No excuses. Time to put your toys away! What, you don't know where they go? Impossible, there's a picture of them tied right on the bin! Now get to it and make Momma proud.
Doesn't always happen as smoothly as you'd like, but I must say that having the photo tags on our toy bins GREATLY improves the speed and frequency of clean up time. And they are quick and fun to make.
It's fun to get the kids involved too. Ask them to pick out their favorite item in the bin and use that for the photo. They can help pose it the way they want. Then take your photos (as close-up as possible), stamp or write out the labels, add a decorative strip of paper if you want and attach it all on a tag. Given that this project will be used, all the time, by kids, I thought lamination would be a good route to go (thanks to friends for letting me borrow for your machine!)
Also, I made these tags double sided because I knew it would drive me nuts to turn over the tags all the time. That extra investment in time was well worth it.
And here they are, after pick up time : ) Now, this storage system isn't meant to be all pretty, decorative, stick-one-cute-toy-in-a-slot-so-it-looks-nice-and-designer-like. Nope. It's a hard core, heavy-duty storage system that uses every inch of space available.
The unit is your typical Ikea Expedit, two 4x4s next to each other. The smaller green bins are Land of Nod's I Think I Canvas bins (super strong and indestructible) and the larger white bins are from Target (not as indestructible, but great use of space). I like having a mix of 1)small bin, 2)large bin, and 3) no bin. Helps balance it out.
We've had this for about a year and a half and it's worked well. Having categories that will grow with your kids is smart so you don't have to redo tags. A side benefit is that it made clean up easier for visiting moms and friends if they wanted to do so. All in all, it's been a wise investment in time. And hey, when they're done with toys (sniff) I will probably cut the tags off and stick them in a little memory book!
Linking up with the Sunday Showcase Party:
This is soo great! I really need to try this! Do you make house calls?? =)
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