Please help me organise the playroom

[HappyAsEyeAm]

Right. I desperately need to sort out our playroom. I have two DSs - 6yo and nearly 2yo. They each play with very different things. DS1's things are numerous; DS2's things are large. All of the toys and books and art and craft things and whatbot are spreading all over the house, which was 100% not the point of buying a house four years ago with a designated playroom.

The playroom is an awkward shape, as there are lots of windows and lots of radiators, two doors and two sofas in there, so not much practical wall space for storage. This is what I have. Four each of these:

GLTC northcote base bit

GLTC northcote top bit

I also have a double bookcase in the dining room with the DS' books and art and craft and playdoh stuff on it. DS1 also has two bookcases (4 foot high or so) in his bedroom.

How can I organise where to put it all? We have masses of stuff. This is what we have:

big plastic stuff for DS2 - pushcair, garage, ride on, truck, and lots more
wooden kitchen and all the food and teaset that goes with that
happyland - quite a lot of it
lots of smaller noisy and light up toys
bag of puppets
bag of musical instruments
ikea cardboard market stall, till, etc (basically a mock up shop)
millions of books - flap books, noisy books and big board books for Ds2; every book DS1 has ever owned as he adores books
enormous amount of wooden train track and destinations, signals, stations, bridges etc
tubs of trains, vehicles, schleich animals, barn
masses of big playmobil stuff like swimming pool, school, farm, coach, campervan, pirate ship, pet clinic; tubs of people and bits
huge amount of art and craft stuff - loads of it
desk
roleplay stuff like doctors set, took set, builders case etc
board games, ker plunk style game, pop up pirate, elefun etc
playdoh sets, cutters, tubs etc
loads of soft toys (they are used in every imaginative game)
vtech stuff like childrens tablet and camera

The only things we don't have (yet!) are dress up stuff as DS1 isn't interested. Thank god.

I am losing the plot. I need it to be less chaotic but I don't know where to start. There is stuff all over the floor and piled high and its getting on top of me.

[HappyAsEyeAm]

sorry for the mammoth post.

I completely forgot about the jigsaws, peg boards, magnetic letters and numbers and big magnetic board, easel, megablocks, proper lego which is in DS1's bedroom and is staying there for now) and shape sorters.

I need an extension.

[amistillsexy]

Out-of-house storage is the way to go!

If the amount of stuff is overwhelming to you, it will be for the DSs, too, and I bet they only play with 20% of what's there, at the most.

Get some massive plastic boxes from IKEA, and start filling them.

I've tried mixing stuff up, and filling according to theme, and the DSs like themes better (ie all the dinosaur stuff in one box, knights and castles in another, etc), but you'll find your own way.

Put 80% of their toys in the huge boxes and store in a shed, garage, or other storage area, then rearrange the playroom with the remaining 20% of stuff.

Every school holiday, begin the hols by emptying the playroom into a couple of big boxes, taking them to storage and swapping them for a couple of different boxes. The DSs will love the novelty of 'new' toys, and play beautifully together for about ten minutes as they rediscover all their old faves, whilst you revel in the glory of your show-room tidy playroom

It's a winner all round!

[amistillsexy]

Yup, jigsaws, craft stuff, Hama beads, everything goes in and out of the boxes. Broken or used up stuff can be thrown away on 'change-over day', which keeps down the amount of tat you keep!

[talktotheface]

Could you get rid of one of the sofas to free up wall space for a big floor to ceiling storage unit? (Ikea have loads). The as suggested above rotate boxes of stuff top to bottom every now and again..

[HappyAsEyeAm]

ami yes, you're right of course. Less stuff has to be he way forward. DS1 has the memory of an elephant though. He might not play with lotsof things but he certainly notices when they're gone, adn of course instantly wants to play with that specific thing.

talkto I can't get rid of a sofa, unfortunately. The playroom is the family room, and that's where we all sit and where anyone who visits us comes to sit with us too. There is a 3 seater sofa and a 2 seater sofa, and enormous radiators behind each of them, so I couldn't put storage against those walls anyway.

[amistillsexy]

My DSs were a bit shocked when I first did it, Happy, but they soon get used to the idea, when they see that their toys haven't gone for good, and they can play with what's left much more easily.
If they have a real craving for something, I'll go and get it out when it's not a 'storage day', if they've seen something on TV and suddenly want to play it, for instance, but usually, they enjoy planning what's going to be the next theme (castles are next- we're currently on cowboys).