Pantry Organization

Last year, before school started I cleaned out and organized my pantry. You can see the entire post here.  It worked, but I'm not going to lie, the bins got messy.  It was great if they were filled and my kids stayed out of them, but that doesn't work for us. 

I always say that I want an organized home, but I have to find ways to organize that also works for young kids.  I needed a solution, and I am really happy with the new set up!

I started by cleaning out the inside of the pantry.  I just decluttered, and also added a few more containers.  I made the switch and put the cereal in clear containers.  After that was complete I added the door shoe hanger.  I have mentioned so many times, I have a love/hate relationship with this way of organizing, but it works, really well, especially for kids. 

 I love command hooks for hanging brooms.  I also have Matthew's lunchbox hanging as well.  I use these wall mounts to keep foil, parchment paper, and straws in one place.

The door organization is my favorite!  The shoe organizer works really well, and is super easy for the kids to keep neat and organized as well.

These water bottles will not fit standing up in ANY of my cabinets. I Placed them in the top row of the organizer and they fit perfectly.

 I put all of the snacky food items on the bottom rows, in the kids reach. 

I also labeled each pocket.  This may be going overboard, but Matthew can read now, so it makes it nice for him, also when a pocket becomes empty it will be easy for me to see what needs replaced.

I also have 2 pockets with snack items that the kids only get as a reward, or a bribe....yea I said it.  They are more sweet treats like m&ms Dum Dums, fruit snacks....

I finally made the decision to put our cereal in storage containers and get rid of the boxes.  It makes the pantry look so much cleaner.  This works for us because we almost always buy/eat the same cereal all the time.

The main part of the pantry hasn't really changed.  I keep paper products on the top shelf, canned good/pastas and other items on the remaining shelves.  On the floor I still have my drawer organizers (now just keeping extra bags of snacks) 

 As you can see, this really only took me an afternoon to do, I spend maybe $30.00 total and I think it looks pretty good! 

Linking up with  Inspire Me Please Weekend Blog Hop, Show and Tell Friday, Project Inspired, Anything Goes

Kid's Work Space

My kids have a big craft area in their playroom but I also wanted to create a space in our dining room to store craft and school supplies.  Usually while in the kitchen making dinner, the kids are coloring/ doing school pages.  I also didn't want to turn yet another room in our home into a kid zone.

So, I took a small portion of our dining room hutch and dedicated this space to kids craft supplies.  I used large pencil boxes (one for Matthew, one for Lilly) to hold markers, colored pencils, scissors, pencils, glue.  I also have a pencil box with just crayons.  The larger bin is just for Mommy.  The kids know they aren't allowed to use those items unless I get them out.  They include watercolors, glitter, paint brushes, stickers.

On the lower shelf I have 2 Melissa and Doug Stamp Sets, washable paints, and a binder with some school printables. 

The kids can easily pull out the supplies they need, but at the same time, it is all easily tucked away and you barely notice it when put back.

I love having a space from them to work where we can spread out to create crafts, work on school work together, and it be close for me to multi-task and prepare a meal/put away dishes. 

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Confession : My Camera LIES!

SO here's the thing, I love taking photos.  I love using them in blog posts, but my camera lies.  The photos I take are of what I want people to see.  Real Life = A mess, most of the time.  Before I take photos of a project, child or activity, I take a look around, make sure there isn't a mess, whether it be on my living room floors, or kids faces.  

 Today  I am here to prove my point: 

{This is my dining room at 2pm, hours after lunch, and yep that is still all the lunch dishes on the table, capped off with a sippy cup and crumbs on the floor}

{One of the reasons the dishes are on the dining room table, because this is my kitchen sink.  #HomemakerFail}

{I do love organization and planning on paper, but this month, it hasn't gone too well.  There is NOTHING filled on for 3 weeks out of the month....and no we haven't done nothing all month long, maybe next month.}

{Above that would be my coat closet, the left photo, that would be today, and the right was just weeks ago when I did a blog post update with my new changes....HA}

 

{This was my "get through" pile during nap time, and 2 hours later still sitting there.... untouched.}

Lastly, I have stepped on more damn baby puffs today than I'd like to admit, it actually makes me contemplate getting a dog, just to go around cleaning up the food left on the floor....so I don't have to....

Life isn't perfect, my house is Definitely NOT perfect, my kids aren't perfect, and most of all I am not perfect.  Not. Even. Close.

