids toys AGAIN. Last time I got rid of all the infant toys.

 

I really like the idea of limiting # of toys. Only problem is most of the toys I buy the kids are from thrift store or hand-me-downs. My mom is the one who spends the most on toys for the kids. How do I limit that?! :tongue_smilie:

[blondeviolin]

Their bedrooms have dressers, a bookshelf with books, beds, and hampers. Toys do not go in the rooms. We have nifty bucket/drawer things and they are allowed one at a time in the living room. If you want a toy bin out, you have to clean the living room first. Then, in order to get another one, you have to put the first away. They don't play with toys as frequently now. LOL