I am thankful for our little home, it's where we have brought all 4 of our children home from the hospital and soon bringing our 5th. We purchased our home before we had children and at the time thinking that we would probably just have 2 children. Blessings have been poured out on us because we will actually have 5 verses the 2! With that comes lots of stuff!
So we find ourselves every so often organizing the space we do have.
Here are some ways in which we organize homeschool materials, toys, etc.
We have utilized all the wall space we can and in needing more room we had to go upward so one of the ways we did was our wall of cube shelves. 81 cube shelves total that line our wall. It contains children's books, toys, some of my books as well as homeschool items.
I have it done by category, believe it or not I know just about where everything is!
We say we have a 2 story garage because our 1 car garage is bursting out at the seams so my husband installed hanging shelves which are suspended from the ceiling using plywood as the shelves and bolts and chain to hold in place. We have had this system for a few years and really helps!
With 6 of us in our home soon to be 7 you can imagine the shoes! So instead of all the shoes by the front door I have them organized by person. Each person has a bin with their name on it. When they come inside they put their shoes in their bin. No more shoe clutter or tripping over shoes!
I also utilize our downstairs bathroom door on the inside AND outside. On the outside I have a cloth shoe holder to store smaller toys while the instead of the bathroom I have another shoe holder that has cloth diapers and pull-ups for my little ones.
And in our kitchen my husband made a pull out pantry. You can read the full post HERE. This has been a lifesaver - I store all quite a bit of our can goods on this shelve. I wish I had room on the other side of my refrigerator for another one!
If you have any organization posts on your blog please leave them in the comments, I would love to read them! I will be posting more on how our famiiy organizes in our small space, come back and check it out!
Thanks for this! I love how you organize the shoes. I have 4 boys and a home daycare and the shoes are sometimes overwhelming! I'm currently doing a series on Organized Living with Kids from A - Z :) Here's part 1: http://www.mamaslikeme.com/2013/01/organized-living-with-kids-from-z-part-1.html
ReplyDeletegreat ideas Nicole! So happy that your family is growing! 8)
ReplyDeleteI'm really impressed!! I keep trying to organize my craft/junk room and I just can't seem to throw anything away...I need shelves like yours!!
ReplyDeleteWow! I love the pull out pantry!
ReplyDeleteYou are amazing! I have the worst time with this. I adore your wall of shelves. I have room but no one to make things like shelves, drawers, although I must say a lot is due to my lack of putting things somewhere. Wish I could give you some space of ours. I did see a bunch of storage type ideas - 14 to be exact on a blog I visited but I can't remember where. If I do I'll tell you. How blessed you must feel to have all 5 of children born and raised in one home. Sorry this is so long :)
ReplyDeleteAwesome organization ideas! Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteYou guys are really organized! What great ideas for space!
ReplyDeleteWOW! You have a LOT of crafty things. Great job on it!! Makes me inspired!
ReplyDeleteThe pull out pantry is fantastic!!! Perfect for all those canned goods.
ReplyDeleteI think you need to organize my house! Mine isn't usually so bad, but even though we cleared out for Santa to arrive, I am having trouble getting it all in the tiny spaces of my son's room! That wall is surely something else!
ReplyDeleteI love the way you have it organized:) Great job!!
ReplyDeleteI absolutely love that wall of cubbies! I want one very badly for my craft room. It would really help with organization
ReplyDeleteI LOVE these tips! We live in a really small house as well and I'm always looking for new organizational tips.
ReplyDeleteI need you to come to my house! We really need to get organized and you look like a master. I love all the cube shelves, we need to get some of those and I'm going to be showing my husband the hanging garage shelves, what a great idea!
ReplyDeleteWhoa, whoa, whoa that wall is the coolest thing I have ever seen! I WISH I could have something like that!! You're awesome, I need you to come over haha!
ReplyDeleteYou sure do make amazing use of the space you have! Our house is little but we have fewer people in it so my apprach is usually to get rid of stuff :)
ReplyDeleteHere's a tip post I wrote: http://howbabbyformed.blogspot.com/2012/03/some-easy-organizing-tips-i-didnt.html
That first picture is amazing! There are only 3 of us, but we've recently moved into an apartment that is a fraction of a fraction of the size of our previous home. And there is only ONE closet. EEK! :) We're making do though.
ReplyDeleteCongrats on #5!
- Kristin
You've done a wonderful job using space. Shelves to ceiling wall-wall from Ikea has helped me immensely.
ReplyDeleteI love love the pull out pantry!
I am super jealous of the pull out pantry and already told my hubs all about what your hubs did :)
ReplyDeleteAs you know we turned half of our one car garage into a school room to keep all of our school stuff nice and organized! The link for it is here:
http://homeschoolingmamaoftwo.blogspot.com/2012/12/our-new-homeschooling-room.html
Natasha
Wow, that's a lot of cubies! But it looks great! I really like to pull out shelf in the pantry too!
ReplyDeleteOh my gosh, Nicole!! I just go through my kids stuff and get rid of things they don't play with or need and I keep our homeschool stuff to what we are doing that year. It helps that I only homeschool 1 grade~ I know you have more. Your organization is great!
ReplyDeleteTiffany
holy moly that's a massive bookshelf system!
ReplyDeleteWhoa, I wish I could be that organized! That's awesome! :)
ReplyDeleteThat's one big book case/toy organizer. I love it. I would love to turn one of our walls into a ceiling to floor book shelves.
ReplyDeleteLove the pull out pantry too!
Wow! I am impressed!!
ReplyDeletethanks for share.
ReplyDeleteKudos to you for finding ways to use the space you have. Creative
ReplyDeleteOh wow, I need some tips from you! That wall is amazing!
ReplyDeleteGreat organization ideas! I am always trying to organize our homeshool books.
ReplyDeleteI can relate! We are a family of seven living in a small, 3 bedroom townhouse (with no garage). Somehow we make it work. It's more crowded that we might like, but it forces us to analyze what we bring into our home and keep!
ReplyDelete