Toy Categorisers - I need your help!

[Beccarollover]

We are moving on Friday to our new [bigger - yay] house.

At the moment DD's toys are a DISGRACE - in the new house there is a conservatory off the kitchen running along side the house - this will become kids living area and toy storage so I want to have a great system for keeping them all organised.

Where do I start?
What do I do?
What are the categories?
What boxes/things do I need?

Help me - coddy are you about!? Your good at this

sorry not cod, sure she'll be along. However, in our house, working left to right:

• books (non-activity) - in bookcase
• soft toys - in big wicker basket [all rest in nice big sturdy plastic drawers/crates on wheels, from Muji - IKEA do similar]
• puzzles & games (eg snakes & ladders, chase-the-tail)
• trains
• cars and other road vehicles (only separate from trains because of volume, shouldn't be a problem w/ a dd)
• construction toys (other than Lego) & marble run; bricks
• duplo/Lego
• RL play sets (tea, doctors)
• non-soft toy animals (ie miniature farm/sea animal sets)
• misc plastic tat from crackers & party bags (their absolute fave)
• paper, crayons, colouring in books, sticker books, other activity books
• dollies, doll accessories & dolls hse
• musical stuff (xylophone, rainmaker)
• dressing up

Thanks Binkie! I have made a list of all of your categories

I have a DS too - just 10mths old at the moment but will soon have plenty of toys to categorise!!

Do you combine siblings toys? Are they all kept together?

Yes - we do keep all together now (they're 5 (ds) and 3 and a half (dd)) - and they take sharing for granted. But when she was little risk of choking was the obvious decider, so poor ds didn't get to play much with his mini toy animals.

Joint play toys (tea set, trains, duplo, play money etc.) always go at the front so that they're naturally first to be got out.

Make sure you get loads of boxes Becca: don't pack them carefully and full. That way everyone can clear up quickly just throw the appropriate things in the appropriate box.

A small box/crate is also good for floppy picture books that fall off a bookshelf and cause chaos.

I can't remember how old your children are ... but I have two boys fairly close in age, and like Binkie they have all shared toys: all stored in together.