The only perfect thing in my life, my husband ;)

Kid Bedroom Organization

Having 2 children share a room, no matter how big the room, or how young the kids, can get messy. Really any kid room is a very tricky thing to organize. You want the room to be clean and neat, but also functional for the child, it is their room after all. Here are some things I do to make my kids rooms, organized, but also kid friendly.

I say you can never have enough bins or containers.  I love these / these from JJ Cole Collections, and these from Target.  Everything has a "home" and even my 4 and 6 year old know where everything belongs.

 

I know this isn't an option for everyone, but if you have another room for playing, I would consider doing that.  Of course I have some space to play, and the kids are allowed to play in their rooms as they please, but I do limit the amount of toys upstairs.

 

These systems really work for us.  I still need to finish the file bins (labeling them and tabbing each grade) and will share more detail about them later.   Also the under the bed storage bins are great for anything really.  I use them for keepsakes, but they can be used for clothing, blankets....the list goes on.  I actually have some of these under my bed, one for wrapping paper/gift products the other for Christmas tags/tissue paper/ribbon.

For me what works is more bins.  Lillian's clothes we hand down to a niece, so as soon as I realize they are to small I throw them in the bin that is in the bottom of there closet, and once the bin is full I pack up the clothes for my sister-in-law.  Matthew's clothes we are saving for JD so once his bin is full we pack them up for our attic.  JD's clothes automatically get packed up for my sister-in-law also.  Clothes can get really overwhelming if they start piling up!

Be sure to check out my Youtube channel for a video walking you though my kids rooms in more detail. 

Also Check out these post for more info on their rooms!  

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The Nursery

We have a three bedroom home, so we knew going into this pregnancy that room sharing would happen.  Here is how we have set up a nursery along with our 5 year olds room. 


First is the crib area.  We didn't change much of the decor, we kept with the train theme, and same colors, so there wasn't much work to do.

 This is the view walking into the room.  Hidden behind the crib is a 6 drawer dresser. 

My 5 year old sleeps on the top bunk, and the bottom is unused for now, but will be perfect in a few years!

 This unit houses all of our books that belong upstairs.  It is a much cleaner looking way to store them, and so much easier for the kids to help clean up.  Under the bottom bunk is also a storage tub for each child.  It keeps things like the baptism gowns, scrapbooks, baby book.  All the special stuff.

 Play area, and a toy box.  Right now the toy box is practically empty.  We don't keep a lot of toys in the kids rooms.

 Prints from Etsy. 

 And the big project which was the closet.  We completed it back in the fall and I still LOVE it.  You can read more about it HERE.

 We decided to go without the changing table this time around.  We were going to put a pad on the dresser, but for now we are going to try to do without it.  Here is an area with all the diapering needs.

 Matthew has 3 drawers in the dresser, and the baby has the other 3.  Here is how they are organized.  The top is newborn outfits, socks, hats and misc.  items.

 The second drawer is 0-3 month white onsies and 0-3 month sleepers.

 And the bottom is 0-3 month regular onsies, and 0-3 month pants.  The rest in in the closet.  I already have 3-6 months sorted out and in a bin under the bottom bunk, ready to put in drawers when needed.

 I am very happy with how the room turned out, and am hoping the transition is an easy one for my 5 year old. 
 

Closet Update

I knew once getting pregnant that I wanted to add more storage options in the kids closet. Since one kid bedroom is bigger than the other, we knew before the sex was determined that the bigger bedroom would have the baby and sibling that matched genders. So we were able to redo the closet before we found out the sex, then added the bins once knowing pink or blue. I am so happy with how it turned out.

 I don't have before pics, but we tore out everything and started with a completely empty space.

Here is the finished product.

The top will have all of Joshua's clothing.  Also above is a shelf (that is hard to reach) that has blankets and extra sheets.

All the bins are JJ Cole Collection found online at babiesrus.com 

The bottom hanging sections are for Matthew.  I love that he can now reach his own clothing, because he dresses himself, but still needed my help to get the clothes down.  Under the clothes on this side is a hamper. 

The other side has more clothes, and a bin that I put clothes that are too small in.  Once I realize something is too small, I wash it, then when putting clothes away it goes into the bin.  Once the bin is full I label it and it gets sent to the attic. 

The small bins have receiving blankets, baby shoes, toys, and anything else that I have started stocking up on.  Right now there are also bottles, monitors and toys stored as well, but those things will find new homes closer to baby's arrival.

It is pretty cool that I started with the drawing below, and my wonderful husband made it into exactly what I wanted!