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How to Organize Toys with Lots of Parts

by Jennifer

My son has many large toys and several small toys that contain lots of pieces, like train tracks and cars for example. He is 2 years old and I just can't figure out what to keep and what to get rid of or just plain what to do with it all. We only have 2 bedrooms so our living room is basically Toys R Us. I have a TV, a couch and chair and our computer desk in our living room. Can you help me???


Thank you in advance,
Jennifer

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Apr 08, 2010
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by: The Organizer

Hey Jennifer,

I don't intend to be discouraging, but I can tell you that the "lots of parts" only gets worse as the child ages. Polly Pocket toys and Transformers drove me and my friends crazy when our children were young, but they loved them. These are the best solutions that we came up for storing toys with lots of parts and keeping them all together.



  • Give limited access to the toys with lots of parts.


    • You can store them in a closet in a storage boxes or in under-the-bed storage units. In order to play with them, the child has to ask you to get it. This allows you the opportunity to supervise and make sure that all of parts get collected in the clean up stage.

  • Use cubby hole storage units for small toys.


    • Baskets can be placed in the cubbies for small toys with lots of parts and a cubby hole without a basket is pretty awesome for keeping books and stand alone items.

  • Declutter the mess.


    • Watch closely to identify your child's favorite toys. If there are things that are just taking up space, store them away for awhile to see if the child asks for them. If they don't, get rid of them.



It would be extremely helpful if you could relocate the majority of the toys to a bedroom. While your child is probably too young to play in his room without direct supervision, it will make it easier to assure that the toys get put up once he is finished playing with them and it will definitely make you feel better to get it out of your living room.

You will find some pretty awesome ideas for organizing toys on Organize-It and you will likely find my article on organizing kids stuff to be extremely helpful.

-The Organizer



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