Organizing Toys at Krista’s

I have been helping my friend Krista organize and redecorate her upstairs. It is the media room/ play area for her family. She wanted to make the space brighter, more kid oriented, and have a nautical theme. We worked on organizing the toys one day last week, I then made the toy labels/ tags at home, and then we put the labels on the bins today. She had purchased an adorable toy storage unit that holds canvas cubes. We sorted the toys into the canvas cubes. I then took photos of the toys in each bin. I made a label for each bin with a photo on it so that her little boys would know what was in each bin, since they are yet too young to read.

These units are becoming quite popular for storing toys. Pottery barn sells them, as well as IKEA, and Target. They come in a variety of configurations and you can find the canvas bins in almost any color you want! Target has an entire aisle devoted to these storage units and bins. They look very similar to the IKEA version. Krista’s is a high end version of this toy storage method. She selected a great piece of furniture for her family’s newly decorated space! It is sure to last for years and years to come.

Here is toy storage unit at Krista’s house. The nautical decor looks super cute I have to say! She and I worked as a team to get the décor for the room. Two minds are better than one!

Here are side by side photos of the before and after of the space. She even had the walls repainted to make it brighter:

The room looks like a completely different space with the walls being repainted and some new furniture for the kids and their toys. I will share before and after photos of the entire project soon. I think the nautical theme for this space is very fun, youthful, and has a happy feeling in general.

Here is one of the 16 labels I made and we attached to each of the toy bins today.

Here is how I made the labels for these bins. It is quite easy and it makes keeping toys organized long-term much easier.

Step 1: I took photos of the toys in each bin. Here are some examples of the photos I took to make the labels:

Step 2: I then took the photos and uploaded them into a word document. I added the words under each photo to make it easy for adults to read what was held in each bin, in addition to the photos.

Step 3: After each photo was added to the word document I then printed the document on cardstock paper and cut each one into a label size.

Step 4: I then laminated all of the labels. They are better protected and will last longer since they are coated in plastic.

Step 5: Once they were all laminated I then used my large, old school, papercutter to cut the labels precisely.

Step 6: Once they were laminated and cut I took them Krista’s and we punched holes in the top of each label and attached them to the bins with twine. I have done these labels in our own playroom and I attached them with decorative ribbon. We used twine at Krista’s as it went with the nautical theme.

The end result was a cute storage area with the toys organized in bins by category. We stored large toys in another space out of view. I will share that in another posting as well. The transformed room is adorable! It has been a fun project.